Where an offender has pleaded guilty in reliance on current sentencing practices, fairness precludes a court on resentencing following a Crown appeal from departing upward from those practices, even if the court considers them inadequate relative to the statutory maximum. The sentence discount for a guilty plea should not increase based on systemic court delays. A plea of guilty to a representative count does not aggravate the offence but removes the mitigating factor of an isolated offence and enables the court to consider the full context of the represented conduct. The Court left open whether current sentencing practices for sexual penetration of a child under 10 should be increased to better reflect the 25-year maximum.
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