Thanks again for the question.
We've been monitoring the whole issue of double-bunking very closely, particularly as it relates to both the modest increase in the population and the impact as a result of us closing three facilities: Kingston Penitentiary, the Regional Treatment Centre, and the Leclerc Institution in the Laval area. As a result of those increases, we've put in an additional double-bunking measure, which saw us on average going up to having about 20% of the population being double-bunked.
Concurrently, we were in the process of building new units. Most of those units will be coming online in the next several months, which will be creating 2,752 new cells, which will allow us to help to move down very quickly from that 20%. Even as of today, we're already just slightly under the 20% figure. We have 2,700 offenders double-bunked and we're at just 19.6%, grosso modo, double-bunked.
In terms of issues around violence, there's been a lot of discussion about whether security incidents in our institutions have been directly linked to double-bunking. We've monitored this very closely. None of the incidents that we've seen, particularly some of the more serious ones, are directly linked to double-bunking at all. They're linked to the behaviours of individuals who are problematic and individuals who should be in federal penitentiaries.
We've done a lot of studies on this. I think we actually shared a copy of a report earlier with this committee. They've demonstrated that there is no direct correlation between the increase in the double-bunking for the last couple of years and the increase in security incidents.