Public Safety Committee on Nov. 22nd, 2023

[Jeff Wilkins]

Each is controlled by a mobile patrol truck that is armed. In most maximum-security institutions, there are also tower officers—those positioned in towers. We would not have those in a medium-security institution. They are very similar in terms of perimeter security.

It's the internal security that is different between the two.

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

I think I have only about 30 seconds left, so I don't know that I'll get into another question.

I appreciate everyone for being here, and I want to echo my colleagues on the importance of discussing this issue.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Heath MacDonald]

Thank you.

We're going to move to Ms. Michaud for two and a half minutes.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to give Mr. Ménard an opportunity to answer my long question from earlier on overworked officers.

I don't know if you need me to go back over what I said or if you can start answering directly.

[Patrick Ménard]

Excessive workloads are still an ongoing problem. They were already an issue when I started my career in 1999.

The workload of parole officers at the institutions is calculated based on numbers of offenders per officer, and that number has constantly risen over the years. When ratios are established, they very often aren't complied with.

Officers outside the community, however, have to prepare various reports and have a minimum number of contacts with offenders. The workload in the community is measured using a tool that, in a way, times the work that parole officers do.

So, yes, this is an extremely important issue for us. Not only are the number of cases and frequency of contacts increasing, but the cases are also increasingly serious. In addition, the employer, the Correctional Service of Canada, asks us to consider increasing numbers of factors specific to each case, such as mental health or ethnicity, for example. So there are a lot of variables that have to be taken into consideration and that encumber reports, interactions and interventions.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

You talked about parole officers assessing inmate files with a view to parole, but could you imagine the same thing happening to officers conducting an assessment in order to transfer an inmate? Are those completely separate teams? Could those people also be overworked such that the decisions that are made would have a direct or indirect impact on public safety?

[Patrick Ménard]

The same parole officer will make a recommendation to transfer an inmate, a recommendation for a temporary absence and, later on, a recommendation for release. In each of those cases, the officer has to make his or her recommendation taking into account all the important factors in the file.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

I'll stop there.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Heath MacDonald]

Thank you, Ms. Michaud, and thank you, Mr. Ménard.

We'll move to Mr. Julian, please.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I wanted to come back to you, Mr. Wilkins. I think we would all agree that prison escapes pose a threat to public safety. No one would disagree with that. I would like you to react to what the factors are that increased the number of prison escapes we had in the past, and to what you attribute the lower level of prison escapes we're seeing currently.

Is it a factor of resources? If a government cuts back on services, does that make a difference? What are the factors we need to be considering?

[Jeff Wilkins]

I certainly wish I had the answer to your question on how to prevent escapes. These are each individual choices that are made by inmates.

I don't know how we assess fluctuations from year to year based on different variables that are associated with institutions, to be quite frank. I don't have the answer to that question.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Thank you very much.

I note—and I think this is important for the public record—that the five worst years for prison escapes were all under the former Harper Conservative government. I think that's something we need to reflect on in terms of public safety and the record of the government.

Now I'll go to you, Mr. Ménard.

Earlier I asked some questions about the fact that sometimes an assessment of an inmate's security level made using a rating scale is disregarded. From what we've heard, that assessment may be disregarded by people at the Correctional Service of Canada, or even by people managing a prison, in approximately 10% of cases.

Is that a frequent occurrence in your experience?

[Patrick Ménard]

No, it doesn't happen often. It's quite rare.

Generally speaking, the files reveal trends. Consequently, parole officers are able to work with the offenders and try to anticipate what will happen for them based on emerging trends. Is the inmate racking up offence reports and institutional incidents? Is she following his programs? Does he have an everyday job? By answering yes or no to these questions, officers can approximately anticipate what the inmate's next security level will be.

[The Chair, Liberal, Heath MacDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Ménard. Thank you, Mr. Julian.

We're going to move to Mr. Lloyd now, for five minutes.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Wilkins, I have a copy of your organization's submission to this committee back in 2018, when we were first reviewing Bill C-83. I note that your third request was: “The reversion of language that now recommends response options be 'least restrictive' to what was previously 'most appropriate'.”

The fact is that prior to Bill C-83 the term “least restrictive” was not in the CCRA. It was actually changed in 2012 under our Conservative government, under the Safe Streets and Communities Act, where we removed the term “least restrictive” and replaced it with the “most appropriate or the necessary restrictions”.

I find the report, the review report, that CSC released over the summer in response to the Bernardo transfer very interesting. It's very interesting to me because it says Millhaven Institution developed “a plan for institutional integration. These efforts were part of an institutional management strategy to establish cohorts...with the underlying goal of alleviating subpopulation pressures, and to provide a less restrictive environment for offenders.”

Previous to Bill C-83, was there a requirement for federal penitentiaries to have strategies to create a less restrictive environment for offenders?

[Jeff Wilkins]

In fact, there was. I know I myself was actually involved in a refusal to work situation before Bill C-83, because there were subpopulations being created with, as I iterated earlier, what would normally have been classified as segregated inmates, mostly inmates who would have been segregated for protective custody reasons.

There were areas of the institution, specific ranges, that were associated with different movement routines, so they couldn't associate with the general population.

The CSC was, in fact, then housing inmates in the least restrictive manner.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

I find it interesting, because it seems to be as a direct result of this review that Millhaven Institution implemented this strategy to achieve a less restrictive environment for offenders that led to the reversal of the decision back in June 2022, which had previously said that Mr. Bernardo had not integrated and that there was a risk to him in the prison. However, because of this strategy to achieve a less restrictive environment—and those are their exact words, “less restrictive environment”—he was then able to integrate and thus was able to be reclassified under a medium-security classification.

I also find it interesting that during that time there was a meeting with the Office of the Correctional Investigator, and the Office of the Correctional Investigator seemed to have some sort of intervention between July 2022 and November 2022, when the actual decision on the reclassification was made. It seems that the Office of the Correctional Investigator was working to try to speed up the process to achieve this reclassification.

Is that something you think happened that you have noticed happening often in our institutions?

[Jeff Wilkins]

No. I have not.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

Is it somewhat unprecedented that the Office of the Correctional Investigator would intervene to try to speed up a reclassification process?

[Jeff Wilkins]

It's strange to me. I can't say I have heard that in my 21-year career as a correctional officer.

I understand that the correctional investigator might be a witness on this panel. I think it would be a good question suited for that gentleman, but no.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

Do you think it's somewhat unprecedented that the Correctional Service of Canada, after making a decision in June 2022, would so rapidly change its decision just four months later, in November? Is that something you think is precedented?

[Jeff Wilkins]

I wouldn't say it's precedented. As I mentioned before, I think this particular inmate is a bit unprecedented in the way that he has been handled throughout the system and throughout his incarceration, to be honest. We don't have many inmates who mirror that exactly, so it's hard to—

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB]

He is certainly a specific inmate, and I find it absolutely stunning that the Correctional Service of Canada would change its decision so rapidly for this particular inmate. I think it is quite unprecedented for this to happen for an inmate of his notoriety, and it's something that I'm very curious about. I hope this committee can delve deeper into that and the reasons that happened.

Thank you. I think that's my time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Heath MacDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Lloyd.

Now we'll move to Ms. O'Connell, please, for five minutes.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Let me correct the record once again. I am going to quote to deal with the misinformation Mr. Lloyd just put on the record. A Globe and Mail article stated:

However, a spokesperson for Public Safety Canada says Bernardo's transfer would have happened under the previous wording of the law, which was brought in by the former Conservative government of Stephen Harper.

That version of the law stipulated that prisoners should be kept in prisons with the “necessary” restrictions. When the law was originally created by former Progressive Conservative prime minister Brian Mulroney in the early 1990s, it used the term “least restrictive”.

“The result of this transfer was not affected by the passage of Bill C-83. A transfer would have also occurred under the previous language of 'necessary' restrictions,” said Public Safety spokesperson....

Mr. Chair, while the members opposite giggled and talked through that, I see why, because they want to act tough on crime but actually don't have the facts to back it up. It was actually two Conservative governments that had the language “least restrictive” and “necessary”, which would still have allowed for this particular transfer.

If we're going to talk about how to make changes to create safer public safety conditions in corrections, then we should at least be dealing with facts, not the fiction created by the Conservatives. Let them giggle, because they haven't had a great outing here today.

My last question I want to actually put forward to Mr. Sandelli.

In your opening remarks you spoke about programming and some of the programming work your members do. Thank you for that, because I'm sure it is incredibly difficult and a weight that is felt by you and your members. This study is looking at all prisoner classification and transfers, not just one individual. In lots of those instances, there may come a day when even dangerous offenders have served their time, based on a court decision, and have to then be released into the public.

How would you feel, from a public safety perspective, if an offender who had served their time went from maximum security, with no programming and no rehabilitation, directly into the community? Do you think that would make our communities safer?