Justice committee  I completely agree. I'd take up that particular point. It sends a clear message that this is how things are supposed to be done. Yes, in some ways this is involving codification of what's been established in case law, but I do think that having it written in law and having something to hold on to has some power to set intention as well as tone.

Justice committee  I think I'm mostly specifically referring to Antic and the reiteration of the ladder approach, recognizing the starting place is the presumption of innocence, as well as releasing unconditionally, reminding us that conditions are not to be imposed to punish somebody or to modify their behaviour and keeping in mind this is all happening when these are allegations.

Justice committee  Please go ahead first.

Justice committee  If you had asked me a couple of years ago, I'd have said I didn't think we had to start all over again. I really did believe that the law was fine, that it was just that everyone was messing up how it was being applied, except I've been studying this since 2005 and it keeps getting worse every year.

Justice committee  Whom do we educate? We educate everybody, Crowns especially. The Crowns are major drivers of the bail process. If most people are released on a consent release, it really is a great deal of control that the Crown has. The Crown decides what those conditions of release are going to be, because as has been explained, an accused person will agree to almost anything to get out.

Justice committee  Absolutely.

Justice committee  For example, it not uncommon to hear a curfew condition being placed on someone when the offence happened at noon, or to being told, “You shoplifted from one Shoppers Drug Mart. You're now not to enter any Shoppers Drug Mart in the entire province”, or that you can't enter the greater Toronto area.

Justice committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair and fellow committee members, for inviting me to speak to you today about the bail provisions as well as about shifting the process for administration of justice offences. As we've heard from other people before, but I will reiterate, since 2005 in this country, we have had more people in pretrial detention than in sentenced custody in our provincial and territorial institutions.