Evidence of meeting #45 for Public Accounts in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was offenders.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Paul Lefebvre Liberal Sudbury, ON
Was there a specific plan before the Auditor General's report came out, other than this 2003 list of programs that we would provide to indigenous individuals? Was there an action plan to make sure that each indigenous offender received services that were required?
Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
The short answer is yes. Were there things that the Auditor General pointed out that we've added? The answer is yes.
Liberal
Paul Lefebvre Liberal Sudbury, ON
Now, yes, but Mr. Head, when you look at this report, clearly there were a lot of things lacking in your prior plan, and the fact that all of the stuff that we are seeing coming through this.... There are so many in this report, and one is access to correctional programs. Paragraph 3.50 in the Auditor General's report states:
We found that Indigenous offenders started their correctional programs an average of almost five months after their admission into custody.
Often, many offenders were there for a short term, so they never received any of the programs. From what we also saw in the report, the ones who did receive access to these programs were less likely to reoffend once they left.
Isn't that the whole purpose of these programs—that when they do go back into the public, they are less likely to reoffend, because they have received the proper services?
Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
Again, the short answer is yes.
Our whole strategy going forward with aboriginal offenders is to have them start their programs at the time of intake, as soon as they come in the door.
Liberal
Paul Lefebvre Liberal Sudbury, ON
I guess what I'm saying is, why wasn't that a priority back in 2003, or forever? Why did it become a priority now that the Auditor General raised it? Wouldn't your plan have addressed that?
What I'm going at here is that there is a systemic issue within the CSC, from what I can read through this. Now that you have the Auditor General's report, you'll deal with it. It's extremely disturbing for us—for me, anyway—to see that they're saying they will do it now because they see it, but then you're telling me that you have a specific group dealing with this, and obviously they weren't doing their jobs properly, or maybe not....
What I'm getting at is, what was missing? Why was there that lack?
Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
I think it was primarily because the focus was on trying to address a long list of program needs for offenders while they were incarcerated, as opposed to identifying the main program, the key program, and activating that as soon as possible.
There is no question that there was a gap. That gap has been identified. We have a plan going forward to close that gap and we will now be—as I say, for aboriginal offenders—taking an approach of presuming that their security level is reduced when they complete the program.
Liberal
Paul Lefebvre Liberal Sudbury, ON
One thing I can tell you, Mr. Head, is that this committee has taken it upon itself to bring back certain reports or certain departments that deal with these reports. I will make the recommendation that this be brought back, that we follow this, because we have individuals who supposedly, within the services that we offer.... They are offered there, but we're not doing a very good job of ensuring that these programs are followed and that they have access, because there are huge wait times. There are, basically, the ones who don't even get the services, so again there's a systemic problem here. Rest assured that we will asking you to follow up as to how we are improving the services going forward.
Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
Just on those lines, Madam Chair, I'd be glad to share our plan with our time frames, be glad to provide the progress report, and be glad to reappear to show that we're taking this seriously.
Liberal
Liberal
The Vice-Chair (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès) Liberal Alexandra Mendes
We will definitely follow up on it. Thank you very much.
Go ahead, Mr. Nater, for five minutes.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you to our witnesses as well.
I'd like to start by drilling down a little bit deeper into the criminal risk index that my colleague Mr. Jeneroux spoke about earlier.
Could you provide some specific examples or some of the criteria that might be used in developing this index? What might be some of the factors that would increase the index or decrease the index in a specific case? Could you provide a couple of examples of exactly what that would be?
Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
I'll turn to Madam Kelly to give you some insight into that.
Anne Kelly Senior Deputy Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
Again, I don't have the specifics, but what we were using before—and it was explained previously—was the custody rating scale. The custody rating scale is a security classification tool. Through research we found that there was a better tool, and that's the criminal risk index that's been developed. The criminal risk index is actually to determine the program intensity level that should be offered to the offender, because we have high-intensity programs and moderate-intensity programs, so that's what it determines.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
Okay, when you say you don't have the specifics, do you mean you don't have the specifics today or...?
Senior Deputy Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
That's right. I don't have them.
Conservative
Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
Just on that, what we can actually do, if it's helpful to the committee, is provide you a copy of the two tools so that you can actually see the criteria that were being accessed.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
That would be appreciated. Thank you.
Following up on that, is this an assessment that would be carried out throughout the individual's incarceration? Would this be updated as it goes along? Would it be something that would play a factor into a parole consideration towards the end of incarceration as well?
Senior Deputy Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
Are we still talking about the criminal risk index?
Senior Deputy Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
Again, it's to determine the program intensity level, so that's done during the intake process. What we do is we determine the needs of the offenders and which program they should.... Well, we have one program now, the integrated correctional program model, specifically designed for aboriginal offenders, and the criminal risk index determines whether they are going to follow the moderate- or the high-intensity program. That's done at intake, when they first arrive into custody.
Conservative
John Nater Conservative Perth—Wellington, ON
In your action plan you've talked about centralizing the intake process, the intake analysis. Do you mean centralized from a national perspective or within an institution or a region? What were you talking about in terms of that centralization?
Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada
What we're going to be doing, in specific institutions across the country, is have centralized intake units that will specialize in doing the assessments, the planning, and initiating the interventions for aboriginal offenders. This way, rather than spread our resources across 43 institutions, we're going to target institutions in each of our five regions and a couple of extra ones in the Prairie region that will be specialized.
We'll have staff members that will be specialized in assessments, correctional planning, and initiating the programs.