Public Safety committee  We'll provide numbers for you.

Public Safety committee  Again, I am not a specialist on methadone. Some people on methadone will phase it out and won't need methadone any more. I guess that is the purpose and the target. But there are people who will have to stay on methadone for a long period of time. It depends on the importance of their addiction and on the personal resources they have.

Public Safety committee  It's not only a matter of security; it is also a matter of health care. When you take methadone, you have to stay under supervision for a certain period of time just to make sure that you are okay. So we can meet both purposes. It's a matter of security and health.

Public Safety committee  We don't have numbers about this now. It's a good question. We'll have to get back to you. We are using methadone as a treatment, and it's working, and it's helping a lot of people stay away from substance abuse.

Public Safety committee  You're right. From a clinical point of view, sometimes we need to be left alone, because there is what we call therapeutic heat, there is too much intervention; it's well documented in the research, and sometimes they need to be left alone. But it needs to be part of a plan, meaning that this is what the inmate with mental health issues will try to do before he asks to be voluntarily placed in his own cell with his stuff.

Public Safety committee  Yes, it's pan-Canadian, with the same objectives.

Public Safety committee  That's one of the effects we want to see. In fact, it's an objective. It's one of the direct effects that correctional officers can see: less use of force and less confinement in administrative segregation for those people. That's one of the preventive effects that we can see in short order.

Public Safety committee  We know about the efficacy, but I thought you were talking about provoking the counter-effect.

Public Safety committee  We can't answer that question in five minutes. From the moment someone is no longer capable of consenting to treatment, is no longer right in his mind and cannot consent to treatment, the provincial act applies. At that point the doctors, psychiatrists and psychologists have other professional duties.

Public Safety committee  The Institutional Mental Health Initiative is two years old. It's a gradual decline.

Public Safety committee  That is indeed one of the expected results. There are many others, such as adherence to treatment, better understanding of the illness, better symptom management and so on. The fact that individuals are no longer confined in administrative segregation because they have mental health problems is definitely one of the desired objectives.

Public Safety committee  It's a pan-Canadian trend to seek refuge in administrative segregation in order to manage one's symptoms and go unnoticed so that people leave you alone.

Public Safety committee  I will have to get back to you on this. Sorry, I don't have that kind of information.

Public Safety committee  Your question is very complex. You just mentioned the SHU. Currently, there are 20 offenders in administrative segregation at the Special Handling Unit and two of them have mental health problems. Segregation, the removal of stimulation, is a significant contextual variable which can contribute to the disorganization of certain individuals who have mental health needs.

Public Safety committee  In Quebec we are in a much better position than the rest of Canada in terms of recruiting nurses, mental health nurses, psychologists, psycho-educators, and the mental health specialties we need. It is very hard to recruit people for Port-Cartier, which is a maximum institution.