Watchdog says feds will spend $1.8B on prisons
CTV.ca News Staff
Date: Tuesday Jun. 22, 2010 2:04 PM ET
Canada's budget watchdog says the Conservative government will end up spending $1.8 billion to provide the number of jail cells it will need as a result of newly introduced tough-on-crime legislation.
In a new report, Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page says the government's recent legislation to restrict pre-sentence jail credit will extend the average prisoner's sentence by about 159 days -- leaving Canada with a need for thousands more jail cells then it currently has.
As the so-called Truth in Sentencing Act comes into effect, Page predicts there will be some 17,058 inmates in the federal system at any given time. That's a major increase over the estimated 13,304 prisoners at present.
According to the estimates put together by Page's office, Canada will need to build 4,189 federal jail cells at a cost of $1.8 billion over the next five years-- and that doesn't include the needs at the provincial level.
"If you look at average head counts, they are twice as big in the provincial system -- 26,000 every year versus 13,000 at the federal level," Page told reporters Tuesday.
"The provinces and the territories carry the weight of the correctional services system in Canada so the impact is going to be enormous on the provinces and territories."
Page tabled his most recent report in response to a request from Liberal MP Mark Holland, who serves as the public safety critic for his party.
Holland warns that the cost of building extra prison cells is only one of 13 crime-related bills that the Conservative government is pushing forward.
"This figure for one (crime) bill is enormous, and we have to remember this is one bill," Holland said. "When you start thinking about all of the other (crime) bills -- 13 -- this can crush Canada's budget, it can destroy and cannibalize the other departments.
"How are we going to afford our health care? How are we afford education? How are we going to afford our military if we have these failed Republican policies eating away at all the other departments?"
Page questioned the impact the prison-spending would have on Ottawa's bottom line over the next five years, when prison costs will average $363 million a year.
"It's a lot of money in a period of time we're generating deficits," Page said.
With files from The Canadian Press
$1.8B is a lot of money to spend to provide more jail cells and some may argue that it is a waste of money but we do need some place to keep the criminals. Spending that money is necessary unless you want criminals roaming the streets just because there is no place to put them. My opinion about the spending of &1.8B on jail cells is reasonable because criminals are also human's and they need some place to stay. Some criminals have life sentences and will never have the opportunity to live a normal life again, and yes some criminals do deserve that sentence for what they have done. Something else to take into consideration is some criminals have been wrongly convicted and they have to live in prison for years, and they do deserve to live in a reasonable conditions. This budget does take away from other departments but I do not consider it to be very useful and it's not wasting money because it's for a good cause(to keep criminals in jail). To conclude, think about this, if we spend the money on extra jail cells we will have our criminals locked up rather them let out early and letting them roam the streets just because there was no space for them in prison.
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