This graph shows three different sentences: someone convicted and sentenced for between two and three years, between three and four years, and between four and five years. What it shows is that the average actual time served is 15 months for a person sentenced for two to three years and approximately 18 months to 20 months for the three- to four-year sentence.
That leads to my final point, which is based on some data I obtained from the Auditor General's report, but then I went beyond this and did some numbers. If the average offender is in a federal institution for three years, they serve only 15 months, according to the CSC data. The average rehabilitation program requires seven months for a high-intensity or violent offender, and on average they need three to rehabilitate. The person is only in a federal penitentiary for 15 months, but it takes 21 months to rehabilitate that person. What this means is that we are releasing people who have not yet been rehabilitated, violent people, back into the Canadian population.
This is really a graph, which I'm sure everyone has seen. It's the dangerous offenders designation, but it supports what I was saying earlier. There's a very small number designated each year.
This leads me to my final slide. Violent offenders need more time, not less, for rehabilitation. In fact, we are not rehabilitating them fully, because they are getting out prematurely—that is, before they are rehabilitated. The outcome is more dangerous communities. The evidence for that statement is the increasing crime, per Statistics Canada, between 1962 and today.
So my conclusion is that we need minimum mandatory sentencing to ensure that the rehabilitation takes, which many people today claim is the purpose of sentencing a violent offender.
I thank you for your attention, and I will be more than willing to take questions afterwards.