SIGN THE PETITION!

This week, across Canada, experts are speaking out against the massive, cruel Crime Bill that our Conservative government is rushing through Parliament.¹ Even conservative Texans are warning Canada not to follow America’s failed path of mandatory sentences and massive prison expansion.²

Now, we need a huge public outcry to stop the bill, and make Canada safer, not meaner.

Experts agree that the Crime Bill would make Canada a more dangerous place by filling new prisons with people who should not be there. Instead, experience shows that we should focus on proven strategies to prevent crime, rehabilitate people and reintegrate them into society.^1,3 The stakes are huge: if this bill passes we’ll be spending billions to trap people and create a permanent underclass of Canadians with little hope for a better life.⁴ Read more »

By TARA CARMAN, Vancouver Sun

Key elements of the federal government’s “tough on crime” package have proven costly and ineffective in other countries and will discriminate against first nations and the mentally ill, an analysis by Vancouver researchers has found.

Alana Cook and Ronald Roesch of Simon Fraser University’s psychology department looked at data from other jurisdictions that have already implemented some of the policies Canada is now pursuing in terms of cost, effect on crime rates and impact on vulnerable populations. Much of the data came from the United States.

Many of the changes to the Criminal Code that have been either enacted or proposed by the Conservative government in the last five years have the effect of increasing prison terms. But two meta-analyses of studies conducted in Canada indicate that longer prison terms result in criminals being slightly more likely to reoffend upon release, the researchers pointed out. Read more »

By. Mick Sweetman, Rabble.ca

Stepping out of a cold, windy Toronto Wednesday night and into the Church of the Redeemer on Bloor street, I'm a little shocked as the warmth of the standing room only crowd hits me. Hundreds of people are here to listen to a panel discussion on Bill C-10, a crime bill being introduced by the Canadian government. The panellists sitting on the stage look small and unobtrusive in comparison to the high ceilings, big stained glass windows and large yellow brick walls with the words "I know that my redeemer liveth" looming over them. But the mental contrast tonight is between the vast open space of the church we're in and the small confines of a seven square metre prison cell.

Bill C-10 is a massive piece of legislation of roughly 100 pages that rolls nine laws from organized and drug crime, to pardons, to child sex offenders, to migrants entering Canada and young offenders into a single omnibus law. The panel is focusing on how the bill's policy on mandatory minimum sentencing for selling, or even giving away a small amount of drugs, will criminalize a generation and attack some of the most vulnerable people in our society. Read more »

By Terry Milewski, CBC News

Conservatives in the United States' toughest crime-fighting jurisdiction — Texas — say the Harper government's crime strategy won't work.

"You will spend billions and billions and billions on locking people up," says Judge John Creuzot of the Dallas County Court. "And there will come a point in time where the public says, 'Enough!' And you'll wind up letting them out."

Adds Representative Jerry Madden, a conservative Republican who heads the Texas House Committee on Corrections, "It's a very expensive thing to build new prisons and, if you build 'em, I guarantee you they will come. They'll be filled, OK? Because people will send them there.

"But, if you don't build 'em, they will come up with very creative things to do that keep the community safe and yet still do the incarceration necessary."

These comments are in line with a coalition of experts in Washington, D.C., who attacked the Harper government's omnibus crime package, Bill C-10, in a statement Monday. Read more »

By Editorial - Comox Valley Record

Anybody who has ever been victimized by crime remembers the effect it had — and perhaps is still having — on them.

A sense of innocence, trust or security can be lost — irretrievably in some cases.

Being doubly victimized by a Canadian legal system that bends over backwards to ensure the accused gets a fair trial might create a feeling of betrayal.

The Stephen Harper government is tapping into these feelings on top of the existing anti-crime element of its ideology.

No politician — or editor — wants to appear soft on crime, which might explain why few political opponents criticized the Conservatives’ Safe Streets and Communities Act during Question Period. Read more »

By. Scott Stinson, National Post

It is the kind of statistic that seems ready-made for a Conservative talking point about the importance of being tougher on crime: as many as 40% of alleged offenders in Canada are returned to polite society before they have even faced justice.

And yet, funny thing about that nugget, which happens to be true: the Tory omnibus anti-crime bill introduced last week will only make it worse.

Most people are likely aware a decent number of criminal cases are dropped - withdrawn, dismissed or stayed - before guilt or innocence of the accused is established. But the scope of those numbers is surprising.

An even 30% of criminal cases were scrapped in Canada in 2009-10, the latest years for which numbers are available.

The figure is lower in the smaller provinces and highest in Ontario, where 40% of cases are stayed or withdrawn before resolution. In Alberta, it's 33%. In British Columbia, 27%. Read more »

By. Gloria Galloway, Globe and Mail

The Conservative government has decided to allow just two days additional of debate on its omnibus crime bill before the proposed law goes off to a Commons committee for study.

Government House Leader Peter Van Loan announced the time restriction on Tuesday – a move designed to thwart long hours of criticism from opposition benches over the controversial 102-page piece of legislation that wraps together nine separate bills the Conservatives failed to enact during their minority government years.

Interim Liberal Leader Bob Rae immediately denounced the cutting off of debate as a act of a “majority abusing power.”

Among other things, the bill would toughen punishments for a range of criminals, from drug dealers to sexual predators to young offenders. But critics say it will be costly for taxpayers while doing little to make streets safer.

NDP House Leader Thomas Mulcair said the Official Opposition would offer to split the bill, allowing quick passage of the measures that have broad support and permitting time for debate on those items that remain contentious. Read more »

By. Dan Leger

The Conservative government’s omnibus crime bill is such a sprawling mess of wrong-headed provisions that some future administration will need years to untangle it. By then, our courts and prisons will be overflowing with a generation of hardened jailbirds, and we won’t be one bit safer.

The Safe Streets and Communities Act is a misnamed hodgepodge of provisions, few of which make sense if the real goal is to reduce crime. It will make the justice system more expensive and less effective. As Conservative party campaign rhetoric, it worked because it defined the Tories against their opponents. As law, it’s a disaster.

The government hasn’t produced a shred of evidence that the measures to impose new mandatory minimum sentences, to lengthen other sentences and reduce sentencing discretion for judges will deter crime. In democracies, laws should address demonstrated needs of society and should not be enacted unless they do. On that standard alone, the bill fails. Read more »

By. Stephen Maher, Montreal Gazette

A few years ago, O I popped into an Amsterdam coffee shop and asked the dreadlocked blond girl behind the counter to sell me a gram of its weakest marijuana.

I can't handle B.C. bud because too much of it is what they call wheelchair weed.

They don't seem to have any mild marijuana in Amsterdam, either, and one toke left me in a state of profound angst. I bought a ticket for a canal-boat tour of the city in a state of medium paranoia, and spent a deranged hour gaping at the beautiful architecture and trying to control my racing mind.

Drugs, including marijuana, pose real risks, and I do not recommend them, but many Canadians indulge. Read more »

By. Althia Raj, Huffington Post

The Conservative government will introduce sweeping justice reforms Tuesday with a massive omnibus bill it hopes to pass early in the new year.

The bill, entitled “Safe Streets and Communities Act,” covers everything from giving victims of crime the ability to sue perpetrators and supporters of terrorism; tougher sentences for drug offenders; tougher restrictions on house arrest; youth criminal justice reforms and as well as changes to the immigration and refugee protection act.

Government House Leader Peter Van Loan told The Huffington Post Canada Sunday that the government’s most important priority was the economy, but tackling crime is second in line.

“The cornerstone of that is the comprehensive combating crime bill that was committed to being passed during the election, the one that we will get done within the first 100 sitting days,” he said. Read more »