Canadian penology and crimes

Editorial: Cost of Canada's federal crime bill calls for review of economic effect
VANCOUVER SUN EDITORIAL NOVEMBER 4, 2011 6:06 PM


There are roughly 13,500 people on conditional sentences at any given time in Canada. If all were sent to jail instead, the annual cost — depending on the length of sentence — would approach $1 billion. Canada already spends about $4 billion a year on its prison system.

Let’s leave aside for the moment that mandatory sentences have no discernible effect on crime rates, and look instead at the economic implications of the omnibus crime bill the Conservative government plans to pass into law within the next 55 sitting days of Parliament.

By way of background, the Safe Streets and Communities Act, as it is known, combines nine pieces of legislation that were not passed in earlier sessions of Parliament, creates new offences under the Criminal Code and imposes minimum sentences for many new offences that will put more convicted people in jail.

It’s a given that there will be significant costs associated with this bill. The federal government pegs its cost at $78.6 million over five years, but that doesn’t include the cost to provinces and territories where the majority of inmates will be incarcerated. The cost to keep a prisoner in a medium- or minimum-security prison is more than $70,000 a year. (In fact, the Parliamentary Budget Office reports the average cost of a prisoner in 2009-10 was $162,373.) On average, it costs at least $50,000 less to hold someone on a conditional sentence, which is served in the community, compared with incarceration in a provincial penitentiary.

There are roughly 13,500 people on conditional sentences at any given time in Canada. If all were sent to jail instead, the annual cost — depending on the length of sentence — would approach $1 billion. Canada already spends about $4 billion a year on its prison system. Of this, the provinces and territories together spend approximately $1.4 billion annually to operate prisons, according to Statistics Canada. And with more felons being sent to already overcrowded prisons, the provinces and territories will have to build more of them. They’ll also have to provide additional courts, clerks, court reporters, Crown prosecutors, judges, sheriffs and prison guards.

Some estimates put the total cost of implementing this one piece of legislation at more than $5 billion.

Similar tough-on-crime laws in the United States resulted in a tripling of the incarceration rate over 20 years and a $43-billion US increase in the amount of tax revenue spent on the prison system.

Some provinces have balked at taking on the additional financial burden of the federal crime bill. Most are still running budget deficits, and forecasts for the coming year call for more of the same in British Columbia ($2.8 billion), Alberta ($1.3 billion), Ontario ($15.9 billion) and Quebec ($3.8 billion). The federal deficit for 2011-12 is estimated at $32.3 billion.

Given such fiscal frailties, neither the feds nor the provinces have the financial resources to devote capital to more prisons in order to incarcerate thousands of people convicted of minor offences. Provincial budgets are already stretched providing basic health care, education and social services, and Ottawa will soon have to find billions to buy its F-35 fighter jets, not to mention spending on seaworthy submarines.

Meanwhile, forecasters have downgraded their outlook for the global economy, with Europe on the brink of recession, persistent high unemployment in the U.S. and a slowdown in China. Canada, being a trading nation, will be buffeted by these negative forces and its growth prospects over the next year have dimmed.

The bottom line is that crime rates have been falling in the absence of any legislative changes, there is little evidence that the measures being introduced will influence those rates and neither the federal, provincial or territorial governments have the financial wherewithal to pay for this bill.

Public safety is a critical function of government, but it must be delivered through cost-effective measures. The Conservative government has yet to prove that its crime bill meets that test, nor that there exist exceptional circumstances that require it be passed so urgently at a time when governments are struggling to maintain existing services.

There are a few worthwhile initiatives in the proposed legislation that merit discussion and debate. The federal government should show patience, allow the conversation to continue and bide its time until the issues are fully aired and the economic climate is more settled.

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