DRUGS FREELY AVAILABLE IN JAIL, CON SURVEY SAYS

OTTAWA --It's just as easy to get crack, cocaine, heroin and pot
inside federal prisons as it is on the outside, Reform charged
yesterday after calling zero-tolerance policies a "bad joke."

Reform MP Randy White said a national inmate survey obtained through
access laws shows that 1,300 cons used crack or cocaine daily while
another 1,300 admitted to using heroin and 5,400 to marijuana. There
are about 15,000 federal inmates.

"My God man, prisons are supposed to be the safest places in Canada
from that kind of thing," White said outside the House, where he
distributed copies of Corrections Canada's 1995 inmate survey.

"If there is unchecked drugs in prison, how on earth are we to fight
it on the outside if the government doesn't even have the intestinal
fortitude to fight it on the inside?" White said.

Solicitor General Lawrence MacAulay admitted in the Commons that drugs
are a major concern and that he intends to address the problem.

Later, at a Commons committee looking at the Corrections and
Conditional Release Act, he asked MPs for suggestions to help solve
the epidemic.

"I was shocked when I learned that almost seven out of every 10
offenders have serious problems with alcohol and drugs," MacAulay said.

A spokesman for MacAulay said spot checks by Corrections have shown
that drugs found in urine tests dropped to 12% from 39% between 1995-98.

White said Corrections Canada has to lower the boom on drug abusers,
including suspending conjugal visits, locking prisons down if drugs
are found, cancelling prison visits and using drug-sniffing dogs to
ferret out illegal substances.

Other drugs inmates admitted to freely using included valium,
amphetamines, LSD and anabolic steroids.