It has been the privilege of my life to serve as Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada. I want to thank Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trusting me with this responsibility for the last four years.

I want to congratulate Arif Virani on his appointment as my successor. I also want to congratulate Gary Anandasangaree on being named Minister of Crown Indigenous Relations. I am pleased to see both of my former Parliamentary Secretaries appointed to Cabinet. They will both be excellent Ministers and I wish them nothing but success in their new roles.

I am proud of what we accomplished at Justice in my time as Minister. Significant law reforms, important advances on Reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, building a judiciary that reflects the country it serves. And accomplishing these things against a backdrop of an extraordinary time in our country’s and the world’s history.

There were 13 bills passed under my watch. There are four I want to highlight: C-4, C-5, C-15, C-28. To me these numbers represent progress. We banned so-called conversion therapy. We finally began to eliminate some mandatory minimum penalties. We created a process for implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. We ensured that being drunk was no defense for sexually assaulting someone.

Confidence in our justice system is central to the rule-of-law. One way of building that confidence is by reaching out to communities who feel alienated from our justice system: Indigenous people, black and racialized communities. This was an important priority for me. The dialogue we had made my work better and improved our legislation. I am grateful for the relationships we developed over my time as Minister.  

Shortly after I was appointed, one of the first files to cross my desk concerned a possible wrongful conviction. It was the first of many such files in my time as Minister. Over the years, it became clear to me that we needed a new process to deal with possible wrongful convictions. Bill C-40, “David and Joyce Milgaard’s Law” is a critical piece in building the public confidence in our justice system I mentioned above. It will create an independent Miscarriage of Justice Review Commission. I look forward to seeing this bill become law.

I am a proud Italian-Canadian. When I entered politics, I felt it was important for Canada to acknowledge and apologize for the internment of Italian-Canadians during the Second World War. It was all the more important given I was Minister of Justice. One of my predecessors gave legal sanction to the internment. I worked hard with my colleagues and the Italian community in Canada to make this a reality. I am grateful for the Prime Minister’s Apology. It was an important moment for our community.

Ministers get the attention, but they are carried on the shoulders of others. I want to thank my Ministerial staff, who helped me navigate this job with intelligence, dedication and no small amount of humour. Any successes that I had is thanks to them. I also want to thank the Public Servants at the Department of Justice who advised me without fear or favour. They are outstanding professionals.

When I was appointed, I promised myself I would live by the example set by my two most significant mentors; former Supreme Court Justice Peter Cory, for whom I clerked, and Rod MacDonald, the former Dean of McGill Law School, and President of the Law Commission of Canada.

Each embodied a deeply ethical approach to the law, and drummed into me the importance of equality as a central value of our justice system.  Both were absolutely committed to treating the people around them with respect, and giving those people the tools and freedom to grow and, once again, make their voices and ideas heard.

As I leave this role, I know I can say I did my best to live by the examples they set.