Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Legal and Constitutional Affairs
Issue 9 - Evidence for February 21, 2008 - Afternoon meeting
OTTAWA, Thursday, February 21, 2008
The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, to which was referred Bill C-2, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and to make consequential amendments to other Acts, met this day at 2:02 p.m. to give consideration to the bill.
Senator Joan Fraser (Chair) is in the chair.
[Translation]
The Chair: Honorable senators, the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs continues his study of Bill C-2, an Act to amend the Criminal Code and to make consequential amendments to other Acts.
We will hear this afternoon witnesses from the Correctional Service of Canada and from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
[English]
From Correctional Service Canada we welcome Mr. Ross Toller, Assistant Commissioner, Correctional Operations and Programs; and Mr. Ian McCowan, Assistant Commissioner, Policy and Research. From the RCMP we have Chief Superintendent D.C. Doug Reti, Director General, National Aboriginal Policing Services.
Ian McCowan, Assistant Commissioner, Policy and Research, Correctional Service Canada: We have a brief opening statement, which I believe has been distributed to the committee. It basically talks about CSC's current situation and the impact of Bill C-2.
CSC is responsible for offenders who have been sentenced for a term of two or more years, along with offenders who are under long-term supervision orders or LTSOs. Our core contribution to public safety is achieved through the safe and secure custody of inmates; through the provision of programs and other interventions to assist inmates to reintegrate safely into the community; and by supervising offenders once they have been conditionally released.
CSC is a large organization with 58 institutions, 16 community correctional centres and 71 parole offices. They operate 24-7. On any given day, there are 21,000 offenders under our care 12,700 of whom are incarcerated and 8,400 are in the community. We have a staff complement of about 14,500 employees and an annual budget of $1.9 billion.
The work of our front-line staff is important but challenging. One of our challenges is the changing offender population. Over the last 10 years, upon admission, we have seen a change in the population. There are an increasing number of offenders who have a number of characteristics. I will give you a short list of those characteristics.
We have seen offenders who have more previous youth and adult convictions. Right now it is nine out of ten offenders who fall into that category. With respect to more extensive histories of violence and violent offences, one in four offenders are serving time for homicide. More offenders have affiliations with gangs and organized crime; this has increased about 33 per cent in the last 10 years. We have more offenders with serious substance abuse histories and problems; they represent four out of five offenders. We have an increasing overrepresentation of Aboriginal offenders, with about 19 per cent of our institutional population of Aboriginal ancestry, while less than 3 per cent of the Canadian population is Aboriginal.
Finally, and significantly, there is an increase in offenders with serious mental health disorders, namely, 12 per cent of the men and 26 per cent of the women. On that front, I would note that the Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology recognized that CSC faces some serious challenges in this area in its report Out of the Shadows at Last. We look forward to working with the newly established Canadian Mental Health Commission in this regard.
I will now turn to the impacts of Bill C-2. With regard to any proposed legislative changes, CSC works closely with other government departments, such as Justice Canada, to assess the likely impacts including costs. With respect to Bill C-2, only two components have costing implications for the Correctional Service of Canada: the mandatory minimum penalty proposal for firearms and the proposed amendments to the dangerous offender provisions.
In November of 2006, Minister Toews provided costing implications of the mandatory minimum penalty provisions in Bill C-10, as it was then known. I believe you all have the numbers before you, but, in summary, after five years, CSC would see an increase of 270 offenders. This would require an additional $245 million over five years with approximately $37.5-million costs after that.
With respect to the dangerous offender proposal, Minister Toews reported there would be approximately 35 more DO applications per year. Obviously, applications do not automatically become DO destinations, so the number of actual designations would be smaller than 35. We are talking about costs that would be significantly less than the MMP sum I just indicated.
The specific numbers in terms of the costing of the dangerous offender LTSO piece have not been made public. They are still considered a cabinet confidence. I am not able to provide more detail other than what I have just indicated in terms of things that have been made public.
As you are aware, the sections of the bill dealing with both MMPs and dangerous offenders were modified somewhat from the time Minister Toews spoke about them. For example, in the case of the MMPs, it has been narrowed, so the cost impact to the Correctional Service of Canada will be slightly reduced.
CSC only begins to work with the Treasury Board in terms of accessing additional funding once the bill is proclaimed. If there have to be costing adjustments in terms of reflecting those changes, those will be done once the legislation is finally approved.
The bottom line of everything that I have just said is that I can confirm to the committee that the monies have been allocated through the government process to address the issue of an increase in the federal offender population should either of these provisions become law. Beyond that, those are the basics of our opening remarks. Mr. Toller and I are happy to entertain any questions you may have on any of that or anything else.
Chief Superintendent D.C. (Doug) Reti, Director General, National Aboriginal Policing Services, Royal Canadian Mounted Police: I must apologize; I do not have any opening comments. This is my first time before a committee like this.
I was a bit anxious when I was told on Tuesday about appearing before you, but since I have been in this room, seeing it is an Aboriginal room, it gives me a certain level of comfort. It was certainly good to see when I came in.
As I said, I first learned of appearing before this committee on Tuesday. It was not completely clear what you wanted to know about, but I certainly respect the good work you are doing. Any time I have an opportunity to talk about Aboriginal policing and my experience, I like to take advantage of that opportunity.
I should point out that I do not have the exclusive or right answer about Aboriginal policing. I like to think that I have learned something over the last 24 years of working with Aboriginal communities. I have moved 11 different times over those 24 years to 11 different communities. I have served in two territories and three provinces. I like to think that I learned something during that time. I hope that I will be able to share some of that knowledge with you and provide any assistance that you need in bringing some clarity to what exists in our Aboriginal communities.
Senator Stratton: Mr. Reti, could you describe your job to this committee. It is rather interesting to hear that you have been working in the Aboriginal community for such a length of time. I have been on many reserves in the North, and I would like you to give us an overview of your job and where you think the future lies with respect to those communities in particular.
Mr. Reti: My job today is more working at policy and strategic levels in terms of moving the organization towards one of its key strategic priorities, which is service to Aboriginal communities; more specifically, safe and healthy Aboriginal communities.
My entire career has been spent working at the front line with First Nations Inuit communities. Most recently, I was the officer in charge of the Wetaskiwin-Hobbema detachment. That community had a number of challenges and even though it is in one of the most prosperous provinces in Canada, the people in that community do not seem to have a place in that prosperity.
One of our biggest challenges — and I think it is indicative of what we see throughout the country — is some of the youth cohort. As you know, Aboriginal people are overrepresented in the justice system. As far as our youth are concerned, it is the fastest growing population. It is a population that, in many ways, due to a loss of culture, language and identity, is trying to find its way and place.
You talk about some of the challenges. I feel, as an Aboriginal person, that one of our biggest challenges right now, is a growing population that feels marginalized to a certain degree and is trying to find its place in society. In many ways we are at a crossroads. Either we help this cohort find its place, or it will find its place on its own. It will find its place and represent itself in the type of things we see in Western Canada in terms of gang activity and some of the things my colleagues have mentioned.
I started a community response unit when I was in Hobbema. It was a 10-person unit specifically focused on violence in whatever form it came. In that specific community our members dealt with 291 Criminal Code files per member. The national average was around 60 at that time. It gives you context of how busy they were.
With respect to this community response unit, I challenged them to look at different alternatives other than the jail system. Many of the youth we were dealing with, if they were not gang members going into jail, they certainly were coming out. We had some real issues in Hobbema. We had drive-by shootings on a weekly basis and so forth.
The youth cohort, from my perspective, is our biggest challenge. They feel marginalized in a number of different ways. They do not know what their place is in society and they do not feel they are a meaningful part of the Canadian fabric. I think we have to reach out to them and find alternatives.
We started a community cadet corps, and we had upwards of 900 youth who registered from that community. People asked, ``What did you do?'' We did nothing. They were looking for some structure and identity in their lives, and this happened to be one alternative they could reach out to. It was something they could take pride in.
I tell the story of a number of our members who answered a call at a house one day. They went in, and there were a number of children in the house. It was in chaos and it was a mess. The members asked, ``Why are you not in school?'' They said, ``Mom wanted us to clean the house.'' The members told the children they had to get to school, and they helped the children clean the house. While in the house, they looked in one of the closets. In this environment of chaos, the one place that had some order to it was this closet in which one young boy in the residence kept his cadet corps uniform folded with his boots on top. That was the only place of order.
These kids are looking for something other than what exists in some of these communities. You asked me what the challenges are. That is probably the number one challenge.
Senator Stratton: I have always felt, during my journeys to these places, the isolation of those communities. The isolated Northern communities particularly were a detriment to the potential of youth. I first experienced that in the late 1970s, and I really do not think it has changed much today.
I have racked my brain, and I am sure others far more experienced than I have done the same, trying to figure out how we resolve the future education and potential of those young kids when they are so isolated. It really bothers me, that there is nothing for them. At first blush, when you look at the youth in these areas, your heart goes out to them because that is their future, the future of the country.
Do you think there is any potential, or how do you overcome what I consider to be a very fundamental problem in these Northern communities, which is simply isolation with no real economic driving force?
Mr. Reti: I do not know what the answer is. I joined from the community of Old Crow, which was an isolated community in Northern Yukon. I have quite frequently had this discussion with a number of colleagues, both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal.
I had worked in Nunavut for three years, where they have some of the highest rates of youth suicide, to a point where we have had to draw members out of the communities just to get relief from having to attend those different types of occurrences.
One of the single differences I find is that in some of these communities, there is not a tremendous amount of hope. All of their investment is perhaps in a relationship to the community because there is not much else to look forward to.
It was interesting. When we talked about suicide, people often think that these suicides come along with drug or alcohol abuse. The reality is we were finding a break-down in relationship, and often it was not a single thing that caused it but it was the single thing that they had hope in that community.
I listened to a conversation my daughter was having. She came with us to all these different communities in the North and so forth. Just the nature of the conversation with her friends in these isolated communities in the North was very different than they were when we eventually moved down to Ottawa. This is my second time here, by the way. I was here in Aboriginal policing and national recruiting before.
The conversation was very different. In the North, it was what she was going to do on the weekend and that evening and so forth. When we came down here and her friends had discussions, it was about what they were going to do when they went to university and what they were going to do after that.
The only thing I can come back to is some of these communities do not offer much in terms of a sense of hope. Where am I going beyond high school? What do I have to aspire to?
When you have communities riddled with gang activity and so forth, what do you aspire to? You aspire to be a gang member or whatnot. It ends up perpetuating itself. Why would a young person not join a gang, really? It gives them that sense of identity and security, all the things a young person is looking for.
If you ask me what would be the answer, I cannot tell you what the single answer would be. I have followed this process with our communities. When I go to a community, I never focus on the solution. I focus on the process of getting there. We need to be able to engage communities. They need to take ownership over those different issues in their communities. So often people come from the outside and tell us about what is good for the communities. So often those answers lie within those communities. We do not give them the opportunity to come out. I sincerely believe that those answers are there.
From my perspective, in terms of hope for the Aboriginal community, I believe that is there. When I see the young people, I see some of the dysfunction; I also see the positive side. Many more Aboriginal youth are going to university are looking at their schooling and are involved in different types of activities and so forth. There is also that positive side. It is not all negative.
Senator Stratton: I appreciate that. I was hoping to hear that in the end because I guess the future, really, is through education.
Senator Merchant: Welcome to the guests at table, and I would like to welcome Constable Moran who comes from Meadow Lake. We are happy to have you. Constable Moran is a policy program analyst here in Ottawa right now.
I have a very specific question. I would like to ask Mr. Reti about this because he is Aboriginal and has worked with his people. What is the impact of the dangerous offender designation on the Aboriginal population? I think the numbers for Saskatchewan are devastating. The national admission number of Aboriginal people is 21 per cent. In Saskatchewan — I am talking about 2003-04, but I think it is constant — 80 per cent of those admitted to adult provincial institutions were Aboriginal; 58 per cent of Aboriginal people reoffend within four years with approximately one half of readmissions within the first year.
How will the changes in Bill C-2 bear on being just and fair to the Aboriginal people? Could you deal with our parole and obtaining pardons for dangerous offenders?
Mr. Reti: I am not entirely familiar with the dangerous offender legislation. I have read some of it, so I do have a bit of an overview of what it will look like. At first blush, as a police officer, it looks like a solid approach. Enforcement and jail has its place in society; it certainly does. In many ways it protects the community.
As an Aboriginal person, I do have concerns over things that are done to perhaps once again disadvantage an already disadvantaged group of people. That is always a concern.
Legislation is only one element. The enforcement thereof is only one element of a police response or approach. Just as important is early intervention and early identification. As police officers always talk about, when a kid turns 12 years and you end up charging him, sometimes it is too late by that point. I do not say it is too late, but we often talk about once they have reached that level, where they are involved with the police, it has obviously taken that step where there must be intervention.
There are a number of strategies from education, awareness, early invention and diversion. For those at a higher risk, then legislation and enforcement is important. There is no single answer. It is not to say it will not work. It is not to say it will either. It must come along. It is a system that must work in concert with other things because there is no single thing to address those different issues.
I challenge our members to look at alternatives to jail systems, such as intervention and engaging the community. What can we do with this offender? I know CSC looks frequently at different types of approaches once they are in the system. Pê Sâkâstêw in Hobbema was an example where offenders were brought back and reconnected with their background, reconnected with spirituality and so forth. There are some values there. I always look at CSC. In many ways they promoted or brokered spirituality in many of our communities and brought it back. I went down to Pê Sâkâstêw quite frequently, and there is some excellent programming in some of those facilities. There is no single approach that does or does not work. It is an array, and it is a coordinated approach.
Senator Merchant: I appreciate your answer. I agree with many of the things you have said, but once they have the dangerous offender destination, I think this weighs heavily on First Nations Aboriginal people. Parole is a discretionary matter, and so for a dangerous offender, it is very difficult to get parole. If you want to get a pardon, you get a pardon when you have finished your sentence; but when you are a dangerous offender, your sentence is never really finished.
In order to get a pardon, you must have some money. You have to get specialists to vouch for you. The reverse onus in this bill is a barrier. I would like someone to tell us how this bill will make it more difficult for Aboriginal people to deal with the system. To give them some hope. If you are a dangerous offender, you have no hope.
Ross Toller, Assistant Commissioner, Correctional Operations and Programs, Correctional Service Canada: I will take a few minutes and provide a little context from where we sit in the criminal justice system. As has been noted here, we are the recipients of people who come to us. On average, there are 20-25, dangerous offenders who come into our system each year. Parole eligibility date is at seven years.
Let us focus on the Aboriginal perspective you are looking at here. You may or may not be aware that the population coming to us, from an Aboriginal perspective, has much more violent crimes served by that particular group.
The crime rates on reserve are generally about three times higher than non-reserve. Spousal violence, as was mentioned here, is about three and a half times higher. The Aboriginal rate of homicide, cases under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs, is significantly higher, close to 10 times. As to the young offenders, they tend to be prone to different types of criminal activity; it is about 50 per cent in that group versus 39 per cent for non-Aboriginal. Violent crime in the Aboriginal group is around 81 per cent; non-Aboriginal, 67 per cent. The women Aboriginal group, by way of example, is 76 per cent, with close to 49 per cent non-Aboriginal.
The context of what we receive is an offender with much more violence and some more of the factors that were mentioned by Mr. McCowan in terms of gang affiliation. Generally, those Aboriginal inmates that come to us have about a 27 per cent gang affiliation when they arrive versus 13 per cent for non-Aboriginal.
What do we do from our end of the correctional spectrum? We operate with an individual intake assessment. We look at the crime that has occurred. We look at mitigating or aggravating factors in terms of management of these people in our system.
In many ways we are proud that we actually consider a number of factors specific to Aboriginals that are worth mentioning here. In the context of mitigating factors, we look at the history of residential schools: Are there any residential school considerations that need to be considered as mitigating or aggravating factors? What are the unemployment factors that may be there due to a lack of access to employment opportunities?
We consider the lack or, even in some cases, the irrelevance of education — as you know, in our traditional society we put a strong focus on education. In some of the northern communities, formal education is not seen as important as the traditional education. Is there a history of discrimination, any restorative sanctions that may have occurred on various reserves or communities? Is there a history of any paths that have been taken in Aboriginal teachings in the past from the elders, and any history of living on or off the reserve?
At the front end, we look at our Aboriginal people coming into the correctional system from a different perspective from our traditional non-Aboriginal people. From there we work in a number of significant areas. I will speak more, if time permits, about one of the healing lodges. Some of the areas we have moved on to address this issue involve the elders. We look at the utilization of elders in guidance and leadership, even in the correctional planning, for those who are interested in following a traditional path. Even at intake, if an Aboriginal inmate comes into our system we will engage elders for their advice, guidance and wisdom in terms of how to best manage these offenders. We now have Aboriginal liaison officers in the community. These are people out there working with the community, looking at unique needs and histories of inmates, both in the institution and in the community, so that their issues are understood and we can meet these challenges.
We have Aboriginal correctional program officers who are people of Aboriginal origin who deliver culturally appropriate types of programs. Obviously, for us that is a significant issue. ``Pathways'' is a terminology given to the management of specific units in our medium-security facilities. We have three of those in which inmates have chosen to follow a traditional path. If you walked into one of our penitentiaries, you would find this unit significantly different from a mainstream unit, with elders involved directly in smudging ceremonies and spiritual ceremonies. As Mr. Reti pointed out, the healing lodge is one. There are others, one specific to women. Again, it is to look at an Aboriginal environment specific to addressing cultural needs.
I want to make the point that after the criminal justice system, there are many avenues to address during the incarceration phase.
Senator Di Nino: Is there a significant difference between Aboriginals who come from a city or a community environment and those who come from the reservations?
Mr. Toller: Yes, I can offer a quick comment. I have to generalize here, but in some circumstances, we find that those who come from reserves have not been actively involved in cultural or spiritual processes. However, we often find that in those cases with elders' intervention there comes an interest and in some cases we have found success. I mentioned the healing lodges. We have research that shows strong success with those people involved in that environment, along with the Pathways unit that I mentioned.
We branch out into the urban communities as well. There is a dichotomy resulting from those who wish to leave the reserve and go to the urban environment. We involve ourselves actively with the urban communities to address Aboriginal issues. Normally, inside we find that where they come from becomes secondary to the response to the path they wish to follow; in other words, an interest to go into a Pathways unit.
Senator Di Nino: On any given day, there are 21,000 offenders, 8,400 of whom are in the community. What do you mean by ``in the community?'' Are these people on parole?
Mr. Toller: Yes, parole under a number of variations, day parole, a full parole or a statutory release. It could be a long-term supervision order in the community. To clarify, that means that while in the community they remain under sentence with a certain set of conditions.
Senator Di Nino: Although I am convinced that we need Bill C-2 to make our streets safer, one of the main responsibilities of our community when we incarcerate people is the area of making these folks productive members of the community.
I would like you to tell me about behavioural intervention, educational or vocational training, sex offender treatment and drug and alcohol treatment. What programs do we have to teach the inmates a trade or to give them an opportunity for employment in the community when we release them?
Mr. Toller: Madam Chair, I promise I will be quick. This is another hour answer.
Senator Di Nino: Just give me three minutes.
The Chair: Obviously, we are interested in the details; equally obviously, we are time-limited, so it might be worthwhile recalling that it is possible for you to say, ``Here are the five main points and then I will send you data on the 18 others.''
Senator Di Nino: Are we doing a job there, and if so, are we doing a good job? Do we have enough resources? Do we make a point of ensuring that we reintegrate these inmates into the community as soon as we can, with the best possible results?
Mr. Toller: Yes, we do target criminogenic behaviour, the reasons why a person has been incarcerated. We then extrapolate that into the various programs. You have mentioned sex offender, high-intensity alcohol and substance abuse, family and spousal violence. If you need more detail, we will undertake to provide the various components of those. There is a natural transition into the community. We try to make sure that the programs have maintenance programs while in the community at different capacities.
As far as I am concerned, there are never enough resources, as we continue to target interventions. Certainly the community is exactly where the vast majority of offenders return to. In my view, the more we can work with the community that is where we get the best public safety result.
Senator Di Nino: Are the inmates required to take these programs?
Mr. Toller: They are not required. They do have the right to refuse programs, but that is, of course, translated into not following their correctional plan. The likelihood then of an inmate who has not looked to address their criminogenic behaviour obtaining parole becomes limited. We do find an increase of offenders who are unmotivated, and we look to target their motivation and to get them involved and to participate in levels of programming.
Senator Di Nino: What percentage does not participate?
Mr. Toller: It is small. I do not have the exact figure, but I would say less than 10 per cent.
Mr. McCowan: One of the challenges we are facing in terms of the population changing a little is that we have many offenders serving short sentences and many serving long sentences. One of the challenges in terms of program interventions is for those people who have short sentences and who consequently are not with us long at all. Those are people who can wait us out, for lack of a better way of describing it, because they will not be with us long, and our window for successful intervention and successful programming is narrowed. That becomes a challenge that compounds some of the other challenges that Mr. Toller spoke about.
Senator Di Nino: I would imagine that participation or lack of participation would be a consideration in parole. Is that correct?
Mr. Toller: It is very much a consideration, yes.
Senator Andreychuk: We are talking about fundamental issues regarding our police and corrections and our Aboriginal communities, which is way beyond the scope of Bill C-2. However, somewhere that dialogue has to continue, and so be it. We will try to keep it within your short mandate here.
Chief Superintendent, thank you for putting forward again that 12 years of age may be even too late when you start addressing criminal activity. I appreciate your comment that if we start providing hope and education at an early age we might not see these Aboriginal children in correction centres at 12 years of age. I agree that we should identify interrelationships and the mental health problems. We would be much better off to start this when the children are young as opposed to dealing with them when they are 15, 20 or 25 years. I think that point needs to be underscored over and over again, particularly in our Aboriginal community. Whether we are in isolated communities or not, you have identified the problems that we have to address.
Having been in the justice system myself, often those issues were beyond the criminal justice system, and so I would be looking at an Aboriginal leader and he would be looking at me and we would say we are discussing these issues. This child is committing offences. What do we do?
That gets me back to the point that I think that the Aboriginal community, on anyone's scale, is overrepresented in the criminal justice system. However, Bill C-2 is talking about violent and repeat offences. We were given statistics this morning that 90 per cent of those — I cannot remember whether it was repeat offenders or the violent offences — were sexual offences.
Do you, in your Aboriginal policing, see a variation on what the rest of the Aboriginal community is asking for concerning the repeat violent offenders?
I have been told that in Saskatchewan, Aboriginal offenders are oversubscribed in the system, but Aboriginal victims are oversubscribed, because it is either marital or community issues that hit. When it comes to this narrow band of repeat, dangerous, violent offenders, often sexual, the communities there are asking for protection and for something to be done with these people, just as I am in my own area. Therefore, is the response to isolate them from the community when they are repeat, repeat, repeat dangerous, the same answer as to the repeat, repeat dangerous anywhere in our community?
Mr. Reti: Some of our communities are suffering the effects of residential schools and what that has brought on our communities. Some of our communities, unfortunately, have seen that continue in their communities, where our own people are abusing our own people. Unfortunately, some people in our communities are not prepared or not ready to heal and as a result, they create casualties along the way. Unfortunately, in a case of pedophiles they create more casualties in the community. I have talked to my relatives about some communities where it was difficult for us to find kids who were not possibly sexually abused in the community.
It is a very serious thing in our community and there is no single answer for that problem. Sometimes the community does need relief from people who choose to victimize other people in the community because some of these young people cannot defend themselves.
The flipside is that person still has to come back to that community at some point. If they are isolated from the community, the question becomes: What is being done to reintroduce them into the community? That is just as important, the work that CSC or the provincial jail systems do while the abuser is there and what they are doing to reintegrate them back into the community, because inevitably they will have to live there.
I was at a workshop with a number of residential school survivors and we talked about that very issue. As the Truth and Reconciliation Commission comes forward, it is not just about those who were abused in the residential schools, but they will also talk about the abusers who live in their community and who create risks in the community today, and the turmoil and chaos that will create by bringing those matters forward. Some of the communities are close-knit, and the reality is that those people are our aunts and uncles and could be respected elders in our community.
I do not think people really understand sometimes how far-reaching that residential school era was in our communities and the chaos it created. Places in Saskatchewan and the western part of the country see that firsthand on a daily basis. We see the effects of re-victimization on the streets of Regina, Winnipeg and Edmonton time and time again.
I hope I answered your question.
Senator Andreychuk: You certainly did, and it is helpful. The prison population is oversubscribed by Aboriginals, but we should look for alternate rehabilitation sentencing, and we have put that in the Criminal Code, namely, to take into account the Aboriginal background of someone before we sentence that person.
My concern is that the majority of people in the courts are not violent. They are there because of other sections in the Criminal Code, and I am not saying they were not properly convicted. However, it is the chronic, repeat violent offenders that are a difficulty. Not only is it the residential schools, but it is also the idea of gangs. How they interrelate gang-to-gang is a phenomenon. I grew up in Saskatchewan next to many reserves and that was not a phenomenon then. Many of the elders tell me it seems to be a ``modern'' phenomenon. How do you attack that problem?
Mr. Reti: We are seeing it more, especially in Manitoba and, I think, somewhat in Saskatchewan. The gangs are no longer just restricted to the major centres. They are moving out into the smaller communities. I was at a community in Island Lake, Manitoba, more than 15 years ago, and the population has just about doubled. This is a community of 9,000 people, and it is a fly-in, isolated community. I remember a gang expert came up to the community, and he said, ``You have tagging in the community.'' I chuckled and said, ``There are no gangs in this community.'' Little did I know young people were going down to school and being influenced that way. The school went only to Grade 10 at that point, and then the students went south. Then they came back, and some of the young people who were sent to jail were coming back as gang members and perpetuating it in the community. Now we see it is threatened almost as governance in some of these communities. The one difference between gang activity in small communities and larger communities is it that it is so much closer to the community fabric and to the governance in those communities. When I talk to people about good governance in communities, they are not separable issues. You have to have public safety because young people do not learn, parents do not parent and leaders do not lead in an environment of chaos.
Senator Cowan: We have had some evidence before us and a number of witnesses who have expressed concern that mandatory minimum penalties would have a disproportionate effect upon Canadian Aboriginals. Those witnesses have said that the threat of a minimum sentence does not do anything to address the root causes of Aboriginal offending and will merely lead to more Aboriginal people being sent to jail for longer and longer periods of time. That particular quotation is from Jonathan Rudin of the Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto. I am sure you know him. Similar views have been expressed to us yesterday morning by Dr. Roberts, a professor of criminology at the University of Oxford and in the brief by the Canadian Bar Association.
There are two parts to my question. First, do you believe mandatory minimum sentences have a deterrent effect? Second, we have mandatory minimum sentencing now in the Criminal Code, and we are seeking to expand the scope. Have you seen and do you and anticipate that you will see a disproportionate effect on Aboriginal Canadians, and if you do, why, and if you do not, why?
Mr. Reti: We already know that Aboriginal people have more of a chance of being charged or more of a chance of going to jail. I think it is said in some communities that a young Aboriginal person has more of a chance of going to jail than graduating from high school. I guess the logical next step would be to assume that, perhaps, Aboriginal people would likely be more readily identified as dangerous offenders. Do mandatory sentences, longer sentences and so forth have an effect on Aboriginal people as a deterrent? I suppose it would act as a deterrent for some. For many others, I do not think it would matter. When you do not care about yourself, you have no self-esteem or identity; it does not matter. I do not think it would get a tremendous effect. It might with some, but with many others it would not. We have many people walking around our communities who do not care what happens to them.
To give an example, often when we look at cultivating sources and so forth, we will use leverages of charges and that type of thing. To many Aboriginal offenders, that does not matter. Having a criminal record does not matter because they still get a job in the community with a criminal record. If I have no aspirations and there are no jobs here anyway, what are the implications at the end of the day? For some, it does have an impact. For a large majority, I do not think it does.
Senator Cowan: Mr. McCowan, there are a number of minimum sentences proposed in Bill C-2 which are one-year imprisonment and that would have an impact on provincial jail populations. What discussions have you had with your provincial and territorial counterparts with respect to that expected increase?
Mr. McCowan: The short answer is if those discussions have occurred, they would have happened through the Department of Justice Canada. We would not have been involved in them directly. The focus for mandatory minimum penalties has been to look at it through our own operation.
Senator Cowan: Are you aware of any discussions?
Mr. McCowan: I am not aware of any discussions my Department of Justice colleagues have had. They may well have happened, but I am not aware of them.
Senator Cowan: Do you know of any funding transferred between governments with respect to this situation?
Mr. McCowan: It could well be, but I do not know.
Senator Cowan: Mr. Toller, when you gave evidence in November 2006 before the House of Commons committee dealing with the predecessor of this bill, you expressed concern about the lack of prison facilities, recognizing the number of Aboriginals in the system and the number of Aboriginals who live in the North or more remote communities. You expressed concern about the lack of prison facilities in those communities. You said that there was no federal capacity in Nunavut but there is an institution near Toronto that was crafted specifically to deal with Nunavut offenders. Has there been any change since you spoke in 2006? Have any facilities been constructed?
Mr. Toller: No, there have not been in Nunavut. We have developed a northern correctional framework with Nunavut government officials to look at increasing community capacity. We have identified the need for community resources. Some halfway houses returned to the community, but in terms of an actual facility, no.
Nunavut does have the Baffin Correctional Centre located in Iqaluit. We have shared a number of programs and assisted them in the development of modernizing their processes and a number of reviews to aid support to them in that particular area. However, as far as an actual facility, the answer is no.
Senator Cowan: Are there any plans for such a facility?
Mr. Toller: Not at this time, no.
Senator Oliver: We are here to study Bill C-2, and we are interested in knowing how Bill C-2 affects the Correctional Service of Canada. There are two provisions of the bill that might do that: mandatory minimum penalties for crimes involving firearms and the proposed dangerous offender provisions. In your overview you described who you are, what you do, what your payroll is, how many employees you have and so on. You looked at these two provisions and concluded that they are basically a matter of money. The information you have about how you will be funded for this new increase is still a matter of cabinet confidence, so you cannot tell us those figures. However, you concluded by saying that money has been advanced.
As I understand it, in Budget 2007, $102 million was provided to you over two years so that you could begin to address some of the requirements that flow from this proposed legislation. You told us that you would use this money to address some of the immediate infrastructure issues, to begin work toward implementing the mental health strategy for offenders and to provide training and protection, et cetera. You mentioned that you were pleased with the new Mental Health Commission of Canada and that you want to work with them.
Since you have some confidential cabinet information of the possibility of more money should Bill C-2 pass — and we hope that it does — what are your main concerns with Bill C-2?
Mr. McCowan: I take your point that finances are only one element.
Senator Oliver: I understand that that was looked after in Budget 2007 and that there is more to come, but it is confidential.
Mr. McCowan: That is right. There are two aspects to this.
Senator Cowan: Do not spend it yet.
Mr. McCowan: In Budget 2007, the government provided $102 million to address our most urgent critical integrity issues. It was an infusion of resources to stabilize the organization, and it was done over two years to allow for an independent review of CSC. That review has been completed and the report came out in December.
Senator Oliver: It made 109 recommendations.
Mr. McCowan: Yes, you are right, and we are awaiting the government's response to that report. In terms of the financial integrity of the organization, there was a much needed infusion of money in Budget 2007, and we are awaiting the government's response to the recommendations of the independent panel.
The second aspect has to do with specific increases that might be associated with a population increase as a result of Bill C-2. Those are the figures that I gave at the outset of my presentation. I apologize if I did not make a clear delineation between those two issues, but that is the framework I was advancing.
Mr. Toller may want to address the non-financial impacts of Bill C-2. It is in the context of our changing offender population — more gangs, more mental health.
Mr. Toller: Some of the figures speak to the need for increased bed space at both maximum- and medium- security levels, as we alluded to previously when discussing minimum mandatory sentences. That is where that dollar figure came from; we did our extrapolations based on what we anticipated CSC would require to respond to a change in Bill C-2.
Senator Oliver: Even though you are a corrections agency, you realize the importance of having laws passed in Canada that will protect the public and provide for public safety. With that understanding, are the three of you generally in agreement with the thrust of Bill C-2?
Mr. McCowan: This is a Criminal Code amendment. I understand that the Department of Justice people have given their best advice to you with regard to the proposed changes to the Criminal Code.
CSC operates within the legislative framework of the day. We are guided by Parliament on the appropriate legislative framework, and we operate within it, whatever it may be.
Senator Oliver: You are a $2-billion operation, and that money comes from the government.
Mr. McCowan: Yes.
Senator Oliver: You say that on any given day there are 21,000 offenders under your care and approximately 12,700 incarcerated. Of the 12,700, what percentages would be what the government calls visible minorities and what percentage would be Black people? Are Black people disproportionately represented in your system?
Mr. McCowan: I understand that this issue came up at an earlier session of this committee, and we do have some numbers to offer you. Our information, based on data from a week or so ago, is that approximately 7.2 per cent of the incarcerated population is Black and 6.0 per cent of supervised offenders are Black.
Senator Oliver: That adds up to 13.2 per cent.
Mr. McCowan: That is 7.2 per cent of the incarcerated population and 6 per cent of the supervised population, and they are separate populations.
Senator Oliver: Does that mean that Blacks are disproportionately represented?
Mr. McCowan: I do not have the statistics for the Canadian population as a whole, so I cannot guide you in comparing that to the population as a whole.
Senator Campbell: Thank you very much for coming today. Will the prison population increase if Bill C-2 passes?
Mr. McCowan: Yes.
Senator Campbell: You currently have a budget of about $1.8 billion. Of that, 1.5 per cent, or $27 million, goes to core programming. If I heard you correctly, core programming, which includes mental health, gangs, and other issues within the corrections system, is important, if not paramount, to the release of inmates into society to be rehabilitated.
I have only heard about increase in beds and increase in size. It reminds me of the privatization of the American penal system. I am more concerned about the people coming out of jail. If 1.5 per cent of the budget goes to core programming, what are we doing to train these people to help them with the issues that get them into prison in the first place? How do we help them so they do not come back as dangerous offenders?
Mr. Toller: In terms of core programming, when you get into the numbers that are sometimes cited in different circles and by different groups, we allot $37 million to core programming. This figure involves direct program delivery officers. Separate from that are the health care budgets that are allotments with psychiatric nursing and social worker nurses. In addition, there is case management, rehabilitation, psychology and psychiatry. I must couch the programs in a broader frame, if I may. I believe the OCI mentioned $27 million, but that figure is actually $37 million.
Your point about the programs is extremely important. Obviously, the correctional system is all about correcting the behaviour. When we talked earlier at a committee relative to our presentations on minimum mandatory sentences, our costing assumptions included programming as well. It was not only about bed spaces but also about the type of offender that we would look at and how to address his needs, as you described, both at the front and at the back end.
For CSC, obviously the question is about public safety. On any given day and in any institution, you will find some inmates undergoing education; some taking programs for substance abuse, aggression and anger management; and some for spousal and family violence. The programming segment is critical to the success of public safety and is embedded in all of our costing assumptions.
Senator Campbell: With regard to the tools used to assess risk and the needs, how are they evaluated? I will give you an example. One witness told us that there is evidence that some tools continue to impose higher than necessary security classifications and results in some offenders, particularly women and Aboriginal offenders, being unnecessarily placed in higher security institutions than the situation warrants.
How do you evaluate these tools to ensure that this is not the case regarding these two groups?
Mr. McCowan: The short answer is that we are always evaluating our tools, which are empirically based. We look at them regularly through our research branch to ensure that they are doing the work that they are designed to do. For example, with respect to Aboriginal offenders, we have had work done on that in the past; there is work being done this year in terms of this year's research plan. To date, the results have shown that our tools are valid in terms of assessing risks for the population as a whole, including Aboriginal offenders. We are constantly in the frame of asking ourselves the question: Given that the population is always evolving, do we have it right? Is it still a valid tool? Is it still doing the job in terms of being an effective guide for assessing public safety?
Mr. Toller: I mentioned earlier about the specific Aboriginal piece that we look at. There are some tools that we use, but it is also the comprehensive factors that we gather. We look at everything from history of involvement in past institutions, the age at the time of sentencing, alcohol and drug use, street stability and gang affiliation to previous periods of parole and release. It all comes in with both a clinical perspective as well as an overall look at aggravating, mitigating factors. The tools are but one area that gets us into a zone.
As Mr. McCowan pointed out, a couple of years ago, we actually revamped the tools for security reclassification for women. We are now still undertaking, as was pointed out, to look at the classification tool for women offenders themselves. That continues to be under review. There is international research out there looking at this specifically in relation to correctional systems. We are anxiously awaiting those results and will make adjustments if need be.
[Translation]
Senator Chaput: According to the information we have received, we know that Aboriginals offenders are overrepresented in our jails. The bill, which has been referred to us, proposes to increase the penalties for dangerous offenders, as well as the duration of those penalties, which would, in my view, cause an increase in the prison population.
Knowing this, and taking to account the fact that this population is not yet ready to heard as you said a while ago, how can we think of setting up rehabilitation programs to give some hope to Aboriginals when the healing as not even yet happened?
With this type of legislation, do not you think it would be useful to recommend that specific program at the Aboriginal population be developed?
I suggest this idea and I would like to have your opinion on that.
[English]
Mr. Reti: Senator Chaput, I would agree with you that there is a certain population that, perhaps, is not ready to heal. However, once in contact with the justice system, they might find that at that point in their lives they will want to begin to heal. It is important that we have both the facilities and the appropriate programming for those people who make that decision.
As I said earlier, legislation and the enforcement thereof is only one component of dealing with these different issues. Early intervention, diversion, and all those different components must also be strongly emphasized. Especially, as my colleagues mentioned, that there is an anticipated increase, there will likely be a need for addition programming.
Senator Chaput: Would you be able to give us examples of concrete programming? That is, according to your experience, things that work better with the Aboriginal population.
Mr. Reti: The things that seem to work well and that seem to have sustainability in a community — and I am talking before they get into the system — are those things where the community is fully engaged and takes ownership of the program. I often talk to other officers about coming into the community and initiating programs, whether crime prevention programs or different activities in the community such as hockey or what not. I always ask the question: What are you leaving the community with? It must be sustainable.
When you go into a community, it is important for the community to take ownership over those things so that when that police officer or that service provider leaves, that program does not fail. The programs that seem to work well have strong community ownership. There is no single thing that works.
To give you an example, we initiated a suicide intervention program. It was a grandiose program where we went into communities and taught people about suicide prevention, and so on. Arguably, it has some effect in the community as it trains people to better identify and deal with people who may have suicidal tendencies.
I was recently at a conference where a school secretary produced a little yellow card. All that the card said was ``I am having thoughts of suicide. I am struggling in my life right now. Would you call this number?'' It was a consistent number. When people come forward, often they do not want to talk about those issues. In this case, all they had to do was lay the card down and the person in front of them would make the call so that they could get some help. The secretary talked about how that decreased suicide in the community. It was not a grandiose program; it was a simple solution in the community, but it was effective and it worked.
As I mentioned before, there is no single thing that works. The important thing is that the community is engaged in that solution and that the community take some ownership over it and focus on the process and not on the solution. If you work with the community, take ownership over those issues. Do not hand it off to them and let them flounder. You need to nurture communities along.
For instance, the justice system has been taken away from our communities for so long; to immediately hand it back is almost irresponsible in some ways. It must be a partnership. I cannot tell you about any one thing that works.
To give an example, the community cadet corps in Hobbema worked for some kids but not all. There are some kids who gravitated towards that program. Interestingly, young Aboriginal females seemed to be attracted to that program, which I never expected. The most vulnerable and high-risk group of people in our community is young mothers and it was encouraging to see them attracted to something like a youth corps.
There is no single thing, but it must have community ownership and it must be community driven.
The Chair: Mr. McCowan, in your presentation, you said that the five-year projection is an increase in inmate population of 270 because of the mandatory minimum penalties, and roughly 35 because of dangerous offender rules. Let us say that leaves us at roughly 300 more inmates over the next five years.
As you are aware, there have been predictions that the increase in the number of people incarcerated would be significantly higher than that figure. Can you tell us upon which numbers these assumptions were based?
Mr. McCowan: Generally, the process we go through in terms of determining assessments is actually quite formal. We work with our partners in terms of other government departments, whether it is the Department of Justice Canada or Public Safety Canada, sometimes Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics at Statistics Canada, to try to get the best assumptions possible in terms of a likely projection. We then draw those estimates up, and they form part of the memorandum to cabinet process. Typically, our senior financial officer — in our case a chartered accountant — will sign off on those estimates and say this is a realistic projection in terms of the likely outcome.
In relation to the two specific components of Bill C-2, you are correct; after five years, it would go to 270 offenders. We did provide more information to the House committee in terms of the breakdown of the estimates on the MMPs. If it is helpful, I could see whether we could provide that information to you.
The Chair: Fax it over, please.
Mr. McCowan: I have conveyed as much information as I could find on the public record with respect to the dangerous offender LTSO piece. Minister Toews referred to 35 applications per year; it was not the aggregate figure. That is as much as I have been able to locate on the public record.
I can undertake to request my colleagues in the Department of Justice Canada to see what additional light might be shed on the matter.
The Chair: Did you make projections for the new impaired driving provisions? We heard from Mothers against Drunk Driving and listening to them, I got the feeling there were to be quite a few more people behind bars because of the elimination of things likes the Carter defence. Have you looked at those provisions?
Mr. McCowan: There are several issues and one comes down to whether it is a provincial or federal impact. Some costs can be looked after in terms of getting money in relation to each additional offender. When you talk about adding significant offenders, you have to pursue this additional route.
We only have cost projections on those two components. We do not have costing components for the other three that, as you pointed out, we have not yet discussed.
The Chair: The publicly announced funds refer only to the mandatory minimums. They not refer to anybody else, correct?
Mr. McCowan: Correct. The only other money that has been discussed is the separate issue of the integrity money, which Senator Oliver raised a few moments ago.
The Chair: You mean the hundred-year-old buildings that need to be fixed.
Mr. McCowan: Exactly, we have an impressive array of decaying infrastructure, and we have difficult offender population changes, as we have discussed. There are a number of factors at play.
The Chair: Mr. Sapers from the Office of the Correctional Investigator told us that the budget for core programming had diminished by 26 per cent over the last six years. He also said that there was a shortage of core programming in maximum-security prisons, which is I gather, where dangerous offenders are sent first.
Can you explain both of those assertions to us: the budget decline and the situation in the maximum-security institutions?
Mr. Toller: I read Mr. Saper's testimony and I am not sure exactly where he received that information.
We have experienced a 16 per cent decrease in correctional program enrolment, but we did that in a strategic fashion. We did that because it was mentioned earlier how we went around and continuously looked at our programs in terms of effectiveness, our changing population and where we should make adjustments. There are always limited resources.
To give an example, at one particular point in time we had a referral for inmates for just cognitive skills, life skills. However, as the numbers of inmates with violent propensities or violent crimes emerged more strongly in our institutions, we had to move that into a frame to target violent offender types of programs.
We have actually revamped our system. In contrast to that decrease, we have improved in terms of our completion rates and programs. We have moved from 72 per cent to 77 per cent completion. That is truly a success for us because a completion in programs talks about public safety. When you talk programming dollars, we have $37 million going directly toward program delivery staff.
It needs to be articulated that the role of maximum security is to instil an environment of responsibility to get people ready for the next phase as they move through the transition of cascading down from maximum to medium to minimum.
The programming infrastructure in maximum security is significantly less than you would find in a medium- or minimum-security institution, as we get closer to the community. The raw numbers must be considered in the backdrop of the roles of the security institutions.
Senator Stratton: Mr. McCowan, I am concerned about the statistics you talked about in your opening remarks, which seem quite disturbing. You say we have more previous youth and adult convictions and approximately nine out of ten offenders reoffend. There are more extensive histories of violence and violent offences. One in four offenders is serving time for homicide. There are more affiliations with gangs and organized crime, increased by 33 per cent since 1977. You tell us that four out of five offenders have serious substance abuse histories and problems.
That ties in with the presentation made by Lynn Barr-Telford of the Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics. Because of these statistics, you can see why we have Bill C-2 before us. It is scary. The attempted murder rate is up 24 per cent since 2004. This information is from the Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics. Youth accused of firearm-related violent offences is up 32 per cent since 2002.
We see a dramatic trend happening and it is frightening, especially in Winnipeg where I live. I know there are many reasons, but is the drug trade at the core of this increased gang-related violence? Are the gangs looking for turf? What is happening here? Do you have any sense of some of the reasons for it?
Mr. McCowan: We welcome discussions about CSC with open arms. The organization is facing some challenges as I tried to outline earlier. The factors that you list can be even more daunting because sometimes you are dealing with individuals who have a couple of them — a mental health problem in addition to a substance abuse problem. When you are trying to intervene in those situations, particularly with a lot of our population who are getting short sentences, you have a narrow window of opportunity to deal with individuals who have a couple of real challenges. If you do not get through the substance abuse problem, you will not get to the anger management problem that lies somewhere underneath. It is a challenging situation but one which enthusiastic folk tackle each day.
Mr. Reti: To build on the comment, drugs certainly fuel the problem, but I do not think that drugs are the root of it. I do not think there is any single reason why we see an increase in this activity. If there were one single reason, it often starts with high-risk children. High-risk youth seem to be a common theme throughout much of this activity. Drugs are not the root of it but certainly fuel the activity.
When I was in Hobbema, many of the drive-by shootings that we saw and much of the activity between rival gangs was because of drug turf. However, when you look at the people involved in that activity and with a tendency to be attracted to that activity, they usually came from high-risk environments.
Senator Merchant: My concern is that crime rates have been steadily going down in this country and yet we are looking for ways to incarcerate more people. I am very concerned about this dangerous offender legislation because I think it is unbalanced and unfair when it comes to minorities and the Aboriginal communities. Very often people do not understand our criminal system, our legal system, the court system, and plead guilty without understanding the implications.
On February 7, we had a response from Mr. Goldstein of the Criminal Lawyers' Association. Mr. Goldstein said that there is nothing in this provision that says that only criminal convictions arising after the passage of this bill count, that, in fact, it is quite the opposite. The idea is to capture people who have criminal records, and so that is a massive problem.
We are going to go back now to offences committed maybe 10, 20, 30 years ago and try and capture those people and declare them dangerous offenders. Do you feel that that is a problem for certain communities? Do you feel that it weighs unfairly on minorities and Aboriginal people and others who do not understand the justice system and the implications of pleading guilty?
Mr. Reti: As I said earlier, we already see a disproportionate number of Aboriginal or minority people in the correctional system. We already see a disproportionate number of Aboriginal people charged or more prevalently being charged, so I would assume the most logical assumption is that we likely will see more Aboriginal people identified as dangerous offenders. It is a logical assumption to make.
Senator Di Nino: Thank you for agreeing to provide the information that I asked for on those five points, and if you did not get them all down, I will give them to you later.
I would like to have some statistics on the programs for employment and training as strongly suggested by the independent panel review of CSC. One of the recommendations was to develop employability and employment skills and that is one of the areas on which I would like to focus, but I will wait to get information from you.
My question deals with the discussion we have been having about the increase in costs of the penitentiary system. My take is based on the information you provided, particularly the first bullet, where you say that nine out of ten offenders had previous convictions. In your opinion, have we done everything that we could have to prepare the inmates for reincorporation into the community, or have we failed based on the statistics that you provided? Nine out of ten of them had been under our care before and they are back again.
Mr. Toller: Whenever you get into the causes of crime, we have heard across the table a number of spectrums. It is complex. Often you cannot zero into one issue, as you indicated. It ties into the question of Senator Stratton. When I look at our group here, 77 per cent of our fellows coming in have no high school education; 70 per cent have an unstable job history; 80 per cent have been characterized as impulsive. We heard the mental health statistics. We heard 80 per cent have drug problems and 80 per cent have poor problem-solving skills. We are dealing with a complex individual who, by the time he arrives at our doorstep, has failed many types of interventions intended to help in his decision-making.
That is our starting point. Who do we have in front of us? How do we develop an individual plan to deal with that particular person? Sometimes we have to carefully and strategically target the cognitive factors first. You may not want to have a person who has extremely short or high impulsivity, depending which way you want to do it, to learn to become a carpenter. If they cannot control that other piece, you have trained an impulsive carpenter.
We look at it from the cognitive perspective, and then from the basics. If we can get that through some means of progression, if we can get the anger management capacity reduced and then get the vocational and education piece tied together there is a likelihood of success. We work toward the inmate finding stable employment once he is released. We attempt to teach the inmates how to manage themselves in situations in which they have been impulsive and aggressive. We try to help them control their behaviour; that is what we are all about.
The community's involvement is very important to this success because over 90 per cent of the inmates face determinate sentences and return to the community. Whatever support the community can offer helps to keep them crime free.
Mr. McCowan: On the employment-employability question, there is a constant evolution in all of the elements we have discussed. Concerning the employment issue, we have had farming operations associated with our institutions. One of the challenges that the independent panel laid down is to get us to look at the best way to connect inmates with job possibilities once they move on. Farming might have made more sense 20 or 30 years ago than it does now. Right now, B.C. and Alberta have labour shortages in a number of key sectors of the economy. It is a constantly evolving thing. We are trying to adjust our approach to give us the best chance at encouraging success.
Senator Di Nino: I appreciate that and I did not say it was simple. That is why I listed five focus areas.
Some 14 years ago, I was dealing with the youth crime bill on behalf of a previous government. For three consecutive days, I went to the Syl Apps Youth Centre in Oakville. This is for youth, but the same message was given to me by the folks. When we wrapped up, many psychologists, sociologists and social workers asked me to send a message, which I did and tried to do strongly. I do not know if anyone was listening but the message was that we make sure to give these kids training before they leave the centre. They have to have a skill before going back into the communities.
I suggest that we are experiencing the same problem. Maybe we are being slow in the uptake and that is not necessarily a reflection on you gentlemen. In general, the whole system needs to be looked at so that when we do release them — because we will release the vast majority of them — they are better prepared to deal with the challenges of life, otherwise they will be back.
Mr. Toller: As we were saying, we are trying to determine the labour market needs and how we can train our inmates to fill those needs once they return to society. You just cannot turn it around on a dime. We have recently redeveloped our CORCAN, which looks after employment for offenders. This has and advisory team and links to the community. This has brought together Canadian citizens from the business community. The minister himself talked to the group, our commissioner has been in front of group, and I am regularly with this group, looking at how to develop partnerships with private industry to determine the skill sets that are necessary for re-entry into society. We are working with the trades. In one example, inmates start building house frames while institutionalized. In Calgary, an employer offers released prisoners jobs when they re-enter the community. We are on that path. It is just starting and we feel we can cover three, four or five items for the country as a whole as this begins to take shape.
The Chair: How much does it cost to keep a prisoner in jail at each one of the levels?
Mr. McCowan: We have the cost of maintaining offenders' index, which is updated every year. The last statistics are available for 2006-07. I will be happy to provide them to the committee.
To give you the bottom lines of the results for 2006-07, the average cost to maintain an offender is $74,261. I am happy to provide further details by security level, men's, women's, community and institution.
Senator Cowan: I recall seeing a figure of $100,000 or more.
Mr. McCowan: For maximum security, the cost is $121,294 per year.
The Chair: Is it your experience that dangerous offenders tend to go to maximum-security institutions?
Mr. Toller: Yes, the person undergoes an individualized assessment and individual consideration based on a number of factors including specifics for Aboriginals. If the crime was extremely violent, depending on the person's motivation, it could very well mean the person would spend time in maximum-security institutions. The general input is that about 15 per cent of inmates go to maximum security. The vast majority are be placed in medium-security institutions. Even if they start out in maximum security, there are ongoing reviews, certainly at a minimum a year from the initial placement, in terms of the person's progress. If a violent offender ended up in maximum security after the initial classification system, then there would at least be a yearly review and sometimes ahead of that, depending on mitigating circumstances.
The Chair: How many of them normally would be bumped down to medium or minimum security?
Mr. Toller: I do not have where they are situated, but over time the vast majority would get bumped down. I can get that information for you.
The Chair: They would probably start out in maximum and decline over time.
Mr. Toller: Yes. It is possible for an offender, after he has been transferred to medium security, to be returned to maximum security depending on behavioural characteristics or a potential escape risk or information along those lines.
The Chair: If we are moving in thirty dangerous offenders a year, it will cost us another $3 million a year.
Mr. McCowan: All I can undertake to do, as I have already done, is to take your issue back to the Department of Justice Canada in terms of the costing of the DO. I am not able to talk to anything else. I will undertake to raise your concerns with the department and see what additional information they might be able to bring to bear.
Senator Di Nino: It is $37 million average after five years.
The Chair: No, that is only for mandatory minimums.
Mr. McCowan: There were two separate costing elements. One related to the MMPs and one related to the DOs and LTSOs.
The Chair: We thank you very much. It has been an interesting session. We are grateful to you. We will look forward to receiving that information. Do not delay; better you should sent it as fast as possible even if it does not all come at once.
We are now privileged to have with us, speaking as an individual, Professor Ronald Langevin, from the University of Toronto; and from Egale Canada, Mr. Ryan Dyck.
Ronald Langevin, Professor, University of Toronto, as an individual: Thank you for the opportunity to speak to this group. If there are any questions or issues that arise after the meeting, my email address is at the top of the handout. I welcome any additional question or comments. I will not read from the handout. I will give you a general overview of my concerns.
I think that Bill C-2 will have a positive effect on protecting the community. It will also scare many sex offenders into doing something about their lives sooner.
I was asked to provide information on recidivism because I have collected data over a 25-year period using a variety of sources that include provincial, federal and RCMP records. I have collected hospital records of informal criminal offences that may not have been detected.
Looking at sexual offence recidivism, it runs at 60 per cent of all sex offenders. If you want to include any offence, because many times other offences may be the product of plea-bargaining from a sexual offence, the general recidivism runs at 80 per cent. When you include undetected crimes — people used to tell us about crimes they committed that were undetected — nine in ten offenders will commit a subsequent offence. That is a very high rate.
The Chair: You mean nine in ten of all offenders or nine in ten of dangerous offenders?
Mr. Langevin: All offenders and that qualifies my concerns about the dangerous offender. I believe we will have far more cases than the indicated 30 to 50 a year. Seventy-two per cent of cases — and I have over 3,000 cases — have a criminal career that spans more than 10 years, and 44 per cent have a career that spans more than 20 years, so it is a lifetime pattern of behaviour.
Looking at actual incarceration numbers, very few have served any real time. Forty-four per cent have not served time; they have been on probation or parole, or they have gotten into treatment programs and so on. An additional 13 per cent have served less than one year and 9 per cent have served one to two years. More than half of the offenders have seen very little prison time for a long-term pattern of criminal behaviour.
My concern about Bill C-2 is what constitutes three convictions. Are they any three convictions that may occur on one court appearance or does it have to be three consecutive court appearances at different times?
I have presented numbers in my handout. If you look at any conviction — and that is in Table 1 of the handout — you will see that I have compared dangerous offenders, and there are 51 of them. That is about one eighth of all dangerous offenders in Canada at this time. One hundred percent of them have three or more convictions based on that criterion. Notice that 47.6 per cent of non-dangerous offenders also have an equal number. If you move to the line below that, with three or more court appearances, you will see that the numbers drop dramatically. Based on these numbers, I anticipate that between one and five, and one in two sex offenders, will have dangerous offender applications.
Given those numbers, I could have provided all of the dangerous offenders in Canada, more than I have done that in the last 30 years; I could have given you 624 of them, based on the three-court-appearance criterion, and I could have given you 1,428 of them based on the any-three-convictions criterion. That is a real concern.
If the federal and provincial databases ever become united, I think the numbers will go up again. The RCMP has only 54 per cent of my cases. That is true from the 1960s and it is true now. If people have only provincial charges, the RCMP does not know about them in half of the cases. If you add those charges in with federal charges — and many of them are felony convictions for sexual assault — you will find that the numbers will dramatically increase. It is a good idea to have that integrated database.
The other concerns relate to what is considered a serious or harmful offence and the risk of harm. Often these are based on nebulous criteria. If we are looking at actual physical harm to the individual, it may be a different criterion that could be incorporated into the legislation, or at least the Crown attorneys could consider it, as opposed to just the nature of the crime.
Some dangerous offenders are not necessarily violent; they are repeat sex offenders who may not engage in actual violent behaviour, although most of them do. The definition of ``physical harm'' and ``psychological harm'' are not clear in the definition of that law.
You will see in Table 2 that most of the dangerous offenders, 73 per cent, have used a weapon, and 84 per cent have seriously injured their victims, but notice that 35 per cent of the non-dangerous offenders have also done that.
In short, I am expecting that our prison system will be overflowing. If the Crown attorneys decide to pursue the application, my understanding, as the bill stands, is that they are required to announce whether they will pursue the application, but they do not have to do it. If they do, I think you will have many offenders, far in excess of the 30 or so a year. I can provide you those figures myself, with my own small private practice of one setting.
Finally, my concerns about the risk that is used might apply to your concerns about Aboriginals. There are now actuarial instruments such as the following: The SIR is used in the Correctional Service of Canada as well as the Static- 99; the Violence Risk Appraisal Guide, or VRAG; and, the Sex Offence Risk Appraisal Guide, or SORAG. All of these measures are used, and they present an illusion of certainty. They are extremely poor predictors of risk, as clinical judgment is. It is worth considering alternative criterion for evaluating the risk of an individual, something more objective than we have at present time.
There is a need for a more standard and thorough assessment of people considered dangerous, not just Aboriginals or Blacks. You need to understand their culture for sure, but often assessments are all too brief. I gave an example of a four-hour interview and file review in which a psychiatrist declared an offender not just dangerous, but incapable of being managed as a long-term offender. That is appalling. It would be valuable to have also built into legislation a minimum required assessment time, who should do it, how long it should be and what should be included.
I have added another table entitled ``Features of the Offender,'' which reflects a number of the questions I heard in the Correctional Service of Canada presentation. You can see that they have many other issues that have been ignored. Of particular concern is the number of people in special education classes. Two to three per cent of Ontarians are in special education classes in public and high school. Notice that 56 per cent of dangerous offenders and 36 per cent of the non-dangerous offenders have such a designation; they have learning problems.
What often happens, and I think it is fairly typical of dangerous offenders, is they are warehoused. They are not provided any treatment options; they are locked away forever; they never see the light of day again. That is the most typical outcome. You are talking about rehabilitation; it is not done. It is given to people who will get out into the community.
Head trauma, disease and attention deficit disorders are over-represented in this population as well as in the community at large, and these issues are ignored. That is also with respect to diseases, for example, endocrine disorders. You can see in Table 3 that it is far more common in that almost 38 per cent of dangerous offenders have endocrine disorders, and it is difficult to get that testing done in any setting. You usually have to get lawyers to do court orders to get blood tests to evaluate endocrine disorders. You can see it might be a significant factor in both treatment and rehabilitation.
That is my overview. Having said all of those negative things, the bill can have a positive impact on community safety as well as changing offenders' altitudes toward treatment. I think more of them will think twice about ignoring treatment programs if they see a dangerous offender application on the horizon, not after 19 charges as we see here.
The Chair: Thank you very much. Regarding the top six lines of Table 1, what are those numbers? Are they percentages?
Mr. Langevin: The percentages are indicated with a percentage sign after the number. That is number of offences. The dangerous offenders have had over 19 total offence convictions before their designation as a dangerous offender.
The Chair: That is an average, in other words, based on your database.
Mr. Langevin: Yes.
Ryan Dyck, Youth Coordinator, Egale Canada: Thank you very much. Egale Canada is Canada's national advocacy organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans-identified individuals. I am also a 22-year-old student at the University of Ottawa.
On behalf of Egale Canada, I want to thank you for inviting us to speak with you concerning the sensitive issue of the age of sexual consent for young Canadians. We are extremely grateful to see that parliamentarians are diligent about consulting the community in regards to this matter.
I am sure we can agree that the issue of young people and sexuality is a delicate subject and should be carefully considered before any laws are passed that would affect the health and well-being of our country's youth.
Unfortunately, Bill C-2 with its provision to raise the age of consent from 14 years to 16 years does not meet the standard for careful consideration in the views of Egale Canada. I hope we will be able to contribute to ensuring this bill fulfills its intention of securing the health and safety of young Canadians as this is an intention that Egale Canada and its membership support in full. However, from Egale Canada's perspective, Bill C-2 is an unnecessary and potentially harmful invasion into the sex lives of young Canadians. Wherever young people do not consent to sex, there are already sturdy laws in place to protect them. We have laws against sexual assault at any age, laws against people in position of authority who take advantage of minors in their care and laws against child prostitution, child pornography and Internet luring.
Any approach to this issue that is truly concerned about the well-being and protection of Canadian teens should not be hastily passed through Parliament, effectively stigmatizing sexually active teens as criminals and inhibiting them from accessing the information and education they need to make mature decisions about their own relationships.
Egale Canada is opposed to raising the age of consent from 14 years to 16 years. Whether any of us think teenagers should be having sex at 14 or 15 years of age, the fact is many Canadian teens of this age are having sex. Some of them are having consensual sex with their same-age peers, and some are having consensual sex with adults. We as a society should be teaching young people to make decisions for themselves. We want teenagers to get reliable information about sex from their schools, guidance counsellors, local health clinics, peer support groups, friends and adults they can trust. If young people feel their behaviour is criminal, we have good reason to believe they will not seek help. They will not report a sexually transmitted infection or get the necessary medical attention out of fear of criminalizing their older partners. If school boards get the impression that youth sexuality is being criminalized, they will be apprehensive about offering sexual health education before students turn 16 years. This bill effectively puts young Canadians further at risk rather than offering them the protection and education they need.
Egale Canada strongly supports any measure that truly increases the safety and well-being of young people. However, ramming a hastily prepared bill through Parliament with negligible debate is not an effective way of doing this. If we are serious about our youth, then we should not be subjecting them to arbitrary parliamentary deadlines. Egale Canada is only one of many concerned organizations in Canada with valuable insight to share regarding this issue. Most of these organizations have not had an opportunity to share their knowledge at all.
Young Canadians themselves, in particular, have been absent from the debate. Parliamentarians should be taking the time to actively speak with the teens who will be most affected by this law. Genuine consultation on this issue would reveal the many problematic holes in this bill, including the need to ensure confidentiality for teens who access sexual health services and education, or the discriminatory differentiation between the age of consent for anal sex compared to that for other forms of sexual relationships. This is something declared unconstitutional in numerous provincial courts, yet Bill C-2 does nothing to address existing discrimination or ameliorate existing risk factors for sexually active youth.
As a community, gay, lesbian, and trans-gendered Canadians know what it is like to be stigmatized as criminals and to be afraid of seeking out the information and services that are necessary to lead a healthy and emotionally fulfilling life. It is precisely around the ages of 14 and 15 years that many young Canadians are struggling to come to terms with their sexual identities.
Egale Canada is concerned that raising the age of consent and inhibiting access to information and education will make it even more difficult and emotionally strenuous for these young people to understand their identities and to develop healthy and mature relationships.
In order to meet its desirable intention of protecting Canadian teens from physical and emotional harm, Bill C-2 must ensure that youth have access to age-appropriate sexual health education, to medical services where necessary and to confidential and trustworthy counselling and advice regarding sexual behaviour and intimate relationships. Egale Canada fears that rolling this provision in with a bill labelled ``tackling violent crime'' will have only the opposite effect.
On behalf of Egale Canada, we would like to thank you for your diligence in considering all the potential effects of this bill.
Senator Stratton: Mr. Dyck, my question is with regard to raising the age of consent from 14years to16 years of age. The first concern is Internet luring. The second concern is older men enticing women into prostitution. That happens often in my city of Winnipeg. They get them hooked on drugs and then tell them that they must pay for the drugs, with their only recourse being prostitution. Those are real and honest concerns, and that is what this bill is intended to address. When girls as young as 12 years become hookers, there is a problem.
I was at an urgent care clinic on the weekend. While I was waiting to be examined, the police brought in a young girl who had been drinking too much. They had to have her medically assessed before they took her to the detention centre overnight. One of police officers was asking why she goes near that guy, who he said was just bad news. ``He'' was an older guy, and the girl was a young kid.
The police need tools to enable them to tell that older guy to stay away from that girl or he will be charged. That is the kind of individual the government is after. It is a red herring to suggest that others would be caught in that. This is specific to the serious Internet problems we are having and the problem of young boys and girls being enticed into prostitution and drugs.
Mr. Dyck: I agree that is a significant problem that must be addressed. However, there are already laws in place to address those things. Raising the age of consent would make is possible to punish people afterwards; it does not tackle the root problem, the social circumstances that lead to these situations or the lack of education of young people in such situations, particularly the dangers on the Internet.
Raising the age of consent brings with it a stigma of criminality and the danger that we will not educate people about sex before they reach 16 years of age, particularly in schools. It is imperative that people get this information without fear prior to this happening.
Senator Stratton: Professor Langevin, you have obviously looked at predators. What age must children be for a predator to be classified as a pedophile? We have the classic example of a young hockey player who was trapped years ago. What is the age limit? Would you not want to protect youngsters from pedophiles?
Mr. Langevin: There are somewhat different parameters for men, and it is mostly men, who are more attracted to girls rather than boys. The typical heterosexual pedophile prefers girls in the nine- to eleven-year age range, and there is a clear demarcation of physical immaturity.
Men who are attracted to boys prefer somewhat older boys, tending to be in the range of puberty — 13, 14, 15 years, where there may be much more sexual confusion in the mind of the boy, regardless of orientation.
People who commit sexual offences on minors are a very mixed group. Some can respond to almost any human and will have sex with men, women, boys and girls. They may also prefer other dangerous activities. The sadist, for example, really wants to hurt, control, injure, and even kill someone as part of his sexual gratification. He may get equal satisfaction from a 14-year-old girl, a 15-year-old boy, or a 20-year-old woman.
On the age of consent, the concern for groups like Beyond Borders Inc. is probably that there are many children being victimized. These children are not engaging in consensual sexual relations; they are not learning about sex; much older men are victimizing them. They are not learning about love and they are certainly having many emotional difficulties as a result. The desire of Beyond Borders is to protect children by raising the age of consent to 16 years. I would agree that is a positive goal with regard to protecting minors.
Senator Cowan: So you think that raising the age is generally a positive move?
Mr. Langevin: Yes, I think it will eliminate many ambiguous cases in which people get away with this type of abuse.
Senator Cowan: What is your view on the mandatory minimum sentence? I am sure that as a psychologist you have had experience with this kind of thing over the years. Do you believe it is a deterrent? We have heard evidence that it is not, or is not for everyone, and that the real deterrent is the fear of being caught. If you do not think you will get caught, the sentence that would be imposed if you were caught and convicted is not a relevant consideration.
Mr. Langevin: Men who sexually assault women get longer sentences; rapists tend to spend more time in jail, so it is in effect a logical deterrent. They are not in a community to commit crimes, so in that sense a longer sentence is effective. However, the great majority of sex offenders, who are the bulk of dangerous offenders, serve very little time in jail; one or two years are usually the maximum sentence.
Raising the minimum required time will reduce the crime rate, because those people will not be at large for longer periods of time. However, the recidivism rate remains very high because they are generally not incarcerated for an extended period of time.
Senator Cowan: Obviously, if he is in prison, he not offending against society, although he may offend within the prison population. The longer he is in prison, the less time he has to commit his crimes. Does that have a deterrent effect on his propensity to reoffend when he gets out, or does it have any deterrent effect on others who might be considering committing those kinds of offences?
Mr. Langevin: I do not believe it does because it is sexual behaviour. Some of these men try very hard; they are well socialized and they fight their urges. Others do not care; they come from very dysfunctional alcoholic families. If you look at the normal cycle of sexual arousal and release in the average human being between the ages of 14 years and 65 years at least, you are seeing release once or twice a week on average across that whole span as a minimum. These people have to fight those urges on a fairly regular basis and at some point they break. They let go and something happens. It is extremely difficult, if they are not in some kind of treatment program taking drugs that will prevent their sexual arousal, to stop those urges. I think that is one of the reasons you see such a high recidivism rate in this population. It is a lifelong phenomenon that sticks with them.
Senator Merchant: Professor Langevin, if I understood you correctly, you indicated that you felt that more criminalization and more imprisonment would make for safer communities and better crime control.
Mr. Langevin: It will because it will make people less available in the community to commit crimes from that perspective only. In terms of rehabilitating and changing the individual, I do not know that it will tackle the actual root cause, namely that they are sexually attracted to children or to raping people.
Senator Merchant: Are you dealing just with sexual offenders?
Mr. Langevin: Yes; they are the majority of dangerous offenders — that is, 90 per cent of them.
Senator Merchant: Are there some countries that we should be looking at that have systems that could serve as models for this country; that is, countries where they have had good results? If so, what are they doing that maybe we should be thinking about doing?
Mr. Langevin: Canada has been a world leader for at least the last 40 years in the treatment of sexual offenders. Corrections Canada has led the way.
I did not hear it mentioned today but one of the things for their funding is the Circles of Support and Accountability. The sex offender released under that program often, as a long-term offender, has a group of people involved in his life as family. It is not a question of being asked if he did it again but he is asked, ``How are you doing? What fun are you having?'' That makes him feel a sense of belonging and a sense of community that he may have never had ever. It is very effective in reducing the risk of reoffending to a marginally small number. That is probably the best thing I have seen in the last 30 years for reducing recidivism, because you have people involved that are seeing that they do not fall into recidivism.
Senator Merchant: I did not get to question him about this, but the previous guest said that Canada is a leader, especially in the treatment of our Aboriginals. I think they mentioned New Zealand and other countries that have come to us and are learning from us. This is something we neglected to elicit from our previous guests.
The Chair: Indeed, Professor Roberts said the same thing yesterday: We are respected worldwide for some of these programs.
Senator Oliver: Professor Langevin, I liked your presentation. I thought it was very helpful and useful. As I understand it, you basically say that your reading of Bill C-2 indicates that the bill has some beneficial effects. You said that you believe the proposed legislation may have a number of beneficial effects on community safety and on changing offender attitudes in complying with treatment.
One of the things I liked about your presentation is that it was so candid. You were very frank. You say that Bill C- 2, the legislation as it stands assumes that psychiatrists and psychologists are accurate predictors of risk of future sexual and violent offenders. You were critical of a whole group of tests. I will not repeat them but SORAG and many others are referred to in your paper. You seem to think that we need something more objective.
In terms of this legislation relying upon psychologists and psychiatrists, what is wrong with that? Is it that their verbal judgments are not accurate? Are there scientific tests and more objective, qualitative and quantitative tests that could be applied? If so, what are they and what do you recommend?
Mr. Langevin: Those actuarial measures are supposed to be scientific and objective. For some of them, such as the Static-99, you do not really need a human to administer them; take the police report and feed it into a computer and you will come out with a score saying whether they are a danger to the community. You do not have to see the person.
Senator Oliver: But that is not accurate.
Mr. Langevin: It is being put forward at this time as a useful index of a person's risk to be in the community. Similarly with the VRAG and the SORAG, people may do a crime search primarily looking at their correctional history, then do a brief interview and fill out all the instruments and come up with some score that looks objective and states that there is an 80 per cent chance this man will reoffend. The problem is that the accuracy of that is about 6 per cent. You may as well take a dart and throw it over your back into a board to come up with a more reliable index.
Senator Oliver: What is reliable, what is objective and what do you recommend?
Mr. Langevin: I recommend examining the use of a weapon in the offence. More damage is done when there is a weapon in the offence. Typically, — and I have numbers in Table 2 — 73 per cent of the dangerous offenders and 28 per cent of the other offenders have used a weapon in their sexual offence. When a weapon is used, more physical damage is done to the victim and he or she must be hospitalized. The victim is bruised, cut, unconscious, and sometimes dead. I am talking about this in terms of objective criterion of physical injury to the person that can be used in an evaluation of the danger to the victim. That is one thing.
Senator Oliver: You would need to go on and look at various types of weapons to determine which would make the risk higher, would you not? If so, have you done that analysis?
Mr. Langevin: I have looked at them and it is interesting that most of them use knives. When you look at people who are drinking or drunk at the time, about half of them are using a weapon. When alcohol is involved, there is likely to be more harm to the victim and it is a weapon of convenience. It is more emotionally satisfying for a sadist to use because if a person is frightened of a weapon you can hold it to their throat and torture them. However, with a gun you shoot them and they are dead; that is it. For them, it is pre-empted foreplay. They will turn to the knife as a weapon. There is also strangulation. The difference is 47 per cent of the dangerous offenders versus 9 per cent of the non-dangerous offenders. Strangulation is also exciting because they are in their control and they enjoy that. These are objective criterion. Concerning the victim injury, you can get hospital reports to see whether you want to pursue an application.
Senator Oliver: Is there any researcher, any scientist, or any agency in Canada that has used the various criteria for their risk assessment tests?
Mr. Langevin: Yes, there is one item in the VRAG and the SORAG measures that I mentioned. It is the opposite of what you would expect. If a person is murdered, the offender is considered the least risk of future offence. You would not want a murderer out on the street again. If there is more injury, then it is an intermediate score; it is illogical. It is the reverse of what you would anticipate as a danger, that the offender might harm someone again. Those are some of the criterion that could play a role.
Alcohol is also a perennial problem. You have heard how many people in Correctional Service Canada are alcoholics. On average, about one-half of all sex offenders and non-sexual violent offenders are alcoholics. You also see in Table 3 that among the dangerous offenders, 60 per cent of them are using drugs at the time of their offence.
Senator Oliver: Alcohol and drugs?
Mr. Langevin: One or the other, often both. The people who use drugs tend to be far more violent. Among sex killers, far more of them are using drugs such as amphetamine or crystal meth, which tends to spark their own violence.
Senator Oliver: When you were talking about the 3,000 cases you have, you said you have a unique way of gathering the information; you went to the RCMP, hospitals and many other places. Then you said that there are many informal offences that have not been detected.
Does that mean there have been a number of crimes that makes it almost impossible to have accurate statistics about crime in Canada?
Mr. Langevin: Yes, I think if you looked at the offence rate, used the provincial and federal records together; you would capture 80 per cent of the cases.
Senator Oliver: Therefore, you would not know about 20 per cent.
Mr. Langevin: That is still pretty good. When they talk about reoffending, you are only moving it up to 90 per cent. People do not tell us that any more. This is from the days when they thought we could cure them and everybody had a positive attitude.
Now, there are 20 per cent or less who will tell us they have a sexual problem or that they had committed an offence. There is less candour now.
Senator Oliver: What do you call these undetected informal offences? Do most of these offences take place within a home?
Mr. Langevin: Not necessarily. They are sexual offences.
Senator Oliver: Do they take place in an office?
Mr. Langevin: More often not. They are more informal. They can be in homes, bars, cars or in parks. Those are the more common scenarios. With children, often the car is used or if they are babysitting. There are quite a range of settings, not necessarily just homes.
Senator Di Nino: Professor Langevin, we had heard from more than one witness about the efforts of CSC about their efforts of training and treatment, particularly of those who have been convicted of some of the major crimes, such as violent crimes and repeat offenders, et cetera. Are you familiar with the programs and if so what is your opinion?
Mr. Langevin: There are a range of programs, such as substance abuse, anger management and sex offender treatment relapse prevention therapy. There is the use of medication and drugs, such as sex drive reducing drugs. Of course, they also treat major mental illnesses with the appropriate medications.
The idea is good and it works for some people. For some, it only works temporarily because they are released to an unstructured environment where they run into the problems they had before they went to jail.
Many of the problems I have encountered, and I have used many of these treatment methods myself, if you look at Table 3 with respect to the academic achievement of these individuals, many of them are high school dropouts who have learning disabilities. They also have cognitive impairment. There is at least one-third overall who have significant brain dysfunction and they have trouble processing information. In some ways, you may as well be talking to the door. I think there needs to be special methods introduced to deal with these people. There also needs to be a change in their attitude. These people hate —
Senator Di Nino: Whose attitude, the inmates'?
Mr. Langevin: In the attitude of people in general about people with learning problems in school, and of the inmates. I am talking about the inmates. Many of them develop a tremendous dislike for learning situations. In school, they are characteristically tormented: You are stupid; you are going to the happy class; you are a dummy. They are so demeaned, and they are so glad to get out of school. That is why you see such a high rate of dropouts. Then you put them back into a therapy situation where they are often in a group, they are given homework to do, they are back in the classroom and they hate it. Much of the time, cost has taken precedence over what would be more effective in dealing with them as individuals. That is one basic problem.
You also have a total disregard or really an ignorance of the neural problems that many of these people have. You can see from Table 3 that there are tremendous amounts of head injuries. In some cases, the sexual behaviour occurs after that injury. It is triggered by some change in their brain and their personality.
ADHD is also ignored. There are studies showing that up to 40 per cent of sex offenders suffer from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. It is a treatable condition that is not dealt with. Endocrine disorders are not dealt with, either; although they can promote aggression in their own right as well, particularly diabetes.
The thrust of the programs is positive and they will work for some people. Some people take them away and they are really good for them. However, on the whole, you need to address these problems when you are trying to teach them. You cannot just put them into the mainstream classroom lecture that so often occurs in anger management and alcohol programs and so on.
Senator Di Nino: Are you saying that the solution starts earlier and should be different than what we are doing today?
Mr. Langevin: Yes, certainly earlier is always better. It would be better if we could intervene at the school level. Many of these people are getting grades of 38 per cent or 40 per cent coming from special education classes. There is something going on way back then, and it is often at the public school level.
Senator Di Nino: Mr. Dyck, did you know that the predecessor to Bill C-2, at least on the issue that you are addressing, was Bill C-22 called the age of protection, which has been in the parliamentary precinct for nearly two years? Are you familiar with that?
Mr. Dyck: Yes.
Senator Di Nino: Knowing that, do you still think that we are dealing with this piece of legislation hastily and with negligible debate? Do you think that 22 months of debate is hasty and negligible?
Mr. Dyck: In the current context, I understand this bill was set to come before the Senate in the fall when Parliament was prorogued and it is only being debated now.
The extent to which youth primarily have been included into the discussion I think is quite negligible. There have been few young people contacted with regard to this bill. Egale Canada was only contacted yesterday in order to speak on this issue.
Right now, it is quite hasty. It is being put together with violent crimes, which sends the wrong signal and the wrong stigma for sure.
Senator Di Nino: Some would argue that the bill also deals with some violent components and that is why it is included.
In your paragraph about where teenagers should get reliable information, you talk about their schools, guidance counsellors, local health clinics, peer support groups, friends they can trust and adults they can trust. You did not mention family. Was there a particular reason for leaving out the family?
Mr. Dyck: No, my apologies. It was not intentional to omit the family.
Senator Di Nino: Would you agree that the youth should be speaking to their families. In my opinion, they should, and families should be one of their main sources of information and guidance.
Mr. Dyck: A family certainly should be a source of guidance.
Senator Di Nino: Lastly, I am not sure I fully understand what you are saying, and I ask this question respectfully. Do you believe that it is quite okay for a 14-year-old and a 44-year-old to engage in sexual relations?
Mr. Dyck: It is not my intention to make a value judgment on particular relationships. I think that is a very individual case.
Senator Di Nino: I think your paper suggests or indicates that if that happens that should be all right.
Mr. Dyck: It is contingent on the individual cases, and there is not a blanket statement that applies to every single 14-year-old in this country. It is something that should be left to the courts, for one, and to individuals to be educated and make informed decisions on their own.
Senator Di Nino: If it is so-called consensual, it would never go to the courts, so it would be an act that would be admissible, at least in what I am reading from your presentation.
Mr. Dyck: It is Egale's position that it is entirely possible for a consensual relationship to exist.
Senator Andreychuk: Are you saying that for the purposes of sexual activity we should make no difference between children and adults? If they wish to participate in a sexual activity, you do not see where the adult might have an undue influence and ability to create an environment that may be negative to the younger person in the relationship. Are you saying it is just a ``check it out,'' it is up to them, and if the 14-year-old wants to engage with a 44-year-old you do not make any value judgment that maybe the 44-year-old might have some undue influence on a maturing mind? You are saying they are totally competent to make that decision?
Mr. Dyck: That is not precisely what I am saying. First, if there is a situation where there is undue influence, the laws are in place against any sort of abuse or sexual exploitation for any minor. In terms of 14-year-olds or 15-year- olds, certainly under the age of 14 is already protected as the current age of consent.
It is our position that age of consent stands quite well where it is, and we need to ensure the people in that age group are getting the education in order to ensure, if they are having sexual relationships, that they are in a consensual relationship and able to make those mature decisions. We are talking about youth between the ages of 14 years and 16 years specifically right now, not young children.
Senator Andreychuk: Do you buy into the proposition, let us say, that from our birth, we grow, mature and develop, and at some point, society says you are an adult, you can assume your full responsibilities but before that age you cannot. What you are saying is that cut off should be 14 years not 16 years. If I understand, you do not think it is all right for an adult to have sexual activity with someone less than 14 years, but you think it is all right over the age of 14 because they have sufficient maturity to make good judgments about their activity. Why is 14 years of age better than 16 years of age in your opinion?
Mr. Dyck: The statistics that I have seen show that people at that age are sexually active. Quite a large number of them are sexually active. Rather than driving them underground — 14 years or 16 years are both under the legal age of an adult according to society. It is a matter of finding an age where they need this education in order to make those decisions because this is where it is happening. We need to make sure they are consensual, that they know what they are doing, they have reliable information, and if things happen, they are able to get help or information. They have to be able to get this information while not fearing stigmatizing or criminalizing their older partners.
Senator Andreychuk: That is my point. I still do not understand why you believe that someone without the age of majority can make all those choices. We as a society are not stigmatizing a child who may want to experiment, a young person who is in activity. There is the age exemption clause; it is not the curiosity of the child. What we are saying is if you are an adult and you approach someone of that age that you have some responsibilities to curtailing your activity, not the child's activity.
Mr. Dyck: Absolutely, but I do not see that it makes much difference changing it from 14 years to 16 years. The paramount effect we see is the lack of education that will happen to the young children.
Senator Andreychuk: Is the lack of education happening now?
Mr. Dyck: Yes.
Senator Andreychuk: Young people are reticent to reach out for that?
Mr. Dyck: Yes, there is a culture of fear. A lot of people do not know they can. To raise the age even further —
Senator Andreychuk: Your fear is it might be accelerated.
Mr. Dyck: Absolutely.
Senator Andreychuk: Do you not see this legislation is putting the onus on the adult, not the child? We will still have all the problems of getting education to young people and their reticence to reach out for it, but the law will signal to adults not to approach anyone less than 16 years of age. That is the intent, as I understand this legislation, and do you support that?
Mr. Dyck: I do; I think that is already in place.
Senator Andreychuk: Professor Langevin, all of your tables point out that the dangerous offenders are more violent, abuse substances more often, have had much more sexual and violent offences, appear in court more often, have committed crimes in more cities, have had more problems.
In other words, how we are trying to attack the issue of dangerous repeat offenders seems to be working. It is not perfect but it is working; is that my understanding, or do you think we are on the wrong road?
Mr. Langevin: Many people would qualify who are not being designated or even have the applications for dangerous offender, and my purpose in laying out the tables in this way to show that the numbers can increase dramatically with the new legislation.
Yes, I think people who are using weapons and so on should be locked away from the public, but I think a lot of the time the decision-making is arbitrary. Our ability to predict whether they will do it again is very poor. It might be just as valuable to have longer sentences for these people, long determinant sentences to keep them out of circulation.
Something is happening, yes. There are people in this group who have not used weapons, who are not injuring their victims. People who might have 15 or 30 children as victims, where they have lured them with gifts or whatever else, that have not harmed them and might even have letters of support from their victims, have been designated as dangerous offenders because they are going to do it again and they are totally unrestrained. If you are looking at violence, this is covering a broader umbrella when you are dealing with sex offenders. Something is working; we are detaining some of those people. Some of them are not being dealt with early enough; they might never get to that point if we did.
There are many issues, but my main point here is that many more than fifty people a year will come up, if any of these things are in place, depending on what the Crown decides to do. They might say they will not go with this; they may not want the work or the effort. It is a lot of work to do a dangerous offender application. However, they might pursue this seeing this is the right thing to do, and you will be flooded. That is why the data is there.
Senator Andreychuk: You are not suggesting that we not take action, are you?
Mr. Langevin: Oh, no.
Senator Andreychuk: You are saying you have identified some tools that you think will be better than the ones being used. It is a question of your competence saying that what has been used to date has flaws and you are making suggestions on how to approve the administration, if I can call it that, of the system.
Mr. Langevin: Yes.
Senator Di Nino: I would like to ask Mr. Dyck if the presentation that he made today is as an individual or on behalf of Egale Canada.
Mr. Dyck: I am here on behalf of Egale Canada.
[Translation]
Senator Chaput: My question deals with sexual exploitation, and Mr. Dyck and Mr. Langevin can both answer it.
Right now, sexual activities of an ``exploitative nature'' are allowed when the person is 18 years old and theses activities mainly refer to prostitution. We all know very well that a large number of prostitutes start to work before they reach 18 years of age. A high age of consent does not seem to have protected them since young persons below 18 years old still prostitute themselves.
This legislation will increase the age of consent from 14 to 16 years. Do you think that increasing the age of consent from 14 to 16 years will reduce the sexual exploitation of the younger ones? When we look at the present situation, it does not seem that the high age limit of 18 years has prevented prostitution.
[English]
Mr. Dyck: I certainly agree with you that problems exist right now. Our system is not entirely effective. A solution is needed. That solution, in our view, is greater education and greater access to support services. It is our view that raising the age from 14 years to 16 years will have the opposite effect.
Mr. Langevin: I do not believe the intent of this is primarily to eliminate prostitution in underaged females or males. I do think it will serve to protect that group of adolescents who are at a stage in life when they are flighty, have poor decision-making skills, are inexperienced and might be very flattered by an older man who can take advantage of them. It might protect this person from becoming involved in a sexual relationship that is beyond their maturity level.
The thrust is to deal with that issue. It might eliminate some prostitution, but prostitutes come usually from a very disturbed family environment. I do not know that most of the kids who are getting on the Internet and seeing someone are necessarily from a disturbed family. They are just unsupervised and they are getting into things that are over their heads. It will help them. It will deal with the average child. I do not know that it will do much for prostitution.
The Chair: There have been a number of suggestions that the age of consent portion of the bill is designed to diminish, at least, sexual exploitation of young people. However, section 153 of the Criminal Code already outlaws sexual exploitation, a sexual relationship that is exploitative of a young person, someone under 18 years, and says that a judge may infer that the relationship is exploitative
. . . from the nature and circumstances of the relationship, including
(a) the age of the young person;
(b) the age difference between the person and the young person;
(c) the evolution of the relationship; and
(d) the degree of control or influence. . .
. . . by the older person over the younger person.
It is the first two, the age and the age difference, that strike me as being massive tools should the prosecutors choose to use them. Why would we need to approach raising the age of consent as a way to diminish sexual exploitation when it is already so clearly set out there?
Mr. Langevin: If it is clearly set out, it is happening. It is not uncommon for 14- and 15-year-olds to be exploited by an older adult, someone in their 40s or 50s, which may be dismissed and never reach the criminal courts. The concern of organizations such as Beyond Borders is that this is happening all too often and it is not leading to prosecution, and often based on the age of consent at 14 years. If they are looking at it in terms of statistical numbers, it would reduce that as an excuse for getting away from exploiting a young person.
The Chair: I am trying to fit all the many pieces of this puzzle together in some kind of a coherent form. I find myself recalling evidence, some of it from you, Professor Langevin, that dangerous offenders who are sex offenders, which would include the kind of people we are talking about, I assume, tend not to be as fully rational as the run-of-the-mill population. They are more likely to have brain injuries and learning disorders, which suggests they will not be paying much attention to the age of consent anyway.
To reach them, it would occur to me that a 45-year-old man who is going after a 14-year-old teenager, especially a girl, may not be fully rational in the way we normally view these things anyway, so how will changing the law change that situation?
Mr. Langevin: That situation is often not even being assessed because the age of consent is 14 years. That is the complaint. There is a lot of exploitation going on in that age group.
The Chair: That is in spite of the existence of section 153 of the Criminal Code of Canada.
Mr. Langevin: For some reason that section of the Criminal Code is not working. The Beyond Borders people are more informed than I am, but that is my reading of it. Whatever the laws are as they stand, they are not effectively protecting children in that age group.
The Chair: Could I just go back then, changing topics, to the really fascinating information in some of your tables? Table 3 lists the features of offenders. The material about the academic records was interesting in its own right, but I found even more so the neurological and possibly the endocrine findings, although those were based on such a small sample that one would have to treat them with caution. You list 84 per cent with head trauma and 41 per cent as neuropsychologically impaired, and so on. What, in your experience, do the correctional services do about people like that? Are there medical programs? I do not know what the appropriate treatment is for brain injuries. You say ADHD is a treatable condition. Is there anything remotely approaching an appropriate, adequate system of trying to help those people?
Mr. Langevin: I do not know of a program anywhere in North America that deals with this problem. When someone is clearly dysfunctional because of some injury, a motor vehicle accident, it is often very difficult to get anything done.
I should point out that there are only about eight or nine studies in the world literature that examine this question among dangerous offenders and sex offenders. They keep pointing out that this is a significant factor. It has not been dealt with in any treatment program of which I am aware. They may be excluded from treatment because they are not able to benefit, or they may just be put into a group and treated as if there is nothing wrong, as if there is no problem at all. There are educational methods to enable these people to learn to deal with these conditions, but they are just not being dealt with at this time.
Senator Cowan: On the first page of your brief you say that you and your colleagues have a record of assessment of 51 applications made for dangerous offender designation over the past 30 years and a database of approximately 3,000 seen from 1966 to 1999. Is that seen by you and your group of associates?
Mr. Langevin: Yes.
Senator Cowan: Then if we turn to the dangerous offenders table, do the numbers in that table deal with the 51 offenders?
Mr. Langevin: That group, yes.
Senator Cowan: And the non-dangerous offender group, what is the size of that group?
Mr. Langevin: That group numbers in the thousands.
Senator Cowan: That would be the balance of the 3,000.
Mr. Langevin: Yes.
Senator Cowan: The first column in each of these tables is either a number based on 51, or a percentage of that 51?
Mr. Langevin: That is right. You must remember that is one eighth of all known dangerous offenders.
Senator Cowan: I understand.
Mr. Langevin: That is a big sample.
Senator Cowan: Thank you.
Senator Andreychuk: Mr. Langevin, you are pointing out that the real predators who are caught under the present legislation are just some of the predators we have identified. Are we not getting at more of a preventive measure, putting the onus on the adult, because now you cannot prosecute some of the cases because consent may be a defence?
Mr. Langevin: Yes, that is what is happening.
The Chair: It has been an exceedingly interesting session. Both of you have given us a great deal to think about and we thank you very much indeed.
Honourable senators, it has been an extremely interesting day, and most informative.
Senator Andreychuk: Mr. Dyck said he was called yesterday, and that gave me some concern.
The Chair: I did want to address that point. We did, in fact, try to reach Egale Canada some time ago. In my experience, including those to whom I have been parent, reaching students is not necessarily the fastest thing one can do in the world, but we did try. If you only got the message yesterday, we apologize for that. Our intentions and our efforts were real. We offer our apologies to you and to Egale Canada.
The committee adjourned.