Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present my thoughts on Bill C-12 today.
The first comment I would like to make about the bill is about its title. The Conservative members have said that they find the title funny. I do not find it funny at all. I think it is misleading.
When the title of a bill states that it will eliminate drugs in prisons, but no part of the bill actually comes up with ways to do that, not only is it misleading, it seems deceitful. I do not find it at all funny when the Conservatives introduce bills that do not fulfill their stated objectives and that, furthermore, will have a negative impact on the public safety of Canadians.
I would like to talk about the objective of the bill before us today. It makes an existing practice official. Currently, an offender who is found, by means of a blood test, to have taken drugs will not be granted parole. That practice already exists; this bill makes it official.
If the title of the bill talked about regulating a situation that already exists and respecting Correctional Service officers by giving them the tools they have been asking for, that would show good faith. This bill says one thing and does the exact opposite. We find it very hard to support a bill that does not respect its own objectives.
This bill's scope is so limited that the opposition will have a hard time not sending it to committee. This bill does so little that the Conservatives need to ask themselves if they really think they can eliminate drugs from prisons. They could do a lot better than slashing $295 million from the budget of Correctional Service of Canada. This measure will not help control harmful situations in prisons; on the contrary. It will make an already bad situation worse.
Parole has an objective. When an inmate is released, the number one priority is monitoring him in order to protect the public. As for the number two priority, the public security department in Quebec says that parole is aimed at rehabilitation. Specifically, the objective is as follows:
Parole release enables offenders to pursue the steps begun during detention to resolve problems that contributed to their encounters with the criminal justice system.
The objective of parole is not only to ensure public safety, but also to help the individual reintegrate into society as a good, law-abiding citizen who also respects his fellow citizens.
Today, as people are well aware, most inmates enter the correctional system with some sort of substance abuse problem. In fact, 80% of inmates have a history of substance abuse. This statistic is very troubling.