44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 28, 2023 10:00AM
- Nov/28/23 4:06:21 p.m.
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Karma is tough, Madam Speaker. During the Harper regime, Conservatives appointed members to the Senate whose only qualifications were that they were defeated Conservative candidates. They did not delay bills; they killed them. They killed Jack Layton's climate accountability act. They killed bill after bill. Now the Conservatives are concerned about the Senate. It is too rich to even contemplate.
We spend $100 million every year for the unelected, undemocratic and, under the Conservatives, under-investigation Senate. Would the member agree with me that it is time to abolish the Senate now and forever?
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- Nov/28/23 5:28:12 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the NDP would like to reserve the right to intervene as well. We will be looking very carefully at the blues.
I would repeat my colleague's request that we see the clock at 5:30 p.m.
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- Nov/28/23 6:09:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to say from the outset that our thoughts are with Paul Bernardo's victims and their families.
What we saw a few months ago was sad. I think that everyone here in the House is trying to ensure that someone like Paul Bernardo, who has a long record of assault and murder, who had no conscience and who committed horrific crimes, should never be able to leave prison and walk among ordinary folks.
We know full well that this will never happen, either. I think that is quite clear. The correctional service was also very clear on that. The crimes he committed are heinous.
Our thoughts are with the victims.
That being said, it is also important to note that the NDP brought forward a motion at the public safety committee that all members of Parliament around the committee table agreed to for the study we are currently working on. I think it is fair to say that all parties are working together to get to the bottom of the transfer of offenders like Mr. Bernardo to ensure that it never happens again. Tomorrow, we will be having other hearings. The recommendations will go to the government. I am confident that we have learned a lesson from this situation and will not encounter it again. It is extremely important for the victims, for the community and for us all.
The question is whether this bill offers some type of solution. I am very concerned by its use of a flawed process within our correctional services that is really the foundation of this particular bill. I do not know if it was because it was rushed to be produced. However, the fact is that it hangs on the designation of a dangerous offender, when we know that, in our correctional system, the definition of “dangerous offender” is deeply flawed. It needs to be fully investigated, judges need to be trained and there needs to be a shift in how we designate dangerous offenders.
A number of my colleagues, including the parliamentary secretary who spoke, have raised the broader concerns that are before the public. We have a correctional system that is, according to the correctional investigator of Canada, Dr. Ivan Zinger, “nothing short of a national travesty.”
According to an article on his report, “More than 30% of inmates in Canadian prisons are Indigenous — even though aboriginal people make up just 5% of the country’s population”. That is why Dr. Zinger described the situation in our correctional facilities as a travesty.
Moreover, the “figure is highest in the prairie provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, where Indigenous people make up 54% of the prison population.” Furthermore, “Numerous factors — including poverty rates and racism in policing — contribute to the imbalance in convictions.”
The article continues:
And once in detention, Indigenous people face another set of systemic inequities: Indigenous offenders are more likely to be sent of maximum-security facilities and are disproportionately the recipients of harm, both self-induced and in incidents involving “use of force”. They are also much more likely to be placed in solitary confinement.
What makes the findings even more troubling, said [Dr.] Zinger, is that the proportion of Indigenous prisoners has steadily increased. Since...2010, the Indigenous population in prisons has grown by nearly 44%....
Let us come to the definition of “dangerous offender”, because that is the cornerstone of the bill before us. Here we see that the travesty that was raised so eloquently by the correctional investigator is even more manifest.
A CBC News article notes:
Advocates say...Indigenous people are disproportionately harmed by dangerous offender designations and are not given adequate support.
“All they want to do is put a dangerous offender designation on and then, just put him away where you'll never hear from [them],” said Congress of Aboriginal Peoples national vice-chief Kim Beaudin.
There were 860 offenders designated as dangerous offenders under the responsibility of Correctional Service Canada...[and] 36.3 per cent were Indigenous, according to CSC....
The number of Indigenous dangerous offender designations has increased 58 per cent....
We have a deeply flawed designation of dangerous offender such that an indigenous offender is 12 times more likely, even committing the same crimes as someone who is non-indigenous, to be designated as a dangerous offender. That is the travesty the correctional investigator was referring to. That is a fundamental problem that needs to be addressed.
As PressProgress reported just a little while ago, the prairie provinces are failing to address systemic racism in the criminal justice system. When we have a situation where 4% of the population makes up almost half, or 36.3%, of the dangerous offender designations, there is a problem with the kind of designation taking place. The concerns around systemic racism in the criminal justice system, including with sentencing and judges, are things that as a society we need to take on. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was very clear that this is a fundamental problem.
The travesty that was referred to by the correctional investigator needs to be tackled. However, instead of informing the bill by that in any way, it uses a term that has become fraught with peril given the horrible overrepresentation of indigenous people among those with a dangerous offender designation. This is a huge problem and is something I believe the mover should have thought through and consulted on.
At the public safety committee, we are working through ways to ensure the transfer that occurred a few months ago never happens again. To have a bill that would create many more problems by effectively doubling down on a system fraught with systemic racism, to the point where an indigenous offender has a 12 times greater likelihood of being designated a dangerous offender than somebody who is not indigenous, should be of concern to all of us.
My colleague, whom I respect very much, made a number of partisan comments. I want to reply by talking about the justice system in a more adult fashion.
First off, one of the ways we maintain public safety is to ensure those who are sentenced in our correctional institutions stay there. I note that the six worst years for the number of escapees in Canada from our correctional services, from maximum-security and medium-security prisons, all occurred under the Harper regime. Every single one of them did, which is three times more than what we are seeing today. When the Conservative Harper government, the Harper regime, was running our nation's prisons, the threat to public safety was horribly greater than what we are seeing now and what we saw prior to the Harper government. The worst years on record were all from the Conservatives.
Second, I note that other countries, such as Norway, had high recidivism rates that were lowered by taking the approach Canada has taken. Norway's recidivism rate, based on the United States, was over 70% and is now down to 20%, which is the lowest in the world. Canada is at 23%. Those approaches work.
The Conservative intent of always importing Republican-style American approaches to the justice system has been a massive failure. The U.S. has the highest rate of recidivism in the world, with 76.6% of prisoners rearrested within five years. If what we are really talking about is public safety, this failed approach from the Conservatives, failed in terms of prison escapees and recidivism rates, is not something that should be replicated.
We will continue our work at the public safety committee to ensure that something like the Bernardo transfer never happens again. However, the approach we need to take is one that puts public safety at the top level. This bill would not do that.
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