Bill S-205

Providing Alternatives to Isolation and Ensuring Oversight and Remedies in the Correctional System Act (Tona’s Law)

An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act

Status

Second reading (House), as of May 28, 2026

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Summary

This is from the published bill. The Library of Parliament has also written a full legislative summary of the bill.

This enactment amends the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to, among other things,
(a) provide that a person who is sentenced, transferred or committed to a penitentiary or a person who is transferred into a structured intervention unit must be referred for a mental health assessment by a person qualified to conduct such an assessment;
(b) ensure that a person may only be confined in a structured intervention unit for longer than 48 hours on an order of a superior court;
(c) allow for the provision of correctional services and plans for release and reintegration into the community to persons from disadvantaged or minority populations by community groups and other similar support services; and
(d) allow for persons who are sentenced to a period of incarceration or parole ineligibility to apply to the court that imposed that sentence for a reduction if there has been unfairness in the administration of their sentence.

Similar bills

S-230 (44th Parliament, 1st session) Providing Alternatives to Isolation and Ensuring Oversight and Remedies in the Correctional System Act (Tona’s Law)

Elsewhere

All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.

Bill numbers are reused for different bills each new session. Perhaps you were looking for one of these other S-205s:

S-205 (2021) Law An Act to amend the Criminal Code and to make consequential amendments to another Act (interim release and domestic violence recognizance orders)

S-205 (2020) An Act to amend the Parliament of Canada Act (Parliamentary Visual Artist Laureate)

S-205 (2019) An Act to amend the Constitution Act, 1867 and the Parliament of Canada Act (Speaker of the Senate)

S-205 (2015) An Act to amend the Canada Border Services Agency Act (Inspector General of the Canada Border Services Agency) and to make consequential amendments to other Acts

Corrections and Conditional Release ActRoutine Proceedings

May 28th, 2026 / 10:05 a.m.

NDP

Leah Gazan NDP Winnipeg Centre, MB

moved for leave to introduce Bill S-205, An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act.

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to rise today to introduce Bill S-205, an act to amend the Corrections and Correctional Release Act, also known as Tona's law. The purpose of Tona's law is to ensure oversight of and remedies and alternatives to isolation in federal prisons, also known as solitary confinement or segregation, which is something that has been called out in international law as a form of torture, in fact. It is something that is still practised in federal prisons today and is something that we know causes irreversible harm to people.

The purpose of prisons is to rehabilitate people, but we know, with recidivism rates, that people in prison come back into communities not rehabilitated but more likely to offend. It is not surprising that more than 80% of former inmates actually return to prison.

I would like to thank Senator Pate and advocates for carceral reform across the country, and I want to honour the memory of the late Tona Mills, a survivor of more than 10 years in solitary confinement, for whom the bill is named. May she rest in peace.

(Motion agreed to and bill read the first time)