Thank you, Chair.
I'll just continue for a brief while on this intervention.
I just want to assure everyone that the purpose of my lengthy speech is not to initiate what might be considered a filibuster, but it is to put, as completely as possible, the arguments on the issue of mandatory minimum sentences in as thorough a way possible.
We have a number of individual amendments that will specifically deal with aspects of it. I will be limiting myself, for the most part, to explaining our amendments and why they are there, and having the vote. It's not intended to prolong, but rather to be efficient in ensuring that the bulk of the arguments are presented in a holistic way.
I have emphasized the Canadian Bar Association brief. We've had a lot of other representations about the concerns on mandatory minimum sentences, but it has a very thorough analysis of this, and it comes, of course, from a very highly regarded group of lawyers—both defence and crown prosecutors from across the country, who are part of the Canadian Bar Association criminal justice section.
Because they contain both, they can't be accused of bias on the part of one side of the law or the other. They are concerned about the rule of law. They're concerned about the way our justice system works, and they're concerned that the principles contained in our sentencing laws and the current reliance on precedent, judges, and the individualization of sentencing is extremely important. They also point out things like the following:
The Criminal Code contains a statutory acknowledgement of the principal of restraint, stating that the purpose of sentencing is to separate offenders from society only where necessary.
And that the Criminal Code states:
...proportionality is the fundamental principle of sentencing, and that “a sentence must be proportionate to the gravity of the offence and the degree of responsibility of the offender”. Proportionality reflects the delicate balance that must be achieved in fashioning such a just sentence.
This is something we'll talk about a little later when we get to the drug courts; they also point out that, “In the area of drug offences, the public is often best protected through harm reduction strategies that encourage rehabilitation.”
They comment that participation in the Drug Treatment Court shouldn't be as restricted as it is in the proposals that are currently in the amendments to the act. In their view, “it should be available to all offenders for whom rehabilitative considerations are appropriate.”
These are important considerations, and I will say I have two other pieces concerning this. One is the representation to the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security in March of this year from the former U.S. congressman, Mr. Asa Hutchinson, who was also—and I'm reading from the Hansard of the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security for March 3, 2011. Mr. Hutchinson was introduced as a former U.S. congressman who appeared before the committee having represented the State of Arkansas. But he said that he also served in the George W. Bush administration as head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, or the DEA. He was then undersecretary at the Department of Homeland Security, with a long career in law enforcement:
...leading large agencies, as well as being a trial prosecutor as a former U.S. attorney in the 1980s during the administration of Ronald Reagan, which was really the beginning of our “get tough on crime and drugs” in the United States.
He was before the public safety committee to talk about how he had signed onto what they called in the U.S. the “right on crime” initiative, led by a group of conservatives in the United States who supported a re-evaluation of their nation's incarceration policies. He said, “So I'm only here to tell you a little bit about the American experience” and to provide some insights into what they did in the United States.
He said that what motivated him to sign to this “right on crime” initiative was two principles. One was fairness and one was the long-time conservative principle of cost to the taxpayers.
These were motivating forces in his getting involved in that.
And he talked about the incarceration rate in the United States, which has 5% of the world's population but 23% of the world's reported prisoners, with staggering costs of incarceration. The conservative leaders supported the rehabilitation both at the federal and the state level, and they proposed reforms to the mandatory minimum sentences, to drug sentences. And they initiated reforms that were expected to save about $2 billion in prison costs over five years, most of it going into community treatment for the mentally ill and low-level drug addicts and their treatment. Crime had dropped from 10% in 2004, the year before the reforms, through to 2009.
So we talked about a lot of that. That was part of the U.S. experience that we're hearing about. We're hearing about Texas; we're hearing about other actions in the United States that are important.
The other item that I want to bring to your attention is connected to cost, but it's also connected to human rights and to the costs of prisons and the conditions in prisons. There was a story yesterday on the CBC news that talking about the double-bunking and segregation cells in British Columbia and Manitoba, a practice that was supposed to be abolished. But they show that in at least two prisons, one in Manitoba and one in B.C., and in a number of Ontario prisons, mandatory assessments that are required before double-bunking takes place aren't done. I am quoting the Office of the Correctional Investigator, Mr. Sapers, who testified before us saying that “double-bunking in segregation is a violation of government policy, the Charter of Rights and international human rights standards”.
So what we see as a result of this is that these confined spaces are not designed to house more than one inmate, and you're bordering on inhumane custody. And then they quote some statistics based on a date of September 11, with a snapshot of double-bunking among the general population in Canada's 58 prisons. Nationally, 13.5% of inmates were double-bunked. A half have had no double-bunking, but others showed a high proportion of offenders: for example, in the Frontenac Institution in Kingston, 72%; in Millhaven, in Ontario, 65%; Bowden Institution in Alberta, 50%; Grande Cache, 58%; Mission Institution in B.C., 24.9%.
What we're seeing already is overcrowding in our prisons to the point where we have double-bunking. We know, and we've heard many of the experts tell us, and it's common sense, of course, that this is going to lead...these measures that are here, and the drug provisions and other provisions of this act, which lead to harsher and longer sentences, are going to result in significant increases in overcrowding in prisons, inhumane conditions, possible violations of human rights obligations, as well as, if these conditions are going to be ameliorated, significant costs to the government, to the taxpayers. Whether they're provincial taxpayers or federal taxpayers, someone is going to have to pay.
When we take that into consideration, along with the reasons that this shouldn't be done--as I've just outlined by paraphrasing and in some places quoting the Canadian Bar Association--we're going to have a very serious situation on our hands. These are many of the reasons that thousands and thousands of people have contacted me, and they've contacted other members of this committee and perhaps the chair and the Minister of Justice over the past number of weeks in wholesale opposition to this legislation. These particular provisions are ones that we oppose. Some of the major reasons for opposing them are the consequences of, in this case, the proliferation of mandatory minimums that are going to lead to more people in prison for longer, more recidivism, more crime, and not achieving the safer society that the bill is supposedly named after.
Mr. Chairman, perhaps the next speaker would--