Thank you.
I certainly agree with my colleague before me that oversight is critical with anything that happens within corrections because, sometimes, that is certainly missing.
I bring to the table my years of experience. I have over 30 years in corrections. I started off as a correctional officer at the medium-security Drumheller Institution in 1980. In 1983, I moved to the maximum-security Edmonton Institution. I was a correctional officer for 22 years there, and now I'm a program officer. That's still my substantive position.
As the president of the Union of Safety and Justice Employees, I represent thousands of employees who go to work every day in corrections to prepare offenders for their safe return to society.
Today we're talking about Bill C-83, measures to make Canada's federal prisons more humane and improve offenders' chances of rehabilitation. USJE believes Bill C-83 is a first step in this direction. However, from my experience, I can say that new resources are needed to ensure its successes. Today, front-line workers burdened with heavy caseloads are at a breaking point. Something has to give.
Since implementation of the reforms proposed by the new bill will fall on front-line workers, this is what USJE recommends. From what we understand, there is approximately $484 million earmarked to support these changes. From USJE's perspective, some of these funds must be used to recalibrate ratios of parole officers and program officers to offenders.
Currently for parole officers, ratios are 30:1 at a max, 28:1 at a medium, and 25:1 at a minimum, but there's no back filling if a parole officer goes on a long-term sick leave or when they take vacation leave. There's no back filling. This means that, when the parole officers are not there, the offenders have significantly less support.
USJE believes that the ratio should be 20:1 for parole officers, and we also believe that back filling must be reinstated. For program officers working in the SIUs, the ratio can be no more than 3:1. At times, due to the complexity of the offenders, the ratio needs to be 1:1.
The changes Bill C-83 proposes for more meaningful interaction with offenders are positive, and that's important, because in all my years working in federal prisons, I've always felt that you need to treat people like people.
I spent an accumulation of approximately four years working in segregation units, and I can tell you that in all those years I never saw one offender who went in to segregation come out of segregation a better person.
The one thing I can tell you is that, when I'm on the street and I have offenders approach me—and they do approach me—or when I'm working bingo for my daughters to raise money for sports, they talk to me there. The one thing I've heard over and over again is, “Thank you, boss. Thank you for treating me like a person when I was inside. That helped me, on the outside, to understand.”
Those interactions definitely need to take place, and they need to take place inside the prison. Preparing offenders for their safe return to society requires real interaction, and that means programs, counselling sessions, mental health care and more face time with individuals. Providing this interaction is necessary to even the most challenging offenders.
Bill C-83 addresses some of these issues, but as it moves forward, the system needs to be better resourced to undertake these changes. Funding matters. Having been so long in the service, we've been through several deficit reduction action plans with the latest, of course, by the previous government. Previously, the action plans have not had a huge impact on the front line. Most of the effects were at middle management and upper management; however, the last time, the effects of cutting resources at the front line really had a significant impact.
As I said earlier, the members that I represent, particularly programs and parole officers, are really feeling the stress. USJE believes that new legislation is a good step in the right direction if resources are identified and put in place to improve offenders' chances for rehabilitation, to help keep Canadian communities safe and to ensure the safety of all employees working inside federal institutions.
Thank you.