Evidence of meeting #137 for Public Safety and National Security in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was actually.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
Thank you all for being here.
Thank you for your advocacy on this issue, Senator Pate, for many years.
The first question really has nothing to do with the bill, but it does in a way.
Would you acknowledge that there have been more investments after 10 years of horrendous cuts to corrections, and that there's been a change in attitude and investments? I'm not saying we have it right yet, but have you seen a difference in the department and in the minister in their attitude towards corrections and investments?
I'll put that question to both of you.
5:20 p.m.
Senator, Ontario, ISG
We certainly have seen a difference in the language that's coming out.
For instance, in our visits to the institutions and in our meetings with senior managers and any witnesses who come from national headquarters and regional headquarters, the language sounds much more progressive than we've heard for some time. However, that has not permeated even the next layer of the institutions, in our experience. Going into the institutions, we often have a presentation from management, and then we'll walk into the institution and see something diametrically opposed to it.
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I know you've read the report out of Edmonton max that said you can't fix overnight something that has taken so long to fester.
I just want to acknowledge that I'm actually really proud of what the minister is trying to do. It's really important that we keep on that path in order to make changes within the system all the way down to the ground.
5:20 p.m.
Senator, Ontario, ISG
Certainly the teacher in me says that you have to repeat it at least 29 times before it starts to penetrate.
The difficulty is, though, that if there was a real willingness, then many of us would have been involved in that process. Unfortunately, it looks to be a more cynical process if in fact you don't take the next step and actually engage those individuals who have, as I do, a huge investment in wanting to make this work.
5:20 p.m.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
This question is probably more to you: What are you defining as “solitary”? You mentioned women's institutes, and we heard from the corrections investigator that there are 10 women in right now. As I mentioned earlier to the civil liberties folks, my sense is that this bill has been written for the men's institutes and not the women's, because you're dealing with very different circumstances in both. You don't have the gangs in women's prisons to the same extent.
You were talking about Stony Mountain. I was there in 2016 and I saw one of the units where they have what I think you referred to as “pod C”. Why do you think those can't work?
5:25 p.m.
Senator, Ontario, ISG
I'll back up. Part of the reason Louise Arbour recommended that the women be used as the flagship for corrections is exactly what you've pointed to, which is that we could be doing many more progressive things that in our experience would also then benefit the men. Healing lodges are a perfect example. They were initially piloted with women.
However, what we can be doing is learning from that process and starting to work at undoing the culture that has been embedded in corrections, and in particular in the prisons for men. That's part of why I'm starting to go in to work with those men who are actually trying to undo that process.
I don't think it requires segregated units to do it, though. I do think we can work with a number of individuals who want to see meaningful change. Already, just in challenging some of the men I've come into contact with by asking them how they're going to get to medium security, they know they'll have to drop their colours and they'll have to negotiate.
Corrections historically would say that starts the minute someone walks into the prison, not somewhere down the road. We're not doing that.
5:25 p.m.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I don't disagree with you at all, but when I asked the minister and the commissioner when she was here about those units such as the pods at Stony Mountain, I believe that was the intent for these units. There would be four to six units together, where people who can get along, such as two gangs that don't kill each other in prison, can have meals together. That's the intent behind it.
5:25 p.m.
Senator, Ontario, ISG
If you start with separation, you actually build friction. In terms of any institution that has worked at this, Ms. Mendelsohn talked about some of the U.K. system and I was involved in some of the U.K. reforms that looked at removing segregation and removing maximum security types of settings and using more dynamic security. Of course that was not to put people at risk, because none of us want that, but to build on the ways that you actually do change behaviour, which is through relationships. It's not through putting people behind barriers because it's easier if you're not getting along to yell through a wall than it is to actually have to negotiate.
5:25 p.m.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I only have two minutes left and I want to ask you about oversight. I asked the previous witnesses as well.
If we were to add something in oversight that saw it being triggered after five days when the conditions were not being met, or by the patient advocate or the health care professional, would that ease some of your concerns?
5:25 p.m.
Senator, Ontario, ISG
For me, no, because I'm familiar with how those mechanisms are being used right now.
If there have been no meaningful consultations to this point on this process, then I would not have faith that those mechanisms would be put in place within the prison setting without external push.
5:25 p.m.
Liberal
5:25 p.m.
Senator, Ontario, ISG
Right now, it's considered independent when the mental health advocates come in. When I contacted them in Saskatchewan, they hadn't been receiving calls at all. The commencement of committal proceedings would start once the person was forcibly medicated or injected, as the case would be, and then they would abandon the proceedings, which meant that the mental health advocate was never called in.
5:25 p.m.
Liberal
Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON
I only have a few seconds left and I want to hear from you as well.
5:25 p.m.
Director, Equality Program, Canadian Civil Liberties Association
If by “conditions” you mean making sure that people get a few hours out of cell, including a couple of hours of human contact, and that this would be the only form of oversight in addition to the patient advocate and mental health advocate, that would certainly not be sufficient in any case, because there has to be oversight over placement in some kind of isolation and over the decision to continue to hold somebody in those circumstances.
All of our objections have been registered. If any of those things are to continue, there has to be oversight over why that person is in that situation and has that status in the first place.
5:25 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you, Ms. Damoff.
Mr. Eglinski, you have the final five minutes, please.
5:25 p.m.
Yellowhead, CPC
Thank you.
I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here today.
I've been listening to Ms. Aviv talking about this oversight. Do you believe that under this bill, and I believe it's actually in the current legislation of the Correctional Service of Canada, that the warden must have that right to make the decision to put a person in a segregated area, or whatever we want to call it—ward C or B or D or E? Do you believe that we need to have it in the legislation that the warden needs to have the right to make that decision, and then have it reviewed?
5:30 p.m.
Director, Equality Program, Canadian Civil Liberties Association
I think it depends very much on what you mean by segregation. I'm not sure that we have the kind of reform or the kind of legislation that we need to justify any kind of isolation. Even the most difficult of people—people who have decompensated—can still have contact with somebody within a prison setting. They can and should, and that will only improve the situation for them and for the institution.
5:30 p.m.
Yellowhead, CPC
No, that's not what I'm asking. If someone has to make that decision initially—
5:30 p.m.
Director, Equality Program, Canadian Civil Liberties Association
If there's an emergency situation, such as a riot, and you need containment on an urgent basis, then I think that the people who are on hand need to be able to do that. That is not a power that should be open to abuse, overuse or misuse. When we say “for the shortest possible duration”, we're talking about a day or two, not 15 days extended and extended, institutionalizing it.
5:30 p.m.
Yellowhead, CPC
All right. Thank you for that, but if someone in the institution where this person is becomes violent or if this person is threatened by another inmate in a life-and-death situation, someone must have the authority to put that person in an area where he or she can be protected.
Do you agree?
5:30 p.m.
Director, Equality Program, Canadian Civil Liberties Association
Yes, but that doesn't have to translate into isolation, nor does it mean that there can't be judicial oversight within a very short period of time.
5:30 p.m.
Yellowhead, CPC
At 12 o'clock midnight, someone becomes very violent. Now who is going to give that oversight? Are you going to call a judge and get the oversight, or does someone within the penal institution have to make that initial decision? Maybe the oversight comes later. You seem to be saying that you have to have oversight in every decision.