HANSARD
Printed and Published by Nova Scotia Hansard Reporting Services
Ms. Maureen MacDonald (Chair)
Mr.Chuck Porter (Vice-Chairman)
Mr. Patrick Dunn
Mr. Keith Bain
Mr. Graham Steele
Mr. David Wilson (Sackville-Cobequid)
Mr. Keith Colwell
Mr. Leo Glavine
Ms. Diana Whalen
[Mr. Wayne Gaudet replaced Mr. Keith Colwell]
In Attendance:
Ms. Charlene Rice
Legislative Committee Clerk
Mr. Terry Spicer
Assistant Auditor General
Mr. Gordon Hebb
Chief Legislative Counsel
Department of Justice
Ms. Marian Tyson, Deputy Minister
Mr. Clarence Guest, Executive Director, Finance & Administrative Division
Mr. Robert Purcell, Director, Policy Planning & Research
Mr. Fred Honsberger, Executive Director, Correctional Services
Ms. Valerie Pottie Bunge, Senior Policy Analyst
Public Prosecution Service
Mr. Martin Herschorn, Director
Mr. Adrian Reid, Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions
Mr. Paul McNeil, Director of Business Affairs
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HALIFAX, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 2008
STANDING COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC ACCOUNTS
9:00 A.M.
CHAIR
Ms. Maureen MacDonald
VICE-CHAIRMAN
Mr. Chuck Porter
MADAM CHAIR: Order, please. I'd like to call the committee to order, please. Today we have before us the Department of Justice and the Public Prosecution Service. We'll begin in the usual manner with introductions from the members and from the Auditor General's Office and staff and guests. We'll have brief opening comments from the witnesses, approximately five minutes for the deputy and the Director of Public Prosecution Service, and we'll proceed then in the usual manner with rounds of questioning.
[The committee members and witnesses introduced themselves.]
MADAM CHAIR: I want to just mention to the witnesses that before you speak, make sure your light is on because this is the recording mechanism for Legislative TV and Hansard. Also, there is no need to speak into the microphones, they can adjust them. I believe that the microphones are all positioned in a way that they should be able to pick up your conversation. In other words, try not to fiddle with them - they don't like that upstairs, it hurts their ears, so thank you very much. Ms. Tyson, the floor is yours, welcome.
MS. MARIAN TYSON: Thank you very much. Staff have been introduced, so I will just say it's my pleasure to speak to you this morning about our crime prevention strategy and related issues.
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As I'm sure everyone is aware, the provincial government has set out five provincial priorities, and included among those priorities is making our communities safer. In December, the Department of Justice released Time to Fight Crime Together; this strategy was created in consultation with Nova Scotians.
A minister's task force - it was a previous minister, Murray Scott - held more than 40 meetings last year and heard from 800 citizens. In addition, there was a Web site and there were about 2,000 hits to the Web site. The task force heard the concerns of all of the people who appeared before it, or spoke or wrote to it, and gathered information about what was working well in Nova Scotia, as well as suggestions from the people who appeared before it.
Time to Fight Crime Together places a strong emphasis on collaboration with other government departments, with our justice partners which include the police, the court system and the corrections system. The strategy will also be rolled out in conjunction with other efforts such as government's response to the Nunn Commission and the recently introduced Child and Youth Strategy.
We are getting noticed by other jurisdictions for our proactive approach and what is unique about Nova Scotia's approach is that we are connecting like we have never connected in the past with other departments such as Community Services and Health Promotion and Protection, just to name two. As one outside observer shared with a staff member just recently, what is unique about Nova Scotia is that we are pulling all the levers at the same time toward a common goal.
There are three pillars to the strategy that will advance us toward our crime reduction goals. The three pillars are enforcement, intervention and prevention. Reducing crime and making our streets safer requires efforts in all three areas.
The recent announcement of 70 new officers supports the enforcement pillar. The 70 officers are in addition to 80 announced last year. This represents a significant financial commitment toward reducing crime and the resources we have targeted, we believe, are already making a huge difference. For example, the Pictou County Integrated Street Crime team has had considerable success. The team includes RCMP officers and officers from the four other municipal units in Pictou County. They've arrested 42 people and laid 128 criminal charges.
Intervention is also a key pillar if we're going to reduce the number of repeat offenders and reach our goal. The Youth Attendance Centre, which turned one year old this month, appears to be a strong success. Youth are required to be more accountable and report in to staff there and they are also given support to help them deal with issues that brought them into contact with the justice system in the first place. The success of that pilot has
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convinced us that we need to expand it and subject to budget approval, we plan to expand to Cape Breton and the Valley so that more youth can be helped.
Let me conclude by saying that we, in the Department of Justice, are optimistic that the emphasis on intervention and prevention in addition to enforcement will lead to positive outcomes. Thank you for this opportunity, I and my staff look forward to answering specific questions.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you very much. Mr. Herschorn.
MR. MARTIN HERSCHORN: Good morning, I am pleased to be here this morning to provide you with information about Nova Scotia's Public Prosecution Service. I realize that in preparation for this meeting you've been given some background material on the PPS. I'd just like to take a few minutes to flesh some of that information out and to emphasize a few key points about our roles and responsibilities.
The Nova Scotia Public Prosecution Service was established in 1990 as Canada's first statutorily-based independent prosecution service. This means that all prosecutions within the jurisdiction of the Attorney General of Nova Scotia are the responsibility of the Director of Public Prosecutions. Crown Attorneys, responsible to the director, conduct prosecutions independently of the Attorney General. This independence is important to Nova Scotians because it removes criminal prosecutions from any possibility of political influence and helps to safeguard prosecutorial objectivity and fairness.
I want to emphasize that the PPS is separate and distinct from the Department of Justice. Each has its own budget and each is operated by a deputy head. However, we do share the same minister and some administrative services like Human Resources and Information Technology. Nova Scotia's 90 Crown Attorneys, assisted by 69 support and administrative staff in 19 offices across the province, prosecute some 40,000 criminal charges and about 4,000 regulatory offence charges in courts across Nova Scotia each year. We do this on a budget of $17.6 million.
Aside from the prosecution of criminal and quasi-criminal charges, our Crown Attorneys also provide advice to police upon their request. Crown Attorneys are prosecutors, not investigators, they do not lay criminal charges. After a charge is laid by the police, it is the Crown Attorney who decides whether the charge should proceed to trial. The Crown Attorney makes that decision by reviewing all of the evidence and deciding whether there is a realistic prospect of conviction and whether it is in the public interest to proceed.
When a matter does go to trial, the Crown Attorney's job is not to win a conviction, the Crown Attorney's job is to present the evidence. When handling a prosecution, a Crown Attorney must represent the interests of the general public. The Crown Attorney is not the
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victim's lawyer, because there are times when the Crown Attorney must disagree with the wishes of an individual victim.
At the moment, one of the most significant issues facing the PPS is that surrounding recruitment, retention and succession planning. In the last 18 months we have had nine Crown Attorneys leave us for higher-paying positions elsewhere: in Alberta, in Ontario, with the federal prosecution service now known as the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, and Nova Scotia Legal Aid. We had two retirements last year and we expect two or three this year. In the next two to five years we will lose as many as a dozen senior Crown Attorneys to retirement.
Acquiring and maintaining a first-rate team of Crown Attorneys is a major concern in light of the increasing demands being placed on the PPS. We are seeing increasingly complex cases that take far more time than ever to deal with. Internet child pornography, complex frauds and crimes of violence are just a few examples. We are anticipating a heavier caseload as a result of the expected 250 more police officers on the street by 2010.
As the government establishes specialized problem-solving courts such as the Mental Health Court, we'll have to assign prosecutors to those courts. As the fight against organized crime continues and the government moves to a proceeds of crime regime, we'll have to supply additional resources in that area. So there's no question, the PPS does have its share of challenges over the next few years.
Just before I close I would like to pay tribute to a most dedicated group of Crown Attorneys and support staff. We are fortunate to have a team of hard-working professionals who are absolutely committed to the job they do. They are integral to maintaining the public safety here in Nova Scotia and they take that responsibility very seriously. I am proud to work alongside them.
That concludes my remarks, Madam Chair. I'd be happy to take any questions.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you very much. The opening round of questioning will be with the NDP caucus, 20 minutes. Mr. Steele.
MR. GRAHAM STEELE: Mr. Herschorn, your opening statement leads to one big, obvious question, do you need more money to do your job and, if so, how much do you need?
MR. HERSCHORN: We will need more money to do our job. We have a history of very good support, from Attorneys General and from governments, since the inception of the service in 1990. We will be putting budget submissions together through the normal budgetary process, which has served us well over the past decade and more, to seek the resources we need.
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I mentioned servicing Mental Health Courts, a Proceeds of Crime Unit being established, the addition of Boots to the Streets program - by 2010, putting 250 additional police officers - and that coupled with the possibility of additional police officers coming from the federal government through a program that's still in the process of being developed, these are pressures which will manifest themselves in additional work for Crown Attorneys, and we anticipate that the government will respond to our budgetary requests.
MR. STEELE: How much more money do you need?
MR. HERSCHORN: It's difficult to quantify it at this point. Some of these programs have yet to be fleshed out. For example, the Mental Health Court, there was just an initial meeting of a steering committee within the last two weeks. So it's difficult to quantify the amount that will be required.
MR. STEELE: The budget is going to be tabled within the next two months. Surely by now you know how much money you need for the Prosecution Service to do its job. I'm just looking for a number - do you need $1 million, $2 million, $5 million, $10 million? Give us an order of magnitude.
MR. HERSCHORN: I think we're probably talking, and this is a rough figure, in the $2 million area would be the type of enhancement we would need to our budget in order to respond to some of these programs. Now some of the programs are phased in; for example, the Boots to the Streets program is through until 2010.
MR. STEELE: Now I'm here today with enormous sympathy for the work that you and your prosecutors do and we want to make sure that you have the resources that you need. I am concerned about what we see. The Prosecution Service, as you said in your opening statement, has lost nine experienced Crown Attorneys recently and more are on their way out. In the nationally advertised competition to fill those vacancies, it is my understanding that you did not get enough qualified applicants even to fill the vacancies; you have an unresolved human rights complaint concerning the policy on maternity leave; and there is an unresolved lawsuit filed by the Crown Attorneys Association against the province, alleging that the province's labour relations practices with respect to Crown Attorneys violates the Charter of Rights.
Does the Public Prosecution Service have a human resources problem?
MR. HERSCHORN: We have human resources challenges. The recruitment and retention issue should not be misconstrued. We are attracting, in most cases, a sufficient array of qualified candidates, what we are losing is experience. A skilled Crown Attorney is not produced right out of law school. That individual, having received their law degree, acquires the skills and the judgmental ability through experience on the job, prosecuting over a period of time. When we lose people with seven to 10 years of experience, as we have lost
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in the recent past, that creates a challenge for us. We are getting good response to most of our competitions, they are all publicly advertised, and in many cases we are getting good young people who are attracted to the service because it's a rewarding and challenging position.
[9:15 a.m.]
With respect to maternity leave, this is a longstanding frustration, both for the Nova Scotia Crown Attorneys Association and our services management. This is an issue that is within the mandate of the Public Service Commission and we have been encouraging the Public Service Commission to address that.
I'm not going to in any great deal touch on a lawsuit which is currently before the courts. There are positions of the Attorney General, who is responding to the lawsuit, and of the Crown Attorneys Association, who are ably represented, and that will play itself out in the courtroom.
MR. STEELE: There are, in fact, some people who would suggest that the fundamental problem here, as you say, is not with the management of the Public Prosecution Service but rather with the fact that the service's human resources are managed by the Public Service Commission. So your pay, your contract negotiations, human resource policies like maternity leave, even discipline - essentially all aspects of your human resources are not in your hands but in the hands of the Public Service Commission. Are you happy or unhappy with the way the Public Service Commission is managing your human resources?
MR. HERSCHORN: We have a number of concerns that we've brought to the attention of the Public Service Commission over the years. Maternity is probably highest on our list - it was first raised in 2004 and we're now approaching four years since that issue first surfaced, with no resolve to it. At the moment that matter is, as I believe you alluded to, a complaint before the Human Rights Commission.
We have another issue of concern which touches on the independence of our service. A key indicia of independence is a salary setting mechanism, and we have a salary setting mechanism in place. In 2000, the government accepted a salary setting mechanism and entered into voluntarily collective bargaining with respect to salaries with its Crown Attorneys - that deals with the Crown Attorneys who are represented. My salary - the position of Director of Public Prosecutions - is set by Statute by the Public Prosecutions Act.
We have a group - one of the individuals to my left represents that group - of our middle managers whose salary determination mechanism is not fully independent. There is an element of independence but, in my view, it is insufficient at the moment to bring our service to a full measure of independence, which is required under the Statute. We are encouraging and working with the Public Service Commission to get a resolve to that situation as well.
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There are a number of challenges. You perhaps overstate the situation a little bit by saying that all these HR issues are within the provenance of the Public Service Commission. Many of them, we work in concert with them; we have our own human resources consultant, now a member of the Public Service Commission, who works closely with us on competitions, on postings and all the various HR aspects.
MR. STEELE: There are some people who would argue that this system where you have independent prosecution services but the human resources of which are controlled by the government - by the Public Service Commission - is a threat to the independence of the prosecution service. As we all know, the very reason why we have a Prosecution Service is to be independent. After the Marshall Inquiry, that was a fundamental condition for the setting up of your office and it causes me an enormous concern to hear the Director of Public Prosecutions sitting here in the Legislative Chamber, saying that he feels that the independence of his service is being compromised.
The role of the Public Service Commission seems to me to be the Achilles' heel of the whole system. That is the point at which the government controls or could control what happens within the Public Prosecution Service and, since we live in a province where recently we saw the Minister of the Public Service Commission charged and convicted of an offence committed while driving a Public Service Commission vehicle, it is not hard to think of scenarios where there might be a perception that the Public Service Commission may wish to influence or may have the opportunity to influence. As we all know, in the justice system it is the perception that matters. We are all familiar with the famous quotation that justice must not only be done but undoubtedly and manifestly be seen to be done.
Do you think it's appropriate that we have a system where the Director of Public Prosecutions does not control his own human resources?
MR. HERSCHORN: It is my responsibility to ensure that there is no inappropriate influence or interference with the prosecution function and I take that responsibility very seriously. I can assure you that with respect to the exercise of prosecutorial discretion, which is at the core of the role of the Crown Attorney, there is no inappropriate interference in prosecutions.
To respond more directly to your question - over time, if there is not a constructive resolve to issues confronting the Prosecution Service, its ability to operate effectively, and hence its independence, can be threatened over time through sort of an indirect means. I'm not saying that is occurring now but over time that could be and it's my responsibility to ensure that we do not reach that situation.
MR. STEELE: Let's be clear, you and I are both saying the same thing. Nobody is suggesting for a second that there is any inappropriate influence. What we are saying is that
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the system is structured in such a way that there is a perception that it could happen and, when it comes to the administration of justice, that is just as harmful.
Let me pick up on something you alluded to earlier, Mr. Herschorn. Crown Attorneys are not members of a union so they don't have access to the usual arbitration mechanisms for resolving grievances. Any discipline against a Crown Attorney is governed by the regular Civil Service rules for non-union positions. Those rules ultimately lead to a hearing before the Public Service Commission - or I should be precise, a panel chaired by the commissioner of the Public Service Commission - again, there a possibility here or the perception that the Public Service Commission could influence an individual Crown Attorney's career. Do you think it is appropriate that the system is set up in such a way that that could happen?
MR. HERSCHORN: Again, I go back to my responsibility as director of the service to ensure that there is no direct or indirect improper influence brought to bear on the work of our Crown Attorneys.
It's difficult to respond to your question for one principal reason - there has never been any triggering of this process as it relates to a Crown Attorney. In one sense this is an academic discussion, but as in most human endeavours, the integrity of the individual involved is key. I want to extend that approach to this process. Should it be triggered, we will watch it very closely to ensure that a fair dispute resolution mechanism is employed as it relates to our Crown Attorneys. I should add, there can always be improvements, there are other models.
There is a constituency within the Public Prosecution Service which reflects some of the aspects of your question and we are an evolving organization, now in our 17th year, and things may change. It is my responsibility to assess the situation as it evolves and to ensure that the public is always properly served by prosecutors who can exercise their prosecutorial discretion independently of any inappropriate influence.
MR. STEELE: I don't know how theoretical it is because as we know, the former president of the Crown Attorneys Association was disciplined - or what he took to be discipline, I think the service technically called it counselling - for things that he said in his role as president of the Crown Attorneys Association. Nevertheless, let's move on to the next question. Again, this is something you've alluded to already, Mr. Herschorn. Your personal independence is guaranteed by Statute. Individual Crown Attorneys, other than managers, have the benefit of the association, but managers in the Public Prosecution Service do not have your statutory protection and they do not have an association. Their wages, in terms of employment, are set by the Public Service Commission. Given the need for the independence of the Public Prosecution Service from other branches of government, do you think that's appropriate?
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MR. HERSCHORN: No, I don't. I have encouraged the Public Service Commission, and various ministers have been supportive in this regard, to bring about the final component into the salary setting mechanisms for our service, so that their managers have an appropriately structured independent mechanism for the setting of their remuneration.
MR. STEELE: Let's turn then to the issue about maternity leave. It's my understanding that a Crown Attorney who takes maternity leave is not credited with that year for purposes of seniority, pay or other benefits. One Crown Attorney in particular, Shauna MacDonald, has made it clear that the maternity leave policy is the main reason why she left the provincial Public Prosecution Service and joined the federal prosecution service. Not only does the federal government not have such a policy, but Ms. MacDonald was credited with the two years that she lost for the two maternity leaves she took while in the provincial service. Mr. Herschorn, am I correct that this provincial policy is set by the Public Service Commission and not by you?
MR. HERSCHORN: That is correct.
MR. STEELE: If you were managing your own human resources, would you change that policy?
MR. HERSCHORN: The management of the Public Prosecution Services has consistently taken the position that the existing rules governing maternity leave for Crown Attorneys ought to be altered so that Crown Attorneys who are confronting a leave situation do not suffer adversely from an arbitrary approach - from the approach that currently exists - the administration of maternity leave. You've touched on one of the aspects - the loss - because they are not performing the job during the period of maternity leave, that they're not able to be assessed and lose a year of relevant experience.
MR. STEELE: Mr. Herschorn, like a good prosecutor I'm going to point out to you that you've very skillfully evaded my question. My actual question was not what is the policy, I know what the policy is. My question is, what is your position on the policy? Would you change it if you controlled that policy?
MR. HERSCHORN: Yes.
MR. STEELE: As I mentioned, the Crown Attorneys Association is suing the province for violating the right to freedom of association under the Charter of Rights. The lawsuit was filed in March 2004 and I will table a copy of the statement of claim. The matter was set down for a week-long trial in July 2007. At the request of the government in a letter dated July 9, 2007, the trial was postponed in order that they could find a new lawyer since the previous lawyer representing the province found it necessary to withdraw. There is nothing in the court file since that letter of July 9, 2007; what is the current status of that lawsuit?
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MR. HERSCHORN: It's difficult for me to speak to that. The Attorney General of Nova Scotia was the respondent to that lawsuit as represented by counsel with the provincial Department of Justice. I'm really not in a position to speak as to the current status of that, nor would it be appropriate to speak to a matter that is currently before the court.
MR. STEELE: But does it not concern you that a lawsuit by your Crown Attorneys dealing with their working conditions is going on without any involvement from you?
MR. HERSCHORN: I'm integrally involved. I was discovered in that matter and I will be a witness in that proceeding.
MR. STEELE: And yet you're not able to tell us what the status of the lawsuit is, you don't know where it stands?
MR. HERSCHORN: I've not been apprised by counsel as to a date. I understand our counsel is pursuing with counsel for the Nova Scotia Crown Attorneys Association. Mr. Theman, who was also a party to that proceeding, is setting up a new trial date. I can't speak definitively to it because I'm not representing the Attorney General in the matter.
MR. STEELE: I would just like to point out that you are not - as you point out, Mr. Herschorn - it is not you who is being sued, it is not the Prosecution Service that is being sued, it is the province. The allegation is that it is the province, in other words the Government of Nova Scotia, that is interfering with the freedom of association of Crown Attorneys, which again causes me enormous concern and surely it speaks to a large degree to this question of independence which is at the heart of all of the questions that I'm asking you today. Does it concern you that your Crown Attorneys are suing the government?
MR. HERSCHORN: Yes, it's a serious concern. It is not a healthy situation, it's not one that is healthy, as I just mentioned, but I respect the right of the individuals concerned to assert their claim before the court and it will be adjudicated. From my perspective though, in terms of overall responsibility for the Public Prosecution Service, I would prefer that this matter be resolved and we get on with our core business which is protecting the public safety and providing solid prosecution services in the province.
MR. STEELE: Do you think that you should control your own human resources?
MR. HERSCHORN: At the moment, under the legislation, the Crown Attorneys of this province are civil servants. That's the regime that this House has decided is the appropriate regime for the delivery of Public Prosecution Services. There are other models - Nova Scotia Legal Aid has a different structure with the commission, it has control of its human resources and the administration of the budget which is allocated to it by the government. We're similar with respect to the budget matter, but different because our
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Crown Attorneys are civil servants on the HR side. Short answer, it will require a study if we're going to move in that direction.
MR. STEELE: I have one minute left, Mr. Herschorn, so let me change the topic for a second and I'll pick this up in the next round of questioning. On September 12, 2007, the Minister of Justice issued a directive to you, the Director of Public Prosecutions. I've never seen a copy of the directive, only the news release that was sent out by the government. According to the news release, "Mr. Scott has directed the prosecution service to use every possible measure to deal appropriately with people who commit violent crimes, or continue to commit crimes when they are released into the community and ordered to follow conditions." What, if anything, is now being done differently as a result of that directive?
[9:30 a.m.]
MR. HERSCHORN: That directive sent a clear message both to Crown Attorneys, but also to members of the public who would commit criminal acts that the prosecution service of the province, that the Attorney General of the province is committed to taking every appropriate step to deal with those who, in particular, commit violent acts. That was the case before the directive, the directive reinforced it; as I mentioned a moment ago it sends a message to the Crown Attorneys and beyond the Crown Attorneys to the members of the public who consider committing criminal activities, that those activities are to be considered very seriously and will be dealt with appropriately.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you, order. The time has now expired for the NDP caucus. Ms. Whalen for the Liberal caucus, you have 20 minutes.
MS. DIANA WHALEN: Welcome to everyone today, I think it's going to be an interesting session for all of us and we're glad to have you here. I wanted to start my questioning if I could with Ms. Tyson. Not very long ago you and I had a discussion about Victim Services and I'd like to carry on that discussion again and look at the budget and the allocation of resources toward that very important area of your department. You indicated the three pillars that you have in terms of your department, the enforcement, intervention and prevention, but I think another important aspect of your work is also what happens in the aftermath of a crime. I wondered if we could start with what the budget is right now for Victim Services?
MS. TYSON: I'm going to refer that to the Executive Director of Finance.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Guest.
MR. CLARENCE GUEST: The budget for the year 2007-08, the current fiscal year is $2.5 million.
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MS. WHALEN: Could you break that down into how much is available for counselling and direct services to victims of crime and their families.
MR. GUEST: The counselling component would be approximately $200,000 to $300,000, I don't have the exact numbers with me.
MS. WHALEN: In the newspaper it was quoted $220,000, would that seem the correct amount for that?
MR. GUEST: That would seem about right, yes.
MS. WHALEN: Can you explain how many staff members you have throughout the province?
MR. GUEST: There are 27 full time equivalents.
MS. WHALEN: In how many offices?
MR. GUEST: That I honestly don't know.
MS. WHALEN: I think there are four offices and one head office, a sort of central division, but I'm not certain so I was hoping you would be able to answer that. It certainly is a service available regionally, so you have a few regional services. What I'd really like to look at is that allocation of resources which I think is very important here at the Public Accounts Committee, which really is our focus, and looking at the value that we're getting and whether or not it's appropriate. Just to put it in context could you give us the total budget for the Department of Justice?
MR. GUEST: The net budget for 2007-08 is $128,205,000.
MS. WHALEN: So it is a fairly small percentage out of the total amount. I'm interested to see that our prosecution service is operating with a budget of $17.6 million and again, regionally across the province in many courts, operating a very big, significant service. What I would like to do is focus on the process and the access to counselling and support that is available in Nova Scotia.
By way of background - I know that Ms. Tyson and I had the discussion - I think it's important to know that I, like many MLAs and probably many people in Nova Scotia, believed that we have victim services in place and that when a crisis occurs or a horrific crime occurs that there is help for the people that are impacted. It was a great surprise and disappointment to me to find that when a crime of that nature took place affecting people in my constituency who called and were looking for assistance that the system is unduly bureaucratic, very slow to respond and that really nobody appears to offer counselling or
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support to a family in need. I think it goes without saying, but I'm going to say it, that early intervention and help to families that are suffering and in crisis is the best way to prevent a lot of future problems. Particularly when young people are involved, often there are all kinds of repercussions when they are indirectly impacted by crime. It can have an effect for the rest of their lives.
The very process that we have in place doesn't even come to bear until people who are in shock and people who are in grief have the wherewithal to make an application to the department. I think maybe we'll just start with that first process, the intake process. Perhaps, Ms. Tyson, you would explain to me how a person would access Victim Services.
MS. TYSON: Yes, thank you. The program itself is a program which offers counselling to family members who are victims themselves or family members who are impacted by violent criminal activities. In order to access the program, the department must receive an application form from the person seeking counselling.
There are many reasons for that. The department does not feel that it should, or can, insert itself. Some victims may not welcome an intervention at that point when they are grieving; others would. In addition, the department has to verify that people are who they say they are, so the process is that an application form is received. Once that application form is received, then the individual seeking assistance is contacted and the program attempts to turn around that application in 24 hours, once received.
MS. WHALEN: In the case that recently occurred in my riding, the family was 16 or 17 days into this process. They had asked for the forms and asked for help, and yet what they received were just the blank application forms - no assistance whatsoever in filling them out, no hand holding, if you like, no support while they tried to look at those forms.
I bring you back to the nature of grief and the nature of trauma, that people, even well-educated and articulate people, can find themselves unable to manage a simple form, or what you might consider a simple form. The application form, I think it's worth noting, there is not just a single form, there's a form for every member of the family that repeats the information again and again and requires the signature of every member of the family, even the minors in the family. A case in point, there were two or three children who are under 18 years of age who were stepbrothers and sisters and brothers and sisters. Each one, even these minors, having to fill in the form, indicating their relationship to the victim of crime and why they were seeking this help.
I think that is unduly bureaucratic and that a parent, on behalf of their children and in fact on behalf of a spouse, could fill in one form for a family. I'd like to know your comment on why we would put families through that.
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MS. TYSON: I don't know the history of how the forms were developed, but we are looking at simplifying the forms so hopefully we can address some of those concerns. In addition, staff are prepared to partly fill in the forms at this time and also to help family members fill in the forms.
MS. WHALEN: Well, I think that would be more than necessary. I really would like to ask you about the 27 staff members you have there. When I inquired, I was told that nobody on staff are counsellors, there's not one person with counselling credentials in that staff - would that be true?
MS. TYSON: I understand that's correct, the staff do not themselves counsel individuals, but rather they provide a list of qualified private-sector counsellors and the family can choose a counsellor.
MS. WHALEN: Again, you know it is noteworthy that we have a process in place where we leave the selection of a counsellor again to a family that is grieving. I have a list of the counsellors who are sent out for Halifax in this area, and I assume there's a different list in each place because there were only a few on that list that were outside of HRM - there were a couple on the South Shore - but that list would be enormous. It's a 17-page list with a little paragraph on each counsellor about what their methods are or what they prefer to do. If you're a victim of crime, you're asking that person, who's still reeling from the effects of this, to wade through a list and to make individual phone calls. I made the point that this is not the kind of situation where a person should have to go shopping for a counsellor.
When I asked the acting director of this area to help direct us to a counsellor, I was told that they can't favour one counsellor over another. That would be inappropriate, sort of like in a tendering process, that they are all equal in the eyes of the department. But that isn't the case, because some of them will be far better in a domestic violence case or a sexual assault case, and there aren't very many who can deal with murder cases, I don't believe, and some of them will not want to. So I would ask you, why is there no further support, why somebody wouldn't come out with that list and go through it with the person who is the victim of crime?
MS. TYSON: Yes, we did have a discussion about that and I did make some inquiries of staff. The reason that they are reluctant to suggest a particular name is they don't wish to show favouritism for one counsellor over another, or be accused of doing that. However, as you pointed out, the list is quite long. We may be able to break down the list or show some of the experience of some of the counsellors and help in some way, so we're looking at that now.
MS. WHALEN: I think that's long overdue and I would hope that it would be in place right away because I'm telling you, even as a person trying to advocate and help the family, I can't make any sense of these various approaches. For example, one will say:
[Page 15]
approaches cognitive behavioural gestalt, emotion-focused, ages, adolescent children and adults, anger management, stress management, depression. I don't think that's the person I'm going to call if I've just been the victim of a murder crime or related closely to somebody who has lost their life. It's gobbledegook for somebody who is trying to figure this out, particularly when they're in grief. I think it's essential that somebody be there to help say, this is the person who can help you, who has done this before.
I wonder if you could tell me about the HRM police services that are offered for victims of crime and maybe how you coordinate with them. In your opening comments you talked about the coordination you're looking at with other agencies.
MS. TYSON: Yes, they do have a counsellor on staff and my understanding is that person is available during the investigative stages, to assist families. They also know about the Victim Services Program and they are able to advise families that program exists and how to access it.
MS. WHALEN: You indicated that when they get the forms they can turn them around in 24 hours, but your turnaround means you get the list of counsellors, right? You're approved, you get a letter that says you're approved and you get a list of counsellors.
MS. TYSON: Yes.
MS. WHALEN: And are you finished with the program then, more or less, in terms of support for that family?
MS. TYSON: I believe so, yes.
MS. WHALEN: Can I ask what other programs these Victim Services staff members are managing?
MS. TYSON: There's only the counselling program that is offered to victims of crime and family members.
MS. WHALEN: How can we justify a $2.5 million budget?
MS. TYSON: Oh, I'm sorry, they do support people who are going to court and appearing in court, victims and witnesses, for example.
MS. WHALEN: Okay, less than 10 per cent of the funds go directly to the counsellors.
MS. TYSON: Yes, the Executive Director of Finance says yes, that's correct.
[Page 16]
MS. WHALEN: I want to go back again to the amount of money that is allowed for counselling for each victim of crime, each person who goes through this process and fills in the form and reiterates again and again the crime and the person they are related to which, in itself, is painful. They are then allowed $2,000 per approved applicant for counselling services, but your maximum per hour is $65. I wonder if you could tell me what the average cost of counselling per hour is.
MS. TYSON: I can't tell you the average cost, but I can say that we monitor counselling services elsewhere in government and we are looking at an increase in the very near future of that hourly fee, but the maximum would remain the same.
[9:45 a.m.]
MS. WHALEN: I think the point is that the average cost is around $120 an hour. You might get it for $100 an hour, which means many victims of crime can't afford the cost sharing on this counselling and will receive no professional counselling while they deal with horrendous grief and crime. I think it's such a failure of this system.
Again I go back to the fact that as an MLA, I believed we provided some support for people in crisis, and you find that in effect the brochure sounds nice, saying we offer counselling and contact us and go through this process, but in effect when you make those calls, you'll find that you're really trying to price the counsellors as you call through the list of 16 pages and find out which ones might possibly do it for $65 an hour. There are precious few on that list, if any, who will, so do you have a comment on how the average person could access that crime?
MS. TYSON: As I said, we do monitor the fees paid for counsellors in other government departments and we try to be consistent. We are looking at an increase in the hourly rate right now, but the $2,000 will remain in place.
MS. WHALEN: I think part of what would be important is the $2,000, that's acceptable to set a limit and a two-year limit in which to use it. The thing is you need early intervention and this process is so slow that it's taking weeks and weeks for anything to be done, and in fact, in the newspaper the director was quoted and he said that once charges are laid and the matter is going to proceed through the court, that is usually when our service gets involved. So it's pretty clear that the emphasis they have is not at the time that the crime takes place, but later on when it's working its way through court, which could be quite a delay in time as we know.
So there's a need for much earlier intervention and I'd like to suggest that you look at having counsellors that are either on a retainer or on staff that you can send out, similar to the schools that act immediately when there's any kind of an issue, any kind of death in a school community or accident, they come in immediately and address the situation with
[Page 17]
counsellors. They don't hesitate suggesting that people don't want counselling, they come in and offer it in person. If the person doesn't want it then surely that's fine, you can withdraw. But not to respond until somebody has recovered enough to even think of the application process, I think, is completely missing the boat in terms of what the need is.
I go back to the severe psychological damage that happens by letting people try to deal with this on their own when it's really beyond anybody's expectation. None of us want to be victims of crime. I think it's really important that we not get bogged down in bureaucracy thinking that, in fact, people would apply for this who are not suffering and that they would want to see counsellors, because they don't - most of us don't ever, ever want to go through any of that. So I think we need to move the emphasis away from the paperwork and the bureaucracy and try to get to being able to provide services. I think for $220,000 you could have people on staff. Could you tell me if the staff receive any sensitivity training in even contacting and talking to families who are victims of crime?
MS. TYSON: I can't tell you that, but I can certainly get that information for you.
MS. WHALEN: I would like to know that and I'd like to know what the requirements are for people who work in that department. Are they simply moved between other government departments? I'm sure they're good bureaucrats, I'm sure they're good workers, but are they prepared for the nature of the work that they're doing and what they have to be involved with?
One of the quotes in the paper from a victim was that the bureaucratic process has only added to our pain, and I think that's very relevant in this case and what I see as a window to many others. Many people in this society, in our society, don't even know enough to call somebody for help. I think you've got a real problem there and it needs to be addressed. I don't feel that we're putting the resources where they can do the most good with timely intervention right off the bat, which is what is needed. Can you tell me if through Correctional Services the people who are accused of crimes receive any counselling?
MS. TYSON: I'll ask Fred Honsberger, Executive Director of Correctional Services to speak to that issue.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Honsberger.
MR. FRED HONSBERGER: Youth who are at Waterville, regardless of whether they're remanded or sentenced, are involved in our programs . . .
MADAM CHAIR: Order. Oh, the light is now on. Could you stand when you speak? Thank you.
[Page 18]
MR. HONSBERGER: We have two categories of offenders in Nova Scotia, we have youth and adults. Youth at Waterville, whether they're on remand or sentenced, are involved in our programs at the youth facility. We don't distinguish between a remand or a sentenced youth offender. With the adults, the adult system is different in every jurisdiction and the main point with an adult is to ensure safety and security. They're in for a much shorter period of time and if a person wants assistance from our classification officers, they can receive a certain amount of counselling. But we don't have an aggressive counselling program for adult offenders in our adult system.
MS. WHALEN: You're answering that they can receive it if they request it?
MR. HONSBERGER: If a person requests it - in Nova Scotia we're fortunate to be co-located with the East Coast Forensic Hospital, so it depends on the nature of their concern, but we're the only province that has that type of co-located environment. If a person has serious difficulties, they come to the attention of our health care staff and if it's quite severe they can actually be brought into a unique place that we have in that facility between the hospital and the correctional centre called the Mentally Ill Offender Unit and actually receive in-depth care. Alternatively, depending on the approach that psychologists or psychiatrists usually take, a person could be dealt with in the Correctional Services side, so it depends on the severity of the issue.
MS. WHALEN: What I'm hearing is . . .
MADAM CHAIR: Order, order.
MS. WHALEN: . . . that it is available to the people who are accused of crime.
MR. HONSBERGER: It's available to a person accused of a crime, for a person who requests it if there's a serious issue they have.
MADAM CHAIR: Order. The time has expired, you'll have another opportunity, thank you.
I now recognize Mr. Dunn, you have 20 minutes.
MR. PATRICK DUNN: Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you for being available here today. The first few questions I have are dealing with youth and I'll direct my questions to Ms. Tyson and if she wishes, she can pass them on to whomever. A flurry of positive initiatives have been introduced during the past several months to assist communities in curbing crime. What is your opinion with regard to the next statement: early intervention is critical and preventive measures should be introduced within our early educational school system?
[Page 19]
MS. TYSON: The crime strategy is a new approach for the Department of Justice in that it includes a very strong focus on prevention and intervention, as well as the traditional enforcement objective. Prevention and intervention have been recognized through the Nunn inquiry and in the Child and Youth Strategy and are recognized in Nova Scotia's crime strategy; it's very important to have those two pillars intact. As our chief in HRM has said - and I've quoted him a couple of times - he can go into an area and clean up the area, but he cannot maintain that area without help in the intervention and prevention side. We are working with our partners - Community Services, Health, Health Promotion and Protection, and the Department of Education - in terms of working together on promoting prevention and intervention wherever we can, and that would include in the school system.
MR. DUNN: I'm interested in that early intervention pilot program for children under 12 experiencing difficulties called CATCH, Children at the Critical Hour. Can you briefly describe this program?
MS. TYSON: Yes, I'm going to ask Valerie Pottie Bunge, she is our expert on the various initiatives under the crime strategy.
MADAM CHAIR: Ms. Pottie Bunge, could you stand?
MS. VALERIE POTTIE BUNGE: That project is designed to help and hold accountable children who are eight to 12 years of age, and it provides an opportunity for the community to support a family and child in crisis. It's basically meant for those children eight to 12 who fall outside of the purview of the criminal justice system.
MR. DUNN: A second youth attendance centre will open up sometime this year in 2008. Can you describe the network of professionals engaged in this process and their accountability to the Justice Department? What I'm referring to there is the professionals who are actually working within the centre.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Honsberger.
MR. HONSBERGER: The program we have in Halifax involves probation officers, we have teachers who are providing the academic program, we have an employment counsellor from the Department of Community Services and there are staff from the Department of Health working there as well to work with the youth. It's a real partnership between these four departments providing sort of a one-stop shopping program service for high-risk youth in Halifax. Our hope is to duplicate that program elsewhere in the province and it would involve those four groups: probation officers, teachers, mental health professionals and employment counsellors.
MR. DUNN: Just as a follow-up with regard to the network and so on, what involvement or input, in the past year or two with regard to a lot of these initiatives, have
[Page 20]
school administrators or student services like guidance counsellors had with regard to the intervention/prevention measure that the Justice Department has put forth?
MADAM CHAIR: Ms. Tyson.
MS. TYSON: Our steering committee included a representative from the Department of Education and on the senior officials committee, which is the same committee that's dealing with the Child and Youth Strategy, as well as the crime prevention strategy, includes representation from the Department of Education. So we rely upon that department representative to gather information from all appropriate areas in the department and in the school system and bring that to the table.
MR. DUNN: If this second youth centre is deemed to be successful as time goes on, can we expect more centres opening in this province and if that's the case, where would the next one be?
MS. TYSON: Early indications, it has been open just one year in Halifax and it appears to be very successful. Subject to budget, our crime strategy anticipates that the next youth attendance centre and bail supervision will be in Sydney and subsequently there is a plan, subject to budget again, to open one in the Valley.
MR. DUNN: Approximately how many students are attending the centre in Halifax at any given time?
MS. TYSON: I'll ask Fred Honsberger to speak to that.
MR. HONSBERGER: There are 20 full-time students in the academic program at the present time, and that's subject to some expansion. The intention of that program, it also provides services to about 200 other youths who are on probation in the Halifax area, again because it offers cognitive skills programming, anger management programming, and that's the centre of excellence, if you will, for our program. So the youths who are on probation elsewhere in the HRM area access programs through that centre.
MR. DUNN: The students who are in this particular centre in Halifax right now, are they there permanently during the school year? Are they back and forth within the school system here in Halifax?
MR. HONSBERGER: It's quite new, but they're getting all of their academic training now through that centre. There's a strong link between the teachers at the attendance centre and the school system in Halifax, so the students who come there come from the school system. Usually they're put out of school, they are a very high-risk group of youth and the intention is to reintroduce them into the school system. Again, we're in our first year of
[Page 21]
operation here and the intention is to link with the schools, which they are, to reintroduce the student back into the mainstream school system.
MR. DUNN: More dollars are being directed toward youth to be used for community crime prevention activities. Can you give me a couple of examples of proposed activities and the community groups that may have the responsibility to provide this service to youth?
MADAM CHAIR: Ms. Pottie Bunge.
MS. POTTIE BUNGE: Some examples of current initiatives underneath the proposed strategy, there are a number that are focused on youth. There's the community Crime Prevention Investment Fund that's designed to support recreational and educational programs for after school for youth, to engage them in positive activities, and organizations that are involved with this can apply for $15,000 a year, of course, subject to budget approval.
[10:00 a.m.]
MR. DUNN: Some people feel a heavy emphasis must be placed on our troubled youth. Have you received any recommendations suggesting that parents or guardians of troubled youth also have to be engaged and assisted?
MS. POTTIE BUNGE: Certainly we heard from the task force that the role of parents was a very important thing. The CATCH Program does speak to that in terms of helping families, as well as their children, who are experiencing trouble, as well as the Child and Youth Strategy as well.
MR. DUNN: Thank you. The youth correctional facility in Waterville, as an example of one in the province, will they be receiving any additional dollars for resources, programs, extra staff, through these initiatives?
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Honsberger.
MR. HONSBERGER: There is not an intention to do that because the youth facility at Waterville is quite well resourced. We have a strong academic program, it's unique in the country but we have a strong partnership with the IWK. Waterville is actually an IWK site. So one of our living units in the last year was transformed from a living unit for youth into a medical unit for the IWK. So the youth receive very good, I would say, forensic services by health; the academic program is strong. We also have addictions programs, sexual offender programs, a good range of cognitive skills programs and also a program which could be the foundation for our future attendance centre, called Centre 24-7 in Coldbrook, which is an off-site academic program for youth who are put out of school, from the community, and also youth who are in our Waterville program. So it is an interesting concept.
[Page 22]
We believe that Waterville is quite well-resourced, a strong staff complement and there's not a need, in our view, for additional resources.
MR. DUNN: With regard to the Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods Act, this is new legislation. It has been successful, very successful, or perhaps extremely successful?
MADAM CHAIR: Ms Tyson.
MS. TYSON: It has been very successful. I'm just going to give you some numbers. The Act was proclaimed January 7th and fully operational on April 10, 2007, so it is very new. The section has received 148 complaints. They have concluded the following: two community safety order applications before the Supreme Court; 31 voluntary evictions; 13 warning letters from the director; 18 requests from other policing agencies for assistance and 45 where no further action was required due to lack of evidence.
They are recognized province-wide, they have great co-operation and they co-operate with the police agencies. It has been, as far as we can see, a tremendous success and we are looking at enhancing that unit.
MR. DUNN: Much of what is contained in the crime prevention strategy is intended to reduce criminal activity. Can you give me some examples, at the present from the initiatives, that are curbing the amount of crime in Nova Scotia?
MS. TYSON: Yes. The most visible initiative is the 250 police officer initiative, of which 80 were announced last year and 70 additional officers were announced this year. That would mean that by April 1, 2008, at least one officer will have been assigned to every one of the 55 municipal units. Of the 70 new officers, 14 additional officers will be allocated to Halifax and four for Cape Breton. The remaining allocation is distributed province-wide. So that is the main enforcement objective.
I'm sorry, would you repeat that question, I don't think I recall exactly the question.
MR. DUNN: Just some examples of what is happening now to curb the amount of crime in the province.
MS. TYSON: We have legislation - for example, the gunshot mandatory reporting has been introduced. We have the intention to introduce a proceeds of crime unit, both criminal and civil, for the provincial government and that will assist the federal unit in discouraging crime. We have the Youth Liaison Office Workers' pilot project. We have the mobile unit that's operating in southwestern Nova Scotia comprising four RCMP officers and one municipal officer from both Bridgewater and Kentville. That unit is patrolling the highways and looking at impaired drivers, and it has been very successful.
[Page 23]
We have collaborative regional crime prevention teams in place. The street crime team in the northern part of the country - Street Crime Enforcement Unit - has had huge success. There are 14 of them operating province-wide now and they support both the local communities and they collaborate with neighbouring communities, which is very important, and part of that collaboration that was referenced earlier. For example, the following successes have been achieved: 75 organized crime groups have been identified and disrupted; 159 arrests have been made in relation to organized crime groups; more than 49 search warrants have been executed; more than 11,000 criminal charges have been laid, including 291 drug charges; the estimated street value of the drugs seized is approximately $7 million. So those are just some examples of some of the initiatives that are ongoing at the present time.
MR. DUNN: Of the 80 police officers in 2007 and the 70 police officers for 2008, will any of these police officers be placed in our school system, actually in the site itself?
MS. TYSON: One of the objectives is school liaison officers, so the province had a number of objectives for the additional officers. The street crimes unit was one, liaison officers in the school system was another.
MR. DUNN: How will it be determined if or when or where a police officer is located, or directed towards as a liaison officer in a school? What's the process that's involved?
MS. TYSON: The department made known that it would be seeking proposals from all of the police agencies, and police agencies were aware of the department's priorities - one of them being the school liaison officers - and the department received proposals along those lines. So whatever proposals were received were considered within the department and recently police agencies were notified of their allocation.
It is my understanding, I'm told, that the policing agencies in Nova Scotia are satisfied with their allocations and very pleased to receive them. I haven't heard of any criticism or objection.
MR. DUNN: I can speak for my own constituency and I speak for the police on practically if not a daily, a weekly basis and they are certainly very, very pleased with the initiatives that are occurring in the province.
We are aware of several high-profile incidents in HRM over the last number of months, perhaps making residents feel a little insecure. The most recent stats that are available, is crime actually decreasing in HRM due to these initiatives, due to the number of extra police officers on the streets and in the community?
[Page 24]
MS. TYSON: The most recent information that we have is that crime has decreased overall in Nova Scotia recently but unfortunately, youth crime has increased and part of the focus of this crime strategy and the collaborative efforts with the police and other departments - our partners - is focused on youth crime and attempting to step in at an earlier stage, along with our partners, to prevent youth from committing crimes, or reduce the number of crimes that they commit. Hopefully, those initiatives will be successful.
We, and our partners, certainly think they will be but it's a bit early to see positive results. This is really a long-term objective, it won't happen overnight.
MR. DUNN: So the department's expectation then, with an increase of police officers in the communities, is that there will be a decrease in the amount of crime occurring as opposed to previous years?
MS. TYSON: Yes, certainly. The presence of police officers and the very specific and targetted initiatives that they are working with - with schools, with street crime, with impaired driving, for example - we feel those kinds of initiatives are having a positive impact and will continue to have a positive impact. The long range objective though is to catch youth at an early stage and also to intervene at all stages - youth and adults - to try to turn as many people around as we possibly can. Some of them need help and support and we're trying to provide that. We think that overall we have the right approach. The task force that Minister Scott initiated told us that we have the right approach and their suggestions form the basis of the crime strategy. We're hearing from our partners that they think this is the right approach.
MR. DUNN: Thank you.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you. Order, the time has now expired for the PC caucus. The next round of questions will be 12 minutes per caucus.
Mr. Steele of the NDP caucus.
MR. STEELE: When I left off, Mr. Herschorn, I was talking about the minister's directive to you dated September 12, 2007. I asked you what if anything had changed with respect to what the Crown Attorneys were actually doing as a result of the directive? If I understood your answer correctly, the answer was nothing has changed, Crown Attorneys kept doing what they were doing. Is that fair?
MR. HERSCHORN: Crown Attorneys - prior to the directive and after the directive - have continued to approach each case, analyze it and take the appropriate response and that has been a consistent response. Where violent crimes are committed, where there is the evidence available to support a Crown position of opposing bail, the Crown will take that position.
[Page 25]
MR. STEELE: Did the directive change anything with respect to the policies or procedures followed by the Crown Attorneys or did they just keep on doing what they were already doing?
MR. HERSCHORN: With the ministerial directive, under our Statute, the minister has the right to provide direction provided it is done publicly and that was a public direction, it was published at my direction as required by the Statute in the Royal Gazette.
MR. STEELE: Mr. Herschorn, you're evading the question. Did anything change as a result of the directive?
MR. HERSCHORN: No, I'm not. I indicated there was little change before or after it. What has changed is that the Attorney General of the province, who's overall responsible for law enforcement, has signalled to the criminal community that this problem . . .
MR. STEELE: Mr. Herschorn, you've already said that - it's not what I asked you. I think you answered loud and clear. I wasn't asking about what the minister did or what he intended or the effect it is having on the public. I simply asked you, did anything change with respect to what Crown Attorneys did in the courtroom as a result of that directive. I think you've answered the question loud and clear.
At the time, one Crown Attorney remarked that this directive was equivalent to directing nurses to look after their patients. Another lawyer writing a few days later in The ChronicleHerald said, the clear implication of the minister's words is that the staff for whom he is responsible are not doing their jobs and are somehow to blame for recent violent crime. What is your assessment of the effect that that directive had on the morale of your Crown Attorneys?
MR. HERSCHORN: That directive was coupled by words from myself and by words from the Attorney General of the day, Minister Scott, indicating full confidence in the actions and the approach taken by Crown Attorneys. We provided that reassurance to Crown Attorneys, and that was my response.
[10:15 a.m.]
MR. STEELE: Let me turn then to another issue that has caught the public's attention and that is the mistaken release of prisoners. There have been three cases of the mistaken release of prisoners in the last couple of months, one in December and two in January. Two were from the Burnside jail and one was from the Cape Breton Correctional Centre. Like many members of the public, I'm puzzled at what appears to be a rash of incidents. Now there are two possibilities here - one is that the three incidents happening so close together were a bizarre coincidence or second, that this kind of thing really has been happening all along and the only difference is that this time the public was notified of it. I wonder if you
[Page 26]
could let us know, these three recent incidents that all occurred within a month of each other, is that a bizarre coincidence or is it something that really happens more often than we think?
MR. HERSCHORN: In my experience, it is a coincidence. I don't know if I would use the terminology, bizarre - it is a coincidence. I can speak in particular with respect to an incident which arose as a result of an administrative error in the Crown Attorney's office in Sydney and we have taken steps to identify the concern to bring the administrative error to the attention of those involved to ensure that it won't happen again in that office and shortly we will be having a meeting of our executive committee of our service and will be examining the situation that occurred to ensure that it will not occur in other offices.
MR. STEELE: I do want to pursue the incident in Sydney in a minute, but I want to get back to this question about how often this occurs. Does your service keep any statistics on the number of mistaken releases from custody?
MR. HERSCHORN: No, we don't.
MR. STEELE: Okay, Ms. Tyson do you or your department keep any statistics on mistaken releases?
MS. TYSON: I don't know if we keep track formally, but we do have statistics, we do know the numbers.
MR. STEELE: And what are they?
MS. TYSON: I think there have been approximately five in the last year.
MR. STEELE: And what about the year before that?
MS. TYSON: I don't have that number.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Honsberger.
MR. HONSBERGER: Typically over the last 15 years that I can recall, there has been about twice a year a person has been released, there has been inappropriate admission or release, it's a paperwork related issue. Just to put this in context, if it happens once it is not acceptable, it's human error and what we're doing - I won't get into that now unless you want to pursue that, but there are measures being taken to restrict the possibility of human error because once is too much. Again, over the last 16 years, we are not any different than any other jurisdiction in that regard, although that's no excuse for it. It is probably a couple of times a year, human error related. It usually happens on a back shift when the main office staff aren't there and we need to give greater clarity and are giving greater clarity to . . .
[Page 27]
MR. STEELE: Mr. Honsberger, do you actually keep statistics that you could share with this committee about how many times it has happened?
MR. HONSBERGER: No.
MR. STEELE: Or this is just your feeling as a person with experience stretching over 16 years?
MR. HONSBERGER: I would say a couple of times a year on average and maybe a little bit less than that, but about twice a year over the last 14-15 years that I've been involved with it. I had some knowledge before that, too.
MR. STEELE: Mr. Honsberger, would it be fair to say that what has changed in the last month is that the public was notified of these cases, but really they've been happening all along?
MR. HONSBERGER: It happened a couple of times a year and the police have been notified in every case and over the years there has been some degree of notification and some not - the issue has been one of public safety. Correctional Services can't speak to the public safety of the offender, we can talk about how they behave in custody, but the police are in a better position to do that. If the case has been a public concern, the public has been notified. There have been cases where that has happened over the last 10 years. If the person is not considered to have been a public safety issue and the police, quite frankly, don't want to alert the person that they're out after them to scoop them up, then they'll go out and take care of that. It's just a matter of a strategy.
MR. STEELE: Would it be fair to say that what happened in these three most recent cases is because each one of the individuals was considered to be dangerous there was public notification, but if they hadn't been considered to be dangerous the public would never have known about it, would that be fair?
MR. HONSBERGER: As a matter of policy if they were dangerous there would have been a notification. The minister's directive recently is that regardless of whether they are dangerous or not, in the future whenever this happens there will be public notification.
MR. STEELE: So from now on, we can expect that if we have on average a couple of cases a year that no matter what the offence is or no matter who the offender is a public notice will go out?
MR. HONSBERGER: Exactly.
MR. STEELE: Okay, thank you very much. Mr. Herschorn, I'd like to turn back to you because the minister has said, and from what I know of the cases I agree with him, that
[Page 28]
each one of the three recent cases was very different circumstances, there's no one thing you can say of all three cases. However, the one that occurred in Sydney in January appears to have been due to an error committed by a Crown Attorney, so that's why I want to explore that particular one with you.
The Public Prosecution Service issued a news release on January 22nd, which I thought was very carefully crafted not to tell us anything about what actually happened. The news release says that there was an oversight and it also said that procedures have been adjusted, but to me if there was an oversight, no amount of procedure is going to fix just plain old human error which we all understand happens, but if the deficiency was in the procedures then it wasn't an oversight. I wonder if you could tell us a little bit more about what happened, what piece of paperwork was missing and why we should expect that this kind of thing is not going to happen again?
MR. HERSCHORN: A couple of amendments to the underpinnings of your question. The press release was issued on January 21, 2008 and did not identify it as a Crown Attorney error, it talked of an administrative error. The error, in fact, was in the area of our support staff. The error in question was in relation to communicating on advice received from the Cape Breton County Correctional Centre, with respect to the pending release date for this individual. That information was passed from one support staff to another - the gap occurred where the information was not forwarded on to a Crown Attorney. So in terms of identifying responsibility it rested in the administrative sector of our operations in Sydney. That was reviewed, identified, staff were spoken to in terms of amending their procedures to ensure that there is a failsafe mechanism in place so that type of administrative error does not occur again. We will be taking steps to ensure that that doesn't occur to the best of our ability because we are talking, as you acknowledged, about human error and human error can occur, but we will take every reasonable step to ensure it doesn't occur throughout the service.
MR. STEELE: The opportunity for human error is greatly increased when people are overloaded with work, and one thing that everybody says about your Crown Attorneys - and presumably the same would apply to your support staff - is that your Crown Attorneys are overloaded with work, they have too many files. I have seen them walk into a courtroom with a great big stack of files under their arm. Your per diem Crown Attorneys, for example, don't get any money for preparation time which is another issue and another concern. Do you believe that workload overload may have partly contributed to this particular mistaken release of a prisoner?
MR. HERSCHORN: No, I don't.
MR. STEELE: Why not?
MR. HERSCHORN: Because of the analysis done by Ken Haley, Chief Crown Attorney in Cape Breton. It identified and pinpointed what the source of the problem was and
[Page 29]
it was not attributable to the lack of staff or too much pressure on the staff, it was identified as a problem with respect to passing on a message and ensuring that it got to the person and ensuring that the Crown Attorney was able to follow up with the matter.
The fact of the matter, for example, in Cape Breton, we've vastly expanded our operations in Cape Breton. We have wonderful new facilities, state of the art offices for our Crown Attorneys and we've expanded over the last two or three years the level of support staff to the point where I think it is acknowledged within the service and without that we're adequately resourced in that area.
MR. STEELE: Thank you, Mr. Herschorn. My time is rapidly drawing to a close so what I'd like to do is just close with this brief statement. I have enormous sympathy for what you and your staff are doing, your Crown Attorneys and your support staff, it's difficult work and they do it day in and day out. I believe that there is a problem with the independence of the service being compromised by your ties to the Public Service Commission. I would like to support you in cutting those ties. I also believe the service is under-resourced and that's a very important issue that we all have to deal with to make sure that your prosecutors can do the job that they need to do.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you, order. The time has expired. I recognize Ms. Whalen, you have 12 minutes.
MS. WHALEN: I would like to direct my questions again to Ms. Tyson and to continue our discussion we were having about Victim Services. One of the letters that I've seen that goes out - I guess that would be the standard letter format that you would have for families after they've applied - relates to secondary victims of crime, which means you're not an immediate family member or witness to the crime but you've been secondarily affected, probably an extended family member. In this, it requires that in these first few weeks and days after an extremely traumatic crime, that the family members are to seek a doctor's diagnosis for post-traumatic stress disorder.
In speaking to counsellors about this, I was told that you would not show the signs of post-traumatic stress for some months, that that is what happens long after you've gotten over the immediate shock of a terrible crime happening to somebody you love. What I would like to know is if you were aware that that was one of the requirements, to have a family doctor make a family diagnosis like that and whether or not you will have that reviewed because it doesn't stand up in terms of practice?
MS. TYSON: Yes, I am aware that that is a program requirement. It's part of the program as it exists today, that immediate family members simply have to apply and if they are an immediate family member or a victim, then they will be approved within 24 hours is the program. If it's not an immediate family member but the next level, they do require that doctor's certificate.
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I think many of these people don't apply immediately and they do have a two-year period within which to apply. So I agree with you that some people don't seem to suffer the stress immediately, it takes a little while . . .
MS. WHALEN: But it's a different kind of stress, Ms. Tyson. Post-traumatic stress is after the crisis has passed. We're talking about people in the immediate crisis. So I'm just saying, it shows a lack of understanding and a lack of sophistication, really, in the department that you would be asking for that kind of a diagnosis.
MS. TYSON: I think, Ms. Whalen, you're highlighting what you consider to be issues or problems or deficiencies with the program itself. So I think we have a program, I think staff are very compassionate and they do the very best they can within the program. That's not to say . . .
MS. WHALEN: I have another question, if I may. I don't mean to cut you off but the 10 minutes goes fast. I would like to ask if in the conduct of the department you have done any surveys or feedback to see whether or not the people you have served are satisfied with the service that's available. This program has been in place since 1990, I believe - I think the little pamphlet says 1990. So what has been done to ever see if you're hitting the mark and actually helping people?
MS. TYSON: That's a good question, I don't have an answer. I don't know if the staff have done that survey but we have done other similar surveys and I will find out for you.
MS. WHALEN: I think it would be very instructive to see when people have passed the state of immediate crisis, whether or not they could say that you actually provided a service that was hitting the mark because that's really what we're talking about, are all of these deficiencies adding up to a service that is reasonable, in light of the crime that we're seeing.
MS. TYSON: If it hasn't been done, I think it should be done.
MS. WHALEN: Exactly. Given the increase in the cost of counselling which has clearly taken place over the last number of years, the $65 per hour I think is a very unrealistic amount of money that we've got allocated. I wonder if you would be in a position now to take off that limit of the $65 per hour and simply say that victims of crime are entitled to $2,000 in counselling fees?
MS. TYSON: I can't do that at the moment but I can tell you that we are in the process of increasing the per hourly rate, to be consistent with what other government departments pay counsellors, and my understanding is based on discussions with counsellors and a review of the provincial situation. That should occur very soon.
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MS. WHALEN: Ms. Tyson, I'd like to suggest that what other departments are paying counsellors for may not be anywhere near the level of intensity that your Victim Services need counselling for. You may be doing job placement counselling, you might be doing family stress counselling within departments as part of your employee programs that are available. I don't think that that in any way is the same as helping victims of violent crime.
I draw to your attention that just in HRM last year, 11 murders and I am sure all of us can name many cases we read about which were horrific and people didn't die but they will have a long, long road to any kind of recovery after the kind of crimes they've experienced.
MS. TYSON: I think the services are different, the problems are different. In my previous experience with Community Services in the child welfare area I think it is just as important, the counselling is just as important.
[10:30 a.m.]
MS. WHALEN: Well, I would ask you to consider that in looking at the other rates that you're looking at. I would suggest you speak to the people you have on the approved list and find out why others are not on that list, because they're not willing to even talk to victims of crime, that they can only be paid $65 an hour for.
I draw to your attention the fact that people who are victims of crime and family members who have suffered a huge loss are very likely unable to work for a period of time. That is a common occurrence and as we said earlier, a lot of victims of crime are not wealthy people, they don't have reserves of money to draw on to take them through a crisis like this.
So the $65 an hour is actually asking victims of crime to shop around for somebody who will provide that service, really, well below the professional levels that are set by those societies.
MS. TYSON: Hopefully that will soon be somewhat addressed in any event and we will be able to provide that assistance.
MS. WHALEN: This is not set in legislation, is that right?
MS. TYSON: No, not the rate.
MS. WHALEN: Well since the budget is already set for $220,000 a year, why could we not simply allow people to use up to $2,000 per individual?
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MS. TYSON: That isn't something that's been proposed recently; the proposal is to increase the hourly rate and maintain the $2,000. So that's been the track, the approach that we've taken and we're partially through that approach.
MS. WHALEN: Do you have a process for people who simply can't cost-share? Is there any avenue that they can ask for this to be waived?
MS. TYSON: I can't tell you that, I can find out, though. I'm sorry, we have everybody here except the Director of Victim Services.
MS. WHALEN: Well, it wasn't clear in the letters that people received that there was any way that they could ask for that but I believe that should be a case, if you're not willing to take off the $65 per hour limit now, we should be looking at a mechanism to allow people to apply and say, we simply are not able to access services. So that's very important.
I'd like to ask the Director of Finance again if he could tell me whether last year's counselling budget was fully utilized.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Guest.
MR. GUEST: I honestly don't know.
MS. WHALEN: Do you not have with you last year's Public Accounts?
MR. GUEST: Not as it relates to the counselling budget, no. I did bring three years of information with me but not that particular information.
MS. WHALEN: Do we know if the overall Victim Services budget was fully utilized?
MR. GUEST: For 2006-2007?
MS. WHALEN: Yes, the last year you'd have public accounts.
MR. GUEST: Yes.
MS. WHALEN: So their budget was fully utilized but you don't know whether the full counselling amount was used.
MR. GUEST: No, I do not.
MS. WHALEN: Well, I think it would be very informative for this committee to have that result, if you could, afterwards, through the clerk. Thank you very much.
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I wanted to ask you, again it appears you don't have the authority today to take off the $65 limit, I'd like to propose that it be reviewed as soon as possible. I'd also like to talk about the list once more and that it be reworked, that the wording on the list and that the letters that are being sent out as well be reworked so they don't just quote chapter and verse of the Act - and this is in the letters particularly - but that they actually speak in layman's terms to people you know are in trouble and are having difficulty processing information and need that extra help.
I'd also like to suggest that people come directly to them. It has to be more user-friendly is really what I'm suggesting, all the way through, from start to finish. That is something I'd like to see done as soon as possible. Is there a commitment to do so?
MS. TYSON: I certainly have indicated earlier that we are looking at simplifying the letters and we'll certainly do that.
MS. WHALEN: I'd like to go now to Corrections Services. I appreciate your commitment to do that - the sooner the better.
Back to Corrections Services because the time is elapsing. I'd like to know again if, for the accused who are in custody in the correction institutes, is there any limit to the amount of counselling that they would receive?
MS. TYSON: I refer that to Fred Honsberger.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Honsberger.
MR. HONSBERGER: If a person was in a correctional facility, there are not formal counsellors. I mentioned earlier about the mental health piece, if a person needed mental health assistance, if a person came in and, based on my experience, asked for - they don't normally ask for counselling. What they ask for is they want to talk to somebody about an issue or a problem; we have staff that do that and part of the role of the correctional officer in our system today is to do that. The correctional officer's role has changed a lot in the last 10 years and it is more similar now to what the youth worker's role is. So they have people they can talk to.
If the problem was extremely complex, there would be people they could access to come in to do that, but typically we don't see that kind of question coming up. We don't receive a lot of requests from institutions for counselling.
MS. WHALEN: The people they're speaking to, though, have some training I would assume. You wouldn't send just any correctional officer to speak to them, so they are receiving counselling.
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MR. HONSBERGER: The people they deal with - I'm not being flippant here, either - have a lot of common sense. I know when I first started in the business myself, I was a correctional counsellor and the people have the capacity to understand - for the youth, the adults are different, there are two categories here.
MS. WHALEN: My other question was, is there a limit to what they are allowed? Would one say that 20 hours have elapsed, that counts to $2,000 and therefore you are no longer allowed any more help?
MR. HONSBERGER: There's no fee paid for counselling. If a person wants to talk to a correctional officer in an institution, during a certain time of the day, they can do that and it is just a matter of fitting into the daily schedule of the facility, in the adult facility.
In the youth facility, it is very different. They are matched up with a youth worker, they're involved in the youth facility and programs all day.
MS. WHALEN: I think we understand. It's a little complex for a one-minute answer, so thank you very much. I don't see that there's any limit to what they can access in terms of speaking to these people on staff.
What I'd like to point out is that there's a huge difference between what's available to the victims of crime and what is available to people who are being held in correctional institutions, that there is an effort to prevent future crimes, to rehabilitate people, to work with them, and there are not services to help families and victims of crime who are reeling from those effects and trying to put their lives back together. I think there is something wrong with this picture. I hope that's very clear and that it will be addressed very quickly.
Again, I'd like to see a strong commitment that we increase, in future, the $2,000 as well and, Ms. Tyson, I know you've spoken about the $65. I don't believe that $2,000 limit over two years, which would equate to about 20 hours of counselling, is nearly sufficient for people who have to deal with severe loss and with horrific images and incidents.
MADAM CHAIR: Ms. Tyson.
MS. TYSON: I haven't actually been told that amount is not sufficient overall, that's something we can look at for the future. I couldn't commit to any budget increase, of course, that would be through the budget process, but it's something we could look at.
MADAM CHAIR: Ms. Whalen, you do have about 30 seconds.
MS. WHALEN: It was mentioned earlier, Ms. Tyson, that the budget process is well underway right now and I think that this is an urgent matter that could call for a redistribution of your resources. I would suggest that you would do well to have counsellors on staff who
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can respond, much as the police arrive at someone's door with a chaplain, somebody who's experienced in trauma and grief, I believe you should be right behind them. The Department of Justice should be there offering services and you should have somebody available on short notice to do that, and that requires a change right now in your budget or your staff allocation. I would suggest that it would be a very good thing to see in this year's budget.
MADAM CHAIR: Order. The time has expired for the Liberal caucus. I recognize Mr. Bain, you have 12 minutes.
MR. KEITH BAIN: Good morning. I'd like to go back if I could just for a few moments to the additional 70 new officers that are going to be put in place. You said that 14 would be designated for the HRM, four for the Cape Breton Regional Municipality and the rest would be shared, that each municipal unit would get one. This would apply to the municipal units that are served by the RCMP as well, am I correct in assuming that?
MS. TYSON: Yes.
MR. BAIN: And you did mention some of the functions of these officers would be for street crime or a school liaison officer. Are there other specific functions that will be carried out by these additional officers?
MS. TYSON: Yes, the priorities also include drug trafficking, assaults, property crime, a focus on prolific offenders, road safety, the police crime prevention programming through the school system, youth court liaison officers, family violence, proceeds of crime and child pornography; these are the areas that the minister has identified. It would depend upon the applications and the needs of the individual police agency where they feel that they would get the most benefit.
MR. BAIN: That answered my next question, because I was wondering if each municipal unit would determine what the function would be.
MS. TYSON: Yes.
MR. BAIN: As part of the response to the Nunn Commission, the Department of Justice set a target to reduce youth court processing to 98 days. I'm just wondering, how close are you to achieving this goal and what actions have been taken moving towards them?
MS. TYSON: We're not quite at the 98 days, we're at 101 right now, but it's close. The 98 days was determined on the basis of former Justice Nunn's comparison with the British system and when you take out the weekends, he was saying that 98 days was appropriate, that's what they have there. So that is the initial target, we are working toward that target and we have a number of partners who are working on that.
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We in the Department of Justice can't do it alone. There is the judiciary; the Public Prosecution Service, which is engaged with us in this initiative; legal aid; and the police forces. So we have a person in the department who is tasked with coordinating and steering that process and monitoring it and chairing a committee of our partners, to try to determine what steps need to be taken, how we can get those numbers down not only for youth, but in the system overall. So we're getting there, it will take a little time, but we're optimistic that eventually we will be, with our partners, able to get there.
MR. BAIN: This year the department plans to expand the Youth Bail Supervision Program. Could you explain to me how this Youth Bail Supervision Program works?
MS. TYSON: I'm going to ask Fred Honsberger who is an expert in that area.
MR. HONSBERGER: The Youth Bail Supervision Program is intended for youth who are otherwise remand-eligible, so for it to work we have to have the capacity to place a youth in custody if they fail to comply with the conditions of the bail program. The Youth Bail Supervision Program works in partnership with the Halifax Youth Attendance Centre and with the youth in particular it's important to have a program component to the bail supervision. What it involves is very frequent contact, daily contact by phone and personal contact weekly with the youth bail supervision officer, program involvement at the attendance centre and it's intended to give increased oversight to a youth who has the potential to be placed in Waterville. If there's failure to comply with that program, for the most part - and I say for the most part - the Youth Criminal Justice Act is a stricter piece of legislation, but for the most part the youth who are involved in the program are remand-eligible and it's a program that we hope to expand to Cape Breton, as we expand the attendance centre. In any place the attendance centre goes, we see this program going as well.
MR. BAIN: So could you explain how the program will be expanded?
MR. HONSBERGER: When the Youth Attendance Centre is expanded to Cape Breton, we will at the same time simultaneously bring in a bail supervision program for the youth in Cape Breton.
MR. BAIN: Okay, I understand. Late last year the department announced an expanded Electronic Supervision Program. I wonder if you could tell me how many offenders are currently involved in this program?
MR. HONSBERGER: At the current time there are about 40 people on GPS electronic monitoring. The program is intended for people who are on conditional sentence, which is an alternative to incarceration and 80 per cent of that number, about 350 are on house arrest. This program is used for people who are on house arrest, there are about 40 province-wide now and it's growing. It is based on court interest in the program, so the courts are becoming more comfortable with the program and we're quite encouraged by the
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process thus far. We're working our way through some of the system bugs, but we have a good partnership with our supplier.
MR. BAIN: In accordance with the recommendations from the Nunn Inquiry, Crown Attorneys dedicated solely to court matters have been appointed. How many of those Crown Attorneys are dedicated for Youth court?
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Herschorn.
MR. HERSCHORN: We have three Crown Attorneys dedicated to Youth court in Halifax and one Crown Attorney dedicated to Youth court in Sydney. In addition to that, our full complement of Crown Attorneys are trained in the Youth Criminal Justice Act and are involved throughout the province where we don't have the focused dedicated youth court functioning.
MR. BAIN: So this number of dedicated Crown Attorneys was taken from the existing number of Crown Attorneys that are in the system right now or are they additions?
MR. HERSCHORN: The government did supply us with an additional $300,000 last year in order to finance two additional Crown Attorneys and one of those was earmarked for Sydney and another expanded our complement from two to three in Halifax.
MR. BAIN: The Crown Attorneys who are dedicated to youth matters, do they have special training in this area?
MR. HERSCHORN: Several of them come with extensive background in the former Young Offenders Act and now the Youth Criminal Justice Act. When the Youth Criminal Justice Act was introduced, all of our Crown Attorneys received extensive training on that subject, they were all brought together for a training program. The Crown Attorneys who are in the dedicated areas in Halifax and Sydney are now being brought together so they can bring best practices to bear and we continue, regularly at both our Spring and Fall education conferences, to include the Youth Criminal Justice Act as a topic of discussion for those Crown Attorneys and all of our other Crown Attorneys.
MR. BAIN: On average how long does it take for a matter to travel through the court system from charge to disposition?
MR. HERSCHORN: I'll defer, if I might, to Bob Purcell who might be the best positioned person to respond to that.
MADAM CHAIR: Certainly. Mr. Purcell.
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[10:45 a.m.]
MR. ROBERT PURCELL: When we started looking at the matters of case processing for young offenders through the Nunn Commission, if you recall, the case processing time in Nova Scotia was around 175 days. The last recollection is we are now down to just over 100 days for case processing, but we have that broken down into pre-trial, trial and post-trial data and that can be provided if you like.
MR. BAIN: So the overall system is on average with the goal of 98 days for the youth criminal justice system?
MR. PURCELL: Are you saying the adult system?
MR. BAIN: Yes.
MR. PURCELL: I don't have the adult system figures right here. My recollection is that it's probably somewhat higher than the youth system.
MR. BAIN: You wouldn't be able to give an estimate as to what it might be? Is it quite a great deal higher than the 101?
MR. PURCELL: I'd be inclined not to guess. I know when the Nunn Commission started its hearings we were just looking at the adult figures and then, of course, we diverted our attention to deal with the young offenders.
MR. BAIN: That's very understandable, thank you for that. Madam Chair, I'm going to turn the rest of the time over to Mr. Porter if I could, please.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Porter, you have until 10:49 a.m.
MR. CHUCK PORTER: Madam Chair, a couple of very quick questions. I just want to quote a quick piece of your opening statement with regard to - a Crown Attorney's job is not to win a conviction but to present the evidence and it goes on, the Crown Attorney must represent the interests of the general public. Do the majority of people understand that? Is there an education piece? I know from different people I talk to, oh yeah, he's got this Crown Attorney or that one and they see favour sometimes in that depending on who that is, that they have a better chance or not. I don't know why that is, I'm certain that this is explained very well to the person they're representing, just for a point of clarity.
MR. HERSCHORN: In particular, a starting point in response is the Kaufman Review of our service in 1998. It recommended that we vastly expand how we communicate both internally, but to your question, externally. Since then we've developed a series of brochures which I think are in your materials, which are intended to explain to the public the
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role of the Crown Attorney and in particular to emphasize what the Crown Attorney is and is not able to do in accordance with the responsibilities of a Crown Attorney, which are set out both in our legislation, but also in case law. There are very strict ethical standards that Crown Attorneys must abide by as they carry out their duties.
MR. PORTER: I may have missed it and we touched on it a little earlier this morning was the number of Crown Attorneys. One of the statements was made a few minutes ago about cross-trained youth versus adult, to be able to represent. What is that percentage - do you know that right off, of the total number you have?
MR. HERSCHORN: The total number is approximately 90 Crown Attorneys in our service.
MR. PORTER: How many would be cross-trained to do both adult and youth?
MR. HERSCHORN: All receive training in youth court matters, but there are four at the moment who are, if we might use the word, specialists. They spend the vast majority if not all of their time prosecuting in a youth court.
MR. PORTER: I know I'm running out of time, but I'll just ask - is it 10:49, Madam Chair?
MADAM CHAIR: I'll give you another minute.
MR. PORTER: Thank you, the question I have is not going to be anywhere near enough time to probably even ask it. Thank you.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you. So the time for questions has indeed expired. I now invite our guests to make some closing comments, if you wish. We'll begin this time with Mr. Herschorn, if you'd like to begin and then Ms. Tyson.
MR. HERSCHORN: Just one correction, if I can term it that way. Mr. Steele in one of his questions mentioned as a fact that we did not remunerate our per diems for preparation time. In fact, we do remunerate them to the amount of $150 for each day that they're going to be in court, in addition to the $300 amount for their services - just that piece of information.
In closing, Madam Chair, I just want to thank the committee for their interest. Obviously we work in challenging times and as Mr. Steele's questions highlighted, there are ever-increasing challenges with respect to the role of the Crown Attorney. We have a vibrant service which is prepared to respond to these challenges and we look forward to meeting those challenges. So I thank you again for the opportunity to speak.
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MADAM CHAIR: Thank you very much. Ms. Tyson.
MS. TYSON: Thank you, Madam Chair. I also would like to thank the committee for the opportunity to highlight some of the important work and initiatives being carried out in the department. We talk about challenges, and there are many challenges throughout the department and when it comes to fighting crime but I believe the department is in a better position than it has ever been in, with the number of initiatives that we have on the go, with the crime strategy, with the additional resources that have been provided and the focus, and in particular with the collaboration which has not always been the case. It has just become more apparent how important that is in recent times.
There is good will from all sectors, from the municipalities. We are working in particular with HRM and Cape Breton. Mayor Kelly is about to release his report from his task force. We are working very closely with the police agencies - Chief Beazley in Halifax co-chaired Minister Scott's task force. Likewise, there is goodwill from the RCMP who have strategic teams and we are working very closely with them, and there is that regular interaction between all government departments. So I think the goodwill has transpired into action and we are set to accomplish very positive things.
I'd like to just pick up on a couple of comments. There is much discussion of the victims' program and I think the program, as it is designed, overall is working well. Staff are very compassionate, they are very dedicated and in a particular situation that was referenced, as soon as it became apparent that there was an interest and as soon as we got the applications, I believe from the e-mail I have read, that our Director of Victim Services did everything possible to assist.
Whether the program should be different is a completely different matter and that was discussed today. I have indicated some of the things we're looking at and have agreed to look at some additional issues that have been raised.
In respect of the releases Mr. Steele referred to, I just want to add a little more context. Of the one or two a year or three a year, there are 15,000 contacts that we move people from place to place, from correctional institutional to court. There are a lot of manual steps in that process, there is judgement, the orders are very complex. So I just wanted to add that, that as Mr. Honsberger said, one inappropriate release is too many and we are taking steps in every one of those cases that occurs, to try to avoid that particular kind of release occurring. Human error is a factor and you can't always regulate or put procedures in place for all human error.
One final comment, in terms of the case processing times which was discussed, our priority has been on the youth and focusing on the youth because of the Nunn Inquiry. I can tell you that Chief Judge Curran, who is the Chief Judge of the Provincial Court, is very, very concerned overall. He is dedicated and determined to reduce the case processing times
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overall. We are certainly more than happy to work with him on that objective that he has. Thank you.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you very much and on behalf of members of the committee I'd like to thank all of you for being here today, it's been very informative for us. Thank you very much.
We have two brief items of business in front of us. We have a motion that has been proposed, circulated to members from, first, Mr. Steele, that the Public Accounts Committee directs its chair to request from the Minister of Immigration an unedited copy of the Conflict of Interest Commissioner's recent report concerning a possible conflict of interest within the Office of Immigration. So Mr. Steele has proposed this motion.
Is there any discussion on the motion? Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Oh, I'm sorry . . .
MR. PORTER: I was just going to speak to the motion.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Porter.
MR. PORTER: Thank you for the opportunity. I wonder, to the honourable member's motion, I'd like to introduce an amendment to that, if I may.
MADAM CHAIR: Certainly.
MR. PORTER: Further, that the unedited copy of the Conflict of Interest Commissioner's report concerning a conflict of interest in the Office of Immigration remain confidential, to protect the privacy of the individual names in the report and that the Public Accounts Committee and its members do not publicly release the report.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Steele.
MR. STEELE: Do we wish to excuse our guests before we get into - there may be some debate.
MADAM CHAIR: Yes, I think we can do that. Thank you.
So there is an amendment to the motion essentially that we receive this report, that we hold the information in confidence, which I think is the second part of Mr. Steele's e-mail to us but not included in the resolution, so it makes it specific. Is there any discussion? Mr. Steele.
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MR. STEELE: I think that's a reasonable amendment and I'll be voting for the amendment and for the motion.
MADAM CHAIR: So, I guess we can vote on the motion as amended.
Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay. (Interruptions)
MR. STEELE: On a point of order . . .
MADAM CHAIR: Okay, on a point of order then, let us go back. We have an amendment so first of all, let's vote on the amendment. Would all those in favour of the amendment please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The amendment is carried.
Now the motion, as amended, let's vote on that. Would all those in favour of the motion as amended, please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion as amended is carried.
Now we have a second motion that has been circulated. This motion has been brought forth by Mr. Porter, that the Minister of Immigration be asked to provide relevant information about the nominees and business mentors who are registered to appear at the February 13, 2008 committee session. So this motion has been circulated.
[11:00 a.m.]
I first would like to speak to the motion. I am not in favour of the motion at this time, although down the road we may want to bring this motion back. Let me say this, by way of providing some background, the Department of Immigration wrote me, as the Chair of the committee, on the 15th of January. I will have the clerk circulate to you a copy of that letter and my response, asking for the list of nominees who would be appearing here at the forum. I thanked them for their interest but indicated that no, we would not be providing the department with that list of nominees in advance of their appearance. They also indicated that they wanted to send us the files of the people who would be appearing and I indicated we would let them know if we required these files at some future date.
It is my view that the forum should follow the process that is used at the Law Amendments Committee, where people register with the clerk and they come forward in an uninhibited way.
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The department has stressed over and over again that the personal privacy of individuals, in terms of the information that is contained in the files that they have, is very sensitive and needs to be dealt with in a very secure manner. I think until we hear from people and we have an opportunity to ask them if they have any objections to our having access to their personal file, that it would be, I think, premature to ask the Department of Immigration to give us their files in advance of the forum. That's my view of the matter.
So the floor is open for further discussion. Mr. Steele, Mr. Porter, Ms. Whalen.
MR. STEELE: Thank you, Madam Chair. I do share your concerns. To release a file in these circumstances, I think, would be irregular and indeed unprecedented. When somebody comes to a member of the Legislature with a community services issue or appears before the Community Services Committee, we don't ask them to have the department release the file. If somebody comes to us with a health issue, we don't ask them to sign a waiver to release their health file. It's beyond my understanding why, when somebody comes to us with an immigration matter, that the government should ask that their personal immigration file be released without their consent.
So in summary I would say, Madam Chair, I agree with you. Let's at least wait and see what is said next week and then we'll be in a better position to know if it would be useful. It seems to me that if we're going to consider a motion like this, it should be on the strict understanding that nothing is released to anybody without the consent of the person concerned.
What I would like to suggest is that rather than dealing with this motion now, that it should be deferred until after we have actually heard from the people. If the mover of the motion insists that it be put to a vote today, then we'll vote against it, but it would be better to revisit this after we've held the forum and know better where we stand.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you. Mr. Porter and then Ms. Whalen.
MR. PORTER: Thank you, Madam Chair. I think if you look at my motion you'll find the words, asked to provide relevant information, not personal information. I'm not looking at any personal information. Just as this committee has gone through thousands of documents that have been provided and some have taken it upon themselves to black out and not provide or release certain information, which is fine - we've gone through that process.
I don't see this as any different. We have witnesses come before us all the time, by way of request, and part of that is information provided to this committee in detail most of the time, so that relevant questions can be asked. The motion to me is very simple; if we're going to bring people before us, we should know the interaction that's been had with the department. That is, after all, what I think this whole thing has been about, we want to know their interaction with the department.
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I'm not interested in their personal lives whatsoever and I don't think that anyone in the committee all along has said that they were. We focused on the issues at hand and this, to me, is quite important actually, to make sure that we have adequate information to ask the people who have volunteered to come before us the appropriate questions.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you. Ms. Whalen.
MS. WHALEN: Thank you very much. I'd just like to speak to this for a few moments. I appreciate what Mr. Porter is saying about wanting to have information that would not be personal but I think that we have to be well aware, as legislators, that coming before a legislative committee is an intimidating process often, for our very experienced staff members, for members of the public who come to Law Amendments Committee to speak on issues. This is something that we should try to make as painless as possible, so that the people who are coming before us are treated well and respectfully.
Similar to really the precedent we have with Law Amendments Committee, people come, it's a very different form from our normal meetings and even in terms of our questioning, we can question them on what they present to us. Later we'll be calling back members, both staff members and others, to come and speak; we want to speak to ministers and really there'll be ample opportunity for others to speak and rebut and have their say. I would like to make this session where we hear directly from the individuals without adding any intimidation or fear for them to come before us. I think that it's already a difficult process for them to engage in and we should remember that these are newcomers who have not lived in Canada for very long. I believe, representing an area with a lot of people who are new to the country, they don't feel the same confidence that we would feel as Canadians and it's a big deal for them to come and speak to us and they're doing it in good faith. So I would like to hear them next week, and in future, after that meeting, we can decide how we go forward and the department will have ample opportunity to speak to us and present their view.
MADAM CHAIR: Mr. Porter.
MR. PORTER: Just a couple of closing points and perhaps one, again, I want to stress we're not interested in personal information. In my opinion, there is time for the clerk to make the appropriate calls and ask about permission for files or parts thereof to be used. With regard to the Law Amendments Committee, Law Amendments Committee is about looking forward not backward. Public Accounts looks back at things that have taken place with regard to the public purse. It has been suggested to me, in my opinion, that you want us to look back with our eyes closed, that's not appropriate.
I really resent the fact that Ms. Whalen would suggest that we would disrespect any witness before us, that has never been the case and I don't think that anyone has ever in this committee, since I've been here, disrespected any witness that has come forward with any
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suggestions. They have all been treated with respect and I see no reason not to continue that. I want to make that clear for the record and the motion, I'm going to let stand for the vote. Thank you.
MADAM CHAIR: Thank you. That was a question I had, if you were prepared to defer it. This isn't a question about not having time to do it, it's about procedure and the proper way to approach it.
We have a motion on the floor. Would all those in favour of the motion please say Aye. Contrary minded, Nay.
The motion is defeated.
There is no report from the subcommittee, we were unable to schedule a meeting. We will attempt to do that when Mr. Colwell is feeling better. I've had the clerk circulate to you an opinion from the Legislative Counsel, Mr. Hebb, with respect to the question of the power of the subcommittee around releasing information. At a further date we will have an opportunity to discuss this and bring this matter to some conclusion.
Thank you and we stand adjourned until next week.
[The committee adjourned at 11:08 a.m.]
