Public Safety committee  We support the definition that NWAC has proposed. We are very opposed to the definition that exists in the proposed legislation. For example, based on the definition that's here, Thunder Woman Healing Lodge would not be able to open because it's not clear who authorizes an urban

Public Safety committee  If I might add to that, the other thing is that it's not just Gladue reports. CSC—

Public Safety committee  Right, but CSC takes an aboriginal social history of people when they come in and they use it in a risk assessment mode. That's the problem. The Supreme Court of Canada in Ewert said that “relative to non-Indigenous offenders, Indigenous offenders are more likely to receive hig

Public Safety committee  I'll try again, thank you.

Public Safety committee  Again, thank you for the invitation to be here. I don't want to spend too much time talking about Aboriginal Legal Services, but I do need to say that our spirit name is Gaa kinagwii waabamaa debwewin, which in Anishinaabemowin means “All those who seek the truth”. We have oft

Public Safety committee  Thank you very much. Aboriginal Legal Services appreciates the opportunity to speak to the public safety committee today on Bill C-83—

Justice committee  We know that indigenous people are under-represented on juries. They don't appear on juries for lots of reasons, but one reason is that when they show up for a trial they would like to be involved in, they're kicked out because they're indigenous. We know that not just because of

Justice committee  If you've ever watched people use peremptories.... I've seen them used to kick every black person off a jury. The Crown will say no to a black person. What you can never do is kick white people off a jury. You can't do that because there are too many of them, but you can kick off

Justice committee  Kent Roach is going to be talking about this a lot. The jury pool issue is often provincial, so it's the rules in each province that often lead to this problem. In Ontario the problem was that to be on the jury, you have to be on the municipal assessment rolls. First nations pe

Justice committee  We certainly share those concerns about routine evidence. If you can cross-examine officers, lots of information comes out that you won't necessarily be able to get at in the routine evidence process: Why did you choose to stop this person? Why did you search this person, etc.?

Justice committee  That's exactly right. In the last panel, you heard from Ms. Deshman. For many indigenous women, just getting bail is a challenge. Think about it. You have a prior record for something else. You're charged with an offence. You're charged with assault, along with your partner. Yo

Justice committee  I don't think you need the provision. There are already provisions. The secondary ground is whether the person is a danger to an individual or to the community at large. If someone has a prior conviction for domestic violence, then the Crown can say that they oppose the person's

Justice committee  That certainly would be something we could support. The advantage of that approach is that because they're written reasons, there would be appellate review. That, in fact, is the standard that judges are using when they are striking down mandatory minimums now. The difficulty we

Justice committee  We can't wait. This is the thing; we have clients every day who are facing mandatory minimums who shouldn't be going to jail. How long do we wait?

Justice committee  There are two points. One of the things we know is that there's a huge use of unnecessary bail conditions. One of the most prevalent is the condition that prohibits someone who is an alcoholic from drinking. As Ms. Deshman said, people will say anything to get out of jail. Th