Bill C-83 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act and another Act

This enactment amends the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to, among other things,
(a) eliminate the use of administrative segregation and disciplinary segregation;
(b) authorize the Commissioner to designate a penitentiary or an area in a penitentiary as a structured intervention unit for the confinement of inmates who cannot be maintained in the mainstream inmate population for security or other reasons;
(c) provide less invasive alternatives to physical body cavity searches;
(d) affirm that the Correctional Service of Canada has the obligation to support the autonomy and clinical independence of registered health care professionals;
(e) provide that the Correctional Service of Canada has the obligation to provide inmates with access to patient advocacy services;
(f) provide that the Correctional Service of Canada has an obligation to consider systemic and background factors unique to Indigenous offenders in all decision-making; and
(g) improve victims’ access to audio recordings of parole hearings.
This enactment also amends the English version of a provision of the Criminal Records Act.

Corrections and Conditional Release Act

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

Madam Speaker, people in administrative segregation suffer from hallucinations. They start seeing things that are not there and they are no longer able to distinguish between reality and fantasy.

Do you think that people in administrative segregation could reintegrate into society when they leave prison? These people are deeply affected. Will this benefit our society?

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I would remind the hon. member to address the Chair.

The hon. member for Rivière-des-Mille-Îles.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I slip up too sometimes. We can always do better.

It is true that when inmates spend too much time in segregation they can be disconnected from reality. There are steps to follow. Inmates are put in segregation for a reason, but they should not be cut off from the rest of the world. They have to have human interaction.

As I said earlier, the bill provides for inmates to be able to meet with health professionals, volunteers, chaplains, among others. Inmates in segregation have to be able to see other people and socialize. However, there are steps to be followed before returning them to the general population and before they can reintegrate into society. Being isolated all day is not normal and can lead to problems.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Madam Speaker, last week, the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness introduced Bill C-83, an act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act and another act. I rise in the House today to address some serious concerns that the Conservatives have with regard to Bill C-83.

This bill seeks to eliminate the use of administrative segregation in correctional facilities and replace it with structured intervention units; to use prescribed body scanners for inmates; to establish parameters for access to health care; and to formalize exceptions for indigenous offenders, women offenders and offenders with diagnosed mental health conditions. While this bill contains some reasonable measures that are worth considering in order to change and improve the overall prison program, we need to examine it closely to ensure we are making the best decisions and changes possible to the prison program.

In recent Supreme Court decisions, the legality of indefinite stays in solitary confinement has been challenged. However, the government is appealing both of those decisions. This legislation applies to transfers, and would allow the commissioner to assign a security classification to each penitentiary or to any area within a penitentiary. In a maximum-security penitentiary, nothing gets in or out without the strictest controls. Maximum security means maximum security. As I understand it, with this new legislation, a maximum-security classification could be assigned to any area of a medium- or minimum-security penitentiary. If that is not the case, we need some clarification. A maximum-security facility has an entire perimeter and security system that is designed to guarantee maximum security. If they were to change a section of a minimum- or medium-security penitentiary, would the security measures also be put into place?

This bill has one very good idea, and that is to use body scanners. However, it should be expanded to include anyone who enters the facility who is not an inmate or an employee. Body-scan searches would make it possible to control at least 95% of the substances that individuals bring into prisons because they show whether there is anything hidden on a person's body. It is no secret that all kinds of things are brought into prisons.

This legislation also proposes to eliminate administrative segregation in corrections facilities and replace it with a newly created structured intervention unit. Solitary confinement is a common and legitimate safety measure that many western countries take to protect guards from dangerous and volatile prisoners. The introduction of structured intervention units may pose a risk to prison guards, other inmates and the inmates in question for whom solitary confinement is used for their own safety.

Another problem with this bill is reflected in the spirit of the law. These are the worst criminals in Canada. They are murderers, rapists, etc., and they are in maximum-security prisons. The intent of these proposed changes is to create a structured intervention unit for these people. They would spend less time in cells and would be put together to interact. The prison environment is a unique environment. It is a closed environment. The officers who work there are at risk every day because they have to deal with the worst thugs and criminals in Canada. Prisoners want to control their environment as much as possible, like anyone else. This is difficult for our officers who work 24-7 to keep prisoners under control and keep the guards and the rest of the prisoners safe. Taking away disciplinary segregation would make prisons less safe and more dangerous for the guards as they would have to deal with the most volatile prisoners being out and about from their cells for four hours a day.

We cannot support Bill C-83 in its present form. There are some things that would work, such as installing scanning equipment; however, we believe that creating structured intervention units would not.

Additionally, it is concerning that the government has not been able to tell Canadians how much the implementation of these measures would cost. Correctional Service Canada has confirmed that it is not able to estimate how much the measures in this bill would cost Canadians. The government seems to believe it is acceptable to table uncosted legislation that would increase the comfort of the most violent prisoners at the expense of the taxpayer.

Let us look back at the McClintic case again. This murderer's transfer from a maximum-security prison to an indigenous healing lodge has had a lot of people concerned, upset and talking. This is someone who should be serving her sentence in a maximum-security prison. In a maximum-security prison, such an offender has her own cell. Those offenders eat, sleep and take classes if they so choose, and they can go back to their cells. They are protected because they are living in a maximum-security environment. However, for reasons still not understood, it was decided to send that person to a place with virtually no security. From what I understand, Bill C-83 would allow McClintic's room in the healing lodge to be designated a maximum-security room. Again, it appears as though it is the Liberal government's priority to put the rights and comforts of violent murderers and rapists ahead of the rights of victims.

If what I understand is true, then Bill C-83 would be dangerous to Canadians' safety. It does not care about what a maximum-security prison sentence means or what keeping Canadians safe means. Instead, it prioritizes the rights of Canada's most violent and dangerous criminals.

Instead of changing the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to make sure that killers like Terri-Lynne McClintic are kept behind bars, the bill defines and softens the law to make prison time easier for criminals.

I think Canadians know that the government is not serious about being tough on crime and it puts Canadians' safety at risk. If this keeps up, things are bound to get worse. The government should be taking rational measures that are consistent with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Prisoners have rights, of course, but it is all in the way things are done. The approach outlined in Bill C-83 is not in line with what the Conservatives consider to be an effective way to manage penitentiaries.

[Celina Caesar-Chavannes, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am going to repeat the same things that I have said in my other questions.

When we talk about removing administrative segregation and still having the capacity to separate individuals who pose a safety risk, we would separate them from the general population and put them into secure intervention units. Not only that, but we would also give the resources necessary for them to receive mental health services, rehabilitative programming and other interventions so that we can decrease the likelihood that they will continue to pose a safety risk not only to the staff but to other people within the institution.

I would ask my colleague if he does not believe that there should be any mercy in this system, and to look at how we can help individuals who are in the prison system be reintegrated back into the prison or back into our communities.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Madam Speaker, when we talk of mercy, we also need to think of mercy for the victims who have been victimized by these people who are put in prison.

My colleague understands the same as we do that what this means is that we are going to take these people from segregated cells. However, if members had the opportunity to visit Kingston in the old days, there were inmates such as Clifford Olson, Paul Bernardo, Willy Pickton, and some others who were segregated not only for the safety of the guards and other prisoners, but also for their own safety. I am not so sure that we understand exactly what it would have meant to move them all out into the general population. At the same time, they also had all the rights for access to medical personnel, health care, and everything that we talk about here. The bill would not change that. Those provisions are already within the prison system.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I had the opportunity to serve with my colleague from Oxford on the justice committee. He brings a wealth of experience as a police officer and former chief of police.

One of the things that we know about Bill C-83's allowing an additional two hours for prisoners to be out of their cells is that it will cost a lot more resources for that to work. While the government is moving ahead with its legislation, the Liberals at the same time are proposing an 8.8% reduction in funding for the Correctional Service of Canada. Out of the 22 priorities for the Correctional Service of Canada, not one of those priorities includes the safety of correctional officers. In the face of the government's mixed up priorities, is it any wonder that the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers has criticized Bill C-83?

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am not surprised that the correctional officers have found this to be full of shortcomings from their perspective. Those might have been alleviated if there had been more discussion and study with them to hear their concerns on a variety of issues. When we look at it, it is exactly as my colleague said: This is going to cost a lot of money that will not improve either the prisoners' safety or the safety of the guards. It is the lack of consultation with the people on the ground, the front-line officers, that is going to create more problems than we anticipate.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-83, an act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act and another act.

As we know, Bill C-83 proposes to implement a new correctional intervention model to eliminate segregation, strengthen health care governance, better support victims in the criminal justice system, and consider the specific needs of indigenous offenders.

The purpose of prisons, though, is clear. We have prisons so that we can protect society from those who, as a consequence of various criminally repugnant acts they have committed, have proven to be too great a risk to the broader safety of others. I believe there are cases where criminals can be reformed. We have programs. We provide opportunities for those deemed to pose a reduced security risk to reintegrate into society and become fully functional and productive members of our community.

In general, Canadians believe this and we would not want it any other way. However, there are those in our society who cannot be reformed and have committed acts so heinous that we never want them to be free to walk among our families and friends, in our towns and cities, ever again.

I am not just thinking of murderers and those who commit assault, like Olson, Bernardo, Homolka, Magnotta, and McClintic. I am also thinking of those individuals whose names will not make headlines across the country, the nameless violent criminals who beat, and steal without remorse from, the most vulnerable in our society.

Prisons are their own societal microcosm. We expect that prisoners will follow the rules of the institutions, that they will behave and participate in programs to improve their situation, as I said earlier, in the hope they can reintegrate back into their communities.

This speech is not about the goals of sentencing or to debate the merits of different forms of punishment. It is about protecting society in general, victims in particular, and protecting society from those who are most dangerous.

It is no wonder that there is violence in prisons. It does not take an academic to explain why, when criminals are placed in a community together, there is a high incidence of crime. Some might say, who cares, that they get what they deserve? However, that is not the consensus within our society.

Our correctional facilities are not designed to put prisoners in harm's way. They are designed to protect prisoners from each other, and to protect the men and women in the correctional services.

Bill C-83 proposes to change that by removing an important tool in our correctional services staff tool box to protect prisoners and themselves from violence. Indeed, the argument about prison safety often focuses on the most violent prisoners harming other prisoners, or on protecting the most evil, those who have committed such heinous acts, from retribution.

We often feel and sometimes forget those who are on the front lines in our institutions who deal directly with these acts of violence, who put themselves in danger to protect prisoners from each other. Eliminating the ability of corrections officers to segregate prisoners from each other will not only put prisoners at serious risk, it will also further endanger our correctional officers. That is unacceptable.

Jason Godin, the national president of the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers has told the Vancouver Sun that attacks on officers and inmates have increased as the use of segregation has decreased. If Bill C-83 passes, he predicts that “The bloodbath will start.” While I do not understand the minutia of administering a prison, Godin does as the president of the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers. He is not speaking haphazardly or without merit.

Bill C-83 calls for more meaningful, human contact. Human contact is important, but not when it is at the end of a fist or a broom handle. Across Canada the number of assaults on staff is projected to rise 32% this fiscal year compared with last year, coinciding with the projected 15% decrease in segregation bed use during that same time.

Solitary confinement is a common and legitimate safety measure that many western countries use to protect correctional staff from dangerous and volatile prisoners. Rather than removing this tool, we should be looking at how to prevent the incidents that cause segregation in the first place. We should ensure that mental health screening is completed, that there is a mental health strategy for prisoners, that psychological counselling is available, and that there are adequate staff on duty to ensure the safety of everyone.

We can reduce the use of segregation by other means without removing the tool of segregation for use when necessary. Rather than prioritizing the rights of Canada's most violent and dangerous criminals, the Liberals should be prioritizing the safety of the general population within our institutions and the officers who run them. Correctional officers are calling for serious consultation and resources to make it work. They are asking the committee not sacrifice this segregation tool as a necessary tool to deter violent behaviour. Correctional Services Canada has already limited the use of segregation. What correctional officers want now are alternatives to segregation to ensure that prisoners understand there are consequences for their bad behaviour.

In the recent ruling, the Ontario Superior Court called into question the legality of indefinite solitary confinement, and the current government has set its sights on appealing that decision. With this I have no issue. However, I wonder why, while appealing this decision, the government is moving forward with Bill C-83. Logically, the introduction of major changes that are at the heart of its appeal make little sense. However, that is not the only thing that does not make much sense.

Under this bill, a maximum-security classification could be assigned to any area of a medium- or minimum-security penitentiary. The facility in question, whether minimum, medium or maximum, is built to protect society from prisoners designated as a minimum-, medium- or maximum-security risks. There are different procedures and expectations in place.

I am getting the signal that there is no more time, which, unfortunately, is a shame because I had a lot more to say.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

It being 5:45 p.m., pursuant to order made earlier today, it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the second reading stage of the bill now before the House.

The question is on the amendment. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the amendment?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

All those in favour of the amendment will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.