Justice committee  The bill would preserve the opportunity for the inmate to apply for parole after serving 25 years. The 25-year period would start at the date of their arrest. So, yes, they would have opportunities to make an application to the parole board, and the parole board would receive it with all the information and apply all the standards that they use to determine if that person should be released into the community and on what conditions.

Justice committee  I'll respond to both aspects, but with respect to your question regarding the prison guards, if the committee is intending to hear from officials at the Correctional Service, they would be best positioned to respond to that question. If you're not, we can undertake to get that information and provide it to the committee.

Justice committee  On your other point with respect to the notice that the judge reads out in section 745.01, that is a lot for a victim to absorb. As some of the committee members may recall, those amendments were included in a bill in 1999 that made a lot of victim-related amendments. Among those, the best route at the time to deal with some of the concerns about faint hope was to make sure that although it does seem a very formal way to provide the notice, there was at least some way for the record to indicate and for the victim to be able to access the information that it would be possible for the offender to bring the application after 15 years.

Justice committee  Correct.

Justice committee  That's correct.

Justice committee  That's correct.

Justice committee  They may apply every two years now.

Justice committee  Year 15, if not successful, year 20....

Justice committee  Maybe we misunderstood the question. We understood the question to be the costs for Corrections of the additional time for offenders who would otherwise perhaps be eligible for early parole and be supervised in the community rather than being detained in custody.

Justice committee  Our colleagues at the Correctional Service of Canada use a variety of strategies similar to what you've described, looking at past experience, to forecast the impact. However, as my colleague indicated in this case, there will not be any impact for the next 15 years. In terms of the incarceration costs, again, if colleagues from Correctional Services are appearing, they would be better placed than we are to indicate how they deal with that.

Justice committee  We don't have a copy.

Justice committee  It would be preferable if we saw the wording of the amendment to comment on it.

Justice committee  In response to Mr. Comartin's question, yes, it will apply to all of those persons. The extension of the time period would apply to anybody who's currently serving a sentence, or who has committed an offence but hasn't yet been charged, or who has been charged and hasn't yet been tried.

Justice committee  Yes.

Justice committee  The numbers would be adjusted accordingly.