DO THE CRIME - DO THE TIME

In May, Canada's Conservative government introduced a bill to limit
conditional criminal sentences. As things stand, more than 5,500
criminals a year convicted of assault causing bodily harm, sexual
assault, robbery, drunk driving causing death or injury, car theft,
arson, break-and-enter and theft over $5,000 serve no prison time at
all, but instead are sentenced to house arrest or community
supervision. During the last election, the government promised to end
this leniency in a drive to "get tough on crime." But Tuesday, the
members of the three opposition parties on the Commons justice
committee gutted the Tories' bill. They joined together to pass
amendments that preserved lax sentencing for all but the most violent
offenders, arguing the government's plan was a "radical, extreme overreaction."

Vic Toews, the Conservative Minister of Justice, vowed that he would
introduce the unamended bill in the Commons anyway, lamenting that
the opposition are "so out of touch with Canadians when it comes to
tackling crime."

We agree.

For the past decade, a vast social experiment has been ongoing in
Canada's criminal justice system, largely without Canadians'
knowledge. In the mid-1990s, Ottawa and most of the provinces agreed
that incarceration should be the exception rather than the rule for
most criminals. Rehabilitation and supervision in the community were
to replace imprisonment in the hope that with such compassionate
treatment, thieves, burglars, arsonists, rapists and impaired drivers
would see the error of their ways and be discouraged from reoffending.

Since then, the number of convicted criminals in provincial and
territorial jails has declined by 31%. Of the 153,000 under federal
or provincial sentence, four out of five are in the community rather
than prison.

While crimes reported to police are generally down -- marginally --
more Canadians than ever tell Statistics Canada that they have been
victims of crime. Each year, 28% of Canadians are victimized, up
nearly 8% since 1999, and more than the 24% of Americans who admit
the same. In all, each year there are eight million criminal offences
in Canada, 2.7 million of them violent, resulting in 650,000 personal
injuries. Fewer are being reported because victims no longer see the
point. If they do go through the hassle of a police investigation and
the stress of a trial, there is a better than even chance their
victimizer will remain on the streets.

If anything, the Tories' proposal did not go far enough. Most
suspects arrested would still have been eligible for non-custodial
sentences. Only those convicted of a crime that carries a maximum
prison sentence of 10 years or more would have no chance at
conditional sentences. True, as opposition critics charged, some
property crimes carry 10-year maximums, even though no person is
injured in their commission. But some property crime is very serious
- -- arson, for example. The risk is significant that someone will be
unintentionally injured or killed, even when the perpetrators do not
set out to harm anyone.

Break and enter of a private home is always traumatic for the
residents, whether they were home at the time or not. Stronger
sentences are a good way to discourage burglars and send a signal
that society will no longer shrug off such acts.

The Liberal, New Democrat and Bloc Quebecois parties are wrong to
believe that Canadians want a continuation of the country's
decade-long test of every-boy-a-good-boy justice. It is time to
restore some sense into our criminal justice system to recognize
again that protection of the community is at least as important a
factor in sentencing as the criminal's feelings and rehabilitation.