Public Safety Minister Vic Toews said Wednesday that one part of Ottawa's reform of criminal sentences will cost the federal government $2 billion over five years.
The sentencing changes, which came into effect in February, eliminate the so-called two-for-one credit given to prisoners who spent pre-trial time in custody. As a result, it is expected the average prisoner will be incarcerated for longer, at a greater cost to the country's correctional centres.
In a report expected to be made public next week, parliamentary budget officer Kevin Page says the sentencing reforms will cost between $7 billion and $10 billion over the next five years.
About three-quarters of those costs will be borne by the provinces, since most sentences are for less than two years and are therefore served in provincial jails.
The federal government refused to declare how much it thought the sentencing reforms would cost when the legislation was debated last fall.
And despite calls from the opposition, it still won't divulge the total anticipated price of its criminal-law reform bills. Last week, the Conservatives introduced bills to kill the "faint hope" clause that allows some murderers to apply for early parole, to institute minimum jail sentences for convicted arsonists and counterfeiters, and to revive two contentious provisions of the Anti-terrorism Act.
The government has an idea of what the total cost will be above and beyond the $2 billion for nixing the two-for-one credit, Toews told reporters Wednesday after many questions on the subject.
But then he added: "I'd rather not share my idea on that. They will come out in due course.
"Our government is prepared to pay the cost in order to keep dangerous offenders in prison," Toews said. "We actually believe that dangerous criminals should not be on the streets."
Government stonewalled
Page's estimates on the two-for-one sentencing reform came in response to a request last fall from a Liberal MP. The costing is rough, laden with caveats, and will be presented as a price range. That's because the government refused to hand over much of the data requested by the budget watchdog, and his office was left developing its own statistical models based partly on U.S. prison data.
Toews said he has not seen the budget officer's report, but his officials tell him it is flawed — a response widely anticipated by a peer review panel brought together by the budget office to examine its methodology.
"We fully expect government to say these numbers are garbage," said Craig Jones, executive director of the John Howard Society of Canada, a group that advocates on prison issues.
But unless Toews is prepared to share details of his own costing with the public, the minister has no grounds to complain about the watchdog's work, Jones said.
The sentencing reforms that came into force in February eliminate the common judicial practice of granting convicts double credit toward their prison sentence for the time they were detained leading up to their trial. Judges would often grant the two-for-one credit to offenders because many pre-trial jails across the country are in poor condition.
The new law says judges can grant no more than 1.5-times credit, and only in exceptional cases. The effect will be to extend the amount of time many inmates spend in custody, be it federal or provincial.
The federal government will accommodate the increase by putting two inmates in each cell, or by expanding existing prisons, Toews has said.OTTAWA — The federal government knows the rough cost of its centrepiece law-and-order agenda. But it's not telling.
Public Safety Minister Vic Toews revealed Wednesday that the federal price tag on just one piece of the legislative package - the Truth in Sentencing Act - will be $2 billion over five years.
But that's just a small part of a huge package of reforms that Toews would not publicly cost.
"We have an idea" of the total burden, Toews finally told reporters after many questions on the subject.
But then he added: "I'd rather not share my idea on that. They will come out in due course."
The federal Tories have well over a dozen pieces of tough-on-crime legislation that have already passed or are in the hopper. They have never given a cost estimate of the entire package.
And they have been reluctant to discuss impacts even on specific pieces of legislation - even when Parliamentarians debating the bills have asked.
"It's clear that our government understands that there will be a cost to this," Toews said.
In response to a request last fall from a Liberal MP, Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page is expected to release his own report next week. He is expected to show that the cost of the Truth in Sentencing measures could run up to $10 billion over five years, split between federal and provincial governments.
The costing is rough, laden with caveats, and will be presented as a range of estimates. That's because the government refused to hand over much of the data requested by the budget watchdog, and his office was left developing its own statistical models based partly on U.S. prison data.
While Page's report has not yet been made public, people familiar with the six-month investigation say it concludes that the provincial governments will likely shoulder about three quarters of the burden.
That's because the majority of inmates are sentenced to less than two years, and are automatically sent to provincial facilities, explained Craig Jones, executive director of the John Howard Society of Canada.
Toews says he has not seen the budget officer's report, but his officials tell him it is flawed - a response widely anticipated by the peer review panel brought together by the watchdog to examine the methodology.
"We fully expect government to say these numbers are garbage," said Jones.
But unless Toews is prepared to share details of his own costing with the public, the minister has no grounds to complain about the watchdog's work, Jones said.
Still, he added that Toews' admission that the cost of one bill is $2 billion lends credence to the budget officer's findings that the total cost of the crime agenda will be huge.
"Our government is prepared to pay the cost in order to keep dangerous offenders in prison," Toews said. "We actually believe that dangerous criminals should not be on the streets."
The Truth in Sentencing Act came into force in February.
It tells judges to stop giving criminals a two-for-one credit for the time they served in pre-custody detention, and instead just give them a one-for-one credit.
The effect will be to extend the amount of time some inmates spend in custody, be it federal or provincial.
The federal government will be accommodate the increase by putting two inmates in each cell, or by expanding existing prisons, Toews said.
But Ottawa refused to give Parliamentarians a cost estimate of the measures while they were debating the legislation last year.
Now, provincial politicians are asking questions about cost too.
The Manitoba government was a key supporter of the two-for-one sentencing act.
But in testimony last week, Justice Minister Andrew Swan said he has not been able to figure out how much it will cost his province.
"I'm not trying to be difficult," he told Progressive Conservative MLA Kelvin Goertzen.
"It just seems that there's a lot of moving pieces that make it very difficult for Corrections officials to say the impact of any one of these things will be this many more beds filled or this many less beds filled." Eliminating double time credit is probably the worst move ever! How will this solve any crime problems, prevent or reduce crime? It won't. By eliminating double credits, prisoners will be incarcerated for longer periods of time, making prisons and jails even MORE overcrowded than they already are. This causes stress, hostility and increased violence among inmates, making them more bitter and dangerous when released and more likely to re-offend. With more overcrowding, comes less and less funding allocated to prison programs, which could be effective, if they had more funding and were the emphasis. With overcrowding, comes less and less resources and programming available to each individual inmate, meaning prisoners will likely be released more dangerous and violent, if they are receiving no rehabilitation.
The Conservatives are not thinking long term. They only think of prison as solving everything. Prison is only a quick fix, but someday these offenders will be released and with all the new government laws including eliminating double credit, their likelihood of re-offending is only to increase, which is not in society's best interests. We need to address the underlying social, economic factors, biological predispositions and psychological/behavioural problems and disorders and personality traits, in order to effectively reduce and prevent future crime. It's been proven to work, yet the government is ignoring the research. The Conservatives are only going to create a more dangerous society in the future. Our prison systems need to have more emphasis on rehabilitation than punishment, retribution and revenge.
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