Public Safety committee  Thank you.

Public Safety committee  Just to address a point at the end there, I should say that it's not that our staff are not interacting with the offenders.

Public Safety committee  A high-risk offender will be met with frequently by a parole officer in the community. Somebody who is on statutory release with residency will be living in a halfway house, so they'll be interacting constantly with our staff. That interaction is going on all the time. I think what you raise is a really important empirical question.

Public Safety committee  It's hard to get a handle on what the cost-benefit ratio is for electronic monitoring, because the full cost-benefit analyses haven't been done. The federal government receives 3:1 benefit from correctional programs that we offer in our correctional institutions. That's a result from a study that was done by the Conference Board of Canada for us, looking at our core correctional programs.

Public Safety committee  It would help them by ensuring they know exactly where the offender is or was at a particular time. The system that was tested in the pilot study was a GPS, so we had the ability in real time to know exactly where the offender was. For example, if they, as a result of a condition, were required to remain at their house and the GPS monitoring showed the person leaving that location and going somewhere else, we would know immediately and would be able either to use a parole officer or, if it was a very high risk situation, to contact the police to intervene.

Public Safety committee  There is that possibility, although most of the time when electronic monitoring is used, it actually gives the offender a greater opportunity to be with his family, so the trade-off in most cases—not all, but in most cases—is an option of being in prison or of being out a little bit earlier and being with your family.

Public Safety committee  Well, that was the problem. The combination of the two produced a reduction. What they were unable to do, and what other studies have been unable to do, was separate those two pieces in the same study and say whether it was the electronic monitoring or the programming that resulted in the effect.

Public Safety committee  If electronic monitoring were implemented, our department would be involved in conducting research and evaluation studies to determine its effectiveness.

Public Safety committee  Well, I think Bill C-10 authorizes us to use it. It doesn't give us direction on how much to use it.

Public Safety committee  That will be a direction that will come after the legislation permits it.

Public Safety committee  The research we have doesn't indicate that it adds to the rehabilitative component of our interventions. It does ensure compliance with a curfew or with a location requirement, but there's no evidence to show that it will add to the rehabilitative component of our work.

Public Safety committee  Unfortunately, that's the normal response from a researcher, but that's where we are today. If you look at the conclusion of all the research studies that have been done, they all end up with the statement that the proper studies have not been done yet.

Public Safety committee  It's very difficult to separate the specific impact of conditional release by itself, because we don't have conditional release just by itself. We have many other things going on. When you're on conditional release, you have a parole officer. That parole officer is meeting with you and discussing what your issues are and how you can work through challenges you're facing.

Public Safety committee  If we're using correctional programs, most of them are based on cognitive behavioural treatment. That is a form of programming whereby you work with the offenders to try to change the way they think about issues in their lives and their approach to life. You try to teach skills for planning and avoiding high-risk situations.

Public Safety committee  In fact--