Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-591. I would like to first congratulate the hard-working member for Chatham-Kent—Essex for introducing this terrific bill. I hope that all parties will support the bill to amend the Canada Pension Plan and the Old Age Security Act to deny CPP survivor benefits and the OAS allowance to anyone convicted of murdering a spouse, common law partner, or parent.

As the member for Chatham-Kent—Essex has pointed out, no one wants to see criminals rewarded for their crimes. Certainly no one who pays taxes or who personally contributes to an insurance plan wants to see murderers receive a benefit for killing someone. Our government always puts victims first and has a strong record of bringing back fairness to the criminal justice system. I agree, and the government agrees with the member's bill, and I will be pleased to support the bill when it comes up for a vote. We will be making some technical amendments at committee. However, we believe that the crux of the bill meets the challenge.

I hope we will work with the opposition to see the bill pass quickly so that the human resources committee can study it this fall. As we have heard, there is all-party support for this legislation.

Let me describe the benefits we are talking about. When a contributor to the Canada pension plan dies, his or her surviving spouse, common law partner, and dependent children are entitled to certain benefits. Specifically, these benefits are the monthly survivor's pension plan paid to the spouse or common law partner, the monthly surviving child benefit for dependent children up to the age of 25, if they are full-time students, and a lump sum death benefit usually paid to the contributor's estate.

For a spouse, common law partner, or child to be eligible for CPP survivor benefits, the deceased contributor must have made significant contributions to the Canada pension plan. In the case of old age security, the surviving spouse or common law partner is entitled to the allowance for the survivor if the survivor is aged 60 to 64, has a low income, and has not started living with another partner.

The Department of Employment and Social Development already has administrative procedures, based on common law principles, that prohibit a spouse, common law partner, or child from receiving survivor benefits if the department is informed that the person has been convicted of the murder of an individual and is the survivor and consequently the primary beneficiary. The problem is that there is no provision in the law to prevent these provisions from actually being paid. What C-591 would do is give clear authority, raise the visibility, and increase transparency to ensure that no one could benefit financially from murdering a spouse.

The member for Chatham-Kent—Essex will be requesting that the Minister of Employment and Social Development write to the provinces and territories to raise awareness of this bill and new legislation so that no one convicted of murder would be benefiting from the crime. We believe that the member's approach is the right approach, and we will be pleased to support it.

Thankfully, death at the hands of family members is not all that common in Canada, and the convicted murderers are not always eligible for these benefits anyway. However, over the last decade, an average of 48 people a year have been charged with spousal murder. Most of these were young men charged with killing their wives or female partners.

Each year between 2003 to 2012, an average of 21 individuals in all age categories were accused of killing a parent or step-parent. Among them were approximately five or six persons accused who were between the ages of 18 and 25. Only three of the accused were under the age of 18. Age 25 is the upper limit for eligibility for a child survivor benefit under the Canada pension plan.

That is why it is so important that Parliament pass the bill, because if even one person can benefit financially from killing a spouse, this is one too many.

The member is correct to proceed carefully with C-591, because it must be both fair to victims and fair to due process. First, this legislation would apply only to people who have been convicted of murder rather than to those who have been charged with murder. It is a basic principle of common law that a person accused of a crime is considered innocent until proven guilty. If the minister learns of a conviction, however, the individual would not only be disqualified from receiving survivor benefits but would also be required to pay back any survivor benefits he or she might already have received. This legislation would be retroactive.

If, however, such individuals eventually had their convictions reversed on appeal, their benefits would then, of course, be reinstated. This is the right approach, the fair approach, and the reasonable approach.

This law would not apply to minor children who have murdered a parent. The surviving child benefit is received not by the child but by that child's parent or guardian on the child's behalf to help cover the costs of caring for that child. We do not want to demand repayment of those children's benefits from a grieving widow whose child has been convicted of murdering her spouse.

What if the murderer was between the ages of 18 and 25 and a full-time student who would normally be eligible for the child benefit following the death of his or her parent? In such a case, the individual would be treated as an adult and would be rendered ineligible for these payments.

I would like to point out that this law would not prevent CPP death benefits from going to the estate of the murdered person. However, it would prevent the death benefit from going directly to the spouse or adult child convicted of the murder.

The government expects that victims organizations and family members would notify Employment and Social Development Canada in the event of these kinds of cases to help ensure that murderers would not benefit from their crimes. To help facilitate this, the government would engage directly with victims advocacy groups and stakeholder groups so that they could easily notify the department when someone was convicted of the murder of someone whose death could otherwise entitle them to a CPP or OAS benefit. In fact, the bill would increase the visibility of the issue, and we expect that it would increase notifications from individuals and groups.

I would like to commend the member for Chatham-Kent—Essex for introducing this bill and for all the hard work he continues to do in representing victims across Canada. This proposed legislation would restore fairness to victims and their families. Therefore, I highly encourage my fellow members to join with us, support this bill, and support it in passing quickly.

Scott Armstrong

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