Thank you very much, Chair.
Welcome, Dr. Zinger. It's great to see both of you here.
For quite a while, our committee has really been sidelined with Bill C-21, and I think this is an important reminder of just how big the public safety portfolio is and how important your work is. I am glad we are doing this important change of topic.
I want to talk about reducing harms in the context of drug use. I come from British Columbia, which, in many ways, is the epicentre of the opioids crisis. In my community in the Cowichan Valley we have a really big problem. I have spoken with people who are on the front lines of this crisis. My Conservative friends like to underline the importance of treatment, and I agree with them, but my counter to that is that you can't treat a dead person.
Right now, we have so many people who are suffering from trauma. They are going out and playing Russian roulette every time they buy street drugs, because of the levels of fentanyl. Many of them are just not ready for treatment. There is a staged process for someone to be successful at treatment.
In your prisoner profile, you highlight the number of people who have substance use issues, and the mental health crisis. My first question to you is this: When it comes to reducing harm in our prisons, can you just put that in the context of what the overdose rate is like in our prisons?
The fact is that inmates, many of whom have substance abuse issues, are going to find a way to use drugs. That is just a fact. Drugs will make their way into prisons. I have talked with staff at the Kent Institution and at the Mountain Institution. Drugs will find their way into the prisons.
In terms of reducing harms and just trying to keep these prisoners alive so that they can, maybe, one day, successfully get into a program, I would like to hear more context from you on this really big issue.