Church Council on Justice and Corrections Launches "Prison Facts - The Co$ts" Campaign

Last week, Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page expressed concern over the ability of the Government of Canada to balance its books through the attrition of the public service, particularly in a context where the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) is planning to hire 4,000 new staff members as part of the Conservatives wholesale expansion of the federal penitentiary system (read 21 January 2011 article by CBC News).

While the government would like us to believe that the only people concerned with the skyrocketing costs of imprisonment in a context of an overall decline in police-reported 'crime' rates is an 'out-of-touch' Parliamentary Budget Officer (who's projections have been far more accurate than those of Finance Minister Jim Flaherty), as well as members of the opposition, media commentators and academics who apparently don't walk the same streets as other Canadians, the Conservatives are now being criticized by religious groups for their backward punishment agenda (see images below).

On 17 December 2010, the Church Council on Justice and Corrections (CCJC) and the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops sent a letter to Prime Minister Harper expressing concern with the federal government's plan to increase the use of incarceration. The letter noted the following:

Dear Mr. Prime Minister,

The Church Council on Justice and Corrections (CCJC) is most concerned that in this time of financial cuts to important services you and the government of Canada are prepared to significantly increase investment in the building of new prisons.

Proposed new federal laws will ensure that more Canadians are sent to prison for longer periods, a strategy that has been repeatedly proven neither to reduce crime nor to assist victims. Your policy is applying a costly prison response to people involved in the courts who are non-violent offenders, or to repeat offenders who are mentally ill and/or addicted the majority of whom are not classified as high risk. These offenders are disproportionately poor, ill-equipped to learn, from the most disadvantaged and marginalized groups. They require treatment, health services, educational, employment and housing interventions, all less expensive and more humane than incarceration.

The Canadian government has regretfully embraced a belief in punishment-for-crime that first requires us to isolate and separate the offender from the rest of us, in our minds as well as in our prisons. That separation makes what happens later easier to ignore: by increasing the number of people in jail for lengthier sentences you are decreasing their chance of success upon release into the community.

The vision of justice we find in Scripture is profound and radically different from that which your government is proposing. We are called to be a people in relationship with each other through our conflicts and sins, with the ingenious creativity of God's spirit to find our way back into covenant community. How can that be if we automatically exclude and cut ourselves off from all those we label "criminal"?

Increasing levels of incarceration of marginalized people is counter- productive and undermines human dignity in our society. By contrast, well supervised probation or release, bail options, reporting centres, practical assistance, supportive housing, programs that promote accountability, respect and reparation: these measures have all been well-established, but they are underfunded. Their outcomes have proven to be the same or better in terms of re-offence rates, at a fraction of the cost and with much less human damage.

Public safety is enhanced through healthy communities that support individuals and families. We, therefore, respectfully ask you to modify your government's policy taking into consideration the impact it will have on the most disadvantaged, its lack of effectiveness, and its serious budgetary implications.

Sincerely,

The Church Council on Justice and Corrections

In response to this letter, will Prime Minister Harper cast the first stone and lump the CCJC with other proponents of the 'soft on crime' approach?

Will Prime Minister Harper turn the other cheek and repent for his misguided punishment agenda?

Or will Prime Minister Harper simply ignore this organization founded by the Anglican Church of Canada, Baptist Convention of Ontario and Quebec, Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, Christian Reformed Churches of North America, Disciples of Christ in Canada, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, Mennonite Central Committee Canada, the Presbyterian Church in Canada, Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), the Salvation Army in Canada and the United Church of Canada like he has so many others with whom he disagrees?

Only time will tell, but in the interim the CCJC has launched its "Prison Facts - The Co$ts" campaign, which aptly displays some of the key problems with the 'conservative' punishment agenda.

Related media coverage:

- Globe and Mail - 26 January 2011 (read article)

- CBC Radio "As It Happens" - 27 January 2011 (listen here)

- CBC Television "Power & Politics with Evan Solomon" - 2 February 2011

(watch minutes 36:30 t0 42:15)

Kingstonians Get a Glimpse Into the 'Back Stage' of Penal Infrastructure Marketing

Last week, I was invited by OPIRG Kingston, Students for Accessible Education and EPIC to the penitentiary capital of Canada to discuss some of my doctoral research findings at the city library (read event notice). While the organizers were expecting thirty to forty Kingstonians to attend, well over a hundred concerned residents - including many from the Save Our Prison Farms campaign - came to the presentation to learn more about the scope of prison expansion in Canada, and more specifically, in their backyards.

Introduction (watch here)

In the introduction, I reviewed penal infrastructure projects springing-up across the country, with an emphasis on the approach used by the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) and the minority Conservative Government of Canada to establish these facilities without robust consultation with community stakeholders - an approach modelled on the process that led to the decision to close prison farms.

Part I (watch here)

In part I of the presentation, I focussed on the strategies used to establish new penal infrastructure in Canada, both historically and in the contemporary context.

Part II (watch here)

In part II of the presentation, I reviewed the origins of penal infrastructure marketing in this country and showed excerpts from a must-see video (for those who have a sense of humour) produced by the Canadian Penitentiary Service (now CSC) in 1977. This penal infrastructure marketing video was created to generate support for the establishment of new federal penitentiaries amongst residents in prospective host communities at a time when there was considerable opposition to such projects due to the violence that had erupted in prisons from coast-to-coast.

Why Build? (Canadian Penitentiary Service, 1977)

Part I (watch here)

Part II (watch here)

Part III (watch here)

Part IV (watch here)

Video excerpt: "We cannot sell the idea of a penitentiary in your locality in the same way as others can use propaganda to promote the establishment of primary industries. And we do not intend to do so. We at the Canadian Penitentiary Service believe the penitentiary is a community institution - the same as a hospital or school".

Part III (watch here)

In part III of the presentation, I explained the role of penal infrastructure marketing campaigns. I also highlighted some of the main messages that are communicated by prison authorities and governments in press releases to sell prison expansion to Canadians. Drawing on unpublished records obtained using Access to Information and Freedom of Information requests, event participants were briefly introduced to the 'back stage' of penal infrastructure marketing and how officials draft messages under the banners of "green prisons", "economic stimulus" and "public safety".

Part IV (watch here)

In part IV of the presentation, I discussed different approaches that could be used by opponents of prison expansion to contest penal 'common sense' - reasoning related to penal policy and practice that appeals to commonly held assumptions or logic, yet is unsubstantiated by empirical evidence. I concluded by making the case for a punishment legislation moratorium as an alternative to prison expansion in order to provide Canadians with the space to develop community-based solutions to the community-based issues that we call 'crime'.

Following the presentation, a group discussion ensued where those present shared ideas on how Kingstonians could come together and mobilize against prison expansion. After the event, one had the sense that, at least in one corner of the country, the punishment agenda of the minority Conservative Government of Canada will not fly. Whether it is because individuals disagree with what they're doing or because of how their doing it, the Conservatives will likely not get a smooth ride in Kingston come election time despite their penal pork barreling efforts.

The Punishment Gravy Train and Penal Pork Barreling Begins Early in 2011

In my 2010 Year-in-Review (read 1 January 2011 post), I noted that one of the stories I was going to watch for in 2011 was the minority Conservative Government of Canada's continued offerings of penal pork to existing pentowns and pencities, along with a side of gravy in the form of punishment bills that promise to grease the wheels of the machine, that is the federal prison system, for years to come. According to a report by journalist Rob Tripp that appeared late last night in the National Post (read article), Conservative MPs will "make announcements on eight prisons in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario and Quebec" today.

The report indicates that the new units announced today to be built on the grounds of existing federal penitentiaries operated by the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) are:

Québec Region

1) Cowansville Institution, 96 cells - 1966

(BQ MP Ouellet's riding)

2) Undisclosed institution, 50 cells

Ontario Region

1) Pittsburgh Institution, 50 cells - 1963

(Liberal MP Milliken's riding)

2) Frontenac Institution, 50 cells - 1972

(Liberal MP Milliken's riding)

3) Beaver Creek Institution, 50 cells - 1961

(Conservative MP Clement's riding)

Prairie Region

1) Edmonton Institution, unknown number of cells - 1978

(Conservative MP Uppal's riding)

2) Undisclosed institution in Saskatchewan

3) Undisclosed institution in Saskatchewan

* Federal penitentiaries in Saskatchewan where announcements could be made: Saskatchewan Penitentiary (est. 1911 / Conservative MP Hoback's riding); Riverbend Institution (est. 1962 /Conservative MP Hoback's riding); Regional Psychiatric Centre (est. 1978 / Conservative MP Trost's riding); Willow Cree Healing Lodge (Conservative MP Vellacott's riding); and Okimaw Ohci Healing Lodge (est. 1995 / Conservative MP Anderson's riding).

As this story plays out today, here are a few questions that need to be asked about the establishment of new units that result in actual answers, rather than obfuscation, so that Canadians can make sense of on-going penal policy developments.

What is Driving the Localities of New Units?

When asked about what factors were used in the selection of locations for new units in an Order of Paper Question (Q-469) tabled by Liberal Public Safety Critic Mark Holland on 19 October 2010, Public Safety Minister Vic Toews outlined the following criteria in his 6 December 2010 response: "population projections; infrastructure capacity of available institutions; workforce availability; and the availability of space within existing perimeters".

In an e-mail written by CSC Assistant Commissioner Chris Price in 2010 obtained by Rob Tripp (read 6 August 2010 post), it was noted that new units would be built "in locations where we expect the greatest increases in offender population". To date, no documentation that evaluates prospective sites for new units have been released to the public as is the practice in a few other jurisdictions (e.g. Nova Scotia, 2010). One must question why this is the case.

Why is the Minority Government of Canada Building New Units on the Grounds of Aging Penitentiaries?

In the 2007 CSC Review Panel, the authors noted that many federal penitentiaries had outlived their life-cycles and were not equipped to meet the current needs of the agency (see page 154). The report also quoted Irving Kulik, Executive Director of the Canadian Criminal Justice Association, stating that "[o]ld facilities are expensive to maintain and so when other budgetary considerations come into play, maintenance is delayed. Inevitably the organization has a huge collection of decaying buildings incorporating elements of new construction in an inefficient fashion" (ibid).

Based on these considerations and others, the panellists recommended that CSC move towards building new regional complexes (recommendation 98, page 160) and "minimize the authorization of retrofit projects" (recommendation 100, page 160). The logic behind these recommendations is that if new replacement penitentiaries are to be constructed at a later date (note: a long-term accommodation plan involving the construction of new penitentiaries is to be submitted by CSC to the federal government in March 2011), money is not invested into aging prisons that are destined to be replaced.

The Conservatives appear to be ignoring this advice as they are authorizing the construction of new units on the grounds of penitentiaries that are more than three decades old in at least five instances today. The question again is why?

Penal Pork Barreling?

As the day unfolds, the sites of new federal penitentiary units will be confirmed, many on the grounds of aging facilities located in ridings either held by the Conservatives or that will be closely contested in the upcoming federal election such as Kingston and the Islands where Liberal MP Peter Milliken will not be running.

Given that the federal government is not releasing any documentation related to the establishment of new penal infrastructure, that their decisions are in contradiction with the 'roadmap to nowhere' that is guiding their punishment agenda (read 29 September 2009 post) and that Conservative MPs, including Cabinet Ministers, have been lobbying for these projects (read 18 August 2010 post), one is left to wonder if this entire campaign is being driven by penal pork barreling.

An Investment in Public Safety?

As the Conservative penal gravy train makes stops at a town near you, we will hear a number of their tag lines. The first, is that these new units will enhance safety in our communities by keeping prisoners behind bars for longer periods of time. It should be noted, however, that most academic evidence demonstrates that incarceration has a negligible impact on the volume of complex conflicts and harms in our communities that we call 'crime'.

More importantly, in many jurisdictions where the mass incarceration has been tried, the experiment failed to reduce 'crime' and is being abandoned on mass. For instance, many American states such as Texas are gradually reducing their reliance on imprisonment because of the poor impact of incarceration on recidivism rates and exorbitant fiscal costs. Prominent Republicans such as Newt Gingrich and Pat Nolan, who once advocated for expanding prisons, are now calling for dramatic reductions in imprisonment in favour of more effective and less costly community-based alternatives (read 7 January 2011 article in the Washingston Post).

Given the proven failure of mass incarceration, it appears as though the minority Conservative Government of Canada prefers to be guided by penal 'common sense' instead of facts as they roll-out their punishment agenda. The worst part is, if the trajectory continues we will likely arrive at the same conclusion in Canada, as Gingrich and others have arrived at in the United States, decades after we have dumped billions of dollars in prisons in the midst of a fiscal crisis and declining rates of police-reported 'crime'.

While funds are being allocated to manage penitentiary overcrowding, money is being diverted from programming that prisoners may need to safely reintegrate into society (read 8 November 2010 post). As I have previously noted, in one $155.5 million wave of unit announcements this past October, the federal government invested more money in prison construction than it had spent on programming for prisoners in 2008-2009, which reportedly still accounts for 2 percent of CSC's overall budget (read 7 October 2010 post). Does this sound like a recipe that will enhance public safety?

An Exercise in "Tangible Economic Growth"?

A second message that we will likely hear today is that the construction of new federal penitentiary units will contribute to "tangible economic growth" in host communities (read 19 August 2010 post). However, no evidence will be disclosed to Canadians that support this claim.

As noted by Toews in response to an Order of Paper Question (Q-469) from Holland, no such research took place "[s]ince the announced institutional expansions will be occurring within the existing perimeters on CSC-owned land, a review of the impacts on host communities was not undertaken".

Likely realizing that he was engaging in conjecture, Toews added: "Given the level of funding that will be expanded in the communities, there will be an increase in terms of construction jobs for the community in addition to new hiring at the facility when the units are ready to be staffed. This is an important part of ensuring tangible economic growth for the communities located around CSC's institutions".

An emerging body of evidence in the United States is showing that prisons fail to have a long-term positive impact on host communities (read 12 May 2010 post). Even if we are to accept that there may be short-term economic activity associated with the establishment of new penal infrastructure, one wonders if the Government of Canada's so-called contribution to "tangible economic growth" could be used to fund projects that address the top priorities of Canadians such as new hospitals instead of dumping money into aging facilities that may be replaced by multi-billion dollar penitentiary complexes in the years ahead.

Unfortunately, Canadians living in pentowns and pencities across the country are not even being given the opportunity to make such choices. As Minister Toews noted in his 6 December 2010 Order of Paper question response to Holland, "[s]ince the announced institutional expansions will be occurring within the existing perimeters on CSC-owned land, in-depth consultation with surrounding communities was not undertaken".

As the federal government establishes the near equivalent of a new federal penitentiary in communities such as Kingston - where additions are slated for Bath Institution (192 cells), Collins Bay Institution (96 cells), Millhaven Institution (96 cells), Pittsburgh Institution (50 cells) and Frontenac Institution (50 cells) - one must ask why constituents have yet to have the opportunity to weigh in on whether or not they want basically another such institution in their backyard. Is it their contempt for the democratic process and/or bureaucratic pragmatism that prevents them from talking to relevant stakeholders? I will leave that up to you to decide.

On the Side of Victims?

Likely accompanied by a handful of frustrated victims of 'crime', who would rather see something being done - even if its in the form of new prisons - than nothing at all, the Conservatives will tout these infrastructure initiatives as being demonstrative of their 'commitment' to the victimized. However, it should be noted that victims' advocates, including Steve Sullivan - the first Ombudsman of Victims of Crime - have publicly stated that prison expansion does not meet the complex needs of victims. Take this excerpt from a 6 April 2010 interview with Sullivan on CBC's Power & Politics with Evan Solomon where victims' expenditure, including cuts to some programs (read 6 April 2010 post 1) was discussed (read 6 April 2010 post 2):

Solomon: "Now I know this is an austerity budget, but we’ve seen statistics saying that there’s more money to be spent on putting people in prison, but it looks like, even though there is a slight increase, key programs around victims are being slashed. What does that tell you?"

Sullivan: "When you’re in government it’s about making decisions and you have to make choices. So if you spend money on this area that means you can’t spend it anywhere else. In this case, we’re spending millions of more dollars on building prisons and that’s a fairly popular position... the public seems to support that. But it also means we’re not spending money elsewhere. We can’t spend that money in two places, and victims of crime, I got to tell you, the stuff we hear from victims of crime on a daily basis – the problems they have meeting their mortgages, needing counselling, not being able to assist their children who are sexually abused. Building more prisons aren’t going to address those problems. And we could put a child treatment centre in every major city in this country. We could build shelters for kids who are selling themselves on the street to come off the streets and try to live a different kind of life. The rates of Aboriginal victimization are so high... by spending so much money on prisons we’re not spending money on those key needs for victims".

Later in the interview, Sullivan stated that the current legislative push is insufficient noting:

Sullivan: "…the needs of victims of crime are very complex. They’re not easy solutions. It’s not about a tagline about building more prisons or getting tougher on criminals. Their needs are complex and they’re very in-depth and they’re long-term. I guess what I would be telling the government is, if you have a pot of money and you have a choice to build more prisons or help more victims, to help more victims".

In response to this statement, Solomon asked: “So as the Federal Ombudsman for Victims of Crime, that’s your message to the Minister... put more money into helping victims?” Sullivan then replied: “One of my last recommendations to the government will be to take the money they’re spending on prisons to helping victims”. “Away from prisons towards victims”, the host remarked as Sullivan nodded.

What this statement reveals is that the federal government's simple calculation that more prisons meets the needs of victims is not necessarily supported by all of them or their advocates. Moreover, it is becoming clear that victims themselves are suffering directly as a result of the Conservative punishment agenda as funds that should be allocated towards bolstering the ability of the penal system to meet the complex needs they may have - information, counselling, restitution and the like - are being diverted towards building more prisons.

Moving Forward

In the year ahead, we can likely expect penal pork barreling to continue as the Conservatives scramble to absorb the influx of new prisoners resulting from their punishment agenda that aims to put more people in prison for longer periods of time with fewer chances of release into the community prior to the expiry of their sentences as has been done in the past to enhance the safe reintegration of prisoners into society.

In closing, it needs to be pointed out that a Memorandum to the Minister of Public Safety dated 1 September 2010 I obtained through an Access to Information request filed with Public Safety Canada noted that the Federal-Provincial-Territorial Cumulative Impact Working Group had yet to develop "cumulative impact costing tools" that "achieved consistency" as of June 2009.

If this continues to be the case, we must ask whether CSC's short-term accommodation plan that is currently being rolled-out based on inconsistent projections related to the Conservative punishment agenda is a responsible course of action. Given what we know about the proven failure of mass incarceration to address 'crime', a Canadian punishment legislation moratorium that will curb future prison growth ought to be seriously considered (read September 2010 article in The Monitor).

Access to Information Requests: A Guide for Canadian Prisoners

By Mike Larsen

In Canada, there is a small but growing group of criminologists and sociologists conducting research on matters related to the carceral (broadly defined) using access to information (ATI) mechanisms. Federal and provincial ATI laws have been around for some time now, and they are often utilized by social scientists – mostly historians – interested in archival methods and the ‘history of the present’. What distinguishes our network of researchers is a sustained two-pronged approach to ATI mechanisms: on the one hand, we use them systematically to seek out substantive information about the ‘back stage’ of carceral and security practices, and on the other hand, we study these mechanisms themselves as sites of information gatekeeping, ‘message discipline’, and the politics of secrecy and transparency. Justin Piché’s work with Tackling the Politics of Crime and Punishment is a good example of the ATI research coming out of this group.

Criminal justice systems are engaged in pervasive and persistent practices of information production. Officials draft, revise, and disseminate policy in conjunction with political bodies. ‘Best practices’ are debated and circulated. Statistics are created, compiled, and mobilized. Situations arise, are described and defined according to the perspectives of institutions, and are thereby rendered amenable to management. Public Relations offices work to manage communications and shape public perceptions in accordance with official positions. Much of the day-to-day work of front-line personnel within the system is ‘information work’. They draft reports, take photographs and videos, fill out checklists and forms, provide expert opinions and access and modify vast databases. In so doing, they collaborate with other workers within the system, and information is exchanged, co-produced, and otherwise used. The individuals who are processed through this system – by the police, the courts, prisons, and social services – are the subjects of constant assessment, examination, explanation and evaluation. They have records, files, cases and numbers. From the perspective of the system, they are in many ways reducible to these things.

Much of this official information is not made readily available. Instead, it circulates internally within the system, and constitutes a vast textual ‘back stage’. Gaining access to government documents can offer invaluable insights into the politics, practices, and ways of thinking that govern the various components of the criminal justice system. Similarly, gaining access to personal information files can allow an individual to learn about his or her official ‘data double’ - the bundle of information that represents a person within the system.

Technically, anyone in Canada can make use of ATI mechanisms as part of a ‘quasi-constitutional’ right to request access to government records. Most of the regular requesters – journalists, lawyers, and academics - that I have encountered have learned how to navigate the complexities of Canada’s various ATI regimes through lengthy processes of trial-and-error. We are often approached for advice by community organizations, other researchers, and concerned citizens who are interested in filing ATI requests but unfamiliar with the process. Common questions relate to effective request wording, how to negotiate with government ATI analysts seeking clarifications or adjustments to the scope of a request, what sorts of documents to seek, and how to file appeals and complaints regarding delays, redactions, or denial of information.

Questions along these lines – particularly from current and former prisoners and prison justice groups working in the community – prompted me to write the Canadian Prisoner Access to Information Guide, which is available free for download from my Academia.edu site, at http://academia.edu.documents.s3.amazonaws.com/1929916/Canadian_Prisoner_Access_to_Information_Guide_Version_1.1.pdf

Contents of the Guide:
1. Introduction
2. The Canadian access regime
3. Exemptions and extensions
4. Before filing: A checklist
5. The process
6. Request wording and types of records
7. Federal and Provincial addresses and information
8. Contact Information

The purpose of the guide is to provide background information, a discussion of procedures and ‘best practices’, resources (addresses, phone numbers, and information about the federal, provincial and territorial ATI / FOI regimes) and commentary for new requesters, with a focus on prisoners interested in seeking information about carceral practices. The current version (1.0) will be revised based on feedback (which is most welcome) in what I hope will be an ongoing dialogue.

Why prepare a guide for prisoners? Two reasons. First, because while Canada’s ATI laws themselves (particularly the federal Access to Information Act) are notoriously dated and out-of-touch with the information age, the resources one needs to use them effectively tend to be located online. Figuring out how to prepare a request, where to send it, how much it costs, and what sorts of information are available or excluded without access to the Internet would be difficult, in some cases prohibitively so. Prisoners, who are generally unable to access the Internet, are at a comparative disadvantage here. The guide does not fully compensate for this, but it does provide the basics, as well as a list of numbers to call for assistance.

The second reason is because as a prison justice advocate and Co-managing Editor of the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons, I am a supporter of prison writing and prisoner research. Readers of the JPP will know that some of the most insightful and effective analysis and commentary on the socio-politics of incarceration comes from writers on the inside. JPP authors are consistently ahead of the curve when it comes to predicting the impact of policy shifts-in-progress, critiquing the logics and discourses of control and exclusion, and, of course, giving voice to the lived realities of the prison. It is my hope that this guide will be of interest and use to Canadian prisoner researchers and writers, and will allow them to further incorporate the ‘back stage texts’ of the carceral system into their analyses.

In sum, I think there’s a good argument to be made that:

1. ATI mechanisms have tremendous potential as tools for critical research on prisons, the carceral, and security and social control practices.
2. Sustained and effective use of ATI mechanisms requires both knowledge of the ATIP process and some knowledge (the more, the better) of the organizations or practices being studied.
3. Prisoners, by virtue of their position within the system, have a unique perspective on carceral practices, and have considerable experiential knowledge of the everyday routines and applied policies of the prison.

- Mike Larsen, 2011

Mike Larsen is a PhD Candidate in Sociology based at the York Centre for International and Security Studies, and the Co-Managing Editor of the Journal of Prisoners on Prisons. He can be reached at mlarsen@yorku.ca.

2010 Year-in-Review

In the context of a fiscal crisis, the continued overall decline in the volume and severity of police-reported 'crime' (read 20 July 2010 post), and a stable victimization rate (read Statistics Canada - September 2010), 2010 was still a year where penal policy and practice dominated much of the political debate and media coverage in Canada.

The closure of the federal prison farms (see Save Our Prison Farms), the preservation of the long-gun registry (read 22 September 2010 article by CBC News), the criminalization of dissent in Toronto during the G20 meetings (read report by André Marin), along with the governments promotion of imprisonment as a means to resolve a wide array of challenges we face such as the management of refugees who are looking to escape conflict and persecution at home (read 21 October 2010 press release by Public Safety Canada), are among the issues that commanded the attention of Canadians. These issues and the discussions they have provoked will likely continue to resonate in 2011 and beyond.

For me, 2010 represents a year of missed opportunities for Canada and its residents. More than a year after Prime Minister Stephen Harper prorogued Parliament to avoid scrutiny concerning the alleged complicity of the Canadian Forces in the abuse of Afghan detainees (read 30 December 2009 article by CBC News), we still have a minority Conservative Government of Canada that fails to be transparent on this matter and others.

The federal government also continues to focus a significant portion of their legislative efforts towards 'reforming' sentencing and the administration of the penal system, also known as the criminal justice system (read 7 November 2010 post), at a time when citizens are more concerned about "the economy, health care and the environment" (read 28 December 2010 article by Amy Minsky).

If 2010 is any indication, it does appear as though federal politicians of all stripes - to a greater or lesser degree - have missed the opportunity the 2009 edition of prorogation provided us with (read 26 January 2010 post), particularly in the area of penal policy where a seemingly never ending barrage of legislative waves that aim to increase the use of criminalization and imprisonment, as well as perpetuate the stigma associated with the 'offender' label well beyond the expiry of their sentences continues to assault our communities. All the while, resources are diverted away from approaches that actually bolster our capacity to deal with the complex harms and conflicts in society that we call 'crime'.

While I have followed the stories above with interest, the bulk of my research, writing and advocacy that is featured on this blog has focussed on the scope and factors shaping prison expansion with an emphasis on the potential ramifications, both economic and human, of federal sentencing initiatives. Below, I review some of the stories that have been featured here in 2010.

TPCP Canada in 2010

In February 2010, I shared my preliminary findings concerning the construction of new provincial-territorial prisons in Canada (read 16 February 2010 post, 18 February 2010 post). Through an online content search, informal information requests by phone and e-mail with government officials, as well as an analysis of unpublished government records obtained using Access to Information and Freedom of Information requests, I discovered that there were at least 22 new prisons and 16 additions to existing facilities at various stages of completion. Once online, these facilities will add approximately 6,500 new prisoner beds at a cost of over $2.8 billion for construction.

Most of these facilities were planned to address a myriad of challenges faced by provincial and territorial prison agencies including aging infrastructure, persistent overcrowding driven by rising remand populations, a need to develop space to cope with prisoners suffering from drug addiction and mental illness, as well as a desire to fulfill space requirements association with changing programming objectives.

It should be noted that only governments in Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and British Columbia attempted to project future growth in relation to the federal sentencing initiatives at the time proposals for new prisons and units were submitted according to unpublished documents I have obtained. This indicates that may jurisdictions in Canada will likely not be able to weather the carceral storm ahead as the minority Conservative Government of Canada continues to table new bills that aim to put more people behind bars for longer periods of time with fewer chances of release prior to warrant expiry. This agenda is being pursued at a pace that makes it difficult to plan for the cumulative impacts these initiatives will have (see 31 May 2010 presentation to Provincial-Territorial Heads of Corrections).

While I was able to map many of the on-going penal infrastructure initiatives being undertaken by the provincial and territorial governments, I was unable to obtain information concerning the short-term and long-term accommodation plans of the federal government and the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC). The issue of government transparency on this matter and the financial cost of expanding the federal penitentiary system is an issue that received considerable attention last year, which is best captured in five stories that I will briefly review below.

1) CSC Expenditures 2010

Following the tabling of the federal budget in March 2010, the NDP noted that CSC's capital expenditures had increased by 43 percent from 2009-2010 to 2010-2011 to $329 million (read 5 March 2010 post). This noted increase began a discussion on whether this money was being used to build new penitentiaries.

A few days later, Minister Toews was asked by journalist Janice Tibbetts, who had obtained an e-mail written by CSC Commissioner Don Head to employees noting changes to senior staff to support "major construction initiatives", how the government planned to absorb the influx of new prisoners (read 9 March 2010 post). Toews' office responded that it was only "updating and improving" existing federal penitentiaries.

The issue of federal prison expansion again resurfaced the following week when Minister Toews appeared on CBC's Power & Politics with Evan Solomon. Having obtained an unpublished report that showed that 29 of 54 penitentiaries had recently asked permission to double-bunk prisoners, a practice in contravention with CSC Commissioner's Directive 550 and the United Nations' Standing Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, Solomon asked Toews what the government was planning to do to accommodate the influx of new prisoners that would enter the system as a result of their punishment agenda. The Minister responded that the government did not have plans to build new facilities and that they would be involved in the "rehabilitation and expansion" of existing facilities. He also stated that they would increase the use of double-bunking which he deemed not to be "inappropriate or illegal or unconstitutional or violates international standards" (read 18 March 2010). The Minister's office defended this policy direction the following day in a statement and noted that plans to build new facilities "will have to go through the normal approval processes" once submitted (read 19 March 2010).

A few weeks later, Globe and Mail journalist Bill Curry noted that "the budget for Corrections Canada is projected to rise 27 per cent from 2010-2011 fiscal year to 2012-13, when it will reach $3.1 billion. More than 4,000 new positions will be created at correctional institutions and parole offices across the country, with estimates of a 25-per-cent increase in employees during the same period" at a time where other government departmental budgets were being downsized or frozen (read article here).

After I read this story I compiled CSC's budget figures since the Conservatives entered office and noted that the expenditures of the federal penitentiary system had climbed by 54 percent since 2005-2006, including a 138.4 percent increase in capital expenditures (read 31 March 2010 post). I also noted that full-time equivalent staff had already increased by 11.9 percent since the Conservatives tabled their first budget in 2006-2007.

Following an appearance on CBC's Power & Politics with Evan Solomon where I shared these figures and asked whether the Government of Canada was planning to build new penitentiaries, Conservative MP Shelly Glover stuck to the government line and even disagreed with the figures I had presented (read 1 April 2010 post). Deny, distort and delay appeared to be the tactics of choice used to obstruct the access of Canadians to the full costs of the Conservative punishment agenda.

2) Federal Victims' Expenditures 2010

With a significant increase in expenditures for CSC projected in 2010-2011, one would expect that the so-called champions of victims of 'crime' would have provided a comparable funding boost to meet the needs of victims. However, while the federal government increased their allocation for victims from $13 million to $16.3 million, an analysis of the federal budget estimates revealed cuts of 41.2 percent to the Grants for Victims of Crime Initiative and of 34 percent to the Contributions to the Victims of Crime Initiative (read 6 April 2010 post 1).

When presented with these figures, as well as the rising expenditures for CSC, during an interview on CBC'S Power & Politics, the soon-to-be ousted first Federal Ombudsman for Victims of Crime Steve Sullivan remarked on the insufficiency of the governments legislative agenda and related prison expansion:

...the needs of victims of crime are very complex. They're not easy solutions. It's not about a tag line about building more prisons or getting tougher on criminals. Their needs are complex and they're very in-depth and they're long-term. I guess what I would be telling the government is, if you have a pot of money, and you have a choice to build more prisons or help more victims, to help more victims.

This statement by Sullivan was important in that it illustrated that there is a cost to increasing the use of imprisonment, some of which is absorbed by victims of 'crime' who are often used as stalking horses for state repression (read 6 April 2010 post 2).

3) PBO Study on the Economic Costs of Bill C-25

Despite efforts by Conservative political commentators such as Tom Flanagan to deflect critiques about the economic costs of incarceration (read 16 April 2010), this narrative was one that simply would not go away with media outlets reporting that the cost of implementing one Conservative punishment bill, the 'Truth in Sentencing' Act, would be in the range of $7 billion to $10 billion according to a forthcoming report from the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) (read 28 April 2010).

This news appeared to have prompted the federal government to revise its estimate concerning Bill C-25 to go from $90 million to $2 billion overnight, although Toews stated that he would "rather not share" the costs of other punishment bills with Canadians (read 28 April 2010 article by Janice Tibbetts). A report by Ottawa Citizen journalist Kathryn May also noted that the PBO was forced to create its own forecasting model to predict the costs of Bill C-25 because CSC refused to disclose their own figures and methodology (read 28 April 2010 article; see also 9 May 2010 article), which was unsurprising given the organization's reluctance to disclose plans for the construction of new institutions (read 14 April 2010 post).

As rumours began to circulate that the provinces and territories would be on the hook for a sizeable portion of the cost of Bill C-25, other governments in jurisdictions such as Ontario began to signal that they wanted assistance to cover the costs of the federal government's punishment agenda (read 29 April 2010 post). Reports also surfaced that provinces such as Manitoba (read 1 May 2010 post) and territories including Nunavut (read 4 May 2010 post; 13 May 2010 post) had prison systems that were bursting at the seems that would likely not be able to absorb an influx of new prisoners. With "[s]ix out of the 10 provinces surveyed" by Globe and Mail journalist Gloria Galloway stating that "they are worried that the new tough-on-crime laws will impose a major financial burden" (read article), it seemed that a prison budget showdown was slowly emerging between the federal government and their provincial-territorial counterparts (read 22 May 2010 post; 16 June 2010 post; 18 June 2010 post).

At the close of a busy winter and spring sitting of Parliament and the media largely focussed on the G8/G20 debacle unfolding in Huntsville and Toronto, the PBO report on the economic costs associated with implementing Bill C-25 was released on 22 June 2010 (read report here). The report found that prison expenditures for the federal government would rise from $2.2 billion a year in 2009-2010 to $4.18 billion in 2015-2016. The provincial-territorial share would also projected to rise from $2.15 billion to $5.23 billion during this same period. Put differently, the federal government would be on the hook for approximately $5 billion, while the provinces and territories would be on the hook for approximately $5 billion to $13 billion over the next five years to implement the 'Truth in Sentencing' Act.

Predictably, Minister Toews dismissed the figures out of hand, while the media and members of the opposition pounced on the multi-billion dollar discrepancy between the PBO and the federal government's projections associated with Bill C-25 (read 22 June 2010 post). The Conservative record of stonewalling on this file even prompted an editorial from the Globe and Mail that called for "Truth in Budgeting" to accompany "Truth in Sentencing" (read here).

In response to the PBO report, CSC Commissioner Don Head finally released the agency's plan to cope with the influx of new prisoners resulting from Bill C-25 (read 22 June 2010 Calgary Sun op-ed). This short-term plan to deal with a forecasted increase of 3,400 new prisoners included the construction of an unspecified amount of new units at undisclosed locations that would add 2,700 new prisoners beds in existing institutions, as well as an increase in the use of double-bunking (read 23 June 2010 post). It should be noted that Commissioner Head has since revised the organization's projections to include estimates associated with other pieces of legislation without having provided an update on how this would impact CSC's short-term accommodation strategy (read 19 October 2010 post; 22 October 2010 post).

In Head's June op-ed, he also noted that CSC was developing a "long-term plan that plan that takes into account the need to replace some penitentiaries that have stood the test of time for many decades and no longer meet the requirements of a modern correctional system". This represented the first time a government official had acknowledged that such a plan was in the works since July 2009 when a CSC webpage outlining the agency's evaluation of its physical infrastructure for the purposes of planning regional complexes was inexplicably removed (see also Head, 2008).

After months of being battered by revelations on the costs of their punishment agenda, it appeared as though the Conservatives were losing their grip on a file that they had been deemed to own by the commentariat. Over the summer, the bombardment continued as the volume and severity of police-reported 'crime' dropped again according to Statistics Canada (read 20 July 2010 post) and President of the Treasury Board Stockwell Day bungled the issue of unreported 'crime' to justify the construction of new prisons, ensuing a media frenzy in the dog days of summer (read 3 August 2010 post).

Members of opposition parties, namely Liberal Public Safety Critic Mark Holland and NDP Public Safety Critic Don Davies, where routinely taking their Conservative counterparts to school on this file, making it seem as though the punishment agenda would encounter robust opposition in the Fall. The Liberals even went as far as to say that the Canadian electorate now had the choice between keeping a government in power whose priorities were "prisons and planes" or electing a Liberal government that was concerned with the "real priorities" of Canadians (read 4 September 2010 post). The minority Conservative Government of Canada, however, would bounce back.

4) Penal Pork Barreling

At a time when Canada was still in the process of recovering from the global economic crisis, many Canadians remained concerned about the economy and the precariousness of the job market. In this context, the Conservatives arguably played on this anxiety by offering penal pork to existing pentowns and pencities, along with a side of gravy in the form of punishment bills that promise to grease the wheels of the machine, that is the federal prison system, for years to come.

With Conservative MP's lobbying for a portion of the so-called carceral stimulus (read 1 August 2010 post; 18 August 2010 post), journalist Rob Tripp obtained a list of 35 institutions that would be expanded as part of CSC's short-term accommodation strategy (read 6 August 2010 Cancrime blog post). Having conducted an analysis of this list, I noted that approximately 65 percent of the penal infrastructure projects were taking place on the grounds of penitentiaries in federal ridings held by Conservatives, which is noteworthy given that 57 percent of institutions are located in Conservative ridings. I also noted that nearly two-thirds of the new units were to be added to penitentiaries built before 1980, which goes against recommendations made by the 2007 CSC Review Panel that noted that the government should "minimize authorization of retrofit projects", particularly for aging penal institutions (read 18 August 2010 post). Given these findings, I began to ask whether CSC's short-term accommodation strategy and the siting of new units was being driven by penal patronage.

This facet of the story did not gain much traction as Conservative MP's began spreading the 'good news', announcing new units from coast-to-coast with promises of "tangible economic growth" resulting from the penal infrastructure projects with no research or evidence to support this claim (read 19 August, 2010 post; 7 October 2010 post; 12 November 2010 post). In a media context fixated on the likes of Russell Williams, Clifford Olson and Graham James, the Conservatives touted their 'tough on crime' credentials by also noting during their unit announcements that they were on "the side of law-abiding citizens, the side of victims who justice", as well as the "side that understands the cost of a safe and secure society is an investment worth making".

With no evidence to support their claims, it appears as though Canadians are still buying the messages routinely fed to them during these announcement, with some polls showing that they believe that the Conservatives are the most credible party on this issue. Although, likely much to the chagrin of the minority Government of Canada who thrive on the politics of fear and distortion, most Canadians continue place 'crime' at the bottom of their list of concerns (read 28 December 2010 article by Amy Minsky).

5) Prison Overcrowding and Its Consequences

While the federal government was busy trying to find new ways to increase our reliance on incarceration (read 7 November 2010 post), others focussed their attention on the human consequences of the punishment agenda with Canadians participating in Prison Justice Day (PJD) events across the country (read 6 August 2010 post; view footage from a 10 August 2010 PJD event in Ottawa).

For my part, I made public a briefing note - submitted by CSC Senior Deputy Commissioner Marc-Arthur Hyppolite to Minister Toews on 16 February 2010 that I had obtained using Access to Information (read 8 August 2010 post) - on CBC's Power & Politics that contradicted the government's position that double-bunking is an appropriate practice (watch 9 August 2010 segment - minutes 16:00 to 31:35). The briefing note stated:

For any double-bunking, other than emergency management, institutional heads are required to have an exemption authorized, in advance, by the Commissioner. This exemption sets the maximum level to which an institution can normally be double bunked... It is important to note that the increased use of double bunking places significant stress on the staff and infrastructure of an institution. Further expansion of double bunking increases the risk to staff and offender safety in an institution.

Rather than taking the responsible path by adopting a moratorium on punishment legislation to curb the influx of new prisoners (read September 2010 article in the Monitor), the government induced a crisis in the federal penitentiary system that required that CSC suspend Commissioner's Directive 550 to allow for more double-bunking (read 11 August 2010 post). It seems that advice Minister Toews received concerning the potential risks of increasing double-bunking posed to staff and prisoners had fallen on deaf ears.

In the Fall, reports and commentary by Correctional Investigator of Canada Howard Sapers also warned that an influx of new prisoners in our already overburdened federal penitentiary system would likely lead to more violence and deaths inside our penal institutions. He also warned that this policy trajectory, left unaccompanied by additional resources, could also undermine public safety by further exacerbating the shortage of programs available to prisoners that they may need to safely reintegrate into society as CSC's funding is diverted towards managing overcrowding (read 8 September 2010 post; 8 November 2010 post). In light of these warnings, it is surprising that the federal penitentiary system has yet to erupt as it did in the 1970s and 1980s when faced with similar circumstances.

Developing Stories to Watch For in 2011

With the likelihood that penal policy will continue to be a major focus of the minority Conservative Government of Canada, here are five stories I'll be tracking in 2011.

1) 'Austerity' Budget 2011

As noted in a 29 March 2010 article by Globe and Mail journalist Bill Curry (read here), while Budget 2010 included cuts to a number of federal government departments, the Conservatives provided CSC with additional funds this past year and forecasted increases in the years ahead.

With another budget only weeks away, that Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has promised will be an exercise in austerity, it will be interesting to see whether CSC's projected budget of $2.926 billion for 2011-2012 will hold or if Canadians will be on the hook for more money to fund our growing addiction to incarceration. It will also be interesting to see which government departments get their funding slashed, in part, because of Conservative penal pork barreling.

2) March 2011 Submission of CSC's Long-term Accommodation Plan

In the 2007 Report of the CSC Review Panel, it was recommended that the federal penitentiary system review its physical infrastructure, and consider the costs and benefits of replacing existing institutions with regional complexes (see pages 166-167). In response to the report, CSC established a Transformation Team in February 2008 to implement the recommendations outlined in the review. Part of their activities involved the development of a plan to 'modernize' physical infrastructure (read Head, 2008).

It should be noted that I have been attempting to obtain documents related to this plan through Access to Information requests for a few years. To date, I have been unable to obtain the records I have sought as CSC has either claimed they "do not exist" or that they are unable to release them for other reasons including "Cabinet confidence" (read 14 April 2010 post). A recent request filed in July 2010 has yet to be processed and, according to a 15 December 2010 exchange with a CSC analyst, will not be fully processed "until June 2011" as a number of documents are being sent to the Privy Council Office for consultation. With that said, according to a 6 December 2010 response from Public Safety Minister Vic Toews to an order of paper question tabled by Liberal Public Safety Critic Mark Holland (Q-471), this "Long Term Accommodation Strategy and Investment Plan" will be tabled "for consideration in March 2011".

As it is doubtful that the plan will be released for public scrutiny and debate, it is vital that Parliamentarians, journalists and Canadians press the federal government of the day to disclose the full costs of CSC's infrastructure initiatives, the policy alternatives considered (if any), as well as how the department plans to carry-out their vision for Canada's emerging penal state (e.g. facility site selection, design, construction, financing, maintenance, operations). With billions upon billions of dollars likely on the table, not to mention the human lives that lie in the balance, it is vital that such information see the light of day so that Canadians can ultimately make informed decisions about whether or not they want to be on the hook for prison mortgages that will be paid for long after the children born this year will enter the workforce.

3) PBO Study on the Economic Costs of Bill C-39

As noted previously, the cost of the Conservatives punishment agenda received significant attention in 2010. This is, in large part, due to the findings of the PBO's report that projected the costs of implementing the so-called 'Truth in Sentencing' Act to be in the neighbourhood of $5 billion for the federal government and another $5 billion to $8 billion for the provinces and territories.

In 2011, Canadians will become aware of the economic costs associated with Bill C-39: An Act to amend the Corrections and Conditional Release Act, a piece of legislation tabled by the minority Conservative Government of Canada that aims to restrict federal parole eligibility as part of their implementation of CSC's so-called transformation (read 25 May 2010 post). They will become aware of these figures not because the government has taken the steps to project and release them (read 28 April 2010 article by Janice Tibbetts; 22 May 2010 post; 19 October 2010 post; 22 October 2010 post), but because Liberal Public Safety Critic Mark Holland has again requested that the PBO conduct a study for these purposes (read open letter).

While I do not anticipate that this report will produce figures comparable to those released by the PBO in June 2010, particularly because there is not a provincial-territorial component to Bill C-39, they will provide a glimpse of a small fraction of the costs related to restricting parole eligibility and opportunities for prisoners to successfully reintegrate themselves into society.

We have to keep in mind that Bill C-39 is merely the beginning of the implementation of 'earned parole' and that the elimination of statutory release - which in my view would dramatically increase the costs of federal imprisonment without enhancing public safety - would still be on the chopping block.

4) Cumulative Impacts of the Punishment Agenda

As the Conservatives will likely continue to recycle Canada's most notorious individuals - Karla Homolka, Graham James, Clifford Olson, Russell Williams and the like - to justify their punishment agenda that arguably mostly targets individuals involved in low-level property and drug-related 'crime', we will continue to see persistent overcrowding in our federal penitentiaries and provincial-territorial prisons in 2011 despite the establishment of new facilities (read 16 February 2010 post; 17 February 2010 post; 23 June 2010 post; 6 August 2010 post; 19 August 2010 post; 7 October 2010 post; 12 November 2o10 post).

With the perpetuation of the punishment agenda we can expect trends affecting federal prisoners noted in the 2009-2010 Annual Report of the Office of the Correctional Investigator of Canada to persist (read 8 November 2010 post), including: diminished access to programming that may help federal prisoners safely reintegrate into society; diminished access to health and mental health services; higher levels of violent incidents and staff usage of force; and increased wear-and-tear on already crumbling penitentiary infrastructure.

Anyone who is interested in understanding the violence that can potentially emerge as a result of overcrowding only needs to look back at the riots and hostage takings that took place in the 1970s and 1980s that are meticulously documented by Claire Culhane (1991) in her book No Longer Barred from Prison to understand the powder-keg that will inevitability explode should the punishment agenda be allowed to persist.

Another issue to watch for in 2011 is whether or not the provinces and territories, who are responsible for incarcerating the vast majority of prisoners in Canada, will continue to allow themselves to be willing passengers on the runaway punishment train with Justice Minister Nicholson and Public Safety Minister Toews at the helm that will likely collectively cost them billions or if they will mobilize their political capital and demand more consideration when penal policies are drafted, tabled and implemented.

To date, the response has been a mixed-bag (read 29 April 2010 post; 22 May 2010 post; 16 June 2010 post; 30 October 2010 post). Only time will tell if issues such as the jurisdictional split, whereby only prisoners serving sentences of two-years-plus-a-day, that was addressed in the yet to be released 2009 Changing Face of Corrections Report (read 5 May 2010 post) will be publicly discussed this year.

5) A 'Law-and-Order' Election?

In a minority government situation, the prospects of an election are always looming. Should one occur, either resulting from a confidence vote or election call, if the current federal government has their way they will likely make 'crime' and punishment a central election issue. While they themselves and media commentators believe that the punishment agenda is a strength of the Conservative Party, in my view their one-size-fits-all approach is their greatest weakness.

For instance, the government routinely touts their support for victims of 'crime' in every initiative they roll-out. However, they have consistently focussed on increasing sentencing as a primary means to meet their needs, as well as advertising resources and services (read 12 November 2010 post) that are woefully insufficient in meeting the other complex needs victims may have (read 6 April 2010 post) such as counselling, restitution and opportunities to meet with perpetrators to receive answers to their questions, acknowledgement of the harms done, and assurances for their safety in the future where desired.

The Conservatives have also professed that they are protecting the public by keeping prisoners behind bars. While they may be passing legislation that will likely lead to more people spending more time in prison with fewer chances of release, they have offered little regarding how this approach will help reintegrate prisoners into society. And it is the question of re-entry, a situation that the vast majority of prisoners will inevitably encounter, that is their achilles heel. With many states in south of the border and other jurisdictions moving away from the penal policies we are pursuing because of the proven failure of mass incarceration, one has to wonder whether Canadians will place the elation of punishment they may feel as being worth the price of admission, particularly when we could be spending our money on preventing victimization by investing in our communities, come election time.

The Need for a Canadian Punishment Legislation Moratorium

When I was growing up, my parents reminded me that if there appeared to be an easy solution to a complex problem it was probably too good to be true. I would argue that the same can be said about the minority Conservative Government of Canada's approach to dealing with the complex conflicts and harms in our communities that we call 'crime' - a 'solution' that will only exacerbate the social issues we face.

As we continue to march towards an increase in our reliance on incarceration, with the human and economic consequences that this will entail, it is important to remind ourselves that these developments are not necessary. Alternatives that do not involve expanding the monuments of our collective failure to address social issues in meaningful ways that we call prisons are available, although they may require more effort and imagination than simply erecting a concrete box surrounded by barbed-wire fences.

In 2010, I, along with others (see below) called for a Canadian Punishment Legislation Moratorium in order to avoid deepening the current capacity crisis in our penal institutions (read open letter; downloadable form; 1 September 2010 article). While this initiative did not garner mass support, it was a tremendous learning experience for me that will inform similar initiatives in the future.

To those of you who signed-up in support of the moratorium, who sent me e-mails and letters of encouragement, or who have read the blog logging over 10,000 hits this past year - thank you. While 2010 was a very challenging year, it has been a rewarding one as well and I appreciate your support. With persistence turning points will emerge and change will come.

In solidarity,

Justin

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CANADIAN PUNISHMENT LEGISLATION MORATORIUM

Whereas the overall frequency of police-reported crime in Canada has been steadily declining since 1991 according to Statistics Canada.

Whereas increasing the use of imprisonment has failed to enhance public safety in locations that have shifted towards a mass incarceration model (e.g. certain jurisdictions in the United States and the United Kingdom).

Whereas imprisonment does not meet many of the complex and pressing needs of those most impacted by crime including victims, those in conflict with the law and other members of our communities.

Whereas many of our prisons are already fill and unable to absorb the influx of additional prisoners serving longer sentences without further compromising Canada's 1975 commitment to the United Nations' Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners which states "9(1) Where sleeping accommodation is in individual cells or rooms, each prisoner shall occupy by night a cell or room by himself [or herself]".

Whereas Canada, as well as its provinces and territories, are in the midst of an economic crisis where most jurisdictions are looking to make cuts to government programs to balance the books and thus cannot afford to take on large expenditures such as building new multi-million dollar prisons.

I support a moratorium on federal punishment legislation that is exacerbating the capacity crisis in our penal institutions by creating additional demand for prison beds likely with little effect on the rate of crime or safety in our communities, at a high fiscal cost.

Susan Boyd, University of Victoria, Victoria

Shannon Taylor, Elizabeth Fry Society, Saskatoon

Valerie Veillard, Elizabeth Fry Society, Saskatoon

Ethel Ahenakew, Elizabeth Fry Society, Saskatoon

Eunice Bergston, Elizabeth Fry Society, Saskatoon

Andy Barber, Elizabeth Fry Society, Saskatoon

Mike Larsen, York University, Toronto

Gordon Groulx, York University, Toronto

Joanne Cardinal, University of Ottawa, Ottawa

Jesse Ring, Elizabeth Fry Society, Ottawa

Alanna Manchak, Edmonton

Christine Lamont, Sisters in Action and Solidarity Project, Vancouver

Paulette Thomson, Sisters in Action and Solidarity Project, Vancouver

Carly Hogeveen, Human Rights in Action Collective, Vancouver

Sarah Rizun, Human Rights in Action Collective, Vancouver

Lara-Lisa Condello, Human Rights in Action Collective, Vancouver

Jennifer Allan, Human Rights in Action Collective, Vancouver

Catherine Bistrisk, Human Rights in Action Collective, Vancouver

Tricia Haggerty, Calgary

Erica Meiners, Northern Illinois University, Chicago

Susan Haines, Ottawa

Deb Feldman-Stewart, Kingston

Graham Stewart, John Howard Society of Canada (retired), Bath

Matthew Yeager, King's University College - UWO, London

Ronald Lahaye, Mount Royal University, Calgary

Jeannot Duchesne, CSRQ, Saint-Blaise-sur-Richilieu

Nicolas Carrier, Carleton University, Ottawa

Claire Delisle, University of Ottawa, Ottawa

Jennifer Kilty, University of Ottawa, Ottawa

Erin Beckwell, University of Regina, Regina

Ailsa Watkinson, University of Regina, Regina

Kevin Walby, University of Toronto, Toronto

Richard Hudler, Toronto

Robert Gaucher, University of Ottawa, Ottawa

Karen Suurtaam, Toronto

Charlie Diamond, Toronto

Pat McGill, Napier Pilot City Trust, Napier (New Zealand)

Laura Lorenzetti, LaSalle

Tia Dafnos, York University, Toronto

Giselle Dias, York University, Toronto

Rick Power-Fardy, Ottawa

Phyllis Iverson, Joint Effort, Vancouver

Elaine Spef, Prisoner Justice Day Committee, Vancouver

Orina Stonechild, Books to Prisoners, Vancouver

Bryonie Baxter, Ottawa

Justin Piché, Carleton University, Ottawa

* Pledges of support from individuals who wanted to remain anonymous (n=18)