Public Safety Committee on March 1st, 2012

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Would you be able to confirm what we've heard from other witnesses, which was that there isn't a lot of research that has been done in Canada on this subject? Did she find the same result?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

Within Canada, there has been very little research. The work done by Jim Bonta probably represents the major study within Canada.

The interesting thing about electronic monitoring is that one of the reviews we looked at for this report looked at over 350 studies that had addressed electronic monitoring, but most of those studies don't address the quality and the value of the electronic monitoring itself. They're not evaluations of electronic monitoring; they're simply descriptions of programs, rather than an assessment of whether they're actually achieving objectives.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

From the report, then, would you be able to give us your opinion on the pros and cons of electronic monitoring, or are you more able to give us a synopsis of how it works and maybe more of the process?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

I can give you a summary of the research literature and what it was saying.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

That would be helpful.

[Dr. Brian Grant]

What the research literature clearly says is that there is a lack of conclusive evidence to demonstrate that it either works or doesn't work. Studies are sometimes contradictory. We get some results that are positive, some that are negative, and some that show no effect. When you take a look at all of the work that's been done, what you conclude is that there's no evidence to say that it contributes to reducing recidivism.

One thing that a number of the studies show is that it does help the person through the period of time during which they're on electronic monitoring. For the short period of time they're being monitored, they're more likely to comply with their conditions. Most of the research is based on the use of electronic monitoring for ensuring a condition of curfew or of living in a residence, such as with a conditional sentence or an early release. Essentially it's a house arrest following an early release.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

That could be interpreted as confirming the overall testimony we've heard to the effect that electronic monitoring is only successful when it's coupled closely with programs and with actual human contact. Then today we heard from the witnesses prior to your appearance that one of the things electronic monitoring does is document, as a more concrete way to measure whether someone is complying with a rule or a condition, which in turn would help them with the work they're doing with their program or with their parole officer.

Is that a conclusion that could be drawn?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

That's a fair conclusion. One of its features is that you know whether the person didn't comply with the condition of location or time, such as with a curfew. It's very accurate when it's used to determine whether they're at a specific location, such as their home. That's one of the things it's very good for.

You mentioned the idea of correctional programs. Correctional programs have been shown to be highly successful at reducing recidivism and to be cost-beneficial as well. There is research that demonstrates that, contrary to what the first witness responded.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

I don't remember hearing that from the first witness, but I think we've heard very strong evidence in a number of our studies that programs are beneficial. What we want to be able to do is see whether there is a benefit to electronic monitoring in corrections and whether we can suggest that the government use it.

Alterrnatively, as we heard other witnesses state, it may be useful primarily in monitoring immigration cases when there have been removal orders and there are risks of people taking flight. In those situations there is no link to rehabilitation at all. The only reason such an individual would wear a bracelet or be monitored would be so that their removal order could be complied with, as opposed to putting a bracelet on to help them comply with their conditions and thus help them with their program and help them keep out of jail and reintegrate into society.

Would you say that any of the research indicates that the strongest value could be placed on just direct, pure monitoring, with no link to corrections at all?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

I haven't looked at the literature evaluating electronic monitoring in immigration cases, so I really can't respond to the specifics related to immigration, but it has shown itself to be effective when it is used simply to monitor curfew or to confirm that a person remains in his or her home.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you.

How much more time do I have?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

You have about 20 seconds.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

All right. Here is a quick question.

I know that in some of the other work you do, you monitor people who are on conditional release. Can you tell me from your experience in your research how often people on conditional release violate their conditions?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

It depends on which group of offenders you're looking at. It's highly dependent on the characteristics of the individual offenders. Offenders who are high risk may be returned to custody at a rate as high as 50% for violating a condition, whereas low-risk offenders may be returned at a rate of about 20% for violating a condition over an extended period of time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much, Dr. Grant.

Now we'll move to Mr. Sandhu, please.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Thank you, Dr. Grant, for being here today.

Are you familiar with the pilot project that was evaluated back in 2008 in Ontario?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

Do you mean the Correctional Service of Canada one?

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

That's correct.

[Dr. Brian Grant]

I'm familiar with it. I wasn't involved in conducting it, but I am familiar with the study.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Could you give us an overview of what the conclusions were for that particular evaluation?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

The purpose of that evaluation was to determine whether it was operationally possible to implement electronic monitoring, and what challenges we would be faced with as an organization. It was not meant to assess whether electronic monitoring was a useful tool for monitoring offenders per se. That would have to wait until we actually had a full system in place; we'd be able to determine its usefulness once we had offenders going out with EM on a regular basis.

That pilot project was there to determine how the technology works. Many of the questions that you've asked of the vendor here were the kinds of questions that we had at that time. How does it work? What are the complications? When is the signal going to disappear? That's what the purpose of that evaluation was. It wasn't meant to determine whether electronic monitoring would reduce or impact recidivism. It was very much an operational issue to see what we would need to put in place in order to actually have an effective electronic monitoring program.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Would you agree that one of the conclusions from that study was that the pilot project was plagued with technical issues?

[Dr. Brian Grant]

I know that's a statement in the report, but you have to put it into the context. There were a lot of technical issues, and that's why they did the pilot. They did the pilot to find out what those technical problems were.

The study was done in Toronto, and when people went into the subway the signal was lost. That created an issue, so you'd have to figure out what kind of policy you'd put in place with the monitoring regime to allow you to deal with the fact that somebody might take a subway. All of those technical issues provided the opportunity to find solutions.

The earlier speaker talked about what happens when a person goes into a building. You lose GPS capability within a building. What do we do when that happens? How often does that happen? The issue of drift was raised, and that was a technical issue that came up in that pilot, but the purpose of the pilot was to find all those technical issues. If I might say so, the purpose was to find out what all those issues were, because the salesperson is telling you that there are no issues and that the system is highly reliable. The only way we could determine the reliability of the system was to actually put it in place and see what kinds of results we got.

That's in fact why the first people on electronic monitoring were our staff. We had 10 staff wear a bracelet so that we could find out what the initial issues were going to be. That's what its purpose was.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

We've actually already recommended that our whips get the electronic monitoring bracelets.

It was a pilot program, then. We did find that the salesperson was telling us that this was a perfect system. Here it is, off the shelf; slap it on, and you're going to know everything about this person. However, during the pilot you found that there were many complex issues and that it's not as simple as slapping on the bracelet or putting on a GPS device.

[Dr. Brian Grant]

That's right. It's a very complex problem.

We might know where the person is, but we don't know what they're doing there. We needed to know the level of drift that we might find and how we would deal with that in policy. Do you revoke somebody's conditional release because it looks like they were in the wrong place, when in fact you find out, by looking before and after that time, where they actually were? That was the real purpose of the pilot.