“Releasing an offender from prison to the community with very little savings, limited skills or options for employment and without a comprehensive, integrated plan to meet unresolved mental health or addiction issues undermines their chances for success,” said Sapers, who is Canada’s correctional investigator.

He said the CSC has a dual mandate of both ensuring the secure custody of offenders in the prison system and facilitating their proper rehabilitation and release.

Despite the CSC’s two obligations, Sapers said only five per cent of the nearly $2.4 billion in spending is allocated to institutional and community programs for reintegration.

“If 95 per cent of your budget is being spent on one of those mandates, it just doesn’t leave very much for the other,” he said.

Too few released on parole

Sapers also noted a need for placing offenders on parole, rather than waiting for their statutory release.

Statutory release from prison -- which happens to 70 per cent of the population -- occurs when an offender has served two-thirds of a sentence without being released on parole.

Research shows those released on parole are less likely to re-offend than those out on statutory release, Sapers said, noting it was more likely for a dangerous offender to be denied parole.

“But this is where it gets a little bit contradictory,” he said. “It doesn’t make sense to put your highest risk offenders out into the community with the shortest period of supervision and support.”


Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/prison-wat ... z3Fi2LPmZK

I hope judges are adding and extra amount to account for that.

Judges often don't even sentence long enough in the first place.

Anyone else feel like only pedophiles and murderers are getting parole?

I personally don't care one way or the other. The batshit crazy criminals that continue to show an escalating violence or criminal pattern shouldn't be released period because a once weekly visit to a parole officer for probation or mandatory release isn't going to change their mental makeup no matter how long they make those visits compulsory.

These people belong in prison for life and the social engineers in our justice system and groups like the John Howard Society who keep getting them released into society to wreak havoc on the rest of us should be put in the cell next to them.

As for the guys doing time that have a chance I have no problem spending the money to give them a shot but, if they continue to fuck up and keep getting returned to prison then see the above post about how they should be dealt with.

State of Incarceration

Canada’s crime rate is at its lowest point in more than forty years. So why are we spending hundreds of millions of dollars to get tough on crime now? More prisons cells, tougher laws for parole, more mandatory minimum sentences: they are all now part of Canada’s high-cost justice system – and they are all ideas that failed in the United States. (see more crime stats)

Our criminal justice system is currently undergoing a radical rethink. Where will it lead? Will the crime rate continue to fall as our prison population increases? What is being done to prepare prisoners for life after jail? These are some of the issues under consideration in an incisive new documentary that looks at where our criminal justice system is headed.

As Canada builds 2700 new federal prison cells -- and strengthens laws that will keep those new cells full – is our government making us safer? Or is this simply a political move—one that ignores research and statistics?

“Based on what we hear from the government, it sounds like crime is the most dire issue facing Canadians,” explains State of Incarceration filmmaker Andrew Gregg. “It’s striking to realize that the crime rate is as low as it is, yet we’re undergoing the largest prison expansion since the 1930s. I wanted to find out why.”

A Texas prison

Greg travelled to Texas, one of the most relentless “tough on crime” states in the US, to discover that they are actually closing prisons and investing heavily in programs to get convicts released. The crew then went to California, to see how their “three strikes” mandatory minimum sentence law virtually bankrupted the state and paralyzed the prison system by increasing capacity to a shocking 200%. “It made sense to us to go and look at what happened in the US because we are implementing ideas here that they have already tried there. Canadians essentially live just north of the world’s largest incarceration experiment. We wanted to see if we’ve learned anything from their experience.”

The film also tells the story of Lifeline, a federally funded program based in Windsor, Ontario, designed to help long-term convicts prepare for life on the outside. Lifeline won awards and was studied and copied by justice officials in other countries. It was even hailed as a success on The Department of Justice Canada’s own website, before its budget was abruptly cut. Lifeline is an example of what gets funded and what doesn’t in this time of flux for Canadian criminal justice.

The film features an exclusive interview with Justice Minister Peter Mackay

“It’s a very complex subject with new studies being released constantly. I was surprised to learn that adding more prisons doesn’t affect the crime rate,” says Gregg. “I wanted to make sure we had a large cross-section of voices on these issues so viewers hear from criminologists, wardens, community activists, academics, and government appointees like Kevin Page, the former Parliamentary Budget Officer, Howard Sapers the Correctional Investigator of Canada and Justice Minister Peter Mackay.

“We also talk to ex-cons and current prisoners, including a convicted multiple murderer who has spent 37 years in both US and Canadian prisons and has a lot to say about the view from inside.”

State of Incarceration is a searing, thought-provoking look at a highly contentious issue as our criminal justice system undergoes a major refit that may not be either effective or affordable, and might even be taking us backwards.

Directed by Andrew Gregg for 90th Parallel Productions in association with CBC.


http://www.cbc.ca/doczone/episodes/new-season-state-of-incarceration

But the overall point is that the stats prove that longer sentences make the public LESS SAFE and COST MORE. It hardens the criminals, and then they're out on the streets whether they're reformed or not.

It's funny because now in both the USA and Canada, crime is at 40 to 60 year lows.

But I guess the long sentences are making us unsafe. Meanwhile in progressive Europe with low sentences and reform programs, crime is shooting up.

I'd blame immigration but 'Dat's raysist!'

Bottom line you are not selling me that long sentences served to completion are making crime rates go up or criminals more violent given the actual facts about the crime rate.

Harpers plan is increase both crime and sentence length?