News Flash

Liberals pledge crime crackdown

A new Liberal government would pursue a tough, effective strategy to fight crime, while respecting the rights of Canadians, Liberal leader Stephane Dion said today in Streetsville.

Accused by the Tories of being soft on crime, Dion pledged to pour millions of dollars into hiring more police officers and Crown attorneys as well as a crackdown on Internet crime. He also promised to make it mandatory for organizations to notify people of breaches involving their personal information.

"We need to adopt a comprehensive and effective approach that deals with every aspect of fighting crime: preventing crime, catching criminals, convicting criminals through competent and quick administration, and rehabilitating criminals. That is what I would do as Prime Minister," he told an overflow crowd of mainly party faithful at Streetsville Kinsmen Hall.

The unveiling of the law-and-order platform was hosted by Mississauga-Erindale MP Omar Alghabra. He was joined by local Liberal MPs Navdeep Bains, Colleen Baumier, Ruby Dhalla and new Grit Garth Turner.

Alghabra hailed the proposed new measures.

"It's an ambitious agenda and vision based on logic, not fear mongering," he said.

Dion's promises include:

* More funds for provinces to hire more municipal police officers and Crown attorneys .

* An additional $200 million for the RCMP to hire 400 officers to fight gangs and gun activity, organized crime and drug trafficking.

* Reverse-onus bail hearings for people arrested on a gun crime.

* Strengthen laws to protect children from being lured by Internet-based predators.

* Acting on the recommendations of the Privacy Commissioner to update and toughen current legislation to deter and prevent identity theft.

"There were almost 8,000 reports of identity theft in the past year, resulting in losses greater than $16 million, and too often seniors whose lifetime of hard work and saving can vanish in an instant," said the Liberal leader.

Dion also said a Liberal government will establish a fund that would help at-risk communities cover the costs of security at their places of worship.

"(This was an initiative) that was started by the previous Liberal government, but abandoned by the Conservatives," he said.

Judicial appointments, said Dion, are being left unfilled as Stephen Harper's government try to produce candidates who share its social conservative values.

"Tories insist on the ideology litmus test. As a result, the backlog of criminal cases continues to grow and criminals are not being convicted because their cases can't be tried fast enough," he said.

"For the safety of our communities, this must stop. I call on the Conservative government to let the courts do their job, and start appointing highly-qualified judges free from political interference."