12799 OFFICIAL REPORT (HANSARD) House of Commons Debates VOLUME 147 NUMBER 197 2nd SESSION 41st PARLIAMENT Tuesday, April 21, 2015 Speaker: The Honourable Andrew Scheer HOUSE OF COMMONS CANADA (Table of Contents appears at back of this issue.) COMMONS DEBATES April 21, 2015 DEBATES Edited Hansard * Table of Contents * Number 197 (Official Version) Official Report * Table of Contents * Number 197 (Official Version) Compte rendu officiel * Table des matières * Numéro 197 (Version officielle) 147 197 21 04 2015 2015/04/21 10:05:00 House of Commons Débats de la Chambre des communes House of Commons Debates 41 2 The House met at 10 a.m.

Prayers ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS Routine Proceedings (1005) [ English ] Government Response to Petitions Mr. Tom Lukiwski (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36(8) I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the government's response to eight petitions.

Committees of the House Canadian Heritage Mr. Gordon Brown (Leeds—Grenville, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 12th report of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage in relation to the main estimates, 2015-16.

Petitions The Environment Ms. Jean Crowder (Nanaimo—Cowichan, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I have three petitions to present. The first petition is on Bill C-638 ,

an act to amend the Canada Shipping Act. The petitioners outline that derelict and abandoned vessels pose an environmental risk and a navigation hazard, and that regulations must be made to establish measures to be taken for the removal, disposition or destruction by the appropriate authority. The petitioners call upon the House of Commons to support Bill C-638 ,

an act to amend the Canada Shipping Act.

Democratic Reform Ms. Jean Crowder (Nanaimo—Cowichan, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, the second petition is on the fair electoral representation act. The petitioners are calling on the House of Commons to immediately undertake public consultations across Canada to amend the Canada Elections Act to ensure voters can cast an equal and effective vote to be represented fairly in Parliament regardless of political belief or place of residence, are governed by a fairly elected Parliament where the share of seats held by each political party closely reflects the popular vote, and finally live under legitimate laws approved by a majority of elected parliamentarians representing the majority of voters.

Agriculture Ms. Jean Crowder (Nanaimo—Cowichan, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, in the final petition, the petitioners call on the Canadian government to ensure that the right of family farmers to use seeds is respected.

Impaired Driving Mr. Mark Warawa (Langley, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to present some petitions here. The first notifies the House that 11-year-old Grace Wynen was tragically killed by a drunk driver, a person who chose to drive while impaired. Gracie's family was devastated. Families For Justice is a group of Canadians who have lost loved ones to an impaired driver. They believe that Canada's driving laws are much too lenient. They want the crime called what it is, vehicular homicide. The petitioners are calling on the government to introduce legislation that would require mandatory sentencing for those convicted of impaired driving causing death.

Sex Selection Mr. Mark Warawa (Langley, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, the second petition highlights that over 200 million girls are missing in the world right now. This gender imbalance is called gendercide. Ninety-two percent of Canadians believe that sex selection is wrong. The petitioners are calling on Parliament to condemn this discrimination against girls.

Public Transit Ms. Rathika Sitsabaiesan (Scarborough—Rouge River, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I rise today to present a petition on behalf of many people from all around Scarborough. They are calling for the creation of a Canada public transit strategy. Canada is the only OECD country that does not have a national public transit strategy. It is estimated that over the next five years there will be an $18-billion gap in transit infrastructure needs.

The petitioners are calling upon the government to enact a Canada public transit strategy that seeks to provide a permanent investment plan to support public transit; establish federal funding mechanisms for public transit; work together with all levels of government to provide sustainable, predictable, long-term and adequate funding; and establish accountability measures to ensure that all governments work together to increase access to public transit. I know in my riding of Scarborough—Rouge River, this is very much needed.

Agriculture Mr. Sean Casey (Charlottetown, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present to the House a petition signed by many of my constituents, respecting the right of small-scale family farmers to preserve, exchange and use seeds. This is a petition that has been actively promoted by an organization called Development and Peace. It calls on the Government of Canada to adopt international aid policies that support small family farmers, especially women, and recognize their vital role in the struggle against hunger and poverty.

Violence Against Women Mr. Matthew Kellway (Beaches—East York, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present a petition to the House today with respect to violence against women.

The signatories to this petition want to draw to the attention of the Government of Canada that women are 11 times more likely than men to be victims of sexual offences, that indigenous women in Canada are seven times more likely to be murdered than non-indigenous women, that nearly 1,200 indigenous women have gone missing or have been murdered in Canada, and that Canada has clear domestic and international obligations to address violence against women, including the United Nations call for all countries to have a national action plan to end violence against women.

The signatories are calling upon the Government of Canada to create a coordinated, comprehensive and national action plan to address violence against women, and launch an independent national inquiry into the deaths and disappearance of first nations, Métis and Inuit women.

[ Translation ] Consumer Protection Mrs. Anne-Marie Day (Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, thank you for allowing me to table two petitions today. The first calls for lowering credit card fees, which are too high, capping ATM user fees at 50 cents, and prohibiting additional fees that penalize people who receive their bills online.

Agriculture Mrs. Anne-Marie Day (Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, the second petition is about respect for the rights of small family farmers to save, exchange and use seeds.

[ English ] Prostitution Mr. Leon Benoit (Vegreville—Wainwright, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, I have three petitions today. The first is regarding prostitution. The petitioners note that the most recent legislation on prostitution was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court and they call on the House therefore to declare such sex with a woman, man or child to be a criminal offence and that it also be a criminal offence for pimps, madams and others who profit from the proceeds of prostitution.

(1010) Genetically Modified Foods Mr. Leon Benoit (Vegreville—Wainwright, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, the second petition is from petitioners across the country who request that no genetically modified fish or fish eggs be sold in Canada.

Sex Selection Mr. Leon Benoit (Vegreville—Wainwright, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, the third petition is regarding gender selection abortion. The petitioners note that the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation aired a piece that showed that there were ultrasounds being done and if the fetus was found to be female, the female would be aborted. The petitioners call on the Parliament of Canada to condemn discrimination against girls occurring through gender selection pregnancy termination.

Questions on the Order Paper Mr. Tom Lukiwski (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, CPC) : Mr. Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand. The Speaker: Is that agreed? Some hon. members: Agreed.

Government Orders Government Orders [ English ] Drug-Free Prisons Act The House resumed from February 17 consideration of the motion that Bill C-12,

An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act , be read the third time and passed. Bill C-12. Third reading Ms. Jinny Jogindera Sims (Newton—North Delta, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure, today, to rise to speak in support of Bill C-12 ,

an act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act, as it has been labelled, the drug-free prisons act, though I am often confused how the bill would make our prisons drug free. However, at the same time, we are supporting it.

At this time, I would like to take a minute to acknowledge the amazing work being done by the critic in this area; that is, the member of Parliament for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca , who has done an absolutely thorough and very detailed analysis of this piece of legislation, and the work done at the committee to try to strengthen the legislation so that it would actually do what it purports it would. As we know, our colleagues across the way are not really up to listening to any experts or advice as to how to improve bills.

In any event, the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca , on this whole file of public safety, has put in, I would say, a gargantuan amount of work in order to deal with real issues for Canadians and to ensure Canadians' safety in a real way. It is interesting that we are debating the bill on the day the budget will be presented. We know that the budget has been delayed. I do not know if it has been delayed because the minister just did not know what to put in the budget or whether they were busy developing their communications or free advertising plan on the tax dollars, but the budget has been delayed.

In any event, we look forward to seeing it today. I really hope that when we look at the budget today we will see a significant investment in what the current government purports its agenda to be. My colleagues across the way often like to see themselves as the champions of public safety but often what we have is a lot of rhetoric with very little funding that goes along with the programs they announced, or lack thereof, or has often been accompanied by cuts as well. This particular piece of legislation, despite its title, “drug-free prisons act”, I would say is a baby step that we do support.

Let me tell members that it would not have the kind of impact that my colleagues across the way seem to think it would because this particular bill would not tackle the real issues that our prisons are facing. Bill C-12 would add a provision to the Corrections and Conditional Release Act that would make it clear that the Parole Board may use positive results from urine tests, or refusals to take urine tests for drugs, in making its decisions on parole eligibility. Let me assure members that my understanding is this is already being done.

Therefore, what we would do is take a practice that is already in play into legislation, and that is a good thing. What it would do is give clear authority to an existing practice, a practice that we do support, but this practice by itself and on its own would not address the serious issues we do have to tackle, which are drug addictions, mental illness and the very fundamentals that lead to more and more people ending up in prisons rather than in treatment. The title of Bill C-12 , as I have mentioned a few times, is misleading.

We know the current government has a penchant for coming up with some pretty outrageous, all-encompassing titles for bills, but when we actually dig into the bill we find there is very little substance. That is what we are finding with this bill. The title sounds great but when we get into the bill, all we have is the government codifying a current practice of the Parole Board.

(1015) The Parole Board right now retains its discretion as to what use it makes of this information, which is actually how it would remain. It always makes me proud to sit on this side of the House with my colleagues, because we have been steadfast in our support for measures that will make our prisons safe, while the Conservative government has ignored recommendations from corrections staff and the Correctional Investigator that would decrease violence, gang activity, and drug use in our prisons. We are not the only ones. We know that the current government is allergic to data and experts.

However, most of us know that when we are dealing with the complexities of drug addiction, we have to pay attention to what we know and to the knowledge acquired by the experts in this area. The stakeholders agree with the NDP that this bill would have a minimal impact on drugs in prisons. This bill is about granting parole and what the Parole Board would take into consideration. It has very little to do with what is actually going to be happening inside the prisons.

Once again, the Conservative government is using legislation to create an opportunity to pander to its base and to pretend that it is doing something with no real solutions to the issue of drugs and gangs in our prisons. I would go so far as to say that the government is actually making our prisons less safe by cutting funding to correctional programs, such as for substance abuse, and by increasing the use of double-bunking, which leads to more violence.

Our priority as parliamentarians should be ensuring community safety by preparing ex-offenders to reintegrate into society once released, addiction-free and less likely to reoffend. I looked very carefully at this legislation, because as a mother and now a grandmother and as a life-long teacher and counsellor in a high school and for the school district, I know what a difficult task we have ahead of us as a society as we try to tackle drug addictions. There are no simple solutions. In my city of Surrey, in beautiful British Columbia, in the last 38 days we have had 23 shootings.

On Sunday, what we all feared happened: a fatality, with a 22-year-old losing his life. People in my community of Surrey, like in other communities across Canada, care very deeply about addressing the issues of violence, gangs and drugs. No parents out there want to see their young daughter or sons engaged in the use of drugs or involved in any kind of criminal activity. When these kinds of tragedies happen in our communities, it shakes us to the core and makes us want to hug those around us.

Right now, my heart goes out to the family—the parents, uncles, aunts, cousins, brothers, sisters—but also to the whole community as it deals with this latest round of gun violence. It is because we want real solutions that we want to tackle the real issues. We want to starting looking at the underlying issues.

(1020) We need a real strategy and action on mental health, not just talk, that happens in a multi-faceted way. Many people will say that it has nothing to do with this topic. We know that the majority of people in our prisons are there because they were convicted of crimes related to drugs and many of them because they suffer from mental health issues. Unless we start tackling mental health issues in a serious way, I do not think this baby step is going to help us achieve a safer society or make our prisons any safer.

It is like the current government wants to see how many more people it can put into prisons, even if it has to double-bunk them, and the mandatory sentencing has led to more people being sent to prison. I absolutely believe that we need policies that mete out punishments that fit the crimes, but we also need to make sure that there is rehabilitation. Before we even talk about crimes and people ending up in prison, we need to look at our communities, school systems, and the kind of programming needed. When I look at the public school system, I would say that it has been under attack for many years.

When I look specifically at British Columbia, a lot of the preventive work that used to be done on drug addictions in high schools is very difficult to do today, because a number of counsellors have been removed and a lot of the money that used to be available for prevention is no longer there. I look at Surrey and the kind of support system for youth in our community. I look at how many students per counsellor there are today compared to when I came to B.C., when there were 250 students to a counsellor in my district Nanaimo. Now I am hearing that the number can be as high as 800 to 1,000 per counsellor.

If we look at all the pressures on our children through social media and the Internet, and we know, because we have dealt with many pieces of legislation in the House, at the very same time that is happening, they are cutting a lot of the support systems that used to be available. In my school district in B.C., we used to have some of the most progressive, stellar programs to engage youth in a positive way. One was called action Nanaimo. There was also a steps to maturity program, which actually dealt with kids' self-esteem, communication skills, and the issue of bullying and how to deal with that.

None of those programs exist today. This is where we have to have all levels of government and communities working together to provide young people with the kind of supports they need so that they do not end up getting into trouble, whether it is due to mental health or drugs, and do not end up joining gangs and engaging in trafficking drugs. We need to make sure that youth have the scaffolding they need to steer through the many challenges they face in our society today. I would say that the same is true of those people who are in our prisons today.

It is very easy to sentence people to prison, but if once they are in prison we do not provide them with rehabilitation, we are not doing a service to society.

(1025) Let me throw out a figure that will be absolutely shocking to most people. The cost to send a person to prison and keep him or her in confinement has risen to about $80,000 to $90,000 a year. We are prepared to spend that as a society. On the other hand, we are not prepared to put even 10% or 20% of that money into education and prevention programs so that our young people do not end up in prison. If mandatory sentences and putting more people into prisons would get rid of drugs and crime, then the U.S. would have no crime and no drug problem.

What we are good at, under the government across the way, is following examples that we know are not good. Instead of looking at evidence, we would rather just blindly copy the U.S. and keep putting people in prison, while the U.S. is sending experts up here to learn about rehabilitation from us. Once people are in prison, we do not provide them with the resources they need to not reoffend. I find it quite outrageous to sit in this House and listen to the rhetoric of the government across the way when it has failed.

It has not only failed to increase funding, it has cut funding to programs that would provide support for those in prison, and in hospitals too. I have a 90-year-old mother who I was recently visiting in hospital. Despite the amazing work being done by the staff at the hospital, I would say that they are facing major challenges as well. To truly address the issue of drug use in prisons, we need to do a proper intake assessment of an inmate's addiction and then provide the proper correctional programming for that offender.

Without treatment, education, and proper integration upon release, a prisoner will likely return to a criminal lifestyle and possibly create more victims. What we have then is what has come to be known as the revolving door. With mandatory minimums, our prison population is increasing while at the same time both federal and provincial governments are closing institutions. It is quite disconcerting how mental health services are being impacted. Correctional Service Canada's directive 55, which establishes procedures to normalize double-bunking, is kind of weird to me.

When I was young and I went to youth hostels, double-bunking was kind of fun, but I cannot imagine double-bunking in prison. Let me once again say that we support this. It is a baby step. However, without investments in prevention, education, treatment, and rehabilitation, all we have are words. Our communities deserve far more. I hope that in the budget presented today we will see a real infusion of funds to address prevention, education, mental health issues, rehabilitation, and real support for an effective reintegration policy that will make a real difference and lead to safer communities.

(1030) I would say there is no better investment than in the education of our children. I urge governments at the provincial level to please make it a top priority, because our children are our future and they are worth every penny we invest. Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Winnipeg North, Lib.) : Mr. Speaker, I will focus my question on the member's priority throughout her speech, which is education. I agree in many ways how important education is. The leader of the Liberal Party, a teacher by profession, has talked a great deal about the importance of education.

For example, he talked about the importance of looking at how we fund first nations education, and that we need to provide a lot more resources. Earlier today I met with representatives, including Paul Olson, the president of the Manitoba Teachers' Society. We talked about the importance of education. If we do not recognize how important education is to the children of our country, then we will sell short their potential. Many will end up on the wrong side of the law if we are not more proactive in encouraging our provinces, which have the administrative responsibility for education.

We also need to recognize the important role that the national government can play. We need to ensure there is a sense of equity across the country in dealing with education as well as issues such as mental health. We need to ensure there is programming that allows for the nutritional well-being of young children even before they enter the education system. If we had a proactive national government dealing with those types of issues, we could actually prevent more people from going into prisons. Perhaps the member could comment on those points. Ms. Jinny Jogindera Sims : Mr.

Speaker, there are areas in which the federal government plays a key role in education, such as in the education for our first nations people and aboriginal communities. A very large percentage of the people in prison are from our aboriginal communities. There is a lot of preventative initiatives that could be happening, such as investing in early childhood education, quality education, nutrition, prevention and education programs, and truly in strong and inclusive community building. It is always easy to say that this is not our mandate, as I have sometimes heard my colleagues across the way say.

However, once people are in prison, it is our mandate. Here is an amazing figure from seven institutions surveyed in February 2012: only 12.5% of the total offenders were enrolled in a core correctional program, and there is a waiting list to access these programs exceeding 35%. They say we should start at home and fix what we can fix, but we have a government that has made cut after cut to services in rehabilitation and education.

What we are seeing now is that only 12.5% access services, and there is a wait list for people in prison who want to get away from drugs and take the rehabilitation and education programs, but the Conservative government has made so many cuts that they are being denied rehabilitation. That is disgraceful.

(1035) Ms. Jean Crowder (Nanaimo—Cowichan, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, as the member has pointed out, the NDP is supporting Bill C-12 . However, there is a misnomer in the title. The

short title is “drug-free prisons act”, but in the annual report of the Office of the Correctional Investigator for 2011-12, it was pointed out that a zero tolerance stance to drugs in prison is an aspiration rather than an effective policy. It simply does not accord with the facts on crime and addiction in Canada or elsewhere in the world.

As the report states. “Harm reduction measures within a public health and treatment orientation offer a far more promising, cost-effective and sustainable approach to reducing subsequent crime and victimization.” The member raised the issues around the need for rehabilitation in her speech. I wonder if she could comment on that statement. Ms. Jinny Jogindera Sims : Mr. Speaker, I always like to relate some of the big issues to what happens in our families and how we raise our kids.

If parents telling their kids that they must do not do drugs would alone get rid of the drug problem in the world, we would not have that issue in Canada today. I know how hard parents work, and zero tolerance is a great aspiration to have, but until we achieve that, we have to have real expert advice from those who deal with these issues, based on the research and what works. We have to have a multifaceted approach. Just telling people not to do drugs, hitting them on the head with a baseball bat and sending them to prison is not going to get rid of the drug problem.

What is going to get rid of the drug problem is investment in education, rehabilitation and reintegration into society. [ Translation ] Mr. Raymond Côté (Beauport—Limoilou, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Newton—North Delta for her very sensitive speech that got right to the heart of the problem: how to prevent and address the challenges of incarceration. The important thing is not to create more problems, which is what the government is doing, unfortunately. During the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security's brief study, the Correctional Investigator was very critical.

He condemned the lack of resources to prevent drug use in our prisons. We can try to limit supply, but all of the credible witnesses said that focusing solely on supply is unrealistic. We also need to tackle demand. That means we have to support inmates coping with addiction. We have to identify them at intake and provide good programs so they can progress and make choices with comprehensive support. Would my colleague like to comment further on the Correctional Investigator's recommendation? [ English ] Ms. Jinny Jogindera Sims : Mr.

Speaker, whenever I talk about drugs in our communities or our prisons, I am always amazed how people want simplistic solutions. It is as if all of us are looking for a magic pill that would suddenly get rid of the impact of drugs on our families, our communities and our society as a whole. The Correctional Investigator has stated and there have been numerous reports that the corrections system risks unintended consequences when simplistic solutions are applied to the complex issue of drugs in prisons. They talk about the need for a proper assessment of prisoners on intake.

For instance, when someone has gotten into problems and has been sentenced to prison, let us do an assessment of what got them there. Do they have mental health issues? Are drugs involved? When did the drugs kick in? We have to take into account all of those things. We have to start looking at some of the causes at that time. Our prison system is not a one-way street. It is supposed to be one where we believe in rehabilitation. That is the kind of penal system we have. There has to be a proper assessment. Then we have to identify the specific problems that can be targeted.

Then we need to have rehabilitation programs so that people can be better reintegrated into society. Once they are released from prison we need to have a reintegration process that is scaffolded with a multitude of services so that the likelihood to reoffend is reduced. Once again, there is no simple pill. This is a complex issue. It is going to take investment and resources. Every dollar we invest will bring us back thousands of dollars in savings. (1040) [ Translation ] Ms. Christine Moore (Abitibi—Témiscamingue, NDP) : Mr.

Speaker, before I begin, I wish to inform you that I will be sharing my time with the member for Beauport—Limoilou . As the House has heard from other members of the official opposition, we will support Bill C-12 . We will support it because the measures in this bill are not bad. Nonetheless, will this bill really change anything? Some doubt remains in that regard. We will support it, in any case, but I really do not believe this bill will have the desired effect. The bill's

short title refers to making prisons drug-free. This title is a little misleading, however, because it is rather unrealistic to think that a bill that contains just five clauses, the first of which is the

short title, and fits on a single double-sided sheet of paper could successfully eliminate drugs from prisons with four clauses to amend Canada's laws. Moreover, this bill is rather redundant, and it legally confirms the common practice and what already exists in Canada's laws. When members of the Parole Board of Canada are deciding whether an inmate can be released on parole, they already have the discretion to take into account the results of urine testing or the fact that an inmate refuses to provide a urine sample.

Parole board members already have the power, albeit discretionary, to consider those factors in their decisions. Even if those members do eventually take drug testing into account, that is not how we are going to eliminate drugs from prisons. It is important to understand that in order to be effective, the government needs to invest money and act on the reports that the Correctional Investigator and the federal ombudsman have published over the years. However, there is nothing in the bill to suggest that the government is listening to the experts.

I highly doubt that this afternoon's budget will contain any additional funds to tackle addiction problems in prisons. In

summary, the bill just legally confirms rules that are already in use. The member for Victoria clearly pointed that out in his speech last December when he referred to the National Parole Board document entitled “Decision-Making Policy Manual for Board Members”.

Section 8 of that manual, “Assessing Criminal, Social and Conditional Release History”, reads: 8. Information considered when assessing criminal, social and conditional release history includes:... e. any documented occurrence of drug use, positive urinalysis results or failures or refusals to provide a sample while on conditional release; Clearly, these factors are already being considered in the decision-making process. The crisis in our prisons involves substance abuse, rampant gang activity and the recruitment of gang members within the prison population.

Some of these problems could be eradicated if we were to apply the measures that were proposed by some of the witnesses when this bill was examined in committee. In short, resources for rehabilitation are wanting, and the budgets of correctional organizations and the many cuts the Conservatives have made over the years are not at all consistent with the logic they are trying to establish in this bill.

(1045) If we want to eliminate drugs in prisons, we need to combat drug addiction there with the help of resources and stakeholders, which we do not have right now. Even though drug addicts are well aware that they risk delaying their parole by taking drugs in prison, they will continue to do so because addictions are difficult to overcome. We therefore need to take action on the ground and establish real substance abuse treatment programs. In the civilian world, people can get help and services from professionals.

However, in prison, inmates who admit that they have a drug addiction are shooting themselves in the foot. It is better for them to hide their addiction in order to avoid the consequences. This is a complex issue. We need specialized addictions counsellors who understand the prison system to help on the ground. However, these counsellors need the government to invest in prisons. The Correctional Service of Canada has admitted that $122 million of Conservative spending on interdiction tools and technology to stop drugs from entering prisons since 2008 has not produced any results.

How come nothing has been done in light of that shocking statistic? Why have there been no policy reviews or the like? We know that a very high percentage of Canada's offender population abuses drugs. The report entitled “Substance abuse—The perspective of a National Parole Board member”, by Michael Crowley, an NPB member from Ontario, begins as follows: It is clear that alcohol and other drug problems constitute a major problem for both incarcerated offenders and those who are on some form of conditional release.

It is estimated that about 70% of offenders have substance abuse problems that are in need of treatment, and that more than 50% of their crimes are linked with substance use and abuse. We know that the vast majority of offenders, unfortunately, abuse drugs and that criminals often have a history of substance abuse. Inmates who are added to the prison system often already have substance abuse problems. These figures are rather shocking and indicative of the government's dire lack of investment in rehabilitation programs for inmates that would address this problem.

Furthermore, the prison population in Canada has skyrocketed because of the infamous minimum mandatory sentences, even though the crime rate has been steadily declining. In closing, I would like to say that mental health issues are also part of the problem. This is a growing problem that, together with inmates' addictions, exacerbates the situation. Inmates with mental health problems sometimes tend to self-medicate with drugs available on the prison market. That is a rather explosive combination. If we really want to eliminate drugs in prison, we have to be realistic.

We have to be prepared to make the required investments, put resources in place and understand that the drug problem in prisons will not be fixed by a bill with four clauses.

(1050) Yes, we support these clauses, because they confirm an existing informal practice. We realize and openly admit that Bill C-12 does little to make prisons drug-free, and it is going to take a lot more than that to solve this problem. Mr. Pierre-Luc Dusseault (Sherbrooke, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech on Bill C-12 . As is the case with many bills, this bill's title is surprising because it is an impressive title about fixing a serious problem.

I have a hard time believing that the clauses in this bill will truly do what the title implies they will, which is to make our prisons drug-free. Could the member tell us what she thinks about the titles this government loves to give its bills? The titles are misleading, because at the end of the day the bills do not achieve what the titles imply they will. Could she give us her opinion on how the Conservative government gives its bills nice titles that do not pan out? Ms. Christine Moore : Mr. Speaker, indeed, the Conservatives have a habit of always trying to fool the public.

They talk about a bill with a title that implies it will fix everything, when in fact that is not the case, since the bill is missing a lot of clauses or it will create other problems. The government often tries to make Canadians believe that it has managed a problem by introducing a bill—in this case on drug-free prisons—but in fact, the bill is not comprehensive enough to fix the problem. People who may not be able to understand the bill, read through the legal terminology and understand its impact will think that the Conservatives took action, when in reality that is not the case.

This government has a bad habit of trying to fool Canadians. It is being intellectually dishonest with the people it is supposed to represent. (1055) [ English ] Mr. Charlie Angus (Timmins—James Bay, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, we have a government that is willing to spend $80,000 to $90,000 a year incarcerating prisoners. We see that it spent over $100 million already in trying to stop drugs getting into prisons and has failed. The problem is a lack of vision in terms of how to deal with the serious issue of drugs that are affecting our communities.

In the city of Timmins we have set up a fentanyl task force to deal with the heavy impacts of the abuse of fentanyl, and one of the key things that has come forward is the need to be able to track the fentanyl patches. These are opiate patches. My colleague is a nurse, so she would know very well about fentanyl, but without a bar code or a serial number put on by Health Canada, the police are unable to track the source of the patches.

If we have patches of 100 mcg coming into the city of Timmins, these are very lucrative for gangs, but we need to be able to take the preventive approach to stop this kind of heavy duty opiate being brought into our communities and then affecting people who may not have otherwise gotten into drugs. I know some wonderful young people who had their lives ahead of them who have been affected by fentanyl, and people who have died from it.

What does my colleague think about the need for these coherent, grass roots, preventive approaches, first, to prevent these kinds of drugs coming into our communities and keep people from getting involved in the drug trade, and also to be able to stop it by going after the gangs who are trading in fentanyl patches? [ Translation ] Ms. Christine Moore : Mr. Speaker, illicit drug use certainly exists, but many people abuse prescription drugs. Unfortunately, sometimes people go through grandma's medicine cabinet looking for interesting things. Those are tragic situations.

In many cases, community approaches are more successful than criminalization and repression. Keeping people from engaging in these bad habits by making positive activities available often has an impact on drug use among youth. When they have access to leisure spaces and opportunities to participate in these activities, that has a positive impact in terms of drug use. Drug use drops when there is better support for the community and people have opportunities to do things other than use drugs. Drug addiction is a complex issue.

We have to take a community-based approach and conduct broad consultations with all stakeholders if we want to eliminate this problem or reduce its impact. Mr. Raymond Côté (Beauport—Limoilou, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I thank my esteemed colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue for sharing her precious speaking time with me so that I can express my views on Bill C-12 on behalf of the people of Beauport—Limoilou . The title of the bill is “

An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act ”. This bill amends a law. The title sends a fairly disturbing message, one that I would call misleading. I would also like to quote the

short title, which the Conservatives liked to trot out all the time. It is the “ drug-free prisons act ”. Like many people, I have tried to get dandelions out of my lawn. Everyone knows that is one tough slog. I am not saying it is a lost cause, but those dandelions often come back from the other side of the fence when you least expect it. First of all, I want to emphasize how unrealistic this bill is, which was also pointed out by the very few witnesses we managed to squeeze into the meetings of the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.

Those witnesses, who were not from the department, pointed out that the bill unfortunately did not introduce anything new, despite its value and the fact that it should be supported. Like my NDP colleagues, I support the bill in principle. This bill will confirm a practice that is already established, but it does not solve the underlying problem. I want to touch upon the Conservatives' message. It is quite ironic that they have not said a thing since this debate began.

I should add that the debate only began about an hour ago, and yet there they sit, firmly rooted in their chairs, refusing to listen to the strong objections and, more importantly, the concerns we are raising in relation to the problem of drug use in our prisons. That problem will not be resolved, not really, by passing this bill. This title, the drug-free prisons act , and these five clauses send a clear message to inmates with drug problems. If they ever want to be released, they will have to satisfy certain conditions.

As far as their substance abuse problem is concerned, they know that they cannot count on getting any help and that they will have to face their problem alone. That has been precisely the Conservatives' approach for years. Repression above all else is what they promise their base. People who are plagued by a problem they often cannot control are told that they cannot count on the Conservatives to spend any money on supporting them and helping them break free them from their addiction to drugs. It is really too bad.

In addition to ignoring the offender population that is facing very serious problems that might prevent early parole and completely undermining reintegration, once again the Conservatives are refusing to listen to experts directly affected by this, namely staff and the Correctional Investigator. These stakeholders are making recommendations to deal with the substance abuse problems in our prisons and other very serious problems that lead to substance abuse, such as mental health problems, a scourge that affects a large segment of the population.

I have some very disturbing statistics, which clearly illustrate the extent of the current problem in Canada's prisons and penitentiaries.

(1100) In 2011, 69% of female inmates and 45% of male inmates were treated for mental health issues. That already speaks to the extent of the problem. However, a certain number of mental health cases may not even be treated. This gives us an idea of how this problem cannot be addressed by the pure and simple repression that the Conservatives defend so vigorously. I am going to tell it like it is: it is easy for the Conservatives to score political points on the backs of our inmates while ignoring mental health problems of this magnitude.

I learned about the position of senior RCMP officials concerning the fight against terrorism. The Standing Committee on Finance, which I am pleased to be a member of, is currently carrying out a valuable study of the financing of terrorism. However, what is troubling is that the RCMP is robbing Peter to pay Paul. We had already heard this at the Standing Committee on Finance, but it was confirmed at a meeting of a Senate committee on public safety, if I am not mistaken. The RCMP is transferring investigators from the fight against organized crime to the fight against terrorism.

In the funding approved by the House, $1.5 billion allocated to the RCMP was not spent, but instead returned to the public treasury. Everyone knew it, starting with the Conservatives. However, once again they chose to ignore this. In the end, the RCMP and our correctional services do not have the means to address the enormous challenge of fighting terrorism and organized crime. Similarly, correctional officers are increasingly ill-prepared to address mental health issues, the violence in our prisons and drug use. These budgets are unfortunately being cut.

Ultimately, the claim made by the department and especially by the government that the drug problem in prisons is being adequately addressed rings hollow. I hope that my colleagues will speak up in the House and participate in an important debate. Despite the fancy titles the Conservatives give their bills and the claims they make when they are boasting to their voter base, this once again shows that—I am going to say it again—the victims of crime are collateral victims of the Conservatives' decision to abandon the fight against drugs at every level. We need to focus on prevention.

When people are struggling with addiction and mental health problems and when nothing is done to help them deal with those issues or to prevent them in the first place, they get more and more out of control and their condition deteriorates. It then becomes very difficult for them to deal with these problems by themselves. A correctional officer told me very clearly that, for most of these people, there is life after prison.

If their mental health deteriorates and their drug addiction leads them down a dead-end street, their reintegration into society and their ability to find a place in it obviously becomes an enormous obstacle that could lead them to reoffend. Once again, the Conservatives are not facing the problem and are abandoning the victims of crime in this regard. I would like to end on that note, and I look forward to questions from my colleagues in the House. I would like to repeat that I support this bill, but I hope that the means will follow.

However, I have been saying that in the House and in committee for the past four years, and I no longer expect results from this dying government.

(1105) Mr. Hoang Mai (Brossard—La Prairie, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Beauport—Limoilou for his speech on a rather important bill that conveys a specific vision of public safety. My colleague gave us a good analysis of the Conservative way of doing things. I would like to hear him talk about his vision and the NDP's vision of public safety issues. Could he tell us about prevention and about investments in social programs? What can we do to address this issue? We need to protect public safety in Canada, but how does the NDP propose that we better protect the public? Mr.

Raymond Côté : Mr. Speaker, I sincerely thank my colleague from Brossard—La Prairie for his question. I do not want to repeat all of the very sensible points made by our highly esteemed colleague from Newton—North Delta , who spoke in favour of education and of the hopes that could be raised when we invest in the future of our young people and the public in general by providing them with opportunities. I will pick up where she left off and talk about the upcoming budget. As I already mentioned, I am a member of the Standing Committee on Finance.

Unfortunately, as with the nine previous budgets, this 10th budget will once again represent negativity and lost opportunities for a large segment of our population. It will cause problems that could escalate and cause people to lose all hope in improving their future or the future of their loved ones. That is truly disappointing, since the Conservatives have always sought to punish people who stay away from drugs but who do not yet have a good job for their bad behaviour and bad choices.

Instead of providing them with opportunities, to be as inclusive as possible and enable people to make real choices, the Conservatives have always limited these choices, and they will continue to do so in this budget.

(1110) Mr. Pierre-Luc Dusseault (Sherbrooke, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech and for telling it like it is. He had no qualms about saying that the Conservatives are politicizing issues at the expense of certain segments of the population, inmates in this case. When offenders with addiction problems enter prison, no emphasis is put on treating their addiction and no program is offered to help them overcome their addiction while they are there. They are given no resources. They are told they have to figure out how to overcome their addiction themselves if they want to get early parole.

Those who do not manage to do so will eventually leave prison with the same addiction problems. What does my colleague think will happen if we stay on this same path, if we do not change this policy and if inmates keep getting released with the same addiction problems? Mr. Raymond Côté : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Sherbrooke for his question. At the beginning of my mandate, when I was taking my first steps as an MP, I talked to a correctional officer about the reality in our penitentiaries.

He said that it was characteristic of this Conservative government to ignore the fact that there is life after prison. Many people leave our prisons abandoned because they were not guided. They were not given the chance to rehabilitate. The Correctional Investigator and correctional officers are deeply concerned about the deteriorating situation, which unfortunately will only get worse in the coming years. Again, the Conservatives should be ashamed of keeping silent in this debate. Not one of their MPs has risen to speak. I am really looking forward to the upcoming election.

When the Conservatives are called on to defend their sorry record, words will fail them again because they will not have spent enough time practising their speeches. Ms. Françoise Boivin (Gatineau, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I have to seize this opportunity. Actually, I have lots to say about the government's silence. That said, let me first deal with the positive. I want to thank the NDP members on the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security, because, especially over these past few months, they have had an enormous amount of work to tackle.

I thank the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca , the member for Alfred-Pellan and the member for Compton—Stanstead . I congratulate them on their hard work. I understand the frustration that can set in when you have to deal with bills like Bill C-12 . It can be frustrating to know that, clearly, we could do so much better. It can also be frustrating—as my colleagues have said before me—to see grandiose titles like drug-free prisons act, as we can see written in the bill itself under “Short Title”: (1115) [ English ] This act may be cited as the drug-free prisons act. [ Translation ] This raises so much hope.

People read that and think that that would be wonderful. Then, reality sinks in. After seeing such a grandiose title, I was expecting a rather lengthy, comprehensive bill, since it deals with such a complex issue. Ultimately, with one clause on the bill's

short title and just four substantive clauses, the Conservatives are claiming they can eliminate drugs from prisons. This reminds me of the time that they studied the issue of prostitution following the Supreme Court ruling. That bill also had a grandiose title, indicating that, with that bill, the government was going to put an end to prostitution and abolish it in Canada. Well done. There will never be any prostitution ever again. Only, that is not what I am hearing in the street. It remains a thriving industry. It may be done differently, but it still exists.

As I was soaking up my colleagues' speeches—thank goodness they are here to speak in the House—I was reminded of what I dealt with over the past two weeks in my riding. Being in my riding is a much more positive experience than being in the House. Those watching us must be as disheartened as we ourselves can be. Sometimes we get the feeling we are howling in the wilderness, and this is one of those times because we really get the sense that just one side of the House is talking about this, and people are noticing that.

We all know, because lots of people were talking about it, that last week was National Volunteer Week. I made a lot of contacts and met with lots of people in Gatineau who are doing amazing work on all kinds of issues, such as helping people with drug addictions and helping former inmates reintegrate into society. I sat down with these people and talked to them about the Conservative agenda. I explained to them that I would be giving a speech this week on the fact that the government says it will eradicate drugs from prisons. Mr. Speaker, you cannot imagine how much people laughed at that.

They did not take me seriously. They asked me just how the government planned to do that. I replied by reading clause 2: If an offender has been granted parole under

section 122 or 123 but has not yet been released and the offender fails or refuses to provide a urine sample when demanded to provide one under

section 54, or provides under that

section a urine sample for which the result of the urinalysis is positive, as that term is defined in the regulations, then the Service shall inform the Board of the failure or refusal or the test result. They said, “All right, and then what?” I told them about clause 3:

Section 124 of the Act is amended by adding the following after subsection (3):

(3.1) If the Board is informed of the matters under

section 123.1 and the offender has still not yet been released, the Board shall cancel the parole if, in its opinion, based on the information received under that section, the criteria set out in paragraphs 102(

a) and (

b) are no longer met. They said, “All right, and then what?” I told them about clause 4: The releasing authority may impose any conditions on the parole, statutory release or unescorted temporary absence of an offender that it considers reasonable and necessary in order to protect society and to facilitate the offender’s successful reintegration into society. For greater certainty, the conditions may include any condition regarding the offender’s use of drugs or alcohol, including in cases when that use has been identified as a risk factor in the offender’s criminal behaviour.

They said, “And then what?” I told them about clause 5: The Governor in Council may make regulations providing for anything that by this

Part is to be provided for by regulation,... Members will understand that they laughed because they wondered how this would make prisons drug-free. They asked me to explain how that would happen. They asked me to explain how that would happen. I told them that there was no explanation. This bill does absolutely nothing, aside from cancelling someone's parole. No one can be against virtue, which is why there is unanimity on Bill C-12 . However, this government is once again missing an opportunity to do something good.

For four years now, the government has been giving us bills with fancy titles that sound great but actually accomplish very little. I think that people are starting to realize this. The best example may be Bill C-51 . All of the polls showed how the New Democratic Party was seen to be on the wrong side of the fence: we supported terrorists, we were not to be taken seriously when it comes to security, and the government was right. Those who are a bit more timid, such as the third party, the Bloc Québécois and others, jumped on the Conservative bandwagon.

Everyone was unanimous because they thought it was the right thing to do. When the members opposite and the third party remain silent on a bill like this, I tell myself that the NDP is doing the right thing. At report stage and third reading, we should have something to say on behalf of our constituents. I am not saying that that is necessary for all bills, but when it comes to a bill about eradicating drugs in prisons, I cannot believe that the members of the House, who represent Canadians, have nothing to say about their respective ridings.

All of us, or almost all of us, have detention centres, prisons or penitentiaries in our ridings. We can talk to our constituents, our street outreach workers, the people who take care of those with drug addictions and those who take care of inmates. If we really want to make our communities safe, we need to know what we are talking about. We have to be able to read a bill to our constituents without having them laugh at us and ask us if we are serious and if we really believe that a bill will solve the problem. Where is the money for rehabilitation? Where is the money for programs?

The Conservatives cut that funding over the past few years. We are constantly being told that we cannot be serious. We are taking a stand. We are doing the work in committee. We are unequivocally telling the government that this does not make sense and that it is ridiculous to insult people by trying to sell them this. I am sure that this afternoon we will see even more rhetoric about what they are doing. I cannot wait to see what kind of budget the government will allocate to public safety and justice. Why?

Because I still think—and I will be surprised if the government proves me wrong—that this government spends more on ads saying how wonderful and extraordinary it is than on programs that could help drug addicts in prison. It is one thing to be able to prove that someone consumed drugs, with a blood and urine test, and to cancel that person's parole, but do we simply want to punish that person or do we want to ensure that he will not continue to have drug problems after he is released? That is what we should be looking at. This government has little interest in such things.

That is ironic, because at the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, one of the first bills that came to us from the Conservative benches, Bill C-583 , covered the problems related to fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. It was a meaningful bill that showed it was possible to do something other than punish. It looked at a disorder, one from which many people in prisons suffer, and tried to find solutions tailored to their needs and their problems. There was unanimity, which was nice, but what did the government do? It withdrew the bill. It forced the MP who introduced it to withdraw it for further study.

We took a close look at it in the time we were given. Everyone knows that the Conservatives do not give us much time for thorough study. The study will probably produce some conclusions. I am eager to see the final recommendations that will be submitted to the House.

(1120) Considering our past experiences with our colleagues across the aisle, I would be willing to bet that the recommendations will simply encourage a more thorough study and therefore do absolutely nothing. This is really just like what the Liberals used to do before them. It is mind-boggling how similar they are; there is no difference. It is astounding. It is extremely frustrating because, actually, what is happening here today is a perfect example of what is leading the people of Gatineau to ask, when I meet them, what the point of Parliament is.

People here do not even have five minutes to stand up in the House and at least explain how the four little clauses I read earlier are going to achieve what the title says, that is, ensuring that prisons are drug-free. Instead of telling us how wonderful and perfect they are, the Conservatives could simply tell us how they believe these clauses will be so successful, when everything else has failed. It is very frustrating. Fortunately, things are balanced in Canada. Our democracy has an executive branch, a legislative branch, and a judicial branch.

At present, unfortunately, Canadian democracy has to rely too heavily on the judicial branch to rebalance the principles of law, which those on the Conservative benches should be familiar with. The Conservative MPs all have the advantages of the Department of Justice: they can consult people ad nauseam and get legal opinions from the top legal minds in Canada. They do not even take advantage of that. They keep passing bill after bill that gets hammered in the courts all the way to the Supreme Court. Some denigrate the Supreme Court by claiming that it is engaging in legislative activism.

That is not the case at all. The Supreme Court tells us legislators that we cannot do certain things, and reminds us that there are laws in this country and that we have a Constitution and a Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It tells us that we can go ahead and pass the legislation that we want, that it is our highest prerogative, but that there is still a framework to be respected. If people are not satisfied with this framework, then it is up to us as legislators to change that. However, we have to work within the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Constitution. This is not about judicial activism.

I will digress for a moment to talk about Edgar Schmidt, a former public servant who is involved in a case against the Attorney General of Canada that is currently before the Federal Court. He said that he received orders not to follow the charter at all or to just aim for 5%. A 5% chance of winning was enough to move forward. That is ridiculous. This government does not take its role as the executive and as a legislator seriously. That leads to the results we get when we end up before the Supreme Court of Canada. Bill C-12 will not end up before the Supreme Court of Canada. That is clear.

We would not support it if that were the case. Nevertheless, in my opinion, this bill will not accomplish what it is supposed to. Unfortunately, the bill will only delay the action that could be taken to do much better. If only the government would listen to the heartfelt pleas of the people who told us in committee what the government should do instead of cutting rehabilitation and support programs for people with serious drug addictions, then we might achieve better results.

As the Commissioner of Penitentiaries told us, given all the bills with longer and longer mandatory minimum sentences, prisons have no incentive to place these people in rehabilitation programs until just a few years before they are released on parole. Take for example someone who is serving a sentence of seven or 10 years. That individual will not necessarily be placed in a rehabilitation program immediately. The prison might wait until that person has been incarcerated for five years or until he has only one or two years left before he is eligible for parole.

What kind of hardened individual have we created in the meantime?

(1125) If we claim to want safer communities, what is our responsibility as legislators? When it is time for these people to leave prison, I would like them to be able to reintegrate into society. What will happen if we do nothing to help them? This is not about being a bleeding heart. I would say that there is a certain measure of self-interest. I want to make sure that these people will not be a threat to my family, my friends, my community or me. We must implement the kinds of measures that will achieve these results.

This government does not see it like that and, after four years, we are familiar with their approach. We were not born yesterday. This government likes to use grand titles. This afternoon, we will probably hear about tons of budget measures that earned us the Conservatives' ridicule just for mentioning them. The Conservatives are going to appropriate them to further their interests and to strut around in the next few months, in a manner that I will not even describe, simply to boast about their magnificent agenda, as though this was the best government Canada ever had.

They will want to make everyone forget all those years in the past when they were unable to bring forward a balanced budget. All the Conservatives have done, in fact, like the good economists they are, is to add to the national debt, after everyone had tightened their belts under the Liberal government of the 1990s. That will not stop them from having a splendidly grand title for their budget, as they did for Bill C-12. That is unfortunate. I do not know whether this is what the Conservatives are looking for, or whether it just reaches a portion of the population that is on their side.

However, even for those who claim they are tough on crime and believe what the government says, I would tell them to go and read the bill. It is worth doing. I was able to read the bill designed to get drugs out of our prisons in exactly one minute. That gives you a good idea. If someone listening to me believes that Bill C-12 will help solve the problem, I take issue with that. We should talk because, seriously, no one in their right mind will believe that Bill C-12 will help eliminate drugs from prisons. This is what I call misleading the public.

In my opinion, it is shameful for a government that otherwise proclaims itself to be serious to think it will succeed in slipping this “quick fix” past Canadians. Again, it is unfortunate that when bills have some appeal, like Bill C-583 and others, the government succeeds, through all kinds of procedural tactics, in derailing it. Moreover, when the Conservatives do not want us to talk too long about something, they bring in time allocation motions. People are no longer fooled, and I saw that firsthand on the ground over the last two weeks. People are aware of this.

I am comfortable with that, because the message I am sending to the government is what we have succeeded in doing with Bill C-51. That bill had a fairly strong measure of support when tabled in the House, but that is no longer the case. People are not fooled. They understand, because we explain it to them. We are doing our job as the official opposition. We do not do so just on the basis of polls. We do so on principle. We have stood firm. Some parties may have changed their ideas along the way when they saw they were perhaps on the wrong side of the fence, like the Bloc Québécois.

Others, like the Liberal party, decided to persist in their error and continue to support the Conservatives. That is not surprising, because they are much alike. That said, people are not easily fooled. We too will have the time to explain what is going on, although we perhaps do not have the same budget as the Conservative government, which will spend millions of dollars, not to say hundreds of millions of dollars, on advertising during our hockey games, for example, to tell us how great its budget is.

However, people are not fooled, and they will be able to tell this government that the time has come to stop mocking them and making them believe it is doing things that it does not do at all.

(1130) Mrs. Maria Mourani (Ahuntsic, Ind.) : Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague on her excellent speech. She really zeroed in on a number of important points, particularly the uselessness of this bill with respect to stopping drugs from entering our prisons. Because I worked for a long time in our prisons, I can say that it is a daily struggle to prevent drugs from being brought in in all kinds of inventive ways. Also, we should not forget that drug use is strongly associated with many other problems.

Therefore, if we want to eliminate drugs from prisons, we should first and foremost help people to stop using them. However, as my colleague put it so well, that is almost impossible, because it involves a multitude of variables that the bill does not take into account. Does my colleague not find that this bill is not only useless, but it also includes things that are already carried out on the ground, such as drug testing and the suspension of parole for offenders who use?

When I read this bill, I had the impression not only that it was useless, but also that the measures it provides for were already being applied on the ground. Did she note the same thing about this bill?

(1135) Ms. Françoise Boivin : Mr. Speaker, that is precisely the case. I wish to thank my colleague from Ahuntsic for her question. I will take the opportunity to congratulate her on the work she is doing. As a criminologist, she has inside knowledge that is absolutely invaluable and very much appreciated when the time comes to make informed decisions. I am therefore happy to hear her speak. I would have liked to hear from other members. I have some colleagues who were police officers and others who worked in detention centres.

That is the beauty of being in a parliament where there are 308 voices representing personal and individual experiences that are widely diverse, as well as people who are dealing with situations on the ground. Much like my colleague from Ahuntsic, I was surprised when I read the bill, because its provisions are in fact already being applied. By putting questions to my colleagues who are more knowledgeable in matters of public safety, I learned that we should not take parole officers for idiots. This bill merely states what is already being done. It is as simple as that.

If there is one thing that should be taken from my speech, it is that the Conservatives only wanted to introduce a bill with a grandiose title like “drug-free prisons act”. The Conservatives are touring around their ridings and saying they have introduced Bill C-12 to make prisons drug-free and they are taking serious measures to make prisons drug-free. People are not going to read the bill. I made a point of reading it in the House because then it will be on the record in Hansard. We will be able to use it and tell people this is it, the vaunted bill in question.

The Conservatives have to stop treating people like fools. I advise people to look deeper than the grandiose titles and the smoke and mirrors that the Conservatives have been trying to get us used to for four years. The fact is that the Conservatives have suffered a series of defeats in the courts and the crime rate for sexual offences against children has risen by 6% in the last two years. Their program is a monumental failure. It is just ink on paper, an excuse to hold press conferences where they can pat themselves on the back. It fixes absolutely nothing. Mr. Pierre-Luc Dusseault (Sherbrooke, NDP) : Mr.

Speaker, I thank my colleague from Gatineau for her speech. She too has not hesitated to tell it like it is. Can she confirm what I think I understood from her speech: when the bill has received royal assent, it will change nothing in the existing prison system or in how the Parole Board of Canada does things? If that is the case, what actual point is there to this bill? Ms. Françoise Boivin : Mr. Speaker, I am glad my colleague from Sherbrooke sees me as someone who tells it like it is. I think so too. Obviously, the message in my speech is to watch out for people who tell it like it is.

Do not be afraid to go deeper than what they say. Even when I speak—and I am saying this to my constituents in Gatineau—people should not simply accept what I say; they should verify the information I give. Do not fall for a catchy slogan, like the one that says the government is going to make prisons drug-free. In fact, the day after it comes into force, this bill will have an effect in the range of 0% to 5% and not much more than that. That is unfortunate. I will say it again: it could have been much more than that.

As is the case for many justice or public safety bills, if, beyond the title, we saw real efforts on the part of the government in power to create programs that match these absolutely huge announcements, and if we saw financial and human resources in them too, perhaps then the grandiose title would be slightly more credible. As I was just saying, however, they are merely words on paper that are not followed by any concrete actions. The first ones to laugh at this kind of thing are people who work in the field, but they are too polite to do it to our faces.

The volunteers can do it because they are not paid by the government. They do volunteer work with inmates in the penitentiaries, with people who have substance abuse problems and others. Those people see it right in front of them. They think to themselves that they are doing all this volunteer work when the government has enormous resources it could use to make our communities safer. What it comes up with, however, is rubbish like this. That is what they call it. This amounts to laughing at people, and that is why people are increasingly stepping away from politics, and that is unfortunate.

If that is the goal the government is aiming for, well done! Mission accomplished, if the goal is to upset people, so they will lose interest in all of it and go back home. However, when I see the reactions to Bill C-51 or to other bills, I tell the government to pay attention, because at some point it is going to break something that is going to make Canadians stand up as one and say enough is enough. I think that is going to happen, probably sometime around October 19. (1140) [ English ] Mr. Kennedy Stewart (Burnaby—Douglas, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I know my colleague has a lot of experience in this area.

Could she give us more of an explanation on the legal aspects of how the bill may or may not help reintegrate folks who have been in prison back into society? Ms. Françoise Boivin : Mr. Speaker, that is an interesting question. When I read the clauses in Bill C-12 , it is all about the possibility for the Parole Board to test people before they are let out on the probation and if they have drugs in their system, it would hold a deliberation. It would do absolutely nothing to ensure they do not take drugs. That is the problem. As the member for Ahuntsic said, how do we ensure that no drugs go into the prisons?

How do we ensure that a person who has a drug problem can get out of that problem? There is nothing, but the Conservatives call it a drug-free prisons act. If that is not laughing at people, I do not know what it is. So many aspects surrounding drugs in prisons would not be addressed with Bill C-12 . It is an insult to anybody's intelligence to claim that it would create drug-free prisons. Mr. Jasbir Sandhu (Surrey North, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, as always, it is an honour to rise in this House to speak on behalf of my constituents from Surrey North, in this case to Bill C-12,

an act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act , the so-called drug-free prisons act. The member before me was saying that the title was almost laughable. In fact, I was laughing when she pointed that out, because there is nothing in this bill that would take any concrete steps to prevent drugs entering prisons or to help those in prison to get off drugs. There is only one small aspect to the bill, and it is a small bill of three or four pages. It is not detailed.

The only thing this bill would really change is that it would add a provision to the Corrections and Conditional Release Act that would make it clear to the Parole Board that it would use a positive result from a urine test or a refusal to take a urine test for drugs in making its decision on parole eligibility. That is all it would do. Basically, it would give legal authority to the Parole Board to use drug tests or urine tests of prisoners to determine eligibility for parole. Here is the kicker. The practice is already in place. The Parole Board already does this.

The only thing the bill would do is give it the legal authority, so nothing else would change. That is why the title of this bill is laughable. It is called the drug-free prisons act. I have yet to hear any Conservative get up in this House and explain it to this House. None of the Conservatives, or the Liberals for that matter, are getting up to explain to us how this would prevent drugs in our prisons. If the Conservatives were really concerned about preventing drugs, there would be a more concrete effort made to address the demand for drugs in prisons, rehabilitation, and those kinds of initiatives.

However, there is nothing in this bill that would lead us to hope that one day we will have drug-free prisons, although it is a great aspiration to go toward drug-free prisons. The Conservatives come up with hollow titles for bills that somehow pretend that things are going to happen. Yesterday, on the opposition day motion, we were talking about the oil spill in English Bay. The Conservatives have been throwing around the idea of a world-class response. We saw what happened in English Bay when the toxic oil was spilled, and it was not a world-class response. It took six hours to reach the spill.

Is that world-class? The Conservatives frame things with fancy titles. I have to give them one thing; they are very good at coming up with fancy names for their bills. The problem is that the legislation itself is hollow. It does not address what we need to address. If they were really concerned about addressing drugs in prisons, they would bring more concrete proposals to this House, and we would be happy. We have always supported having concrete initiatives to ensure that we have safe prisons, drug-free prisons, and prisons that have a good work environment for the people who work in those difficult situations.

I have visited a prison. I was on the public safety committee, and we were studying this very issue of drugs in prisons.

(1145) We had a number of hearings. We heard from Corrections Canada staff, experts and many stakeholders throughout Canada. I can say that the majority of those people at committee were of the opinion that we need more rehabilitation in prison to curb this menace in prisons. I know that Conservatives do not like facts and figures, and they even have trouble with business and economics when it comes to supply and demand. I will get into that in a minute, but I want to go back to the amount of money the current government has spent trying to prevent drugs from getting into prisons and what the result has been.

In 2008, the Conservatives decided to invest, over three years, $122 million to bring in sniffer dogs and ion machines to prevent drugs from getting into prisons. The result of that three years of spending a substantial amount of money was that random urine tests done at the beginning and random tests done at the end did not show any difference. Basically, the amount of drugs in prisons before was still present afterward, even after spending $122 million on interdiction. At the same time, the programs to help these individuals get off drugs were being cut.

In terms of supply and demand, the Conservatives are trying to cut the supply, yet on the demand side, they are not helping those individuals get off the drugs. Sometimes I wonder if the Conservatives actually understand what economics is all about or if they understand the law of diminishing returns. I had a chance to visit two medium-security prisons in Kingston, the Kent Institution in the Harrison Lake area, and the Matsqui Institution in Abbotsford. I had a chance to sit down with the prisoners, and I asked the warden to step outside. Some of the prisoners were on a committee representing other prisoners.

I asked them point blank what had changed in the last three years since the government had started the interdiction program and had spent $122 million of taxpayers' money. I asked if I could get drugs in the prison. They said, yes, sure I could, and then asked what type of drug I would like. When I asked what had changed, they said the only thing that had changed was that the price of drugs had gone up to five or six times what it was before. They could still get the drugs, but the price had skyrocketed. That was the result of the effort by the Conservative government to stop drugs from entering prisons.

Then I asked if they wanted to get off drugs. I said that surely they wanted to get off this stuff and be clean when they got out. I asked what was needed for them to be off drugs. They told me that they needed rehabilitation programs to help them get off these drugs. The majority of people going into prison, 80% or 90%, have some form of addiction. This is well documented. However, if there are no rehabilitation services or programs to get into when they get to prison, how are they supposed to manage?

(1150) This was what the prisoners were asking for. They wanted programs available to them when they got to prison so that they could access those services and get off these drugs. There would be less demand for these drugs, and we could reduce the supply of drugs coming into prisons. One way or another, once prisoners do their time, they will be out in society. We have a captive audience where we can provide rehabilitative services and programs that will help them get off of these drugs and reintegrate into society when they are released from prison.

It becomes much easier to reintegrate if they are off of any substances they were taking before they went to prison. As I said, a high percentage of prisoners are addicted to drugs or alcohol when they get to prison. That is the record. If we are really serious about curbing the use of drugs in prisons, we also have to look at the demand side and at helping those individuals get off drugs. However, the Conservative government has made cuts to rehabilitation services and programs that would help curb drugs in prisons. Today is budget day.

I know that this is going to be the last budget for the Conservative government, because it will not be presenting a budget next year. I can assure the House of that, because I have heard from my constituents and people from across the country that this is the Conservatives' last budget. If the Conservatives are really concerned about curbing drugs in prisons, they have a last opportunity. Let us make an impact. Talk to the Minister of Finance . Talk to the Prime Minister . Talk to cabinet colleagues. Let us make this real.

Let us make that investment in this budget to ensure that we have rehabilitation programs not only in prisons but in our communities. There have been over 20 shootings in my hometown of Surrey over the last 35 days or so. That is very disturbing to me as a father and as a representative from Surrey North. This is happening in my backyard. There is a gang war going on. There are drug deals going on. There is a turf war going on. Unfortunately, what we had feared happened just the other day. One young man was killed, and there are fears that the violence will escalate because of this tragedy on the weekend.

I urge the government to invest in the very programs that are going to make our communities safer instead of coming up with these hollow, laughable names for bills that do nothing to make our communities safe. Let us make real investments in our communities. Let us fund programs. I have a motion in the House asking for long-term, sustainable funding for youth gang crime prevention programs. I have talked to service providers in my community that help youth and provide services to at-risk youth.

What they have been telling me is that the programs that have been funded through the Canadian government have been cut by the Conservatives over the last number of years. If we are going to make investments in our youth and in safer communities, it is these kinds of programs we need to make investments in. I have talked to the individuals who provide programs to these at-risk kids, and the results are fabulous. There has been about an 80%-85% success rate in these youths being able to graduate from high school.

However, I have seen in my own community that the Conservative government has made cuts to the very programs that help our youth get on the right path and that help make our communities safer.

(1155) If the Conservatives were concerned about making our communities safer, instead of presenting hollow, laughable bills in this House, they have an opportunity, their last opportunity, because they will not get that opportunity next year, to commit to making that very investment. When they formed government in 2006, they said they were going to do things differently than the party in the corner over there, the Liberal Party, yet they have failed to do that. They are basically doing the same thing. They are shuffling chairs at a table on the Titanic . It is not helping.

If they were really concerned about ensuring the safety in our communities, they would be making investments. The bill has a very narrow scope that simply gives direction to the Parole Board to legally use the fact that a prisoner failed to provide a urine sample as a tool to deny parole. As I have said before, the Parole Board has been using this practice. There is nothing concrete in this bill, the drug-free prisons act, that would actually enhance or provide for safer working conditions, safer prisons, drug-free prisons.

There is absolutely nothing in the bill, yet the Conservatives have come up with a fancy name to have people believe that somehow, magically, out of the sky there will be drug-free prisons. Frankly speaking, this is their 10th year in government and I think they are running out of new ideas on how to provide for Canadians, whether it is safer communities, providing services, enhancing our health care, or whether it is working toward having a pharmacare program and a day care program. The Liberals promised a day care program, a child care program, back in 1972. They did not deliver on that.

The Conservatives said that they would make hundreds of thousands of spaces available, yet they have not delivered. We have an idea. We will be bringing in child care programs throughout this country once we form the government in 2015. An hon. member: Dream on. Mr. Jasbir Sandhu: Mr. Speaker, I see the member cheering. He can be sure that we will be forming the government in 2015. There is one issue that comes up often, and we heard it when we were doing the study into drug-free prisons.

If the Conservatives were truly interested in drug-free prisons, they would provide tools and investments for the CSC to have a proper intake assessment of inmates' addictions, and then provide the proper correctional program required. Without addiction treatment, education and proper reintegration upon release, a prisoner will likely return to the criminal lifestyle and possibly create more victims. It is common knowledge that when a young person is brought into the prison system, it is a university for higher learning from other gangsters with respect to crime.

Gangsters are a problem, as I have said, not only in my part of town, but also in prisons. This is an issue we need to address. If the government were serious about addressing this issue, it would be looking at rehabilitation, looking at investing in our communities across this country, yet the government comes up with hollow titles and tries to pretend that somehow it is actually doing something.

(1200) This is a very small step which, yes, I will support, but at the end of the day, what the government is proposing is already being practised by the Parole Board. [ Translation ] Mr. Pierre-Luc Dusseault (Sherbrooke, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Surrey North for his excellent speech and for sharing his experience in his riding and the experience he had when he visited a penitentiary.

He touched on this, but I would like him to elaborate on the subject: does he think this is a real missed opportunity on the part of the Conservatives, to have a bill with this title but with only four clauses that ultimately only reiterate a practice that already exists at the Parole Board? Is this an opportunity that the Conservatives have missed to put new measures in place, real, concrete measures, to prevent the spread of drugs in our prisons? They could have done so much more. With a title like this, it truly is a missed opportunity.

As other colleagues have said, the bill will not have the planned effects, as stated in its title. Is this a missed opportunity? And with this being budget day, would there be other opportunities that the government might offer in order to genuinely address this very real and well documented problem? (1205) [ English ] Mr. Jasbir Sandhu : Mr. Speaker, the

short title of the bill is very misleading in the sense that we all aspire to have drug-free prisons, but there is nothing in the bill that is going to help us have drug-free prisons. The bill allows the Parole Board to use drug tests on prisoners to deny them parole. That is already happening. That practice is being used by the Parole Board. This is a missed opportunity. The member is absolutely right. Today is budget day. The government has run out of new ideas for some concrete ways to make prisons a safer place for correctional workers and for the reintegration of individuals into society.

Instead, the Conservatives have come up with a fancy name for a bill that has no impact whatsoever on the actual workings of the prisons or any sort of elimination of drugs. The official opposition has always advocated for ways to reduce harm and reduce drug use in prisons. We will continue to do that. In 2015, we will bring in real concrete action, real concrete proposals to ensure that our prisons are safe not only for the workers, but also for the prisoners. Mr. Charlie Angus (Timmins—James Bay, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to my hon. colleague.

There are so many people working on making safer streets, dealing with recidivism, making sure that we actually get people out of the drug trade and making sure that people do not get involved in drugs. Then we have the Conservative government. This is a perfect Conservative bill. It meets the three criteria: one, it has a ridiculous title that means nothing; two, it will not change anything because what it is claiming to do is already within the Parole Board; and three, the big kicker, the Conservatives have already wasted $122 million and have not changed anything.

They are going to stand again and bang their heads against a brick wall that they created in their prison attitudes without ever bringing forward in the House one coherent, reasonable response that would actually cut down the drug trade and bring down the rates of recidivism. With the member's experience in Surrey and what he knows in dealing with drug issues through his portfolio in the House, why does my colleague think the government continues to present such tired, out-of-touch ideas? Maybe it is time that Canadians finally did throw those guys out. Mr. Jasbir Sandhu : Mr.

Speaker, I could not have summed it up better than the member for Timmins—James Bay did. This bill has a fancy title and yet it has no meat. It pretends to do something that it will not really do. That is what has been happening with the Conservative government over the last four years that I have been here. The government pretends to be doing something, but actually does not do anything. The member is absolutely right. The government spent $122 million over a three-year period to eradicate drugs from prisons. What was the result? The result was zero change.

In the Correctional Service annual reports, I checked the random drug testing that was done and after this $122 million was spent, the rate of drugs in prisons was the same as before. There was no significant change. Experts have been telling the government that if it is looking at the supply side, it also has to look at the demand side, which involves prevention and rehabilitation.

The government put a chunk of money on the supply side, which had no effect on the amount of drugs getting into prisons, but on the demand side, it cut the preventive and rehabilitation programs that would cut the supply if there was no demand. I know it is hard for the Conservatives to comprehend something as simple as supply and demand. The member is absolutely right. The government has run out of ideas. I think Canadians will show the Conservatives the door come October 19, 2015.

(1210) Mr. Nathan Cullen (Skeena—Bulkley Valley, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, crime is a big issue for many Canadians, I would say in particular in his part of Canada, in Surrey. It is a top-of-mind issue for many voters and yet in dealing with this issue, it is important to bring our best intelligence and thoughtfulness around what to do about crime, be it crime that is committed in prisons or leading in. My question for the member is about this particularly annoying statistic for the Conservatives, which should not be annoying because it is good news.

For a number of years now, 15 or 20 years or more, crime rates in Canada have been steadily dropping. Violent crimes, property crimes, murder and whatnot have steadily dropped, all statistics across the board. At the same time, since the Conservatives have been in government, and I would argue it was more for political reasons that they needed to make crime an issue, the incarceration rate has gone up. Before any of the measures that the Conservatives brought in, the crime rate was dropping and continues to drop even though they bring in these new laws and they are supposed to change this, that, and the other.

The one thing that has changed is incarceration, which is an incredibly expensive thing. It runs up to more than $100,000 a year per prisoner. My friend tells me it is $150,000 for a federal maximum prison. However, the government is unconcerned with whether its measures are actually working, but just wants to spend money and lock up more people. If crime is dropping, let us look at the things that actually work. If incarceration rates are going up, let us look at who is being incarcerated and try to find out how to prevent the crime in the first place.

Would that not be the most ideal crime-fighting tactic any government could take on? Mr. Jasbir Sandhu : Mr. Speaker, the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley hit the nail on the head. Absolutely, we need to take proactive approaches to crime in today's society, and prevention is the best investment any government and any society could make. There have been a number of shootings in the town of Surrey over the last month. There have been over 20 shootings. A young person was killed over the weekend. There are fears in my community that this will further escalate.

Not only do we need more police, which the government promised back in 2006, but we also need additional preventive programs, preventive investment in communities, to ensure that young people are not getting into these types of activities. Unfortunately, I have talked to many organizations on the ground and the Conservatives have failed to make these vital investments in communities that would make them safe. Many studies have been done. These are not Kijiji facts.

These are academic studies from the United States and Canada where a minimal investment in crime prevention programs provides a huge return at the end. As the member pointed out, it costs a lot of money to keep someone in prison. Up to $150,000 is being spent per prisoner per year, but a fraction of that invested early on in gang-prevention programs in communities would make Canada a better place for all Canadians. Mr. Jack Harris (St. John's East, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to play a role in this debate. It is an important debate.

Although the bill itself is rather modest in scope it is rather expansive in title. It claims to be the drug-free prisons act, but it would actually amend a practice that is currently being carried out by the Parole Board, which is to take into account either a failure to take a drug sample or the results of a drug sample testing for someone who is about to be released on parole. Therefore, it would not actually change very much, except to put into law a practice that already exists.

However, it is an opportunity for New Democrats to spend some time to talk about the approach the government has taken not only for legislation in general, but in particular, legislation as it relates to crime and punishment and the treatment of offenders. We can be magnanimous today and say everyone in the House would like to have a safer society. We would like to have safer streets and communities. The question is, how do we go about that and is the government's approach one that works and actually creates safer communities or is it not?

We on this side of the House, in particular New Democrats, believe that the government is an absolute failure when it comes to this issue. It is great at the rhetoric. We have one here today. “The act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act” is the

long title. The

short title, the inaccurate propaganda title, is “the drug-free prisons act”. The government is good at propaganda. It actually puts propaganda into the names of legislation. I do not know if this is unique to this particular government. Maybe the Liberals did it too. I do not remember that far back. I was not here then. I was here back in 1987 when the Progressive Conservatives were in power but I was not here during the Liberal regime. To call this act “the drug-free prisons act” is an attempt to fool people.

There is an old saying that is common enough, but we do not hear it that often these days as it is a bit of an old-fashioned saying. It is, “You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.” In fact, one cannot fool the majority of the people all of the time and the government is going to find that out in September of this year. Let me go back to the first part of that saying, “You can fool all of the people some of the time”. The government believes it can get away with titles like this.

It believes it can fool all of the people some of the time. By calling a bill “the drug-free prisons act”, it believes it can make people think the bill will remove drugs from prisons. The government has spent $122 million on interdiction programs over a three-year period from 2012 on, the same period it took $295 million out of the corrections system. What was the result? Did it create drug-free prisons? It absolutely did not. In fact, there are just as many drugs in prisons these days as there were then. Therefore, is the government's approach working? No, it is not.

I would like to quote from the office of the correctional investigator, Howard Sapers, a very renowned expert on this matter. He is so renowned that the government decided not to renew his appointment after serving the position for some eight years or more and doing a magnificent job providing dispassionate, fact-based, evidence-based advice to government. In his 2011-12 annual report he said that a zero tolerance stance to drugs in prison is an aspiration rather than an effective policy that: ...simply does not accord with the facts of crime and addiction in Canada or elsewhere in the world.

Harm reduction measures within a public health and treatment orientation offer a far more promising, cost-effective and sustainable approach to reducing subsequent crime and victimization.

(1215) The John Howard Society is working very hard at this but this is basically saying that it is not a realistic goal to even have. Therefore, the government really has the question put wrongly and it has the wrong answer. What we are really trying to do to create a safer society and safer communities is to reduce the number of victims of crime. We know that the crime rates are going down, although we would not know that from the emphasis that the government is placing on it. Prisons are becoming more filled. The conditions in prison are getting worse with double-bunking and so forth.

One of the consequences of that is we will not have safer communities. If we have people in prison longer without programs to assist with issues such as drug addiction and substance abuse, many of those prisoners will eventually be released into society once they have served their sentence. If they go out into those communities without those problems having been solved or tackled they will pose a bigger danger to society and there will be more victims of crime. That is just plain logic.

I know that interferes with the views of some of the members opposite with respect to humankind and how we should deal with criminals. I practised law for many years and practised criminal law for a number of those years. I understand the system. There are principles of sentencing. The idea of sentencing is to fit the sentence to the crime. There are a number of factors taken into consideration. We need to deter and punish crime but we also need to rehabilitate the offenders so that we have safer communities. Those factors are taken into consideration.

Once they get into a prison those factors should be put to work. Once they are removed from society, as best we can we want to reduce the rate of recidivism, which is a complicated word for a simple thing. It means that we do not want these people who are in prison to commit crimes when they get out. How do we do that? By spending $122 million over a period to try to interdict and prevent drugs from getting into prisons, totally without serious effect, and then spend I think it was $9 million to $11 million over the same period on substance abuse programs in our prisons. That does not make sense.

At the point in time when this bill was going through committee it was estimated that 2,400 prisoners in our corrections system were waiting to get access to a substance abuse program. One would ask what happened. One aspect is that they are in prison with no access to a substance abuse program and have access to drugs, because we know that there are drugs in the system.

When those prisoners eventually come out of prison without having had an opportunity to deal with their drug addiction and without having an opportunity to move forward they will go back into the streets without the ability or the opportunity to be better serving members of society. That is really what we are dealing with. One of the comments that was made by representatives of the John Howard Society was that this bill will not eliminate drugs from prisons and merely seems to be a tactic to ignore some of the real issues in prison, such as mental illness, double-bunking and prisoner self-harm.

Prisoner self-harm is one aspect that we are reminded of as a result of the very tragic story of Ashley Smith, a young woman who died in prison at the age of 19. She was first arrested at the age of 14 for I believe throwing crabapples at a letter carrier, which was what got her in trouble with the law. She ended up in what turned out to be a death spiral from the ages of 14 to 19, which led her to desperation and maltreatment by the prison system. There have been reports on this. It is a tragic case.

(1220) It was well investigated, well reported on, but tragic nonetheless. She ended up killing herself under the watchful eye of corrections officials who were told not to interfere while she was strangling herself in prison. That is what it came to in that particular case. It was a sense of desperation that cried out for reform, cried out for change, and change is still required to take place. We are not getting it from the government. What we are getting instead is increased crowding in prisons and the closing down of some special facilities that dealt with mental health cases in prisons.

We do know that when we are talking about drugs in prison, a very high percentage of the offender population who abuses drugs is also currently struggling with mental illness as well. We do not have adequate programs in the prisons for that. The Conservative government is closing down treatment centres for inmates dealing with serious mental illness. This is a very serious problem. Many times drug abuse and substance abuse occur with mental health problems. There are some figures that show the size of this issue.

In 2011, it was estimated that 45% of male offenders and 69% of female offenders had received a mental health care intervention prior to going into prison. That shows a level of serious need within prisons to provide access to care and access to programs. Prison can, in fact, be a positive experience for some people who are in desperate circumstances if the programs are available. We need to have an attitude that recognizes that there is individual responsibility, and nobody is suggesting that everybody in prison is there because they have somehow been wronged.

However, we do know there are socio-economic factors. We do know there are people with serious needs that are not being met in society, whether it be drug addictions that they have no way of dealing with or whether it be mental health issues that are improperly or inadequately addressed in society. We do know there is high unemployment in many parts of this country. We have significant problems in the aboriginal communities as a result of many factors which I will not go into here. There is a whole series of issues that have led to that situation.

We cannot say the answer is to just increase the sentences, which we have often heard from the government. Putting in mandatory minimum sentences as a deterrent to people committing crimes is something we know does not work and has even been recognized very recently by the Supreme Court of Canada. The research shows, and has been confirmed by the Supreme Court of Canada, accepted by the highest court in the land in a recent decision, that mandatory minimum sentences as such do not in fact deter crimes.

The government is anxious to continue to make prison a situation which is negative, not only for the prisoner, obviously, but also for corrections guards. When the government starts talking about zero opportunities for parole forever, what will that do for the safety of corrections officers? What will it do if a prisoner has no hope whatsoever of ever getting out and nothing to lose? Even if there is a faint hope, it is still some sort of hope.

It the metrics of that are changed and we say to the prisoners that no matter what happens, no matter what they do, they are not getting out ever and the circumstances are going to be worse, will that help the safety of corrections officers? I think the answer is pretty obvious. It does not at all. We have to do something different from what the government is doing, because what the government is doing, frankly, does not work.

(1225) We support the bill because it would in fact put to place in legislation a practice that already exists. We are okay with the legislation. We are happy to see it pass, but we do not want to let his opportunity go when we pass legislation that has a

short title of drug-free prisons act, which is clearly a misnomer, is clearly a propaganda title and is clearly wrong. The

long title of the bill

An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act , which is fine. In fact, a motion was made in committee to amend the legislation and, of course, the motion was not allowed. We tried to fix it. I want Canadians to know that even though we support the actual terms of the legislation, what it stands for and what it says, we do not like the title. We tried to change it and it was ruled out of order because there was no amendment to the bill that would lead to a change in the title being required. What do we have? As of March 14, 2012, the national penitentiary population was 15,000.

If 20% of them, nearly 2,400 people, are waiting for a program for drug abuse and substance abuse, then we have a serious problem. If this legislation is followed through, those people would stay in prison longer, they still would not get the programs they need and eventually they would have to be released when their sentences ended. When that happens and they did not have access to the programs, we will have a continued problem for our society, despite the government's claim that it cares about victims. I think we all care about victims.

In fact, we care about victims to the point that we want to see fewer of them. One way to do that is to ensure that people who are incarcerated get the rehabilitation programs and support they need to allow them a greater chance of living a life of less crime when they get out and to participate better in society. Let us talk about some of our other programs. When we talk about a mandatory $15-a-hour minimum wage, that is really designed as well to allow people to have a decent opportunity to make a living and support themselves.

When we talk about other programs we are promoting, that is also about ensuring that prisoners who get out of jail and want to be productive members of society can have proper rehabilitation programs so they have those opportunities and a better chance of not reoffending. There was a lot of talk about supporting victims and victims' bills of rights, but the current government has done nothing to help the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board program that has existed in our country for many years. When it was established, the federal government support was based on the dollar formula of 90/10.

It provided victims of crime with compensation for losses they incurred as a result of crime. The government has done nothing about that. It brought in its so-called victims' bill of rights, but it did nothing on the plus side to provide something that would help with their problems associated with the crimes against them. We want prisons to be a safe workplace for correctional staff. We want prisoners to be rehabilitated. We want to have them access government programs so when they are released, they are in a better position to lead a crime-free life.

If part of their problem is mental health or drug addiction and rehabilitation programs can help fix that, we need to put more money into prison programs to make that possible. (1230) [ Translation ] Mr. Matthew Dubé (Chambly—Borduas, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. Although we support the bill, I would like to take this opportunity to point out just how much the Conservatives’ approach does not work, even though they say they are the best ones to handle law and order issues. My colleague gave an excellent example of this in his speech: mandatory minimum sentences.

In the United States, even the Republicans, who are often hand in glove with the Conservatives ideologically, are rejecting that idea as a way of reducing crime rates in our communities. When it comes to drugs in the prison system, we also have to consider health and prevention. Of course, people have addiction problems, and I do not understand why we would not be considering solutions to address that.

As my colleague said in his speech, we could offer programs within the prison system to start reducing the incidence of these problems and healing these people and then, as he put it so well, avoid crimes being repeated. The best way to protect victims is to make sure that people are not in a position where they want to commit crimes, and I think we can do that by focusing on rehabilitation. On that point, would my colleague like to say more about the fact that in spite of the new laws being enacted, very little is being done to offer more resources?

We see cuts being made and a lack of financial resources in the prisons. What does my colleague think? (1235) [ English ] Mr. Jack Harris : Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for reminding the House of the fact that the government is bucking the trend. In the United States for example, the trend had been to be far more harsh on prisoners, with more use of mandatory minimum sentences, solitary confinement and other methods. The Americans have recognized that this does not work.

Some of the more right-wing states that had a tradition of being so-called tough on crime, as the Conservatives like to call themselves, are recognizing that some of the measures they have chosen lead to greater crime in their communities and to less safe communities. It is a bit of an enlightened approach even for those who take that ideological point of view. The Conservatives government does not seem to get it.

However, I hope that when the government changes in the fall, we will have an opportunity to put more resources into ensuring that rehabilitation programs are available and that prison conditions are more conducive to rehabilitation. That way, when people leave prisons, they will be better citizens and less likely to commit crimes. Ms. Rathika Sitsabaiesan (Scarborough—Rouge River, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague is always intelligent when he helps people. The NDP has been steadfast in our support for measures that will make our prisons safe.

Meanwhile, the Conservative government has ignored recommendations from Correctional Service staff and the correctional investigator that would decrease violence, gang activity and drug use in our prisons. Multiple stakeholders across the country agree that this bill would have a minimal impact on the drugs in our prison system. Recently the Conservatives cut $295 million to the operating budget of Correctional Service Canada, which likely has impacted the already small portion of the funding that is dedicated to core correctional programming.

Meanwhile, they have invested $122 million into failed interdiction tools, even after the stakeholders and experts in the field have said that drug-free prisons are not achievable. Experts have said that we need to invest in rehabilitation programs for our prisoners and the Conservatives have shown that is not something they are interested in doing. My colleague said that we needed to invest in more programming to support our prisoners, so when they left the prison system recidivism would be lowered rather than maintained at the same rate. Could my colleague comment on that? Mr. Jack Harris : Mr.

Speaker, it is a serious situation when the government makes things worse and less safe for our communities by taking the money out of the prison program that could be used for substance abuse programs or other programs that would help to rehabilitate offenders, help them with mental health issues and to provide substance abuse programs. It would leave us all in a situation where, when they came out of prison, they would be in better shape than when they were when they went in. We do not want them in the same frame of mind with the same problems if they can be addressed inside prison.

We want it to be a positive experience. Instead, what we have is money taken out of the system and conditions becoming worse, and that is not good for society.

(1240) Mr. Jasbir Sandhu (Surrey North, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I have been in the House since this morning and I have listened to the debate very carefully. It is almost deafening that the government and Liberal members are not participating in this debate. Why? Surely, if the government is presenting a bill, it would want to defend it and root for it. Is it because it is an indefensible bill? The title of the bill would not really address the real issue of drugs in prisons. It would just provide a legal avenue for the Parole Board to use urine samples to deny parole, which is already a practice.

One would think that for a bill like this, the government would be getting up, cheering and defending it, letting Canadians know what is happening in the House of Commons. Would the member care to comment on that? Mr. Jack Harris : Mr. Speaker, the member for Surrey North makes an interesting point. I see members opposite, apparently unwilling to get up and talk about this. I suspect there is one reason why. I do not really believe that anybody over there is happy to get up to try to defend the fact that they have called this bill the drug-free prisons act when it would do nothing of the kind.

In fact, it has no relation to having drug-free prisons at all. I think the member for Yukon and the committee recognized as much by acknowledging that the title was a bit of an overreach. That is a pretty big admission from the other side. In fact, it is more than an overreach. It is something that is really indefensible and that is why we do not see anybody on the other side getting up trying to defend it. Ms. Rathika Sitsabaiesan : Mr. Speaker, following in a similar vein to my previous question, we know that mental health is a significant problem in our communities across the country.

In the intake interviews with prisoners, there is quite a significant number of prisoners who go into our prison system with identified mental health issues. Instead of complaining, I would like to hear proposals or propositions of how we could make changes. What should we do as responsible legislators to ensure that the occurrences of mental health issues and concerns with our prisoners as they exit the prison system can be reduced, rather than increase or stay the same.

According to many studies, mental health continues to be a problem, rather than being resolved or worked on while our prisoners are in the system. Mr. Jack Harris : Mr. Speaker, I will quote Catherine Latimer, the executive director of the John Howard Society, who talked about what we could do for people who were out on parole. She said: We want to enhance the likelihood that communities would be safer. We do that by a supported, targeted parole reintegration scheme that looks at the needs of the individual and how to support those needs.

On the way in to prison, when individuals are taken in and assessed at the beginning, there has to be a program that assesses the addiction problem and provides a proper correctional program for that offender. Without addiction treatment, education and proper reintegration upon release, a prisoner will likely return to a criminal lifestyle and possibly create more victims. That is what we are trying to prevent.

(1245) Ms. Jean Crowder (Nanaimo—Cowichan, NDP) : Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-12 ,

an act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act, and as others have pointed out, the

short title is the drug-free prisons act. Other New Democrats have indicated today that we are supporting this very narrow bill, and people might wonder why we are rising to speak to the bill if we are supporting it. Part of the reason we are rising to speak comes down to the

short title, the drug-free prisons act. Nothing in the bill would contribute toward a goal of drug-free prisons. One would think, given the Conservatives' approach to being tough on crime, that part of their interests would be that any legislation they bring forward would actually have a goal of keeping our communities safer.

So part of that goal would be that, when people are incarcerated, when the justice system has found them guilty and they are incarcerated for whatever their misdeeds were—we would presume the Conservative goal would be to ensure that prisoners are rehabilitated so that they can be reintegrated back into the community in a safe way and thus keep our communities safer. I think all of us in the House would argue that one of our roles is to ensure that federal employees have a safe workplace.

We would assume that any legislation we bring forward would consider whether or not the workplace for correctional officers, men and women who serve in the federal penitentiary system, is safe. I would argue that nothing in the bill would achieve those ends. I am turning to the legislative

summary because it is important to highlight what exactly the bill would do and presumably why the bill came about. The legislative

summary says: The bill requires the Parole Board of Canada (PBC) (or a provincial parole board, if applicable) to cancel the parole of an offender who has not yet been released if the offender tests positive in a urinalysis or fails to provide a urine sample and the Board is of the opinion that the criteria for granting parole are no longer met. The bill also clarifies the legislative intent underlying

section 133(3) of the Corrections and Conditional Rel