Thank you very much for the opportunity to address you on legislation that affects the lives of all children.
Justice for Children and Youth has been acting both for young offenders and young victims since 1978. Just as it says in the submission of the Canadian Bar Association, we feel that we understand the issues from the perspective of both those desiring to be more safe and those who have offended.
The first thing I have to do, unfortunately, is apologize. I would normally just ignore this, but because our written submission says the exact opposite of what I mean on one page, I want to point it out now. On page 7, the last sentence of the first complete paragraph says “If this amendment is passed, we can expect a return to much higher rates of detention at great taxpayer cost but with increased public safety”. I mean “without” increased public safety. I will send an amended submission to reflect that change, but I wanted to apologize now in case I misled anyone about my views.