Evidence of meeting #66 for Justice and Human Rights in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was marijuana.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
So it's not that long. What is the cost, approximately, per officer?
Deputy Commissioner, Contract and Aboriginal Policing, Royal Canadian Mounted Police
It can vary. There's a 10-day classroom component, and then there's a period where the trainees are tested. It can vary in timing, but the cost is around $8,000 to $10,000 per candidate. Each session that goes through typically has 20 candidates.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Thank you.
Ms. Thompson, on the issue of efforts to create awareness and education around drug-impaired driving and alcohol-impaired driving, you alluded to the fact that the government has committed some money for such a campaign. I've been asking this for a long time, but where is the campaign? You said it's going to be rolled out in the near future. We're six or seven months from July 1, 2018, and the marijuana task force, in their report, stated that it was very important to mount an early campaign to create awareness. The campaign has not yet been rolled out. You said it would be later this fall. When exactly do you anticipate that it will rolled out? Will it be in two weeks, a month, two months?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Community Safety and Countering Crime Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
The campaign was launched in March through a social media Twitter campaign, which in our experience is the best way to target youth. That is our principal audience, although there are other audiences as well, particularly when we look at the polling. Particularly young males 18 to 28 to 34 are a very important demographic.
The Twitter campaign was very successful. It reached 13 million social media users. Videos on impaired driving have been produced on the Internet as well.
That was all done in the spring, and now we're in the process of doing research, public opinion polling, focus groups to make sure we target the message effectively. That should roll out in the next few weeks, and as I mentioned, it will be in print, on television, in broadcasts, and in movie theatres as well.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
I understood about the Twitter campaign, but I meant the larger, broader campaign.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Community Safety and Countering Crime Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
It has been building up.
Liberal
Colin Fraser Liberal West Nova, NS
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you all so much for being here and for your presentations.
With this many witnesses, it's going to be pretty difficult to ask all of you all the questions I want to, but certainly any information you have given us is helpful.
I would like to start with a couple of technical questions for Mr. Yost with regard to the bill itself. One of the things I heard in testimony from the Canada Border Services Agency was the definition of a vessel and the fact that has changed in section 320.11 .
Can you help me understand the rationale for the change because, as I understand it, the state of the law right now with regard to the definition of impaired operation of a vessel would include things that are muscle propelled. The definition specifically in this legislation is excluding that. Why?
Greg Yost Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
The reasoning was that the criminal law was aimed at those who were endangering the public. We have impaired operation of a motor vehicle. We don't have impaired operation of bicycles, scooters, etc.
The current definition of vessel isn't a definition. It just says that it includes a hovercraft. It's for the courts to interpret what a vessel is. The information we had from prosecutors was that impaired operation of canoes and kayaks was not charged. The information we received from the CBSA that you received, which I was listening to, appears to be contrary to that.
We thought that when someone was injured or killed, criminal negligence charges could be laid. Nevertheless, returning to the status quo by eliminating the “doesn't include” would leave it to police to decide if they want to charge and prosecutors if they want to proceed with the charge.
Liberal
Colin Fraser Liberal West Nova, NS
Are you aware of someone being convicted of an offence of being impaired by operating a canoe, for example?
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
I am not aware. I asked an articling student in some haste to try to find some cases, and she did not find any for me.
Liberal
Colin Fraser Liberal West Nova, NS
If I can move now to the term “impaired to any degree”. The words “to any degree” are added. The criminal defence lawyers indicated that could cause some uncertainty in the state of the law.
I'm wondering why “to any degree” was added, and what that means because impaired means impaired so what does “to any degree” add to it?
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
The witnesses referred to the Stellato case, and the Stellato case is referred to in the material that the government has put out on its backgrounder, etc. In that case, the Ontario Court of Appeal was deciding between two streams of authorities, one of which said that you needed a marked departure from normal behaviour before you could find impairment. The other one basically said, no, it doesn't have to be that marked. There just has to be evidence of some impairment.
The Ontario Court of Appeal decided that the appropriate balance was not to include a test that was not written into the legislation, and if I remember the words properly, that any impairment from slight to great was quite sufficient.
We felt that putting this in was a reminder to the courts of what the legislation is. If you read as many cases as I do, you will occasionally be astonished at what judges seem to require as proof of impairment. They seem to want intoxication.
So that was the reason.
Liberal
Colin Fraser Liberal West Nova, NS
Thank you.
A question for both you, Mr. Yost—I would like your quick comment on it—as well as Ms. Thompson, if you can.
We heard earlier today, and we have heard it from others, that making mandatory samples for drugs would be the better way to go rather than keeping the reasonable suspicion element as the standard, so alcohol and drugs should be the same is the suggestion where you're doing it on a random basis.
What is your comment on that?
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
We certainly considered random drug screening. First of all, when you're looking at the Australian experience, it is the presence of it, so finding it in your oral fluid is actually an offence. It's in your body if it's in your oral fluid. When we looked at the state of the technology and compared it with approved screening devices, we found approved screening devices give you a virtual certainty of what the person's blood alcohol concentration is. As you know, concentration in the oral fluid does not equate necessarily to the concentration in the blood, so it's not as useful a test. But even more important is that you have to keep the person there. It said five minutes. The information I've seen, when they did the pilot testing of some these, said it was an average of about eight minutes. Frankly, that causes serious charter concerns about the arbitrary detention of a person. Maybe the legislation will get changed later, when the Drugs and Driving Committee tells us things have improved on the technology, etc., but for now we do not believe it's justifiable under the charter to hold someone for that long for this test.
Liberal
Colin Fraser Liberal West Nova, NS
That's fair enough.
Ms. Thompson, do you have anything to add to that?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Community Safety and Countering Crime Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
No.
Liberal
Colin Fraser Liberal West Nova, NS
If I have a moment, I'll just turn quickly to the TTC.
You mentioned drug cut-off levels for the random tests that you're doing now. What are those levels, and how did you determine them?
Executive Director, Human Resources, Toronto Transit Commission
For marijuana specifically, our cut-off level is 10 nanograms. If you're interested in the others, I can go through them, but I anticipate that's the focus.
Liberal
Colin Fraser Liberal West Nova, NS
No, I'm interested in that one in particular. How was that arrived at? Where did you get the idea that was the right number?
Executive Director, Human Resources, Toronto Transit Commission
We received advice from a forensic toxicologist with respect to that cut-off level. Various workplaces in Canada will utilize different ranges: some use five nanograms, and I know some are looking toward one nanogram. From our perspective, given the absence of legislation and given the inconsistent arbitral jurisprudence and what would apply in our case, we felt that was the most appropriate number that could assure us, based on the advice we were receiving, that an oral fluid swab would determine impairment at the workplace.
NDP
Murray Rankin NDP Victoria, BC
Thank you very much. I'd like to pursue what Mr. Fraser was talking about.
For Mr. Yost and Ms. Thompson, I heard Ms. Thompson say that the government has a zero-tolerance approach, yet I understand we're going to have per se levels set by regulations under Bill C-46 of two nanograms, and five nanograms as well. If the Australians have a presence-absence system, isn't that essentially what a zero-tolerance level would mean? I'm told on the other hand that we're going to have regulations that won't set that, so I'm confused.
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
The Australians do have zero tolerance. It is an illegal drug in Australia. They don't want you mixing it with your driving, so it is definitely zero tolerance. We find it in your oral fluid. Now you must recall that oral fluid is going to reflect recent use, because taking a brownie takes a lot longer to be digested and work it's way in. If you find it in oral fluid, you almost undoubtedly have a person who has recently smoked marijuana. And you smoke marijuana, as I understand it, in order to get high, which may not be a good idea if you're planning to drive. The Department of Justice calls it a “precautionary approach”, based on public safety considerations. We prefer to avoid zero tolerance.
