Thank you.
In my opinion, you have shown that you have a great deal of competence in your field. I have always said that managing delinquency means managing failure. Here I speak of personal failure, failure of the education system, the family, society and, more and more, the failure of mental health services. It would be interesting to examine the priorities of the Correctional Investigator. His priorities would no doubt be completely different from yours, but I do not want to say anything further on that issue.
I know that the main problem, the one that is underlying all the others, is drugs. That comes as no surprise to me. In 1966, 90% of the time, alcohol was given as the reason for committing a crime. That damn alcohol! That was it. Slowly, drugs started playing a more predominant role. Obviously, drug use is not often used as an excuse, but we all know that this is the main reason. That is why I do not think that minimum sentences will do much to reduce crime if we do not attack the root of the problem.
You know, Matsqui was a failure. This prison was established in order to reintegrate drug users. I note that your service had some agreements with external organizations in order to deal with the most hardcore drug users, such as Portage in Quebec. I do not know if there are any models, such as Daytop in New York.
Could you tell me how much money we spend to treat serious drug addicts at these external agencies?