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Gary Mauser
Canada has a serious problem with drug gangs, as anyone can see who is not willfully blind. Canada's gang problem has been festering for decades, overlooked and even encouraged by long-standing federal policies and practices. What can be done?
To put this in perspective, Canadians are considered relatively safe on an international scale. According to United Nations surveys, Canada's homicide rate of 1.8 per 100,000 falls in the middle of the pack. India's homicide rate, at 3.5, is twice ours, and Mexico's at 13.4 is shockingly high. On the other hand, several countries, such as, Israel, Switzerland and England, all have homicide rates below 1.0. However, it is a truism that crime statistics are meaningless -- until you or your family face a criminal attack. If we wish to keep Canada's crime rates from getting worse, we must take action now.
The crime problem is not with older people but our youth. (Stats Can defines "youth" as perpetrators aged 12 to 17). The youth homicide rate has more than doubled from 1.3 in 2001 to 2.9 per 100,000 youth population in 2007. This was the second highest rate ever recorded in Canada; the highest rate was the year before in 2006, 3.3 per 100,000. All indications are that 2008 was worse, although Stats Can has yet to release the figures. What is wrong with our young people? In a word, gangs.
Gang-related homicides have soared from 5 percent of all homicides back in 1997 to 20 percent in 2007. It is no exaggeration to say that criminal gangs in Canada are out of control. Criminal violence is particularly acute in our larger cities - the greater Vancouver region and Toronto - but gangs infest smaller towns in all provinces and territories as well. The only realistic solution must come from Ottawa but a minority government is in no position to take bold decisive action.
The Conservative government in Ottawa is attempting to crack down on gangs and drug violence, but they cannot get support from any of the opposition parties. The NDP and the Liberals claim publicly that it is important to deal with criminal gangs, but behind closed doors, in parliamentary committees, the opposition parties continually work to undermine all legitimate attempts to take action. In a minority government, the opposition can all too easily stifle governmental efforts behind the scenes. Unfortunately, the opposition prefers to play games rather than accept their responsibilities.
Canadian courts are not seriously concerned with protecting the public. Recent news stories reveal that many, too many, violent criminals commit their crimes when they are out on bail or probation. Reporter Kim Bolan in the Vancouver Sun (August 14, 2009) reported that both of the two men arrested last week were out on bail on earlier charges. It is a scandal that courts continue to allow convicted violent criminals to roam the streets looking for victims. Courts should keep dangerous offenders in prison longer.
Another egregious problem is "double credit for dead time." "Dead time" is time in pre-sentence custody. Criminals are credited with two days for every single day they spend waiting for trial. Thus, if a convicted criminal is sentenced to two years in jail, but has waited six-months to come to court, he is credited with having already served one year, so he must only serve an additional year. For example, in July two members of the Vancouver Hells Angels were convicted of weapons offences but they were only sentenced to just one day in prison after double-time credit was given to them for pre-sentence custody (Vancouver Province, July 27, 2009). The prosecutor asked for 45 months, but the courts decided these criminals only deserved one day. Is that justice?
The Conservative government introduced Bill C-25 in Parliament in April this year in order to limit credit for time spent in pre-sentencing custody. Unfortunately, the NDP and the Liberals are doing everything they can in committee to stall consideration of this bill. Apparently, the only way the government can get its legislation passed is to make each bill a vote of confidence; in effect, to threaten an election.
Another example is that past Liberal governments have preferred to fool the public by focusing on guns rather than criminals. Instead of jailing violent criminals the Liberal government of Jean Chrétien, supported by the NDP, preferred to concentrate on hunters and target shooters by making them register their rifles and shotguns rather than doing anything meaningful to protect the Canadian public. The problem isn't hunters but gangs. See my paper, Hubris in the North, on my website (www.garymauser.net) for a more complete explanation of the problem. In summary, the long-gun registry is conceptually misguided and flawed. It fails to prevent gun crime. The long-gun registry has not been able to reduce criminal violence and yet it has wasted over 2 billion dollars to date. The vast majority of crime guns are smuggled into Canada, not stolen from legitimate gun owners, as was claimed when the gun registry began.
In an effort to repeal the ineffective long-gun registry, the Conservatives introduced Bill C-391 that would stop this unnecessary waste of money. In an effort to reduce partisanship, Bill C-391 was introduced as a private member's bill rather than a government bill. Calculations show that Bill C-391 could pass, even if the Conservatives only have a minority, because many NDP and Liberal back-benchers have been critical of the long-gun registry. Unfortunately, party leaders Ignatieff and Layton prefer to silently sabotage this bill in committee. That way they can have their cake and eat it too; they can claim publicly that they are concerned about crime while they stop the Conservatives from actually doing anything about gang crime.
We need a majority government in order to pass crime legislation that focuses on protecting citizens rather than coddling criminals.
As the gang problem festers, Canadian courts are failing the public time and again. Courts are not seriously concerned with protecting the public. We need a majority government in order to pass crime legislation that focuses on protecting citizens rather than coddling criminals
Trend in Youth homicide rates
(the number of victims killed by perpetrators aged 12-17 per 100,000 youth population)
Youth homicide rate
1999 1.86
2000 1.74
2001 1.28
2002 1.67
2003 2.33
2004 1.72
2005 2.80
2006 3.30
2007 2.90
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