Justice Committee on Oct. 18th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

I call the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights to order.

I know it was agreed upon by the steering committee and the committee as a whole to examine the estimates. In this particular case, given the fact that so often there is such a cursory examination at best, and really you don't have an opportunity to dig a little deeper, it was decided that two programs would be viewed over the next couple of days, one being the area of the drug treatment courts and the other being legal aid.

I'm pleased that three members of the Department of Justice are here. Welcome to the committee Mr. Piragoff, Ms. Merriam, and Ms. Latimer, and thank you for attending. I know you will have the opportunity to explain the mandate of each of the areas that we are looking at. I trust this will give us the basis for the line of questioning we'd like to follow.

Regarding legal aid, I trust that all the members have the information from the Library of Parliament. On the first page of the presentation, the fifth paragraph reflects some of the mandate and the purpose behind each of these particular programs. For legal aid, of course the issue is accessibility to all Canadians, and the goal, as stated here, is to try to ensure that the legal system may be fairly accessed by all Canadians, regardless of their financial status.

In terms of safety, an important program provided through funding by the department is that of the drug treatment courts. These courts are designed to deal with the revolving door of those who are addicted to drugs, as they come in and out of the justice system on a regular basis. The drug treatment courts are designed to deal with the root causes of criminal behaviour, not simply the after-effects. I would assume that's where our questions would be focused: on these two particular programs and their mandates.

So we could begin with Mr. Piragoff, the deputy minister. Sir, we're ready for your presentation, if you would like to begin.

[Donald Piragoff, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Department of Justice]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Members of the Justice Committee, it is my pleasure to appear before you to answer questions regarding funding of Legal Aid and the Drug Treatment Court Funding Program.

The department will continue working closely with our provincial and territorial counterparts to promote the development and implementation of legal aid policy under the auspices of the federal-provincial-territorial permanent working group on legal aid.

I would now like to turn your attention to the drug treatment court funding program. It is managed jointly by the Department of Justice and Health Canada and was initiated in May 2003. The objectives of the program are to promote and strengthen the use of alternatives to incarceration, with a particular focus on youth, aboriginal men and women, and street prostitutes; to build knowledge and awareness among criminal justice, health, and social service practitioners and the general public about drug treatment courts; and to collect information and data on the effectiveness of drug treatment courts in order to promote best practices and continue refining approaches.

Drug treatment courts were established as pilot projects in Toronto in December 1998, and in Vancouver in December 2001. They are based on the successful drug treatment courts in the United States, of which there are now more than 1,000. Both the Toronto and Vancouver courts have shown promise in reducing addiction and repeat offences in those areas. The drug treatment court funding program supports four new courts in Edmonton, Regina, Winnipeg, and Ottawa, and continues to fund existing courts in Toronto and Vancouver.

Each of the funding recipients must report annually on the results of their activities. These results are used to support annual reports to Parliament and the Canadian public and to inform others who may want to establish drug treatment courts in their communities. This reporting activity also helps to ensure that best practices and standards are consistent across the various jurisdictions, while supporting the needs of individual communities where courts are located.

The courts use court-monitored treatment and community service support for non-violent offenders with drug addictions. The participants must enter a structured outpatient program where they must attend both individual and group counselling sessions, receive appropriate medical attention such as methadone treatment, and submit to random drug tests. Participants must also appear regularly in court, where judges review their progress. If that progress is positive, judges may reward participants verbally. However, should conditions not be met, judges may impose sanctions ranging from verbal reprimands to expulsion from the program.

The drug treatment court system understands that participants have other basic needs, such as safe housing, stable employment, and job training. Staff members worked with partners in the community to help address those needs as well.

Once a participant gains a measure of social stability and can demonstrate control over the addiction, he or she is likely to receive a non-custodial sentence, meaning restrictions other than going to jail. However, if an offender is unsuccessful, the offender will be sentenced as part of the regular court process.

Funding from the Department of Justice and Health Canada is helping to support court-monitored treatment of drug-addicted offenders who have committed crimes to support their drug habits. The program promotes drug abstinence and holds offenders accountable for their actions.

Now that I've briefly described the two programs, we would be pleased to answer any questions the committee may have in this regard. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Thank you, sir.

Ms. Barnes, please.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Thank you.

First I'll put on the record--with no disrespect to the three people sitting before us as witnesses, and I don't envy their position--that when we had the earlier meeting with the minister, I asked for the minister to be able to talk to us about legal aid and drug courts. Quite frankly, I don't believe it's within your purview to be able to answer the policy questions. So while it's nice to have you here and we welcome your information, it's not going to be particularly useful. I haven't seen before where a minister doesn't want to defend his own estimates. Certainly when the people sitting in government now were in opposition, they wouldn't have stood for this.

So I will ask some of the questions and see if you can answer them.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Excuse me, Ms. Barnes, in reference to those comments--

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

I hope this isn't on my time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

--the minister actually did appear on the estimates in May.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Yes, and he didn't have the answers, because he had partial figures. We told him that he would come back and he would answer those questions. That's in the Hansard of those meetings, and he's not here today.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Right, but just to let you know, he did appear, in fact, on those particular points.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

No, he didn't, because he couldn't answer the questions. We invited him back, that day, in the Hansard, and again I put it on the record when he was here on another bill. I understood that he would be here to answer, because the policy questions are not for officials.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Right. Understood.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

So let's ask some of these questions.

The planned contribution to the provinces to assist in the operation of legal aid systems will decrease, I understand, by $40 million. Can you give us the rationale for this change?

[Donald Piragoff]

It is a technical budget reporting discrepancy, but there actually is no proposed reduction in legal aid financing by the federal government for this year. What happened last year is that with the federal election at the end of November and a new government taking office in the winter, there was not sufficient time for cabinet to address this issue in the regular budget cycle. Accordingly, there is a discrepancy, as Ms. Barnes has indicated, of approximately $40 million. It is the intention of the minister to seek that amount in supplemental estimates such that the entire amount for legal aid for this fiscal year will equal the amount of last year.

What happened is that on March 31, 2006, the three-year agreement with the provinces expired, and as I said, because a new government was in power and did not have sufficient time to discuss this issue with the provinces to negotiate a new agreement, the government decided to extend the terms of the existing three-year agreement for one more year at the 2005-06 levels.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

That's fine. I understand that.

Can you tell me what will happen, say, in my province of Ontario, where the provincial legal aid, which is responsible, is in a deficit situation? The year hasn't gone through, and yet we have legislation before us, in Bill C-9 and Bill C-10, that will put people at risk of going to prison. That's the test in my province: if they have a substantial risk of going to prison, they're supposed to be able to obtain legal aid. They're $10 million in debt right now in that system, so what is the federal government going to do and what were the discussions on those areas?

[Donald Piragoff]

First, as mentioned, there is the supplementary estimates request, which will provide the provinces with the full funding that they had last year. With respect to new pressures on the system, as indicated by federal-provincial-territorial ministers following their meeting last week in Newfoundland, ministers will continue to work together to look at the legal aid costs to try to reach a new agreement. They are also aware of the new funding pressures that would be created by new reforms.

But I think each of the ministers who left that meeting last week understands that responsibility in the criminal justice area is a shared responsibility at both the federal and provincial levels. Provinces, for example, cannot continue to demand law reforms without at the same time shouldering some of the costs, but on the other hand, the federal government also realizes that, as a shared partner, it must also share some of the costs. The ministers have agreed to continue their discussions and look at the actual numbers.

With respect to particular bills, as you know, you've heard testimony on Bill C-9, for example, and there are differences with respect to what the cost implications would be. I believe the bill is going to clause-by-clause. There may be some amendments. The amendments may have the effect of actually reducing the financial impact on provinces, but that's something within your purview as MPs, as to what the scope of the impact would be, depending on the scope of the bill.

But I do want to indicate that ministers did agree last week that they would continue to work cooperatively to address the costing pressures on the system, both existing, such as legal aid, and also new pressures as a result of law reform.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

I would like to look at the drug treatment courts. Is this the same discrepancy of $638,310, the same as the former situation with legal aid?

[Barbara Merriam, Acting Director General, Department of Justice]

The drug treatment court funding program is shared between the Department of Justice and Health Canada. What you're seeing in the main estimates reflects the Justice portion and how the figures were profiled over the four-year period. So in 2005, it was $2,333,000. In 2006-07, it's $2,341,000.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Has the evaluation of the drug treatment courts been done by the department? I know there was a considerable amount of concern about this in Vancouver.

[Barbara Merriam]

As my manager mentioned earlier, the Toronto court started in 1998 with federal funding through the National Crime Prevention Centre. The Vancouver court started in 2001, again with National Crime Prevention Centre money. Both have had promising evaluation reports.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Could we get those reports?

[Barbara Merriam]

Yes.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

If you distribute them to the clerk, he can get them to all of us.

[Barbara Merriam]

They're very hefty reports.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Do you have an executive summary?

[Barbara Merriam]

Yes.