With respect to community sentence orders, the first thing that we would ask you to keep in mind is that CSOs are a form of imprisonment. Although CSOs allow an offender to serve their sentence within the community, there are strict conditions, some of which are statutorily required. They ensure that an offender complies with the order and they ensure that an offender is properly and adequately treated.
Expanding the use of CSOs is helpful to both the community and the offender, and it serves more of a rehabilitative aspect, as Mr. Tachie was just alluding to. We have to be mindful that since Black people are subject to hypersurveillance and over-incarceration, this can help serve the double objective of rehabilitation and punishment, where it is appropriate.
CSOs also leave Black offenders vulnerable to mandated state surveillance and ensured compliance with conditions. While we unreservedly advance and advocate for the position that an expanded use of CSOs is appropriate, we urge you to consider that it is still a punitive sentence, notwithstanding the fact that it's being served in the community.
If I can address for a moment the question that was posed by member Cooper, there is something to be said for what Monsieur Gélinas proposed. Often, these crimes are being committed in the community and the victims are from the community. There is something to be said for the fact that members of these same communities are coming to you, honourable members, to say, “We would like to see the lifting of mandatory minimums. We would like to see the imposition of CSOs, because our communities are the ones that are affected.” The Black community and the indigenous community have universally come to you to say, “We don't want these in place. We are the victims. We are not standing only on the side of the offender. We are considering the true victims of the crime, which is our community”. They are telling you, “This is important to us. This is what we want to see.”