Public Safety committee  Yes. As you know, there are tremendous fiscal restraints, and the crunch...and unless you live in various parts of the U.S.A., you cannot appreciate how serious it is. You just need to read Paul Krugman's articles in the New York Times to get a sense of how serious the matter is.

Public Safety committee  But please realize that there's no evidence out there indicating that electronic monitoring reduces criminal behaviour. Of course, who's on electronic monitoring? It's low-risk offenders.

Public Safety committee  I'm just repeating myself. Try it with high-risk offenders who need treatment in the community. That is a worthwhile goal to pursue and evaluate. Then you have to have a system that has the applicable wherewithal to stand by and deal with the issues that come when there's a serious mistake.

Public Safety committee  There are none that I know of. There could be a study coming up some time down the road that indicates that, but it would be an outlier. There's just an overwhelming amount of data so far indicating that these are the results, and they're not likely to be overturned.

Public Safety committee  That's the sample size.

Public Safety committee  Any evidence there would be strictly anecdotal. There is probably a subset of any offender group that tries to think of ways to fool with the system.

Public Safety committee  Whether it's an electronic monitoring program, another kind of sanction program, or drug testing, or whether it is a treatment program or a psychological intervention, they are not effective with low-risk offenders. Why? Because low-risk offenders have, relatively, a very small chance of committing crimes in the future.

Public Safety committee  Quite possibly, but it's not my area of expertise—far from it. In the U.S., there is ICE, the organization that takes the kinds of individuals you're describing—individuals who have tried to get into the country several times, who have committed a serious crime—and immediately puts them in prison.

Public Safety committee  Well, if they committed a very serious crime, you might—

Public Safety committee  Yes, precisely.

Public Safety committee  Quite possibly, yes.

Public Safety committee  Is this the one that Dr. Bonta referred to?

Public Safety committee  I have just taken a look at the paper trail for that program. It was embarrassing as a Canadian citizen to see the mark-up in that program from a technical standpoint and other regards. I thought we had surely developed electronic monitoring long enough to put a program in place that worked more effectively than that, just from a technical standpoint.

Public Safety committee  Colleagues alluded to it. Yes, it was an enormous cost.

Public Safety committee  Electronic monitoring is cheaper than incarceration—