You have no idea of the benefits the conditional sentences provided to those eight people. Academics, some of our members from the Bloc, and Mr. Ignatieff have suggested the progress this type of sentencing makes toward the objective Canadians want from the justice system. Some of this evidence is in the book The Virtual Prison: Community Custody and the Evolution of Imprisonment, written by one of the experts, Julian Roberts, who is editor of the Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice. It suggests that offenders given community custody orders are punished, yet also given the opportunity to change their lives in ways that would be impossible in prisons.
Ms. Kane, I'm sure the department must have access to research that outlines some benefits for conditional sentencing. Could you comment on some of that research?