The topic: The rising costs of the criminal justice system (CJS).

What’s new: According to documents obtained through the Access to Information Act, overall CJS costs increased by 36 percent from 2002-2012. The 2016 document, prepared for the Deputy Minister of Justice on trends in the CJS, revealed that policing, court systems, and corrections costs were among the highest noted. Statistics since 2012 were not presented in the package.

Why it’s important: The nation’s criminal justice system is an expensive machine comprised of several moving parts. Over a ten year span, policing costs have grown by 43 percent, court system costs by 21 percent, and correction costs by 32 percent.

In terms of policing expenses, Jeffrey Monaghan, a professor of criminology at Carleton University, explains that if one police union requests a pay increase, a neighbouring union will demand the same. This “horse race” is one of the largest contributors to the upsurge in policing costs, says Monaghan, adding that the mandate for officers has changed as well. Police are now expected to make community outreach a priority, thus doing the work of a volunteer on an officer’s salary.

Despite there being many expenses weighing on the court system, Ian Carter, the vice president of the Canadian Bar Association (CBA), says that nothing has had a greater impact on the system than court delays. A decision that came out of the Supreme Court last year assigning time frames in which cases at the provincial and superior levels need to be heard, tried, and closed; 18 and 30 months, respectively. If cases are not closed before the prescribed time, the Crown pays a fee. Carter says that arbitrarily selecting time limits was an ill-thought-out decision Canadians are now paying for.

Another expense taxpayers’ dollars are covering is a corrections system impeding rehabilitation, says Monaghan. With approximately 5000 people entering prisons every year, a bottleneck is being created, breeding violence and accelerating the wear-and-tear on aging structures. Monaghan says funds are allocated towards accommodating growth, rather than improving parole programs and as a result, resources are spent adapting to the problem rather than solving it.

What the government says: Ian McLeod, a media relations representative for the Department of Justice, wrote in an email that “the federal government is committed to ensuring our criminal justice system works efficiently and effectively,” but failed to provide concrete examples of how the government is tackling the rising costs of the CJS.

What others say: It’s a complex problem with a complex solution, says Monaghan, calling the CJS “a whole system of broken stages.”

Carter agrees, adding that current strategies being employed are “expensive way(s) to deal with the problem,” and equates them to expanding a highway to accommodate volume rather than working to lessen traffic; it is neither cost-effective nor does it directly address the issue.

What’s next: A government task force has been established to privatize police, meaning that tasks including court duty, investigations, and crime scene analysis, would be carried out by civilians with the same schooling as police officers, with the exception of weapons training. These pseudo-police will work for 40 percent less than a salaried officer, says Monaghan.

The CBA compiled a list of ten solutions to solve the court delay issue, which includes eliminating preliminary inquiries, thus limiting the number of cases being tried, says Carter. Fewer offenders going to trial means fewer hours logged by judges, resulting in a lower risk of court delays and therefore fewer fees incurred by the Crown.

As there is no current plan to address the lack of resources for prisoners hoping to reintegrate into society, Monaghan says it’s likely the rate of repeat offenders will rise, reinforcing the system that overpays its over-worked police force and strains court resources.

 

Supplemental material:

This is a document prepared for the Deputy Minister of Justice on current trends in the criminal justice system and it was prepared by the Research and Statistics Division of the Department of Justice. It was very helpful and well-organized. The ample amount of charts  and thorough bullet points made it easy to understand the information and isolate key facts that would make a good story.

 

Original requests:

Previously released records:

Copies of correspondence: