Without repeating what's already been said, I would say the Correctional Service of Canada certainly has some capacity issues in regard to substance abuse programming. Those issues include physical space as well as human resources capacity—vacancies in regard to the people who deliver the programs and provide the interventions, and persistent recruiting problems, for example, recruiting psychologists.
Also, the Correctional Service of Canada is undergoing a transformation in how it delivers correctional programming. I think the commissioner mentioned yesterday in his remarks a move away from nationally validated individually targeted programs to an integrated delivery model. It's very hard right now to even get a good understanding of who gets into programs, how quickly they get into programs, which programs they're participating in, and how they graduate.
We've seen a decrease in the actual dollars being spent on substance abuse programming this year over last year.
There are going to be some later evaluations to see whether or not this new model even has the same effectiveness as the old model.
There are a lot of unknowns right now about correctional programming in Canada.
It's even difficult to compare one region of the country with another. The Atlantic and Pacific regions are already using the new integrated model. The other regions, Quebec, Ontario, and the Prairies, aren't using that model. We know there are differential outcomes for different subgroups of offenders—men, women, aboriginal offenders, etc. So there are a lot of questions.
We do know that the performance is not expected to be more than 40% to 50% participation before parole eligibility. That's very important, because the second biggest reason for postponement or a decision to waive a parole hearing is incomplete programming, not being able to complete your correctional plan.
The first reason offenders waive their opportunity for parole is because they know they're going to get a negative decision, and that's usually related to that second thing, that they haven't been able to get into their correctional plan.
To not lose the train of some of the previous questions, when we're talking about incentives and disincentives, keep in mind that seven out of 10 offenders are leaving federal penitentiaries now at statutory release date. It is not a conditional decision by the national Parole Board. Seven out of ten don't get out until SR. For aboriginal offenders, it's eight out of ten.
If there is going to be an incentive, that incentive will apply to only those 20% or 30% of offenders who are getting the benefit of a conditional release decision, and for those offenders, often that decision comes far after their earliest eligibility date. We're talking about a very small number of offenders who may—may—receive some incentive. But we don't even know the number, because we don't know the number right now who, either through reasonable grounds or random testing, are being found in breach of that condition between the time a positive decision is made and the time they actually leave the institution. It's very hard to come to an evidence-based answer to the question about whether this is an incentive that could work and what population it could work on.