SOCIETY WANTS TO KEEP DRUGS OUT OF SCHOOLS

Judicial System Has Undermined Hard Work Of Police

Today I would like to share with you my concern about the April 25
Supreme Court ruling regarding the use of drug sniffing dogs.

To be honest, I am very disappointed with this ruling. The Supreme
Court ruled that it was unconstitutional for school administrators
to invite police to do spot checks for drugs in our schools.

The court ruled random searches by drug sniffing dogs violated
Section 8 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Section 8
reads, "Everyone has the right to be secure against unreasonable
search or seizure."

While I agree with that statement, I am still astonished by this
decision. I believe that society wants to keep drugs out of our
schools. It seems to me that keeping our schools free of illegal
drugs is a very reasonable reason for search and seizure.

Furthermore, it is my understanding these searches are done by the
dogs sniffing the students' lockers while they are sitting in their
classrooms.

I am under the belief that this system allows for the discovery of
illegal drugs without the risk of unwarranted public embarrassment.
Backpacks were not emptied in front of the student body and teachers
did not rifle through personal belongings.

The actual searching is done by an "impartial" animal that calls
attention only to illegal drugs and ignores old lunch containers,
dirty gym clothes and the hundreds of other things that can be found
in a high school student's locker.

I fear that this decision takes a tool away from our administrators
to make our schools a safer place. I fear that this decision will
embolden youth who threaten our communities and be an invitation to
drug-dealing adults, who take advantage of young drug users, to take
up shop in our schools. But most of all, I fear that this decision
will have widespread repercussions that will discourage our school
administrators from taking action against students that they suspect
may have drugs, alcohol or weapons for that matter.

The decision appears to outweigh the rights of those breaking the
law against the abilities of those whom we ask every day to keep our
children safe.

I am certainly not calling for a drug-sniffing dog for every school.
However, I would have liked to think that individual schools could
use this tool if they felt it would help them if and when they
suspect illegal activity was taking place.

We should be working to keep drugs out of schools, not limiting the
abilities of our police to do their job.

The precedent this decision seems to set suggests that no person may
be stopped or searched without reason or without a warrant. Does
this decision mean that RIDE checks or seatbelt blitzes are
unconstitutional and without "just cause?" You be the judge.

Does this decision not call into question the issues of search,
seizure and privacy with these programs in the same way that it does
with our schools?

For quite some time now there appears to have been a disconnect
between society's will to get tougher on crime and our judiciary's
direction in their decisions. Our police have to deal with this
frustrating dilemma all the time. Far too often police take
criminals off of our streets only to see them returned with a pat
on the head from our judicial system. All you have to do is look to
what happened recently with the large grow-op in Georgian Bluffs and
the large crystal meth lab in the Stokes Bay area.

Too often the hard work of our police officers is undermined by a
judicial system that puts all of the rights in the hands of criminals.

Too often the topic of criminal proceedings turns into a search for
wrongdoing by police officers instead of the offences of the accused.

This ruling in our nation's highest court is no different. The hard
work of school administrators and police who worked together to make
our schools safer was tarnished by this ruling.

As your member of Parliament I feel that it is important to share my
thoughts with you on these issues. As always, if this Supreme Court
ruling or another topic has caught your attention I hope that you
will share your thoughts with me by contacting my offices in either
Owen Sound or Ottawa.