Again, a couple of problems have been identified in ongoing consultations with provincial senior justice and territorial officials representing the provinces' and territories' attorneys general.
To begin with, the crown declaration is addressing the issue that in not every case are the crowns able to put their minds to the issue of whether this particular offender merits a dangerous offender application. I don't think the issue is one of necessity in some jurisdictions or that the issue is one of resources in other jurisdictions. It tends to vary.
What we do know is that statistically there seem to be variances in the prevalence of the use of the dangerous offender provisions from province to province and territory to territory. That being the case, I think the policy behind this was in fact to not force crowns to bring a dangerous offender application in a certain situation but to make sure they've addressed their minds to whether this individual deserves or merits a part XXIV application, and to make that intent clear on the record in the court.