SUFFER THE CHILDREN

Opposition politicians are supposed to inflate the significance of
problems the government hasn't dealt with. They're supposed to call
for solutions without thinking of what those solutions will cost. The
problem is, Vic Toews is no longer an opposition politician.

He's the minister of justice. If he wants to extend the notion of
criminal responsibility to 10-year-olds, he'd better be prepared to
back it up with some facts and some cash.

At a recent speech to the Canadian Bar Association, Mr. Toews said
he's considering making the Youth Criminal Justice Act apply to
children as young as 10. The current law considers children under 12
incapable of committing crimes.

The first fact Mr. Toews needs to establish is the size of the
problem, if there is one.

It's true that far too many teenagers run afoul of the law. In 2005,
police charged more than 73,000 youths aged 12 to 17 (more than
96,000 were processed without charges). More than half the cases in
youth courts, though, are 16- and 17-year-olds.

Last year, a Statistics Canada study found that most young offenders
are not repeat offenders.

Mr. Toews spoke of "anecdotes" about problem children coming into the
court system at 12 as hardened criminals. If he wants Canada to
change its law -- indeed, its ideas about childhood -- he'll need
more than anecdotes. He'll need to show there is a significant
population of children under 12 committing what would, for adults, be
considered crimes.

And he'll need to demonstrate that the courts are the right places to
deal with those children. Mr. Toews wants the courts to mandate
treatment for problem children.

The Conservative government has put some money into community crime
prevention, but it will have to spend much more if Mr. Toews is right
and there are children in need of help. In fact, if social services
were sufficiently funded now, particularly in the area of mental
health, perhaps Mr. Toews wouldn't be hearing those anecdotes.

Mr. Toews will also have to stop throwing around the word "deter." He
told the bar association: "We need to find ways of ensuring that
children are deterred from crime." If he means stopping children from
becoming chronic offenders by putting them into treatment programs,
fair enough.

But "deterrence" usually refers to the idea that awareness of legal
consequences will prevent crime. The theory of deterrence is
imperfect, even when it comes to adults. If 10-year-olds are fearful
of any consequences from, say, shoplifting, it will be from the
shopkeepers, their parents, or their own consciences. They're
unlikely to even be able to name the Youth Criminal Justice Act,
never mind have any idea whether it applies to them.

The current age threshold is arbitrary, but it would be just as
arbitrary at 10. In fact, the government would making a strange
statement about the psychology of children by raising the age of
sexual consent to 16, but lowering the age of criminal responsibility to 10.

Perhaps judges should be able to intervene in very serious cases,
even for children younger than 10. Mr. Toews is right to raise that
possibility. But if he simply lowers the age without considering the
consequences, that could put more stress on underfunded services and
busy courts, while hurting more children than it helps.