Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to the other committee members.
With me today is Émile Thérien, past President of the Canada Safety Council. My presentation will be in English, but we are prepared to answer questions in both official languages.
Our submission in February 2008, a year ago, explained why the government should leave the legal blood alcohol content, or BAC, at its current level of 80 mg%. The Canada Safety Council strongly urges Justice Canada to work with Canada's national strategy to reduce impaired driving, also called STRID. The strategy is a collaboration of Transport Canada with all provincial and territorial jurisdictions and many safety organizations, including the Canada Safety Council. STRID takes advantage of Canada's most respected traffic safety experts and applies the best research and practice.
Since our presentation last February, STRID has published three major reports. First, let's look at some abstracts.
Let's look at their July 2008 survey of over 1,000 crown prosecutors and defence counsel. That survey found, among other things, that it takes longer and longer to process impaired driving cases, from up to six months for a negotiated plea agreement to well over a year. We would like to point out that such delays would only be increased if criminal charges were laid below the current level.
Almost 30% of cases that go to trial result in an acquittal. Given the reliability of breathalyzer technology, this leads us to ask whether many of those charged are getting off thanks to the good preparation of their defence counsel, when in fact they were impaired.
Repeat offenders account for about one-third of all impaired driving cases. This new information reinforces our recommendation that Justice Canada should focus on sentences that will prevent recidivism by ensuring remedial programs are part of the sentencing and are readily available.
The report concludes that people challenge a criminal charge due to the severe consequences of a conviction. Again, this reinforces our recommendation that lower-BAC drivers should continue to be dealt with outside the Criminal Code, where the consequences are much more sure and immediate.
Secondly, a fall 2008 report on trends in alcohol-related crashes reinforces our point that progress is being made in the fight against impaired driving. The problem group is not drivers under the current legal limit; it is still those with BACs over 80 mg%, and specifically those with BACs over twice the legal limit. Over half of impaired driving fatalities are the impaired drivers themselves.
Finally, the STRID monitoring report for 2007 shows that more and more jurisdictions are strengthening their administrative sanctions for drivers under 80 mg%. New last year, Ontario is adding administrative licence suspensions to the driver record and increasing those suspensions from 12 hours to three days, and even longer for repeats.
These three reports support the Canada Safety Council's position that lowering the criminal blood alcohol level is not what is needed to reduce Canada's impaired driving problems. They confirm that public safety is best served by dealing with drivers with BACs lower than 80 mg% outside the Criminal Code.