Social Services Committee

2017-04-10

Newfoundland and Labrador — Committees

PDF Version

April

10, 201 7

Pursuant to Standing Order 68, Mark Browne, MHA for Placentia West Bellevue,

substitutes for Betty Parsley, MHA for Harbour Main.

The

Committee met at 6 p.m. in the Assembly Chamber.

CLERK (Barnes):

Good evening, everyone.

This is

the first meeting of the Social Services Committee for this session of the House

of Assembly. Before we can proceed, in accordance with our Standing Order 65(2)

we need to elect a Chair for this session. So I call for nominations for the

Chair.

MR. WARR:

I nominate Ms. Lisa

Dempster, Cartwright L'Anse au Clair.

CLERK:

Any further nominations?

declare Ms. Dempster, the Member for Cartwright L'Anse au Clair, acclaimed.

CHAIR (Dempster):

Good evening, everyone.

It's

hard to believe that a year has gone by and here we are back at the excitement

of Estimates again.

So I'll

let the

CLERK:

You have to do Vice-Chair

first.

CHAIR:

Sorry, I told you I was

rusty. It's been a year.

I call

for nominations for Vice-Chair, before we begin.

MR. BROWNE:

I nominate the Member for

St. George's Humber.

CLERK:

It has to be a Member from

the Opposition.

CHAIR:

Thank you for that, Mr.

Browne, but it has to be a Member from the Opposition.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I nominate Ms. Rogers.

CHAIR:

Okay, Ms. Rogers has been

nominated.

You

have been nominated for vice-Chair to the Social Services Committee.

Do you

accept?

MS. ROGERS:

Sure, all right.

CHAIR:

Any further nominations?

Seeing

none, we'll move

CLERK:

We have two sets of minutes

from the last meeting.

CHAIR:

We have two sets of minutes

that I need to have a motion to approve.

Okay.

We'll now call for a motion to approve do we need to do them separately,

Sandra?

CLERK:

Yes, please.

CHAIR:

Okay, we'll call for a

motion to approve the minutes of the Department of Health and Community

Services, May 11, 2016.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So moved.

CHAIR:

Mr. Davis.

I call

for a motion to approve the minutes of the Labour Relations, May 11, 2016. I

need a motion to approve the minutes of Labour Relations, May 11, 2016.

MR. REID:

So moved.

CHAIR:

Mr. Reid, thank you.

I'll

turn things over to the minister. He can introduce his Estimates and his team,

if he wishes; 15 minutes for that, Minister Parsons. The responder will have 15

minutes and then we'll go 10 and 10 back and forth.

Just on

a procedural matter, if it's the wishes of the Committee, will we go through by

subheading department? So we'll start with Executive and Support and we'll move

through that and then we'll a little bit faster maybe or more efficient in

AN HON. MEMBER:

(Inaudible.)

CHAIR:

Yeah, okay.

Minister.

MR. A. PARSONS:

All right, thank you.

I'm not

going to waste much time here. We have a lot to cover. I'm just happy to have

the full team with me. As I do every other day, I rely very heavily on them, so

I'm going to probably rely heavily on them tonight as well.

I'm

Andrew Parsons, MHA Burgeo La Poile, just in case.

I'll

let them introduce themselves and then we'll get right to it.

MS. JACOBS:

Heather Jacobs, Deputy

Minister of Justice and Public Safety.

Departmental Controller.

MR. CHAFE:

Dan Chafe, High Sherriff,

Sheriff's Office.

MR. SAMMS:

John Samms, EA to the

Minister.

MS. STOODLEY:

Amy Stoodley, Director of

Communications.

MS. HAWLEY-GEORGE:

Kim Hawley-George, Chief

Legislative Counsel, ADM, Legal Services.

MR. FOWLER:

Robin Fowler, ADM, Courts

and Corporate Services.

MS. KNICKLE:

Frances Knickle, Director of

Public Prosecutions.

MS. ORGAN:

Shelley Organ, Chief Executive Officer of the Supreme Court of Newfoundland and

Labrador.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

Theresa Heffernan, Executive Director of Support Services, RNC.

MR. BROPHY:

Owen Brophy, Superintendent of Prisons.

MS. MACINNIS:

Wilma MacInnis, Director of Court Services with the Provincial Court of

Newfoundland and Labrador.

MR. PRITCHARD:

Rolf Pritchard, Director of the Civil Division.

MR. GREEN:

Andrew Green, Budget Manager.

MR. A. PARSONS:

And on that note, if you

guys are ready, we can get going.

CHAIR:

Okay, I'll ask the Clerk to

call the subheading.

CLERK:

1.1.01 through 1.3.01

inclusive.

CHAIR:

Shall 1.1.01 through 1.3.01

inclusive carry?

Mr.

Davis.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Thank you, Madam Chair,

congratulations.

Thank

you, Minister, and your officials for joining us tonight. I think last year we

went around three and a half hours? I'll try not to make that happen this year,

but there was a lot of information shared. We appreciate that and I'm sure this

year will be much the same way.

Minister, maybe I'll, if I may, start with a very high-level question so I don't

have to repeat it constantly through many of the sections here. One of them has

to do with staffing. I'm looking for an overview on I know there were a number

of changes in the department this year.

Now, we

can go through them, if you want,

section by section, but, for example, under

Executive Support under 1.2.01 there's a $168,000 decrease. We know there have

been changes, especially in the executive and management level, and I was

looking for some indications of, if you can tell me how many terminations there

were or how many new hires those types of questions.

So do you want to do them can we do that generally or do

you want to go through them

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah, we start generally, and then as we go through, if you have more specifics.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Sure.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That works for me.

I think we had 21 positions that were eliminated out of

those eight that were vacant. I can go through all the names of those now if you

want, or you can wait until we go I have a list here.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Well, it's up to you. Or you could provide them.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Or we can go itemized if you want, whatever, but that's or I can provide you

with a list after.

MR. P. DAVIS:

That'd be fine, yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I will say on the record, any information I provide to one will obviously

automatically go to the other. So it will be the same list going out.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

Okay, so 21 positions; eight vacant.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

And then you created some new positions through your processes?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, we've added three new sheriff's

officers, three new Crown

attorneys, two lawyers in the Civil Division and the court manager in Happy

Valley-Goose Bay.

Oh,

there's going to be positions added under what's called the

Contraventions Act. What I'd like to

do, if you'll indulge me, I'm going to let Virginia sort of give a high-level

explanation of that because that is relevant to almost every

section in here.

You'll see extra money added.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

So the best bet is for

Virginia to because she's a heck of a lot better than me, she can explain what

it is, how the money is coming in. That way as we're going through, we'll say

that is contraventions money; that will be the explanation there instead of

doing it every time.

MR. P. DAVIS:

There's a separate

section

right on Contraventions Act , I think.

MR. A. PARSONS:

It shouldn't be in there,

but under a number of different headings, under courts and a few others,

sheriffs, once we get in we'll say that's contraventions money.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I don't know if there's an

actual physical

AN HON. MEMBER:

(Inaudible.)

MR. A. PARSONS:

There shouldn't be a

(inaudible). What it is, there are some changes coming down federally that apply

here and there's some revenue coming in, and with that there's also positions

being created. So what I'll do is I'll let Virginia give a good explanation,

certainly better than what I could do.

Basically, Justice and

Public Safety is entering into a memorandum agreement with Justice Canada. Under

the Contraventions Act , which allows

for federal tickets to be prosecuted by means of a ticket, that's not possible

right now and they have to go through the court system.

There

is funding available under the

Contraventions Act fund to allow the federal government to support

initiatives in both official languages. As a result of that, there is additional

funding for salaries and operating in fines administration division which

processes the tickets in the provincial court where, of course, tickets can be

contested, and also under the Sherriff's Office.

So at

this particular point in time we're looking for an agreement for one year. We'll

bring in $900,000 in federal revenue, and to offset that we have $900,000 in our

budget and you'll find it in those three places.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Then you could remind us

when we get there of where they are.

Under

the Contraventions Act , I understand,

while we're on the topic, I believe it was in British Columbia has an

administrative court or administrative process for impaired-related offences. I

believe it is impaired driving offences.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Would that be part of this?

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, I don't think that forms

part of it, although I am aware of what you're talking about. They've changed

impaired. In fact, we've had a discussion about that just over the weekend. So

that's not part of this. I don't know if that's a conversation you want to have

later on but, no, that doesn't fall into this that I'm aware of, no.

MR. P. DAVIS:

But that's something you're

looking at?

MR. A. PARSONS:

It was something that came

to my attention this weekend. Actually, I had a police officer email me and

bring it up. So, as I usually do, I sent it off to all the executive and just

having a discussion. It's literally less than 72 hours old in terms of when I

first became aware of it, but what they've done is they've turned impaired,

basically, into administrative events where you still get the fine, you still

get the prohibition from driving, but I think the aim was to reduce the court

time, reduce the amount of time officers are putting into it.

haven't done any research into how it works is it successful, does it have

deterrents, nothing like that but I am aware of it just from the weekend

actually.

MR. P. DAVIS:

When I read some notes on

the $900,000 in funding, I wondered if it could be applied to that as well

because in BC they do have this, I think they call it administrative court, is

what it's actually called, where impaired driving and related offences and

they follow that standard where, you're right, it does decrease the demand on

court process and also decreases the demand on police officers and waiting

times. God knows, they spend hours and hours sometimes sitting in a courtroom

waiting to go to trial.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Apparently it was a much improved process also from the offender's perspective

on being able to implement stronger rules and guidelines coming out of the

process.

It's

good, and I look forward to you having further discussions on it.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Well, it's an interesting

idea. I'm always willing to consider ideas but that one is pretty recent.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

We'll

go back to staffing, if I may.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah.

MR. P. DAVIS:

The other thing I'd be

interested to know is besides the 21 positions eliminated, you've listed nine

new positions, I think. I'd be also interested to know if there have been any

temporary employees retained in the last year or anticipated in this year's

budget.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I don't know if we have the

numbers here.

AN HON. MEMBER:

Seven of the new contraventions people will be temporary.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, seven of the new

contraventions people will be temporary.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Like, will they be 13-week

temporaries?

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, I don't think 13 weeks.

Like maybe a year contract type deal.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

MS. JACOBS:

As well, the three new prosecutors, I think that money is for two years.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, that's contractual.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

And

13-weekers, do you know if they have any

MR. A. PARSONS:

I can get a list of that. We

have some right now within the system, certainly they continue on, but I can put

together a list if you want.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes, certainly; yeah, if you

wouldn't mind.

The

other question related to that, which you can include, is on PCNs.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

When you eliminate those 21

positions, would the PCNs be maintained or would they be eliminated?

MS. JACOBS:

No, those positions will be eliminated with the PCNs.

MR. P. DAVIS:

The PCNs are gone now.

MS. JACOBS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Minister, I don't know, it's a hard question but I'm interested to know. I think

I asked it last year if I remember, but do you know the total complement of the

department today? Or better yet, I suppose we could find it in some of the

salary details, but I thought I'd ask you.

MR. A. PARSONS:

The number I always use, and

which doesn't include RCMP, is around 1,600. That does include RNC. RCMP, I

would put around, there are 421 officers. The number I always use when I talk is

Justice has about 2,000 employees.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

I see

under 1.2.0.1, under Executive Support, the salary last year budgeted was just

over $1 million and about $168,000 less this year. Is that for a particular ?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Which heading is that?

MR. P. DAVIS:

Salaries, 1.2.01, under

Executive Support.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Okay, just one second now.

It's

less because there's one less ADM and one less Administrative Assistant.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Madam Chair, I don't know,

before we turn the page if you wanted to

CHAIR:

Okay. You still had some

time on the clock, but okay.

Ms.

Rogers.

MS. ROGERS:

I'm fine with that section.

Thank

you.

CHAIR:

All right.

We can

vote

section by section. Is that okay? That's normally what we do.

MR. A. PARSONS:

It doesn't matter to me.

CHAIR:

Shall 1.1.01 to 1.3.01

carry?

All

those in favour, 'aye.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

All those against, 'nay.'

MR. A. PARSONS:

Did you go to 1.3? I thought

it was just the first two.

CHAIR:

That's what I called in the

beginning.

MS. ROGERS:

If I could just do with a

little clarification, I'm fine.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, not a problem.

thought we only done the first two there, the Minister's and the Executive.

CHAIR:

So did you have something,

Ms. Rogers?

MS. ROGERS:

No, I'm fine with that first

section.

Thank

you.

CHAIR:

Okay.

When we

started, I called 1.1.01 to 1.3.01.

MR. A. PARSONS:

It's not passed, so ask the

questions.

MS. ROGERS:

If I might make a

suggestion, maybe we could go through the whole one

section as a block and then

CHAIR:

That's what we're doing.

That was what I called, all of the ones.

MS. ROGERS:

Right.

CHAIR:

To have discussion on that

and then move to two.

MS. ROGERS:

I know where it is, yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

She's tough, man; she's

moving through.

CHAIR:

You just have to pay

attention to the headings I call; that's all.

Okay,

so we're going to continue on one.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

CHAIR:

Ms. Rogers.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay, thank you very much.

under 1.2.02

MR. A. PARSONS:

Okay.

MS. ROGERS:

when we look at the

Purchased Services, can we just have an idea of what some of those purchased

services might be?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, just one second now.

Virginia?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, no, I'm calling out to

the people that are

Oh, okay.

Most of

the costs that are included in there include printing we cover printing for a

lot of the divisions. We cover repairs to furniture and equipment, photocopier

rentals, also contributions toward miscellaneous office rentals, specialized

training and monies included for contracts under the family violence

intervention court.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay, and I also want to say

thank you very much, everyone, for coming out. I know some of you have done

incredible work at times under very difficult circumstances. I know that both

the people of the province and all your colleagues really appreciate the work

and the leadership that you have shown in all of the work that you do, and I

know that this evening makes for a long day. So thank you very much.

Back up

to 1.2.02, under Salaries, 01, we see a difference there of $470,000. I know

we're going to be getting a list of some of the positions lost, but what

positions were lost there, if lost?

MR. A. PARSONS:

That, I believe, if I'm

correct and if I'm not correct, you'll tell me there was one management

position reduced. I think last year there was funding there for the expansion of

the family violence intervention court, which has been pushed forward one year.

So that was funding we were anticipating but never got there.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

Can you

tell me the status of the family violence intervention court now in Labrador?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Well, basically, I have a

mandate letter where I have to expand it to Labrador and to Central. Labrador,

quite frankly, I don't think it's ready to go yet. And by all means, I have a

couple of people back here that could probably speak to it even better than me.

I've

been up there a couple of times. I think there are a number of issues there. We

still have some kinks that could be worked out, the ones we have here on the

Island, even out in Stephenville. It's getting better, but I don't think it

should be expanded if we haven't got it completely figured out. And Labrador

brings its own challenges, especially with the infrastructure up there. It's an

extremely busy court, with a huge caseload. As you see, we've got the court

manager hired up there now.

Having

visited there, we have to figure out what's the best model to use. Is it going

to be the same? I don't know if my colleagues back here have anything. Maybe

Wilma can speak to it, as she knows more about the Provincial Court than me.

MS. MACINNIS:

Certainly, yes, we've been in a bit of flux, we'll say, in Labrador certainly at

the Provincial Court. We've had a number of vacancies there and only since

probably last fall have we sort of, I think, turned the corner in terms of

establishing some stability there. We actually contracted a court manager then

and that's the position, actually, that we sought permanent funding for because

we certainly saw some really great strides being made since the fall and we have

stabilized some staffing there as well.

right now, I think we just have one vacancy there in a court officer position.

Our staff person actually took a position with the Supreme Court in Goose Bay,

so we're in the process of recruiting there. So it's doing much better, so I

certainly agree with the minister in terms of it's been a bit of a turbulent

time in terms of establishing, taking on another court process there for sure.

But we're certainly getting there in terms of stability and the help with this

new position will certainly be of great assistance.

MS. ROGERS:

So for Labrador, what is the

new time frame for the domestic court?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Well basically, everything

I've operated on has been sort of within the mandate. I'm always hesitant to put

timelines on things, especially when there may be things that are outside my

control. My timeline is still to get it done within this mandate. But having

been up there now on a number of occasions and having visited the circuits, I'm

not going to be silly enough to promise it by a certain time because I think

there are some more foundational challenges, as Wilma has mentioned. I think

we've got a lot of work to do in Labrador in terms of justice anyway.

My next

thing I'd like to do we had this justice summit here in St. John's just a

couple of weeks ago. My next plan is to have one of those up in Happy

Valley-Goose Bay, and bring the Labrador partners and players into a room to

talk about what are some of the fixes because there's a lot of challenges, not

just with the family violence intervention court, even regular Provincial Court,

we have infrastructure challenges, we've got logistical challenges.

We're

lucky in terms of staffing. Our Crowns, we have a full complement there. But

that's sort of where I am. I'd still want to see it within the mandate, because

I think the court is necessary, I think it is positive and it's a good thing,

but I don't want to say it's going to be in the next six months, 12 months,

whatever, because I don't want to overpromise.

MS. ROGERS:

So is there anything being

done in the interim in terms of monies available to community to provide support

services for victims?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Well, we still have family

violence service was it family ?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, no, the family justice

services. We had family justice services, which is there. In fact, that's just

recently gone under the control of our court again. It was sort of outside;

we're putting a back under there. I think there's a lot we can do to make it

better.

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. We're just having a

chat about so you're talking about Labrador specifically?

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

We still have a number of

programs that are always already there. We've got some more ideas, but we can't

put it out there right yet. There are things we need to do, but overall I'd like

to think that we got to get up there and find a way to just look at the caseload

too. There's a huge caseload there, so it sort of all ties in together. But, no

doubt, there are challenges.

MS. ROGERS:

And then the Stephenville

court, is that still called a pilot project, or was it called a pilot project or

temporary, was it?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think it started as a

pilot project, but it's not something that's going to go anywhere; it's going to

stay there. Maybe Robin

MS. ROGERS:

So it's established and

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah, Robin Fowler can talk

about it. Robin has been out to visit the court. Actually, I was out there as

well, but Robin knows a bit more. So maybe he can talk a bit about it.

MR. FOWLER:

The issue that we've been having with the family violence court, both for

Stephenville and St. John's, is that in order to qualify for the family violence

court the applicant, the accused person who becomes the applicant, has to meet

with a social worker and they go through an assessment process that includes

risk assessment.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. FOWLER:

That's done before any plea

is entered and it's been done under the protection of a solicitor-client

privilege. It's done with counsel. What's been happening is there's been a

difficulty in communication between that beginning process and then when it

moves on so that the person goes and enters a plea in court and it's dealt with

in the family violence court. They then have to deal with our probation

officers. There's been difficulty in allowing the communication from that

beginning stage to the probation office and we need to deal with that.

We're

working on a way of creating some sort of waiver that everybody is going to be

happy with to allow the process to keep going. Right now, we don't have

everybody in agreement on what that waiver is going to look like. So that's the

holdup right now, the difficulty that we're having, whether it's Stephenville or

St. John's, with the family violence.

MS. ROGERS:

Was that a difficulty with

the first incarnation of the family violence intervention court?

MR. FOWLER:

My understanding is the first time around it was set up a little bit

differently.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. FOWLER:

They decided to go with this version for a lot of reasons; one being that it was

easier for the applicant to make an informed decision of what they wanted to do

upfront. But right now the whole question becomes because what happens now is

that a lot of the evaluation process is repeated again, and then if there's

disagreement it can cause issues. Right now, we're looking into the possibility

of having a waiver but we haven't been able to completely deal with that yet.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Thank you.

Thank

you very much.

Under

Salaries again, under 1.3.01.

MR. A. PARSONS:

1.3.01, Fines?

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

And the

Salaries there so we'll again get information on those positions that are

lost.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That was one management

position that's gone there. One management position at Fines Admin and we're

adding a position back with the contraventions money.

MS. ROGERS:

Right.

Okay,

I'm fine then.

Thank

you.

CHAIR:

Okay.

Thank

you.

Mr.

Davis.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes, if I can just run back

to 1.2.02, Administrative and Policy Support. There's a reduction in Salaries,

as you explained, of $470,000, but there's an increase in Employee Benefits. Can

you explain that one?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I believe, if I'm correct,

that's workers' comp costs. That's not just for this section, that covers off

all the department.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I think we saw that same

thing last year, did we not?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MS. JACOBS:

We were just trying to rightsize that amount of money because we know we're

spending more all the time.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

they're under each section. That's fine.

As I

understand it then, where I see Employee Benefits and see those changes, then

workers' comp is a factor with many of those. Is that what you're telling me?

MS. JACOBS:

Workers' comp is only for this activity.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MS. JACOBS:

But the other increases you may see in Employee Benefits may be for another

reason. When we get to those you can ask.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Thanks.

Under

1.2.03, under Legal Information Management, there was about $122,000 revised

from last year's budget, and then a reduction from there of $170 from what it

was last year, but $46,000 in Salaries. I'm not sure if you explained that one

or not.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There is one position gone.

We also dealt with a retirement there and the backfill to sick leave. That

explains some of the discrepancies there. Did I get that right? Yeah.

MR. P. DAVIS:

One of the positions that

you

MR. A. PARSONS:

What was the name of the

position? Director of Legal Information Management, yeah, that's the position

that was eliminated.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

You may

have explained this one earlier. Under 1.2.02, on Revenue Federal, it goes

from $30,000 to $120,000.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

The

$30,000 last year was our federal funding for the drug treatment feasibility.

The $120,000 is new federal money we're getting to further on the drug treatment

court work, which I'm hoping to have some further announcements on in the very

near future. That is the federal money for that.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Over on

Fines Administration I've got a sense that there's been some work done on

Fines Administration. We talked about the Salaries, but I also see here a

federal revenue portion that didn't exist before.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Contraventions.

MR. P. DAVIS:

That's contraventions. Okay.

Any

idea what the outstanding fine level is now?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think the number I got

today is $36 million and change: $36,692,472.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Just by memory?

MR. A. PARSONS:

My God, no.

remembered the $36 million but after that it got a little

MR. P. DAVIS:

I think that's all I have on

that one.

What's

the provincial revenue? Is that fine collection?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Ticket revenue?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Besides the fact that the

RNC now are doing a lot of work on proactive enforcement I guess that's the

best way to put it. I know they've been doing a lot of work and working towards

that. Is that

MR. A. PARSONS:

There was also a change in

the fee from $7 to $9, so that accounts for some of the increase there. It would

be a full year of that increase.

MR. P. DAVIS:

A change in fees from what,

sorry?

MR. A. PARSONS:

It went from $7 to $9 on the

processing.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Is that right? Yeah, okay.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Would that include

processing like City of St. John's parking tickets and that kind of thing?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

That's almost $100,000.

That's a lot of processing.

Okay, I

think that's all I have on that section, Madam Chair.

CHAIR:

Good. Okay.

I'll

call it again.

Shall

1.1.01 to 1.3.01 carry?

All

those in favour?

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

Those against?

Carried.

motion, subheads 1.1.01 through 1.3.01 carried.

CLERK:

Subheads 2.1.01 through 2.1.05 inclusive.

CHAIR:

Shall 2.1.01 to 2.1.05

inclusive carry?

Mr.

Davis.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Thank you.

2.1.01 in Salaries, a $364,000 change there.

MR. A. PARSONS:

We've increased the

complement of civil lawyers up by two.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Under

Professional Services there was $3.3 million down to $2.3 million.

MR. A. PARSONS:

The logic behind it is that

we're hoping that's the money we pay outside counsel. The logic is that we

want to do more in-house. We think there are ways that we can do it basically

cheaper within. I don't know if you'll see that full change right away but

that's what we're trying to do there.

Some of

it's uncontrollable. Of that $3.5 million, if I get this right and, Rolf, if

I'm wrong, you're going to correct me 28 per cent of that is AG-funded

counsel. We have absolutely no control over that. I think the other one is

I'll go to Rolf, he knows it better than me.

MR. PRITCHARD:

Once again, as the minister said, 28 per cent is AG appointments over which we

have no control. Those are things where the judge appoints counsel in criminal

matters or judicial indemnification.

About

23 per cent are costs that arise in litigation; for example, if the department

retains an expert witness. Then the remaining 49 per cent is for where services

are needed that can't be provided within the Department of Justice; for example,

perhaps we need to retain a lawyer in Quebec to deal with the civil code there

and who speaks French, things like that where we don't have the expertise

in-house.

MR. P. DAVIS:

The two additional salaries,

it's not meant to offset the $1 million reduction?

MR. A. PARSONS:

No. Basically, the logic

behind it is that we're adding more solicitors. Our goal is to decrease the

amount of work that has to go outside and basically find efficiencies there.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So it will. One is connected

to the other.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, definitely.

Is it

an actual correlation, like the two lawyers cost this much money, you're going

to save exactly this? No. That's just the logic that I'm using in making that

decision.

Again,

the other thing is when it comes to stuff like AG, we can't get around that nor

do you have any control over that. You're talking about almost 30 per cent of

the budget there. But that's the plan. We think that we can do more within.

MR. P. DAVIS:

This is just Civil Division,

not Criminal Division.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's right. Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I've heard from time to time

and still hear from time to time and I'm sure you won't disagree of the

significant demands that are on lawyers within the department, including Civil

Law Division which we're talking about here now. If there's a movement of using

less professional services to try and increase the complement of lawyers

in-house so that more of that can be done in-house, does that do anything to

elevate the overburden and the significant workloads that exist on civil law

lawyers?

MR. A. PARSONS:

No doubt there's a burden.

Rolf can speak to this as well; he's been around a long time.

I think

if anything, in my meetings with them lately I've given them a vote of

confidence. What I've told them is I think we can do more within. And I think we

all agree that it can, but I've said look, instead of us sending out work I

come from a private law background where if a file came in, for me to send it

out, it has to be pretty bad. I don't want to send it off to another firm to do

it. That's money that I'm not going to make and so I want to have the same sort

of mindset here.

I think

we can do it but it's like anything, there are a lot of pressures on them. We

have a lot of very, very good lawyers. I think that if we add more we can still

look at ways to do more. Myself, Rolf and the executive are also looking at the

division to see are there places where we need extra work.

I don't

know if there's been a review done of the Civil Division. We're doing that now.

My review is not about having less, my review is about where are the challenges,

what can we do better. That's why I've added more rather than cut.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah, it sounds like we're

probably expressing the same concern. One of the continuing or consistent

concerns that has been heard and known within Civil Law Division as well as

Criminal Law Division I guess we'll have the same conversation when that comes

up is the enormous amount of workloads that exist. I know lots of lawyers

within the Civil Law Division who at 4:30 could only dream about going home and

they're here much longer than that and later than that. Look at the smile on

Rolf up there when I'm talking about this.

They

work long hours and have heavy responsibilities. Lawyers do have that, but I

know that in Civil Division it's been an issue.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. Like I say, there's no

doubt this line of work, you're going to put long hours in whether you're

private or you're within. We're lucky that we have a really good complement of

lawyers who work hard and know their files.

What I

want to do, it's not a case of looking at them and saying we should do the same

amount or more work with less people, I think we can look at it and say we can

do more within. We're always looking at finding ways to save money, but I would

rather to save the money on outside counsel and get more done with them.

doubt there are pressures, but we've got to again, coming from that background

where I did a little bit of that work, certainly nothing near what they do. A gain,

Rolf can speak to it, but I'm trying my best to work with them.

There were some times over the last number of years where

they faced constant fear of who's not going to stick around. So what I've tried

to do this year is say, look, that's not what I'm looking at. I'm looking at

ways of having all of you here, but can we do things differently, are there

different ways we can do business?

MR. P. DAVIS:

Sure.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I don't know if Rolf wants to speak to that.

MR. PRITCHARD:

Thank you, Minister.

Just by

way of an example, one of the things that we're trying to encourage within the

Civil Division is to have some of the younger lawyers develop expertise in areas

where previously we have not had expertise and have gone out of the department

to get that expertise.

When

you consider the hourly rates that are charged by some of these lawyers downtown

and in other provinces, if you can do some of that work in-house, the savings

can be quite dramatic. So we think there's an opportunity there and that's one

example.

As you

say, there will be some things for example if we need someone who specializes

in civil law in Quebec, well, we won't be able to do that but some of the

areas of the oil and gas, some of those things, we think that some of our

younger lawyers can develop that expertise and then there would be a

commensurate savings.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah, good. I know it takes

a lot of years to develop expertise, skills and experience. We've seen that in

the RNC with no middle and I'm sure the minister knows what I'm talking about

no middle in the RNC right now, and the continuing recruitment and so on will

be necessary to keep those skills advancing.

Minister, under the same section, 2.1.01, Allowances and Assistance, there was

$1.5 million budgeted but $5.3 million under that line. What does that include?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Okay, that's the historical

sexual assault settlements, which you try your best, and we usually get pretty

good analysis on what we think is going to settle and not settle, but obviously

it's not an exact science. Sometimes these can progress faster than expected.

Sometimes you think they're close to settling and they don't. These are

historical, and when I say historical, I mean decades old.

we've always budgeted the $1.5 million, last year there was the $5.3 million. So

I think we actually had to go to the contingency fund to use, and that would

have been tabled here in the House.

The

other thing, too, is I don't know if it's a realistic fear or not, I think

there's something to it, but if you budget that up and people see there's this

big sum of money that might change attitudes in terms of coming after it.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

But that's sometimes what

we've used the contingency fund for, which is tabled here. I believe we're

anticipating more this year.

MR. PRITCHARD:

Yes, we're embroiled in various litigations. The fund is used to settle matters

where a recommendation is made by one of the Civil Division lawyers, or if

there's a settlement ordered by the court at the end of a trial, but those

matters continue.

think we have a pretty good sense of what we can win and what we can't. So the

settlements usually reflect where a lawyer has advised the department that it

would be in everyone's interest to settle a matter. It's difficult to predict at

the start of the year, as the minister said, how many cases may settle in a

given year. Some years it's more, some years it's less.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So that line, the Allowances

and Assistances, are for all settlements not just the historical the

historical ones are thrown

MR. A. PARSONS:

Those have been decreasing

in fairly significant size.

CHAIR:

I remind members again as

well, before you speak, if you could say your name for the benefit of those in

the Broadcast Centre.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I might say there, that

number is not actually $5.33 million; it's actually $3.9 million. This would

have been done in February. So I think maybe you can explain, Virginia,

because she understands the accounting better than me.

When this book was done, when the book was being prepared, that particular

number, the revised number was our expectation of potential costs to the end of

March for the fiscal year. At that time, when that was done, we still didn't

know exactly what would come out of that fund, but that was the estimation of

what could be paid out. We've actually only paid $3.9 million to date. It was

the best estimate at that time.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

CHAIR:

Do you want me to go to Ms.

Rogers and come back? Your 10 minutes is up.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I'd just rather monopolize

all the time myself, but she can go ahead. I have some questions on the

Sheriff's Office, but she can certainly go ahead.

CHAIR:

Ms. Rogers.

MS. ROGERS:

Thank you.

Can you

tell us some of the larger cases, some of the large files that you're dealing

with right now in Civil Law?

MR. A. PARSONS:

To do that justice, maybe

I'll let Rolf talk about some of the bigger files. The offshore one's, Hibernia

has always been a big one, but I think Rolf might do a better job of this than

me.

MR. PRITCHARD:

Yes, Ms. Rogers, you're curious about some of the large files that we're

currently litigating

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. PRITCHARD:

not necessarily with respect to settlements, just what we're litigating?

MS. ROGERS:

That's right, yes.

MR. PRITCHARD:

Sure.

Well,

as the minister indicated, this year we had arbitrations involving offshore

royalty regimes and various costs, what were included and what were not, and

that's actually being appealed. We have litigation ongoing with Oceanex this

year to do with the federal subsidies and whether or not they're reasonable or

not, and that's being challenged by judicial review. We've had lawyers on a

number of ATIPP appeals. That's an ongoing issue.

well, there are a number of other matters. For example, occasionally we get

applications with respect to some of the sexual abuse claims, procedural issues,

trying to move those matters along. Those are some of the key ones that come to

mind. I can probably think of a few others. If I do, I'll bring them up, but the

Oceanex is one that comes to mind because I'm working on that one, spending a

lot of time on that lately.

We have

a number of judicial reviews, decisions of ministers that are challenged for

various reasons in various departments; some successful, some not.

MS. ROGERS:

And where is the tobacco

file? That would come under this?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, there's a contingency

fee with Roebothan McKay Marshall. I don't know were there any monies actually

spent on that last year? I don't know if there was a lot of work done on that

one.

MR. PRITCHARD:

No, what's happening with that right now is the stage they're at is they're

gathering up the information. There have been researchers with the Department of

Justice who have been going from department to department collecting documents,

and then those documents have been deposited with the law firms that are acting

for the province. The intention then is to generate the lists of documents that

have to be filed as part of litigation.

those matters are a long way from coming from hearing. Once the documents are

filed and it'll be a while before all the documents are filed then there'll

be discoveries and then we'll see if it gets to the point where there are

pretrial certificates filed. That's moving slowly.

MS. ROGERS:

So for the tobacco file, is

there any guesstimate end in sight or are we still looking years and years down

the road?

MR. PRITCHARD:

Needless to say, the tobacco companies, through their legal counsel, raise

objections. They file applications and it tends to slow the matter down. So it

has been in the process for a while. We've tried to move those matters along but

where you have another party that's actively involved in slowing the matter

down, it's really difficult to predict.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Thank you very much.

If we

move on to 2.1.02, Sheriff's Office, we see an increase there, and there were

new positions in the Sheriff's Office.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There were three new

positions just created. There would have been some funding there through

contraventions. That's down at the bottom, right?

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

One position created out of

that. Then there were positions that we had anticipated not needing last year

with the court closures, which ended up being reinstated and stayed around.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

Transportation and

Communications, we see from the budget from '16-'17 and then the estimate, the

revised, can you tell me what that jump is?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, occupational health and

safety made up a portion of that, and I think a large portion of that would have

been the Muskrat Falls situation back in October where the Sheriff's Office was

called in to enforce court orders. So that had a significant cost.

MS. ROGERS:

So it's the transportation

of personnel.

MR. A. PARSONS:

As well, the Labrador

circuit always has a cost too; the sheriffs are on those circuits.

MS. ROGERS:

The budget for '17-'18 is

significantly higher than the budget for '16-'17. What would that be for?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Under which one, sorry?

MS. ROGERS:

Transportation and

Communications. I can see the revised. We see a big bump in the revised, and so

now in the actual budget estimate for '17-'18.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. Well, again, the

Labrador circuit is there. We didn't anticipate that being there. So that's a

part of that.

What else do we have?

OFFICIAL:

Just rightsizing of the budget.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Basically, what we're saying

here is that it's a rightsizing of the budget.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Again, we have the High

Sheriff here. I don't know if anybody wants to ask him any questions.

MS. ROGERS:

I don't know if there's

anything particular you would like to say about now with the new

positions, does that feel we'll be able to address the issues that were

outstanding for your office?

MR. CHAFE: Yes,

absolutely. With the three additional positions now we can go on all the

circuits that were previously taken care of by the RCMP, which then puts them

back into the community, which is a better use of their time, which is really

good for us.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Good, thank you.

Under

Purchased Services, we see a considerable jump there from $250,000 in '16-'17 to

$397,000?

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's the contraventions

costs, I believe. They are mostly associated with the actual system that they're

putting in place.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. All right, great,

thanks.

MR. A. PARSONS:

And if I could just add on

the record here that the High Sherriff just graduated a brand new class of

deputy sheriffs today down at the Supreme Court, so we've got 13 new deputy

sheriffs who just graduated.

MS. ROGERS:

And where is their training?

Is it in-house, the training for them, and how long is their training?

MR. CHAFE:

The training is 10 weeks in class, and then there are three weeks of on-the-job

training.

MS. ROGERS:

So there were how many new

grads?

MR. CHAFE:

Thirteen.

MS. ROGERS:

Thirteen. And how many are

women?

MR. CHAFE:

One women and three of those positions, ironically, we were able to offer the

new positions that were just created. So of the four vacancies in Goose Bay

currently, we're going to fill three as of tomorrow, so that's pretty good.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay, so of the 13 new ones,

one is a woman. What does that give us in terms of the numbers of women and

number of men in your ?

MR. CHAFE:

I think we're about 24 per cent. That's something we're going to try to work

through different recruitment drives.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

MR. CHAFE:

And we're trying to also

hire within our own community. So in this particular class, pretty much

everyone's going home when they graduate, which is really good for retention.

MS. ROGERS:

Oh, great.

MR. CHAFE:

Yes, we're really pleased with that.

MS. ROGERS:

What do you see as some of

the blocks and barriers to women entering this profession?

MR. CHAFE:

I think law enforcement in general can be a challenge, so I think we need to do

a little better with getting the word out there that it's for everybody.

MS. ROGERS:

And then you would think

more women would apply.

MR. CHAFE:

I think so.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. And is there a plan to

do that?

MR. CHAFE:

Yes, we've actually had some focus groups within the Sherriff's Office with

females in law enforcement, with some of our partners. And that's gone a long

way to understand what some of the barriers are for them, and we'll include that

in our strategic plan going forward.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes, it's still such a

challenge

MR. CHAFE:

It is.

MS. ROGERS:

in so many areas, even

when you look in this House.

MR. CHAFE:

Yeah.

MS. ROGERS:

It's a huge challenge.

Okay,

thank you.

MR. CHAFE:

You're welcome.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Under 2.1.03

MR. A. PARSONS:

Support Enforcement?

MS. ROGERS:

Yes. Under Purchased

Services and I think those were mostly banking fees, were they?

MR. A. PARSONS:

All banking.

MS. ROGERS:

So we see a real jump.

What's happening?

MR. A. PARSONS:

So what I am being told is

that's historically something that's always been overspent, so this is a case of

rightsizing.

MS. ROGERS:

Rightsizing, okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

But again, it's a challenge

all across government when it comes to fees.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay, thank you.

And

Family Justice Services, under Salaries, so does it look like we've lost a

position there.

MR. A. PARSONS:

One director position.

MS. ROGERS:

One director, okay.

And

Purchased Services, what kinds of purchased services would we have there under

Family Justice Services?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Rent is $256 of that and the

rest is the copier, printing.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

And so

when we were talking about the Domestic Violence Court in Labrador, any of the

support services, the counselling services for victims then in the Labrador area

would come from the Family Justice Services, would it?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Wilma.

MS. MACINNIS:

I was previously with Family Justice Services. Family Justice Services is a

program that deals with families who are going through a divorce and separation.

MS. ROGERS:

Right.

MS. MACINNIS:

So they wouldn't necessarily be providing I think that would be more Victim

Services in terms of providing supports to people who are going through

because they are one of our partners with the family violence court so I would

think it would be more Victim Services.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

All

right, thank you.

CHAIR:

Ms. Rogers, the time is up,

so I'll go back to Mr. Davis.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes, fine.

Thank

you.

MR. P. DAVIS:

While we're on the page I

want to go back to the Sheriff's Office momentarily under Support Enforcement,

2.1.03, I don't think Ms. Rogers asked if she did I apologize, I missed it

but the salary, there's almost $173,000 salary decrease.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That is an admin error.

There was one management position, which makes up a portion of it, but the other

one there was an actual error in the printing, or the accounting, or they took

the money twice or something.

Thank you.

There

was one position removed from that division. It was basically an accounting

error. We missed it and didn't realize that it had been taken out twice.

Basically, we reallocated some of the funds to another area and then realized

after the fact that the funds had come out. So we couldn't correct it for the

budget book, but we will correct it during the year.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So what's the right number?

MR. A. PARSONS:

If I might add, it wasn't

Virginia who did it; it was some other budgeting crowd. I'd say it's Cathy

Bennett's crowd that made the error.

It is

$81,000.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Back on the sheriffs, you

mentioned that there were three new sheriff's officers being hired, you got 13

just graduated today, so all 13 of them are being employed but there are three

new positions. So what's the total complement now of sheriff's officers?

MR. CHAFE:

I believe there are about 110.

MR. P. DAVIS:

That's including the 13?

MR. CHAFE:

Yes, we had vacancies across the province.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So are the vacancies now

filled?

MR. CHAFE:

There's one additional position to be filled in Goose Bay. We'll have to run

another competition for that one.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Also

under Sheriff's Office there's federal revenue there of $252,600.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Contraventions.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I thought Purchased Services

was contraventions.

MR. A. PARSONS:

It is. I guess one is there

and then the other one is the offset.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay, it's an in and an out.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Supplies are up $61,000

under Sheriff's Office.

I was

going to say I see everybody looking at each other, but

OFFICIAL:

No, Virginia is going to answer it.

The Supplies budget in the Sheriff's Office will cover such things as, not only

office supplies and that but it also covers uniforms, gas, supplies for vehicles

and equipment for handling. While we did add a small amount of money for

supplies under contraventions, I believe most of the money is a reallocation of

funding just to meet operational requirements.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So it was previously

unfunded, is that what you're

Yeah, the Supplies budget would vary or the requirements on that particular

budget would vary depending upon the amount of uniforms that are required in any

given year, and that may change.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So it is historically

underfunded the deputy is nodding her head yes.

MS. JACOBS:

With a collective agreement you have to buy uniforms different years, so then

you'll have your ups and downs. Probably this year, I'm assuming, Dan, you may

be purchasing some uniforms.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

OFFICIAL:

Yes, it's $116,000 in uniforms this year.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

I think

I can go over now to 2.1.05.

Is this

the last

section for this group, Madam Chair? It is? Okay.

Under

Salaries, $125,000 we were at $692,000, it went to $350,000 and now it's

$679,000.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I'll let Heather provide the

explanation on that.

MS. JACOBS:

Yes, we spent less in the revised because we had three new positions and we had

delayed recruitment for those three new positions. That's why we still have

them. Obviously, ATIPP is a very busy office so we'll be filling those this

year.

MR. P. DAVIS:

They were vacant positions,

were they?

MS. JACOBS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

They were vacant when they

came over from OPE.

MS. JACOBS:

Yes, when we got ATIPP in September, they were vacant, and then it just took us

a while through the HRS process for classification. We just got them classified

in February. I believe one position is filled and we're in the process of

filling the other two right now.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Were there any terminations

under Access to Information?

MS. JACOBS:

No.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Any new hires, other than

the ones you must mentioned?

MS. JACOBS:

No, just the three new positions, but they were from last year's budget that

weren't filled. There were none in this year's budget.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay, so you had three last

year.

MS. JACOBS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I know the new Privacy

Commissioner has expressed concern about workloads within government. I don't

know if you can offer an opinion if you share those concerns. If so, then what's

the plan to deal with it?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah, I speak to that.

Obviously, there has been a significant increase in requests. That's something

that we're cognizant of. You've got the changes in legislation that has added to

those workloads, but at the same time we're always operating with the constant

fact that you just can't go and create the new position.

It's

trying to find is there a different way to do this as well. You've got the

respect the legislation, but at the same time, is there a way that we can do

things differently, do things more efficiently? We're looking out to other

provinces as well to see how their system is set up. There are some different

set-ups and formats to ATIPP

MR. P. DAVIS:

We've heard the message from

time to time that there's a real struggle in government to keep up with demand.

While I think everyone expected that after the new legislation there would be an

increase and a peak, we don't seem to have seen the peak yet.

The

Commissioner, in discussions I've had with him, is concerned about and I think

you may have been there for one of them, at least one of them, and that was

probably the discussion we had when you were there the increase in demands and

the need for them to keep on time with legislation. I know he's felt it if he

has three positions from last year. Do you have a timeline on how long before

they should be filled?

MS. JACOBS:

We're in the process of doing that now so I'm sure they'll be done within the

next couple of months.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

I think

that's the last

section for those.

CHAIR:

Before we call that, I'm

just wondering if Ms. Rogers had anything up to 2.1.05.

MS. ROGERS:

I'm fine.

Thank

you.

CHAIR:

Okay.

Shall

2.1.01 to 2.1.05 inclusive carry?

All

those in favour?

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

All those against?

Carried.

motion, subheads 2.1.01 through 2.1.05 carried.

CLERK:

2.2.01 through 2.4.01 inclusive.

CHAIR:

Shall 2.2.01 to 2.4.01

inclusive carry?

Mr.

Davis.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Thank you.

Criminal Law; I would expect we're going to have a fair bit of discussion about

this as well. In Salaries there's an additional almost $340,000.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Three new prosecutors.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Three new prosecutors.

Has

there been any terminations or positions terminated in the last year under

Criminal Law?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, we had one admin

position.

MR. P. DAVIS:

PCN is gone with that too,

is it?

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I know it's another area

where there's significant pressure in significant areas, especially with Jordan.

I know you have $390,000 to address Jordan. Is this part of that? Is this part

of that money there?

MR. A. PARSONS:

That is the crux of it, I

would think. There's been a lot of talk about it publicly and a lot of talk

about it nationally. In fact there's, I guess you would call, a special FPT

meeting going on not next week, it's the end of the week after, up in Gatineau;

ministers across the country as well as the federal minister just to talk about

Jordan because we're all facing this same pressure since that case came down. In

fact, the Supreme Court of Canada is going to be hearing a case on that again in

the next couple of weeks: Cody.

I'm

going to ask Frances to speak now in a second because she's a heck of a lot more

eloquent then me and certainly knows the system. There are two things here; I

think overall, when faced with other provinces, we're actually doing reasonably

well compared to some other provinces that are just really having a tough time

keeping up with the Jordan applications that are coming in.

The

second

part is that it's really hard to go back and deal with pre-Jordan. The

emphasis from here, from us, has been since that case came out, what can we and

what have we done? Again, I'll let Frances speak to it because she can talk

about the measures her office has taken, what she's seen and maybe her thoughts

and views on it. Feel free to ask any questions as well.

MS. KNICKLE:

We found ourselves in a very

interesting situation last fall. Jordan was released at the end of July, but as

you probably heard in the news and it was something that we identified

ourselves our caseload has increased substantially over a number of years;

I'll give you a statistic in a moment. But particular in that are our major

cases, specifically homicides.

Something that we had been trying to do that came out of the Lamer Inquiry

which most provinces across the country do, most public prosecution services

is ensure that when we have these kinds of major cases we have two prosecutors

assigned. When we started looking at what we were facing, we had 14 homicides.

Well, we have 48 prosecutors. That means we assign two prosecutors, we have half

our service assigned to homicide prosecutions.

actually approached government last fall in relation to this, in light of

Jordan, seeing that we have quite what I'm seeing as a bit of bottleneck and

then with the increased pressure of Jordan. The addition of these three

prosecutors allows us to meet our obligation or our desire to have two

prosecutors assigned to our homicides and then have more junior prosecutors pick

up some of the bulk of the caseloads.

Just so

you know, for example, in 2007 we had 78 cases opened and closed over the course

of the year 7,829 cases and we had 41 prosecutors. But in 2016 we had 44 Crown

attorneys and we had over 12,000 cases. We suffered a significant cut in 2013.

We lost prosecutors and a number of support staff, yet our caseload has been

increasing steadily. It's increased 60 per cent since 2007 and the number of

Crown attorneys increased less than 10 per cent. So we needed to get some

prosecutors in the office, and that's what this is about. I have to say we're

very excited. We've got people on board already. We've got a new one starting.

that's just kind of like the numbers. In terms of Jordan across the country, we

have pockets, but Newfoundland is actually not doing badly relative to some of

the other jurisdictions. We haven't had any homicides, for example, stay of

proceedings entered.

We've

had middling results. We've got 12 pending applications. We've had four judicial

stays entered as a result of findings that there was unreasonable delay. We've

actually appealed three of those. We've had two that were dismissed, we've got

two applications pending and we've had about four cases that we ended ourselves,

looking at the facts and the circumstances.

What

you have to remember, all of these cases are cases that were already in the

system before Jordan even came down. So the prosecutors, counsel and the courts

were operating under a different legal framework. And what has to happen

essentially, and one of the reasons Cody is up at the Supreme Court of Canada,

is that we just simply have to litigate Jordan because there's a lot of

reasoning within the decision that has to flush itself out, and that's what a

lot of this is about.

I don't

know if that answers your question.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes, it does and the next

one, and the next one, and the next one.

I was

trying to copy and trying to make note of some of your statistical information

and data, which I think paints a pretty clear picture. So you've said there have

been four judicial stays.

MS. KNICKLE:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Three were appealed.

MS. KNICKLE:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Two successfully, is that

what I understood?

MS. KNICKLE:

Yes, and we're still waiting on

MR. P. DAVIS:

And there's still two

pending you said then, I thought.

MS. KNICKLE:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I'm trying to make the math

work but

MS. KNICKLE:

Well, then we've had a couple that we resolved for other ways.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

MS. KNICKLE:

We either worked out a plea,

or we withdrew it, or

MR. P. DAVIS:

But there's 12 pending?

MS. KNICKLE:

No, 12 total applications. Sorry.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, total of 12.

So how

many are pending, or outstanding, or haven't been heard?

MS. KNICKLE:

We've just got two pending right now. I was advised that we may have another one

being filed. I mean, this is a really fluid statistic because I'm sort of

updating. We may have a new one entered, so we're trying to keep track of them.

They

cover the gamut in terms of the kinds of offences. We haven't had any filed in

relation to any of our homicides yet. Fortunately, those are rolling along. You

may recall we had a homicide trial before Christmas. There was an acquittal for

Mr. Stacey and then the next day there was another homicide and an arrest. So we

just sort of get ahead of the game and then something else happens.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah.

thought you said 14 homicides, two prosecutors per each; so the hire of three

new prosecutors, two homicides and you're back worse off than you were

yesterday, really.

MS. KNICKLE:

Yeah. Well, there is actually one homicide file that we actually haven't

assigned a second prosecutor to it yet just because while it's something that

you want to do, some cases are more complex than others. And some of these

prosecutions, for example there are three joint accused well, four accused

together, three of them are jointly accused so you definitely need to have two

prosecutors there; other files, not necessarily so.

We are

trying to use our

article clerks as well to assist on some of our other more

complex prosecutions. We have a drive-by shooting trial that will be starting,

hopefully, in January depending on what happens with the pre-trial application,

so we'll be assigning a junior prosecutor to assist with that one as well.

MR. P. DAVIS:

It's kind of hard to believe

really we're talking about Newfoundland and Labrador, isn't it?

MS. KNICKLE:

I hate to say it, but it sure has changed from when you and I were down in court

doing impaired driving.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Absolutely, yes.

MS. KNICKLE:

It's a different kettle of

fish.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Absolutely, it sure is.

Minister, lots of concern about Jordan and I've talked to people, certainly not

every day, but regularly, about cases upcoming and looking for an assurance that

Jordan won't be a problem into the future. I understand the cases you have now,

and as Ms. Knickle just explained, if I understood her correctly, cases since

Jordan haven't been an issue of course, it's only been last year anyway.

Do have

any sense or can you give us any kind assurance that you believe you're going to

be able to deal with Jordan appropriately in the future, and that no other cases

may be in jeopardy?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I guess that's more of a

general question. I'm very confident that (

a) we've shown that we're willing to

put the resources in that are necessary; (

b) we've looked to the rest of the

country to see what best practices are; and (

c) since Frances has been in this

position, she's immediately gone out and put in best practices in place in terms

of talking to police about working on increased not increased, expedited

disclosure, talking about different ways to eliminate things like preliminary

inquiries, things that are not necessary.

So I'm

extremely confident in our department, whether it's our courts, our police, our

Crown prosecutors, you name it. I'm just as confident as any Attorney General in

this country that we are going to be able to make sure we do what's necessary.

That being said, if new challenges arise, we'll deal with them accordingly. The

second

part is that, as Frances said, there may be changes coming, that's why

they're all getting applied and getting dealt with in court now, because there

are so many different wrinkles that may happen. It's going back to Supreme Court

now.

we'll adapt as quickly as possible. It's one of those things that since it came

down in July, it's been a top issue in the department. Because that's all you

hear about. We're lucky we haven't had a murder, as Frances said, but you see

any of these cases not going to court for a decision based on the facts, that's

troubling for anybody. Whether you're me or just a person watching TV, nobody

likes to see that. You'd rather see a matter decided on its facts, acquittal or

conviction. That's how I feel about it.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Before I relinquish some of

my time to Ms. Rogers I did give her a couple of minutes earlier, maybe she'll

give it back to me now because it's on the same topic area. I know from

time to time there is utilization of outside out-of-province resources for some

investigations, SIRT, those kinds of things, also in prosecution. Is that

included under this in this area?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Where would that one fall? Would that fall under Civil?

OFFICIAL: SIRT

(inaudible).

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, but you're talking about the outside prosecutor, right?

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Is that Purchased Services for this one? We had a prosecutor from Nova Scotia. I

think that comes under our Civil that we were just on.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, does it? Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Because that would have been under Professional Services there, would it not?

OFFICIAL:

Prosecutions that are being handled by outside (inaudible).

MR. P. DAVIS: I

can't hear you.

MS. KNICKLE: We

have two prosecutions being handled by outside counsel because of conflicts.

MR. P. DAVIS:

And the budget line for those is under Civil, is that what I'm

MS. KNICKLE:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

hearing the minister saying?

MS. KNICKLE:

We've had to go, because we normally wouldn't do that.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes, I was looking for the budget line for them.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That would be back under Civil division, 2.1.01, am I right?

OFFICIAL: Yes,

under Professional Services.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Under Professional Services of Civil.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay. And I would imagine then the outside investigations, such as SIRT and

those, probably comes under enforcement under policing, does it?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

CHAIR: Good?

Ms. Rogers.

MS. ROGERS:

Thank you.

Yes, I'd like to go back to the issue of the lost

prosecutors in 2013. I know that we'd lost a significant amount. So I can't

remember if we had any new positions before

this year since the deep cuts in 2013. If so, I wonder, when we look at the

increasing number of cases and the demand on the system, whether three new

positions although I'm sure the news was heralded and people were very happy

about that can that really address the growing caseload.

MS. KNICKLE:

It's something we're really

sensitive I would like to have as many prosecutors as possible.

MS. ROGERS:

Of course.

MS. KNICKLE:

Alberta just hired 50.

That's our entire service, but we have to be when looking at what's going on,

for us to have, for example, 14 outstanding homicides, it's highly unusual. I

went back and looked at the statistics and talked to our friends at the police

forces and two or three prosecutions ongoing in any given year, maybe four,

maybe five.

So it's

hard to know right now whether that's a bottleneck and something that requires a

permanent increase in prosecutors or is it something that we can deal with.

Like, let's just hire a few for a couple of years and see how things work out

and maybe we'll be able to go back, but we're very sensitive to is this just a

bottleneck or is it an actual trend that's going to require a permanent increase

in the complement.

MS. ROGERS:

Frances, can you provide us

we also tried very hard to write down all your stats you gave us. Is it

possible to give us those stats?

MS. KNICKLE:

Yes, absolutely.

MS. ROGERS:

Oh, great.

I'm not

sure if this is the best place to ask this, but I will anyways. The program

which will be offering support to complainants of sexual violence, would that

come under here?

MS. KNICKLE:

No, it doesn't.

MS. ROGERS:

Where would that

MR. A. PARSONS:

Adult Corrections.

MS. ROGERS:

Adult Corrections. Okay, so

we can talk about that there then.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay, great. Thank you.

Let's

move on to Legal Aid. Just in reference to the royal report, it's been three

years now. I wonder if we can have a bit of an update on some of the

recommendations, the status of some of the recommendations.

MS. HAWLEY-GEORGE:

I have recently taken

over responsibility within the department for the Legal Aid Commission. I'm

working with Nick Summers at the Commission and understand that yes, certainly

those recommendations have been put in place.

With

respect to any changes or so forth, I know Minister Bennett has recently

announced a review of ABCs. With respect to management organization, the royal

report recommendations will be taken into consideration when those are done.

MS. ROGERS:

So we will get a formal

update then? Is that what you're saying, Kim?

MS. HAWLEY-GEORGE:

Certainly, I can request that from Nick absolutely.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

I have

another question in terms of the tariff, particularly in homicide trials when we

see the tariffs that were established and, again, it's been three years. Is

there any appetite or plan to increase those tariffs, or that's it until we have

another review?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, there's no plan right

now. This is a topic I've actually planned we've discussed it internally

that I want to have a look at. We're spending a significant amount of money on

this.

cases and I think we just talked about this, this morning actually, where we

have cases where legal aid looks at it and decides there's no merit to doing the

appeal. People will then apply for outside counsel to do the appeal that legal

aid looked at and said it wasn't worth it.

MS. ROGERS:

So how do you deal with

that?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Court orders, we have no

control. So it's frustrating and it's difficult. It's hard work for these

people.

Yes,

there's no plan to look at that right now in terms of increasing it, but there

are plans to look at legal aid as a whole, the legal aid tariff, AG funding,

counsel, things like that. It's one of those things that you look at what you

have control over and what you don't have control of, and it becomes

frustrating.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

How is

legal aid in terms of vacancies and complements in Labrador, particularly?

MS. HAWLEY-GEORGE:

Legal aid has recently retained three solicitors on a contractual basis. With

respect to Labrador, I believe that is filled but I can certainly come back to

you with that information.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay, because that's been

another difficult area as well.

MS. HAWLEY-GEORGE:

Exactly, yeah.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Thank you very much.

So,

2.3.02, Commissions of Inquiry, I would imagine the revised amount is because of

the Dunphy inquiry.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. Basically, when we had

budgeted last year, I think it was $1 million for Humber Valley. Then,

obviously, when we got the report and decided to move in that different

direction there was some re-budgeting there. So that would explain a lot of the

differences there.

MS. ROGERS:

I can't remember how much

so it was allocated a million dollars for the Dunphy inquiry?

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, we originally said a

million for Humber Valley.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think when it's all said

and done Dunphy is going to cost about $2.6 million.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

They'll

start the search and rescue inquiry this year?

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's our plan. We'd like

to see that happen.

MS. ROGERS:

How much is budgeted for

that?

MR. A. PARSONS:

We're not in terms of

reference cost model, because it may be a different model of inquiry. We use

different options. So we're not that far yet, but given that we've gone through

this once doing the first one, never having done it before, it was brand new.

Having been through this now, I think that we'll be able to move in terms of

setting it up quicker.

MS. ROGERS:

Do you have a timeline in

mind for it?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I'm saying by the end of

2017. Again, knowing there may be some aspects that are out of our control in

terms of the fed's side of it.

MS. ROGERS:

So that would be to start by

the end of 2017.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I'd like to see that.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Thank you.

2.3.03, Office of the Chief Medical Examiner; we see a difference in Salaries of

$51,000.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There was a part-time person

there, Dr. Nash Denic who's no longer there not a reduction on our end. Dr.

Denic decided to do another job at Eastern Health. So, yes, that's the reduction

there.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

Professional Services, we see a drop there of $100,000.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, there was some there

allotted for the study that we did with Dr. Matthew Bowes in Nova Scotia. So

that was the $100,000 there.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Thank you.

I think

I'm good there.

Human

Rights, 2.3.04, Professional Services have dropped $10,000. What would have been

under the Professional Services?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Going through the zero-based

budgeting process, that was a rightsizing. That money traditionally is not

spent.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

Purchased Services for the Human Rights ?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Most of that is the lease.

There's an anticipation this year after talking to Remzi he talked about the

fact that a different lease arrangement could possibly be arranged. They had too

much space there basically, so we've talked and we're anticipating that there

will be a move there or sharing of space.

One of

the things and I think it's probably across government and this was led by

Remzi. He came in and saw me and said: I think we can have different bodies and

maybe do shared services. Like a copier, because that's a big expense across

government, is just copying.

I think

it's a good idea. We're willing to work with them and other groups that have

similar needs, services and clientele and trying to work together to fix the

leases like that.

MS. ROGERS:

There was a concern, because

of previous cutbacks to the Human Rights Commission, of the inability to really

fulfill its mandate in terms of doing proactive work and a significant amount of

educational work which is so very important. Do you know where they sit with

that now?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Well, I can say that it's

been a tremendous fight to keep it where it is. There have been no cuts. I'd

love to see more money put there but, to be quite honest, I'd like to see more

money in every part of the department, whether it's Criminal Division, Civil

Division, everywhere else. That's just the tough part.

Everybody is the same; I'm sure every department will come in and say the same

thing, so I'm happy that they stayed where they are. There has been a slight

increase in the number of files that they do. But I agree, after talking to

Remzi, if anything, I wish we could do, like you said, more education. I really

think we could do more, but maybe there's a different way to do it that's not as

cost heavy as the travel. Some of it is just the travel going out there.

There

are a number of changes coming there in terms of the board. Some people have

fulfilled their mandate so we have a new board. We're in the process of

filling that again. I'm looking forward to sitting down with them and saying:

What are your ideas and what can we do differently or better?

MS. ROGERS: Do

we have any idea how many cases they have and what the wait-list is like?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I thought I saw 81 or 91? Ninety-one new official complaints accepted as of

mid-March for 2016-'17.

MS. ROGERS:

Ninety-one new cases?

MR. A. PARSONS:

And the year previous it was 80.

MS. ROGERS: Of

those 91 cases, were any of them completed in the year?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Fifty-six closed.

MS. ROGERS:

Yeah.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Twenty-seven were settled through settlement, basically. Six were executive

director dismissals, two were withdrawals, 20 were dismissed by the Commission,

one was resolved after a board inquiry and there are three that they're awaiting

decision on.

MS. ROGERS:

They've been busy.

MR. A. PARSONS:

They're really moving towards this mediation, really trying to work to settle

them that way rather than have the full hearing.

MS. ROGERS:

Great, yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

So I think they've really put an emphasis on that.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

We're lucky to have Remzi in the board there, and very lucky to have Carey and

her staff there.

MS. ROGERS:

Great, thank you.

CHAIR:

Okay.

Mr.

Davis, did you have anything else in that

section up to 2.4.01?

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah, if I could go back to

Legal Aid just for a moment. Minister, you were talking about appeals and Legal

Aid making a recommendation now not to appeal and people getting counselling.

You made a comment, you said: Court orders we have no control. What did you mean

by that?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Well, sometimes courts can

order the AG to fund counsel for somebody and we have no say. There was a recent

case where the person who was later convicted was appointed amicus. This is a

person who went through X number of lawyers which frustrated everybody, so they

ended up appointing amicus, a friend of the court. So they had to bring in a

private lawyer to basically sit and watch the trial in case somebody got

dismissed again.

It's a

significant cost; we have no control over that. The courts can go ahead and do

that stuff and we all have to pay.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes, absolutely.

Under

the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, 2.3.03, you said Dr. Denic has moved

on to other responsibilities. Has he been replaced?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Hmm?

MR. P. DAVIS:

Dr. Denic. You said he's

gone on, he's left

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, he's moved on so we've

only got Dr. Avis there now.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

He's got people that are

helping him. Although I'm very interested to see what Dr. Bowes' report is going

to say because I anticipate that there will likely be I'm hoping to have that

very soon changes necessary.

I can't

say what they are, can't prejudge them, but one of the things I am looking at

I mean this is not a big secret, Dr. Avis is getting towards the end of his

career, he's even said that himself. So we have to start setting succession

plans in place and there are not a lot of pathologists out there. This is

something that, actually, Dr. Bowes is going to work with us on because, again,

if Dr. Avis said tomorrow that he was going, we'd have to find someone.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah, certainly not a lot of

pathologists with his experience.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Not at all.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Thank you.

We'll

move past Human Rights to Office of the Public Trustee; $167,000 in salary

change.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There was one position. I

think the Deputy Public Trustee position was eliminated. What happened there is

the Public Trustee retired last year. The person who was in that role stepped up

and is the acting Public Trustee. We've gotten rid of the Deputy Public Trustee

position; there was nobody actually in there.

There

is also an admin error there too; the same thing as described previously where

there was like a double accounting, taking away the money twice. I don't know

who to blame for that.

OFFICIAL:

Me.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So where's the error? What

is the error?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think what it is, they

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah, I know, but what

numbers are

MR. A. PARSONS:

That would have been under

Salaries, right?

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What's incorrect? The

$614,000 is incorrect?

OFFICIAL:

Yes. It should only have been (inaudible).

MR. A. PARSONS:

What should the number be?

Do we know?

MR. P. DAVIS:

Instead of being $614,600,

what should it be?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible) only reduced by $80,000.

MR. A. PARSONS:

So basically you add $80,000

on top of that, right?

OFFICIAL:

Yeah. It should have only been a reduction of $80,000.

MR. P. DAVIS:

It's $694,600?

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Under Revenue Provincial,

can you explain those numbers to me?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, and we've got to give

credit to the current Acting Public Trustee, John Goodland. Basically, what he's

done is he's gone out and Robin might do a better job of explaining this than

me, but he looked at all these old files that were just there, sitting there,

hadn't had the work done on them because they're busy.

Basically, that's the extra revenue that they found and managed to haul in. We

only anticipate it to be one time; I don't think they're going to go out and

find this much extra money every time. But this comes down to them looking out

to those files, getting them done. So we're pretty lucky that they did that.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What would the revenue be

created by?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Hmm?

MR. P. DAVIS:

What's the revenue created

by?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Well, it's through the

estates, right? You might have an estate file that's sitting there and hasn't

been touched in some time. When you go and dig into it you find the assets that

are out there, because every estate that's done, there's a fee paid into the

Public Trustee.

There

might have been cases that had been sitting there, hadn't been touched and

hadn't been disposed of. It's just a matter of going back and getting these old

files and just getting them done, just following up on them.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I'm not sure I understand

what creates the revenue.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Okay, so basically if I pass

away and I have nobody to handle my estate, I don't have an executor.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah.

MR. A. PARSONS:

The Public Trustee can

handle that estate and they have to pay a fee to the Public Trustee

MR. P. DAVIS:

The estate pays a fee to the

trustee?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

That's

a lot of fees, $3 million in additional

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah. And in some of the

cases, estates would have been sitting there undistributed.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, yeah. Okay.

OFFICIAL:

The legislation requires (inaudible).

MR. P. DAVIS:

I never got a call.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah, and I've heard

and that falls under Robin, who's been down to meet with John there are still

more out there. Some files have been around for a hundred years just sitting

there. Some of this money, you'll never get. It's too late.

MR. P. DAVIS:

2.4.01, Legislative Counsel.

That's pretty much all the same from last year.

MR. A. PARSONS:

No changes there that I'm

aware of, except Kim works twice as hard.

MR. P. DAVIS:

All right.

Just if

I may go back to I apologize for jumping back there again.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's no problem.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Back on Legal Aid again, my

colleague, Ms. Rogers, raised an issue and I've heard talk of in the past and

heard public discussion on it as well on tariffs for Legal Aid, particularly in

homicides. Do you see that as an issue? Is that a major issue in the province

today? You have 14 homicides. I know many of them, just by nature, quite often

are represented by Legal Aid.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Maybe what I could do is

just talk about the money that we're spending outside.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Mr. Pritchard, while we're

waiting for your microphone to come on, maybe you can make commentary if an

accused has expressed I've heard accused express difficulty in retaining the

legal representation that they would like to have or hope to have. Maybe you

could comment on if that's an issue as well.

MR. A. PARSONS:

(Inaudible). There's an

unfair perception out there that Legal Aid is not good

MR. P. DAVIS:

No doubt, yeah.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Completely unfair,

completely ridiculous. In fact, Legal Aid has some of the best lawyers, but

that's just the perception that's out there. I think it's completely unfair. I

think it's ridiculous. They work their butts off. I can tell you when I

practised myself, you see them coming in with these boxes and boxes of files and

they do good work, but that's the problem.

The

other thing is that we do have private counsel out there that is going out of

their way to try to I have to be careful how I say this. Like I say, people

are asking for these lawyers. I think that Legal Aid can do it. I think they are

able to do it.

Some of

the lawyers there, you take someone like Derek Hogan who's been at it a long

time, he's appeared at every level, major, major cases. He can handle any file

that comes in front of him as far as I'm concerned, as with the rest of them,

but that perception is there. People want to get private counsel. It goes in

front of the court, they make the assessment and like I say am I right when I

say no control?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. A. PARSONS:

If the courts order it, it

what it is.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

It is frustrating, though,

because these lawyers are good lawyers.

MR. P. DAVIS:

There's no argument from me.

I know some Legal Aid lawyers who've spent their entire career I spoke to one

recently, retired the last couple of years and his entire career was with Legal

Aid a person who I've always had great respect for. I'm sure Mr. Fowler and

Ms. Knickle can speak to some of them as well because they've dealt with them

themselves in the court room.

you've mentioned, some of them are really good, but I've heard the discussion

and I understand sometimes the complications with it. From an accused person,

I'm sure there are some who it seems like, sounds like, that they're not getting

the representation they want.

Maybe

you can answer this question for me. Ms. Knickle mentioned that for complicated

homicide files, quite often there would be two prosecutors. Would the same kind

of policy happen for defence counsel?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. We pay for certain

files. We pay for multiple counsels within firms and stuff.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

You can have multiple

lawyers.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

I think

that's all, Madam Chair, I have under those sections.

CHAIR:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

If I might jump in here,

Madam Chair, can we take five minutes for a quick recess?

CHAIR:

Yes, I was waiting to call

this section. We'll do it now and then we'll take a five-minute break.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Perfect.

Thank

you.

CHAIR:

All right.

Shall

clauses 2.2.01 to 2.4.01 carry?

All

those in favour, 'aye.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

All those against, 'nay.'

Carried.

motion, subheads 2.2.01 through 2.4.01 carried.

CHAIR:

Okay.

We'll

take a five-minute break, come back and start at 3.1.01.

Recess

CHAIR:

Okay, everybody back and ready for the final half hour of this exciting segment.

I'll

ask the Clerk to call the next subhead.

CLERK:

3.1.01 through 3.3.01 inclusive.

CHAIR:

Shall 3.1.01 to 3.3.01

inclusive carry?

Mr.

Davis.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Under

3.1.01, Supreme Court which includes the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, Trial

Division and Family Division $135,000 reduction in Salaries, Minister.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Okay.

There

are actually no cuts there. That's just annualization to my understanding.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, sorry.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There are no cuts there.

There would have been more spent last year. There was a retirement, I think.

OFFICIAL:

Four.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Four retirements, so that's

where the money was spent. There are no positions not this year, no.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

you've had four retirements and replaced them, then you have lower salary

scales. Would that be accounted for that?

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. P. DAVIS:

Under Purchased Services, a

$404,000 difference.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That has to do with the

Family Division renovations. There's $450,000 for that and $195,000 has to do

with some work on renos, basically a facelift of the Supreme Court on Duckworth.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What's happening at the

Family Division?

MR. A. PARSONS:

The Family Division, there's

you might talk about it a little better.

MS. ORGAN:

We're creating an extra courtroom. We now have five judges. We have four

full-time judges, well seven five full-time judges and two supernumerary

judges. We have four courtrooms and a small boardroom.

We are

busting at the seams down there so we are renovating to create an extra

courtroom and a larger boardroom, an extra judge's office, or judge's chambers.

The registry will be enlarged as well and the funding was over three years.

MR. P. DAVIS:

This is the first year, is

it?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Last year was the planning. This year and next year are the build phases.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Right.

The

Budget Speech referred to $450,000 to address increase in demands for the

Supreme Court Family Division and $195,000 for the Supreme Court Trial Division,

so that's those funds. That's this year's funds of those amounts, right?

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Under

Provincial Court a fairly significant salary change there, Minister.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That was the change I

think, the money was allocated last year for the tribunal and basically it's

just taken out of there. That hasn't been decided yet, but I think it's parked

elsewhere is what it is. That's the big difference there. There was no change, I

understand, to Salaries besides that.

OFFICIAL:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. There is one change in

the sense that we added the court manger up in Happy Valley Goose Bay and the

contraventions, five positions?

MR. P. DAVIS:

What's the status on ?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Five positions for

contraventions.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What's the status on the

tribunal?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think we're waiting on a

decision, are we not?

MR. PRITCHARD:

Yes that's correct. We're

waiting on a decision. The matter was heard last December before Justice Faour

but we still don't have a decision.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Employee Benefits there was a decrease, an unanticipated decrease.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That would have been

tribunal retro amounts for judicial education, I think, or allowances.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Tribunal retro amounts is a

smaller amount, so it will still be outstanding after this year? Is that what

you're ?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah, there's still a

liability for it. That money was budgeted last year but it's not the same as

the salary increase, it wasn't used.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yeah. Does that mean it will

come up somewhere down the road like maybe in future years?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

And on Transportation and

Communications there's a $62,000 reduction there.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There's a rightsizing there.

You'll see there was a big change in the money spent because basically there

were a lot of people travelling back and forth to Goose Bay from the province to

run the court. That's why we actually created the position up there. So we're

anticipating a significant savings in that cost in T and C.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What's included in the

Purchased Services? There's a $160,000 difference.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's the rent down at

Atlantic Place. That's one part. The bulk of it is rent, video-conferencing and

copying too.

MR. P. DAVIS:

And the revenue from federal

revenue, $572,000?

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's the contraventions

money.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Other than the provisions on

Jordan, the boundaries or time boundaries, limitations put on by Jordan, what's

the current status on cases, generally speaking, before the courts versus 12

months or 24 months ago? I've heard Ms. Knickle talk about increased caseloads

and so on for prosecutors. Does the same type of issue exist in the courts as

far as not being able to get court time and those types of things?

MS. KNICKLE:

Do you mean in terms of

delay?

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MS. KNICKLE:

It really depends. Shelley

might be able to speak to this, but my understanding is it really depends on

what court you're talking about whether or not you're running into delays that

bring you up against the Jordan time limits.

In some

courts it's fine; you could get a trial tomorrow if you actually needed to.

Other courts, there is a problem, it's a little bit longer; our own superior

court. It's very variable within Newfoundland in terms of the delay. The bulk of

criminal matters happen within Provincial Court. I mean, your homicides

obviously happen in the superior court, but the bulk of criminal matters are

happening in Provincial Court. Most of the Provincial Courts are operating

within the time limits reasonably, especially when you start comparing us to the

kinds of delays that are occurring across the country.

I don't

want to point fingers at other jurisdictions, but both Askov and Jordan Askov

was the original unreasonable delay case these are situations that come out of

Ontario and BC and they have massive systemic problems. I mean they're working

very hard to fix them, but we run a pretty good ship down here for the most

part. There are always going to be the smelly cases, but, yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Back there, Minister.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Wilma?

MS. MACINNIS:

As Frances alluded to earlier at their office they certainly were eyeing this

issue even before the decision. I can say at Provincial Court we were engaging

in, we call it the case flow management, even before the Jordan decision came

out some years back just in terms of monitoring case flow through the various

courts. We continue to do that. And as we look at court dates, and as Frances

just alluded to as well, we're constantly checking in with our courts to see

what are the available dates like.

Actually, just prior to the summit, when we spent the day together, we canvassed

all of our courts, our 10 sites across the province. With the exception of two

so that would have been the end of March sites you could have gotten a one-day

trial date within March, even at the end of March, April, May. There were two

outliers: one was I think the fall and one was later this year, but it was still

well within certainly an 18-month time frame that Jordan calls for at Provincial

Court.

We're

constantly doing that work with our courts, looking at scheduling, working with

some of the sites, as Frances mentioned, that may be more problematic such as

Goose Bay. This week, actually, our provincial manager and another manager are

in Goose Bay doing some work there with the staff in terms of scheduling. So

we're certainly trying to keep our finger on the pulse of that, realizing that

it's certainly a priority.

MR. P. DAVIS:

The two exceptions would be

Happy Valley-Goose Bay and Harbour Grace, I take it?

MS. MACINNIS:

We would certainly say Goose Bay is definitely very challenging.

MR. P. DAVIS:

You said two, what was the

other one?

MS. MACINNIS:

Oh, sorry. The outliers at the time were actually Grand Falls, I think one was

Central and the other was Harbour yeah.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

Thank

you, Madam Chair. That's all I have under those sections.

CHAIR:

Ms. Rogers.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

Just to

go back to the discussion about seeing the increase in the loads, in the number

of cases, when we were talking about the prosecutors, where is most of the

increase? What kinds of cases? Is there sort of a thumbnail kind of sketch or

picture of ?

MS. KNICKLE:

Sadly, they tend to be major

cases is what we've seen most an increase, not all. Your basic breathalyzer

takes twice as long now as it did 25 years ago. I'm a huge supporter of the

Charter but it has complicated litigation. Trial management has just become more

complicated.

breathalyzer that I would have done in an hour, 20 years ago, now generally can

take half a day to a day, so it's that. But a large part of the increase that

I've seen, what we define within our service as major cases, that's not

necessarily what everybody else defines but we call major cases.

MS. ROGERS:

So what would be ?

MS. KNICKLE:

Generally it's anything

where a federal sentence could be imposed, so generally indictable offences. It

doesn't necessarily have to be something in superior court. Your aggravated

assaults could be your range of sexual offences, anything that involves a public

figure.

At one

time we would have said something that attracts a lot of media attention, but it

just seems like everything that's in court attracts media attention now; a pet,

cruelty to animals,

summary prosecution attracts media attention. That's really

stressful for a prosecutor so it can be a complex case. I would say we never

used to see gun violence and now we do.

MS. ROGERS:

Would a lot of that would

you think be drug related?

MS. KNICKLE:

I'm not the best person to

ask that but, yeah, often. There are probably better, other stakeholders that

question is probably better asked.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Anecdotally, and Mr. Brophy

could probably talk about this one, I visited our institutions and just talked

to guards and management. They say that the number of people inside who

obviously have gone through the court process has dramatically increased in

terms of drug addiction. I would say that, yes, if that's what they're seeing

inside, then that's what going through the courts obviously, definitely.

MS. ROGERS:

This might be a good time,

then, to ask specifically about the drug court. Where is that at?

MR. A. PARSONS:

As you see, we have more

money there which we're really happy about.

MS. ROGERS:

Yeah.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I'm expecting the

feasibility study before the end of this month.

MS. ROGERS:

Before the end of this

month?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yeah.

I've

been a firm believer that this is not a case of if, this is a case of how.

There's been a lot of work done in the last year.

Myself,

I actually visited the Drug Treatment Court in Saskatchewan to see how they do

it out there; the people that are working on it Patricia and Penny?

OFFICIAL:

Penny.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Penny Winter and Patricia

visited the ones in Kentville, all over the country, Yukon. So there's been a

lot of work done. We've had some good people come on board, John Duggan and

others who have put a lot of work into this. I'm really looking forward to

seeing the report. It's exciting because we need to do something different.

MS. ROGERS:

What was the mandate of the

study? Was it should we, could we ?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think the mandate was to

do a feasibility study and then further to that if it's feasible, what may be

the best way. Are we talking about a bricks-and-mortar approach? Again, I can

only speak to what I've seen elsewhere.

It's a

case of taking pre-existing courts and then finding the way that you do it. Do

you need a dedicated resource, do you need a dedicated judge, et cetera. So

we've got a lot of people working on that. That's what the study is going to

tell us. Then we get that, then take the new money and then work on trying to

get it up and running.

MS. ROGERS:

There was new money that's

beyond the feasibility study, was there?

MR. A. PARSONS:

The feasibility was $30,000

and then we've got an extra $120,000.

MS. ROGERS:

One hundred and twenty

thousand dollars; what's that for?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I guess that's to help us

implement the next step. There's a formula that the feds use. There are other

provinces that are getting this money.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Every province is different.

I mean it's probably based on population or court numbers, just a number of

factors. That's the amount that we were eligible for.

MS. ROGERS:

There was $30,000 for the

study and then $120,000 to the next step.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Thanks.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There's money for a position

and operating within that $120,000.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay. Thank you.

Court

Facilities, 3.3.01, $500,000.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's for the study which

I'm really excited about. Basically, just to speak about it generally, we've got

a Supreme Court that is over a century old. We've got a Family Division that, as

was said, is busting at the seams. We've got Provincial Court down at Atlantic

Place which is a significant cost too. Then you throw in all the ancillary

offices, whether it's Family Justice Services, whether it's Victim Services,

probation, sheriffs. Our Court of Appeal has infrastructure challenges in terms

of they've had a lot of repairs that had to be done.

MS. ROGERS:

MR. A. PARSONS:

The argument we're making is

that we should do a study to talk about the possibility of creating almost like

a campus and what can we take to put it together. That's where we got the money

for a study which I was happy that they agreed to. We went after it for a long

time.

I think

that when it's all said and done you'll find efficiencies. I think you'll find

savings just in if you look at the rent we're paying across the board, the

total for the next five years is about $10 million just in rent.

MS. ROGERS:

Over the next five years?

MR. A. PARSONS:

In infrastructure, yes, over

the next five years.

So I

think there's a way we can do it better, and I think it's a again, this is why

the study is there, to see if it can be done. We know some of our buildings are

at the end of their lifespan. Although, it's interesting this is where I get a

little bit geeky, more than usual. I talked to Chief Justice Green who talked

about the fact that he showed me the Benchers' minutes from 1893 and talking

about how they had infrastructure issues then, but thank God the Great Fire

wiped out the old courthouse. So

MS. ROGERS:

Let's not wish that on this

one.

MR. A. PARSONS:

So the Benchers and people

in this province, for well over a century, have complained about the

infrastructure. There it is, right.

MS. ROGERS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

But it is an old building.

MS. ROGERS:

So when will this work

begin?

MR. A. PARSONS:

As soon as possible. Again,

there's a TW component to this. It's not just us pushing it. So I don't have as

much control, we'll say, but sooner rather than later.

there anything I'm missing on that?

OFFICIAL:

No.

MR. A. PARSONS:

We have to go out and get

external Professional Services to figure out the functional requirement, space

requirement, cost estimates.

MS. ROGERS:

Is there an intention to

specifically look at the old Grace Hospital site? Is that

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think we can look at that

and the possibility of a build, or is there the possibility of taking something

that is pre-existing and renovating.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I'm open to anything if it

means replacing what is out there. So hopefully it will come back with some cool

ideas.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay, thank you.

I have

nothing further on that section.

CHAIR:

Okay.

Mr.

Davis, are you finished with that section?

MR. P. DAVIS:

I'm just trying to clarify

there's $120,000 referenced for a feasibility study.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Oh, that's the courts?

MR. P. DAVIS:

The drug treatment court.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. Where's that to?

OFFICIAL:

Admin and Policy.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Admin and Policy, yes. That

was back in 1.2.02.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, really?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

You said there was $30,000

for the feasibility study?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What was the balance then

the ninety .

MR. A. PARSONS:

There was $30,000 for the feasibility, now we've got an extra $120,000.

OFFICIAL:

(Inaudible.)

MR. A. PARSONS:

The $30,000 is used for the complete feasibility study, which we should have by

the end of the month. Now we've received an extra, or we're receiving an extra

$120,000.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So the feasibility study was

done, and what's the additional $120,000 for?

MR. A. PARSONS:

That would be going towards,

I guess, implementing what comes out of the study. I haven't seen it yet. We

still don't have it done, but that's money that we're eligible for. We're

anticipating a position and then whatever operating costs.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

MR. A. PARSONS:

I don't think I have any

issue with it. I'd like to meet with the committee first. I don't see any reason

why it wouldn't be put out there because it's not the usual caveats. If

there's something there we're not supposed to put out according to the

committee, but why not put it out to tell everybody exactly what is feasible.

CHAIR:

Okay.

Shall

clauses 3.1.01 to 3.3.01 inclusive carry?

All

those in favour, 'aye.'

SOME HON. MEMBERS:

Aye.

CHAIR:

All those against, 'nay.'

Carried.

motion, clauses 3.1.01 through 3.3.01 carried.

CLERK:

4.1.01 through 4.2.03

inclusive.

CHAIR:

Shall 4.1.01 to 4.2.03

inclusive carry?

Mr.

Davis.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I guess

we'll start with salaries again, Minister. I know there were some changes last

year in the RNC. Maybe you could just review the salaries for us.

MR. A. PARSONS:

There are two management

positions that were eliminated.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What positions were those?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Two inspectors no. Sorry,

an inspector in Corner Brook, a superintendent in St. John's.

MR. P. DAVIS:

How would that decision have

been made, or who would have been responsible for that decision, Minister?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I guess ultimately I would

have been responsible, but this would have been done in consultation with the

RNC. Part of the process we went through looking at management across the board,

all departments, all agencies. So this would have been we did do

MR. P. DAVIS:

Sorry, I never caught that.

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, I'm just saying we

reached out to the RNC and would have had this discussion.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay, thank you.

Transportation and Communications, almost $250,000 decrease.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That would have been a

reallocation that was achieved using zero-based budgeting. Because you look at

what was budgeted last year and then what was the revised. So we looked at that,

and there would have been reallocations that would have been budgeted there, but

they're now under Purchased Services. Am I right?

OFFICIALS:

Yes, (inaudible).

MR. P. DAVIS:

Reallocations that were

under

MR. A. PARSONS:

I guess they would have been

put there, but they actually ended up being a part of Purchased Services

instead.

MR. P. DAVIS:

That's why there was a

revised decrease?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I think that explains some

of the difference there.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Okay.

So the

relocations now come under Purchased Services instead of okay.

Are you

able to tell me the current complement of the RNC?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Hmm?

MR. P. DAVIS:

The current complement of

the RNC, can you tell me that?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Four hundred and nine

officers.

MR. P. DAVIS:

That's what, March 31?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

I would imagine.

Sorry,

you were finished were you?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, I didn't know. I thought

there was another comment coming.

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, no, sorry 409.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Because you continued to

talk (inaudible).

MR. A. PARSONS:

I was just looking at the

note there.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So, Minister, maybe you

could talk to me about anticipated retirements. Maybe you can tell me how many

retirements you had in the last year and what the anticipated retirements are

versus new hires?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Okay. There are, in terms of

new hires, we have 16 recruits this year. I think we got there were 17 last

year. Right now, I'm going to guess and say 92 or 94.

OFFICIAL:

Ninety-two.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Ninety-two people right now

are eligible to retire. Which I think is pretty consistent for the last six

years. Usually they're averaging 20 retirements per year. This year there were

14. So to speak about it generally, it is a succession plan concern. That's one

I'm concerned with, but obviously it's not a new fear. It's a fear that's been

there for some time.

As we

go through the process for the now that Chief Janes has announced his plans

and has moved to that process, I'm sure that's one of the issues the new chief

coming in will put on their radar to look at. Like I say, we got a lot of people

that are eligible to go. We got new people coming in trying to fill out that

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

but like any organization,

succession planning is necessary.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes, and the 92 are not

getting any younger. Of course, as we talked about earlier with the RNC having

no middle, we're soon going to reach that period where the recruitments from the

'80s and early '90s ended

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

and then there's nothing

coming behind them. But we know that those 92, I would think and you can

comment on it, but I would have thought the 92, as time goes on, there's a

higher likelihood they're going to retire.

MR. A. PARSONS:

But you can only go on the

statistics. Right now, they're averaging the 20. This year, it was 14, so it's

actually lower. This comes back down to succession planning. This is not

something that popped up in the last 15 months. This issue has been present for

really, if you think about it, the last two chiefs, this issue has been known

or on the radar, it could have been forecast.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

It is an issue, so what I'm

suggesting is that obviously it's something I'm aware of. I mean, ultimately I'm

responsible, but as the new chief comes in this might be part of their Chief

Janes finished his strategic plan, and the same way before him, Chief Johnston

finished their three-year. Chief Johnston left and said as you're coming in,

Chief Janes, you do your three-year strategic.

Basically, that's what Chief Janes said to me, look, there's someone new going

to come in; I'll let them come up with their new strategic plan. This may be one

of the issues that needs to go into it because you don't want a scenario like

you described where you could, theoretically, have a large number of people go

and what's there to fill it in.

That's

a challenge that any organization faces. That being said, when you're dealing

with public safety, it's probably a little more pronounced than any normal

company we'll say.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

remember there was a plan to hire or to increase the complement by 20. I think

10 of those were completed and then 10 were scratched from last year's budget.

Plus there were four vacant positions. So that's actually 16 of the 20 weren't

come to fruition. So there was, of the 20, actually 4 new positions, if I have

my math right.

So I'm

glad you're on top of that because I know it's a concern for many at RNC and

also it could become a significant problem for the general public if, all of a

sudden, you have 90 people retire and the 20 that were planned to hire hasn't

happened. So

MR. A. PARSONS:

Right now, there are no

vacancies. From what I'm gathering, what I'm being told, there's possibly the

consideration down the road that we won't need to put as many through. We don't

want to oversaturate it. We don't want to have too many. I think I might have

that correct, Theresa. Maybe Theresa could speak to it.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

With regard to our current

I guess the complement that's eligible to retire right now, if we continued with

our average of 20 retirements per year, in five years' time, we'd be balancing I

guess. So the requirement should be lessened in our police studies program. But

that's not necessarily going to continue in the long term.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Right; especially, as I

said, 92 of them are getting older.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

Correct.

MR. P. DAVIS:

They've got 25-plus years

now. Many of them have 30-plus years.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

And there are 41 in the

bubble that you mentioned earlier.

MR. P. DAVIS:

What do you mean 41?

MS. HEFFERNAN:

Forty-one members.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

So 276 have 12 years or less

and then we've got 41 between 13 and 24 years.

MR. P. DAVIS:

How many was that, sorry;

226, 12 years and less

MS. HEFFERNAN:

There are 276 for 12 years

or under.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Yes, 276.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

Forty-one between the years

of 13 and 24.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Wow.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

And then the 92 is over and

above the 25 years, which is the retirement eligibility.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Right.

So far,

we know now of five managers leaving.

MS. HEFFERNAN:

Four confirmed.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So that's two gone, two

terminated, and three more put in their notice, or at least that I know of.

The

RCMP, Minister, there's a reduction there of $2.5 million. I know their services

are purchased and that's generally their professional services, but the $2.5

million, where are they achieving those reductions?

MR. A. PARSONS:

There is the decrease in the

funding there. So we work with the RCMP on that. There will actually be, as the

term goes, no boots on the street, no detachments closing. Basically, there is

going to be some civilization. When you look at their computer systems, there is

basically a greening movement that will be slowed down where we won't be able to

do as quickly as we want. There will also be not as many transfers completed and

there will be some reduction in police vehicles. So that's how that decrease

will be handled.

MR. P. DAVIS:

So civilization of some

officers to civilian positions?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes, but that won't affect

street officers, administrative, et cetera.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Oh, they're administrative.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Any other changes I know

you said there's no changes in detachments and no changes in

MR. A. PARSONS:

No.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Is there any areas that have

significant pressures right now or resource issues in the province with the

RCMP?

MR. A. PARSONS:

I hear from communities. I

haven't visited one community yet that hasn't said that they don't want more

officers. Every community wants more. I mean, that's just natural.

So last

year for instance, myself and the new commissioner, Peter Clark, went out to

Grand Falls-Windsor and they had the same concern. There was the presence of

some street gangs or bikers. What they actually did was get into changing the

models so they actually saved money but increased the coverage because they

wanted this 24/7 coverage. So you're seeing a lot of that.

I think

they're working on the same thing for Gander and working on the same thing for

Clarenville. They say the same thing I think that the RNC are saying that we're

lucky that they've got a close relationship and we have the joint task force

there. Drugs, that's scary and you seeing the increased presence the RCMP have

really been sounding the bell on Fentanyl because, again, they're dealing with

it nationally. That's extremely scary when you're hearing that conversation.

Other

than that, that's it. I've been in pretty close contact with them and I've had

an opportunity to do a number of visits with the new commissioner since he's

been here, getting to speak to officers, but that's the usual stuff you're

seeing. A lot of the stuff is like the iceberg, there's what we see and then

there's what they see out there.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Absolutely, yes.

MR. A. PARSONS:

You would have been privy to

that. There's what you know and then there's what everybody else knows.

MR. P. DAVIS:

Thank you.

CHAIR:

Okay.

Ms.

Rogers.

MS. ROGERS:

Thank you.

Just to

go back to the RCMP, I know that there were some significant challenges in the

Carbonear-Harbour Grace detachment with sick leave, stress leave and feeling

that there wasn't enough, that they were short on resources.

MR. A. PARSONS:

That's not a concern that's

been brought to my level by the assistant commissioner. So if they're facing it,

they're dealing with it internally. It's not something that they've brought to

me. They're finding a way to manage.

MS. ROGERS:

Okay.

And

back to the RNC, there was some discussion about civilian oversight with the

RNC.

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes.

MS. ROGERS:

Can you tell us a little bit

about where that's at?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Basically, when it comes to

the SIRT teams, as it's called, there will be legislation brought to this House

this year. It will be the fall session, so we'll have that legislation here for

debate. It has since been brought to my attention about having a civilian

oversight board. My attentions hadn't really been there before. We've been

really encompassed with putting our attentions on the SIRT legislation, the

team, the model, and dealing the other provinces. But the more I think about it

and look elsewhere, we're starting to put some attention on that. But that one

is sort of a little bit behind.

MS. ROGERS:

Because those are separate

issues, right?

MR. A. PARSONS:

Yes. So really when you talk

about policy, one of the things I've dealt with in here is that we have a lot of

things we're working on, just the stuff we've talked about tonight, drug

treatment courts, family violence courts, the sexual assault pilot and this

stuff, but having the resources to do all the policy work that we want to is

challenging. I mean, I really do put a lot on the people we have here, and we're

lucky to have the good people we have, but as it relates to the oversight board,

there has not been as much attention on that because it's only something that

was recently sort of brought to my attention. The SIRT team, there's been a lot

of work done and we'll have that in place.

We're

actually having a conference here at the end of May where all the groups from

across the country are coming here. So I'm looking forward to meeting with all

them.

MS. ROGERS:

So for the civilian

oversight, the overall civilian oversight of the RNC, do you have any kind of

timeline as to when you might look at that?

MR. A. PARSONS:

No, I don't want to put a

timeline on. I've put my attention to the SIRT team because of what we've dealt

with in terms of public confidence, and the forces themselves would prefer to

have that. So that's where my attention is.

As I

can get a little more work done on the civi

Document details

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Citation	2017-04-10
Type	committee
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