Public Safety committee  If you don't mind, Mr. Chair, I'll try to clarify some of those numbers. The minister's comments were in the right zone; I just want to make sure that the context was clear. I'll talk about the urinalysis testing first. The minister was talking about the testing we do. On a monthly basis we random test in the institutions 10% of the population.

Public Safety committee  It could be any nationally recognized program. What will happen, as I mentioned earlier, is that every offender who comes through our door right at the time of admission has a correctional plan. That correctional plan, based on a number of evidence-based assessment tools, will determine what programs the offender needs to address both in the institution and in the community.

Public Safety committee  There's always the debate around incentives and disincentives and what works or what doesn't work. When I look over the last five years, in terms of the kinds of measures we've put in place coupled with the treatment programs, and particularly offenders who are going out into the community and who have conditions to abstain from the use of substances, the number of individuals who are violating that condition is being reduced.

Public Safety committee  Yes. If you don't mind, I'll actually go back in time. This coming week it will be 37 years ago that I first started working in a penitentiary. In those days when I started as a correctional officer the kinds of tools that were available to us were pretty limited. It was basically our good sense, our good nose and observation skills.

Public Safety committee  What we see particularly with individuals who come into the federal system is that they've gone through the provincial system a number of times before they end up coming our way. Given that our provincial and territorial colleagues, unfortunately, do not have the same suite of programs that we have available, offenders are at first reluctant to become involved in programming.

Public Safety committee  Thank you, Minister. We do have waiting lists for various programs. We prioritize the offenders' participation in programs depending on their eligibility dates for potentially day parole, full parole, and statutory release. Ideally those who have a release coming sooner than somebody else will be at the top of the waiting list or already in programs.

Public Safety committee  We offer intensity levels in our programs. A high intensity level program can be as long as 12 weeks. A moderate intensity program is from 8 to 10 weeks. In addition to that initial program we have maintenance programs. One of the things we're always concerned about is that we could give offenders a program early in their sentence while they're still incarcerated.

Public Safety committee  We've put in place a series of initiatives to address the recommendations of the Correctional Investigator as brought forward. A lot of that has been focused on responding to the needs of self-harming women. That's where a lot of our time, energy, and reallocated resources have gone.

Public Safety committee  We have in place a series of approaches to deal with aging offenders. As you can appreciate, individuals who stay with us for long periods of time, who are as old as I am or older, come with a significant number of health care issues. One of the challenges for us is around palliative care and dealing with individuals who end up passing away in custody.

Public Safety committee  Thank you for the question. As of today, the incarcerated population is 14,983 offenders in 43 penitentiaries. When we talk about those significant overestimates that were done back in early 2008 based on 2005 data, the estimates had put projections up to 18,000 inmates. Those have not materialized at all.

Justice committee  As an organization, we're going to be proactive in that regard. Currently, we have just over 7,700 registered victims in relation to about 4,000 offenders. Through our victim service officers, we have been advising them of the opportunities for victim-offender mediation for restorative justice opportunities.

Justice committee  Sure. Thank you. I have just a couple of points to add. We have victims who come into our institutions now to attend parole board hearings. One of the things we're very conscious of is their safety and security while they're in the institution. We have a good track record around providing physical protection for victims but also of providing emotional support for them as well.

Public Safety committee  It is yes, and if we get another opportunity I'd be glad to give you some of those details.

Public Safety committee  Thank you for the question. I think there's some really good information to share. As was pointed out, the farms were closed and our research did not suggest that it was providing any significant changes in terms of issues around recidivism. One of the things we have been pursuing is looking at how we modernize our overall program delivery infrastructure, as well as how we deal with the employment skills of offenders.

Public Safety committee  Thanks again for the question. We've been monitoring the whole issue of double-bunking very closely, particularly as it relates to both the modest increase in the population and the impact as a result of us closing three facilities: Kingston Penitentiary, the Regional Treatment Centre, and the Leclerc Institution in the Laval area.