Ford: Our country should not be built on vengeance and revenge

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They were young, fit and healthy; The pride of a small Saskatchewan town of about 6,000 residents. The Humboldt Broncos hockey team was on a bus taking them to a playoff game. They never did it.

On a part of the rural highway, six years ago on an April day, the same bus and a semi-trailer truck crashed. 16 of the 29 people on the bus were killed and 13 were seriously injured. The accident was, in a word, terrible.

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Next month, a deportation hearing will be held for the semi-trailer driver, who was distracted by the driver and failed to notice a large stop sign at that intersection. This is not only a test of Canadian law, but also a litmus test for Canadians.

Is Canada's criminal justice system punitive or rehabilitative? If the answer is the latter, the driver should be allowed to stay in this country.

Jaskirat Singh Sidhu made a terrible and fatal mistake. A terrible mistake. He was not drunk, stoned or otherwise impaired. He pleaded guilty to dangerous driving and did not try to avoid an eight-year prison sentence. He was released on parole last year.

But he faces a different punishment—not for what he did, but for who he is.

Sidhu is not a Canadian citizen. As a permanent resident, but not yet a citizen, he could be deported to his native India. In less dire circumstances, he is the immigrant Canada needs – a young man willing to work hard and make a home for himself in Canada. It is clear that he will never be given a chance.

The judge denied the request to allow him to stay. The Canada Border Services Agency recommended that he be deported.

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Many Canadians would probably consider him deserving of such an additional punishment that he deserves to be banned from this country. Look at how many families have been robbed of their children. I can still hear the anger; and listen to the understandable need for some form of punishment if not revenge. Nothing will bring those guys back. Nothing can ease the pain of these families.

But the truth is, if every criminal in Canada acted like Sidhu, our jails wouldn't be full of people who care so little about others; People who are too drunk or stoned or psychotic to realize what they are doing when they commit a criminal offence. Sidhu accepted his sentence and showed some remorse. Nothing he does should endanger the life or safety of anyone if that person remains in Canada.

He had no previous criminal record before the accident. To anyone who believes that justice favors rehabilitation over punishment, Sidhu is shown on posters as an example of a guilty plea.

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This is not just one person's opinion, but the accepted view of this country as written in the law. We must remember that Canada has abolished the death penalty because we are not soft on crime, but an enlightened country does not kill for revenge. Our country should not be built on revenge and revenge.

A simple search for sentencing a criminal states: “The sentencing process involves taking into account the following principles in every decision: condemnation, deterrence, social isolation of criminals, rehabilitation of criminals, recognition of harm and reparation. did.”

The Government of Canada's website states: “Canada's criminal justice system plays an important role in ensuring that Canada is a just and law-abiding society with an accessible, efficient and fair justice system. It is also a complex system involving many players, each with different responsibilities and roles, who must integrate and work in tandem with each other.”

Canadians who believe in scriptural “an eye for an eye” as some form of righteous justice should read more than Exodus or Leviticus.

There is a simple reason for not seeking punishment: it makes us better than bullies. It makes our civil society hard and rough.

Worst of all, it makes our lives hard, along with our heads and hearts.

Catherine Ford is a regular columnist.

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