Mr. Speaker, that was an excellent question from my colleague.
Many of our citizens are not aware that the government is actually closing prison farms. People who are incarcerated had a chance to work on this farms to develop skills sets, to develop discipline and structure that they may not have had before. By closing these farms the government is preventing people who are incarcerated from building the skills they need. When these people get out, and they will get out as we know, it prevents them from reintegrating into society.
It is unfathomable and incomprehensible that the government would close down these farms and take away the opportunity for those who are in jail to build new skills. The government has never given any justification whatsoever as to why it is closing the farms. It needs to explain to the Canadian public and the House why it is doing this.
I want to refer to the evidence regarding what the Perry pre-school study 40-year retrospective analysis showed. The crime statistics show real differences. Compared with the control group, fewer pre-schoolers, the ones who were involved in the Perry pre-school program, have gone on to be arrested. Fewer of them have gone on to be arrested for violent crimes, drug-related crimes or property crimes. About half as many have been sentenced to prison or jail. Pre-school also seems to have affected their decisions about family life. More of the males are married. Many of them raise their own children. These men report fewer complaints about their health and are less likely to use drugs.
These are all objectives congruent with what the government wants to do. Why on earth is it standing in the way of these programs that have proven to accomplish that which the government claims it is interested in, and certainly our society and our citizens are interested in?