CRIME-FIGHTING STRATEGIES DON'T MATCH

Prime Minister Stephen Harper defended his government's plan to
create new gang-related offences in the Criminal Code during a visit
to Vancouver Thursday, and promised to keep working on B.C.'s demands
for reforms they say are more urgently needed.

Federal opposition parties say they will support Conservative
government bills that would:

- - Create a new offence for drive-by and street shootings, with a
mandatory minimum of four years in prison and a maximum of 14;

- - Make murders connected to organized crime activity automatically
subject to a first-degree murder charge;

- - Create new offences of aggravated assault against a peace officer
and assault with a weapon on a peace officer, with maximum sentences
of 14 and 10 years.

Liberal justice critic Ujjal Dosanjh said his party will support the
new laws, but the federal government is making a mistake in not
taking up B.C.'s priorities, such as ending the practice of giving
convicted criminals double credit for time spent awaiting trial and
updating 40-year-old wiretap laws.

"The remand two-for-one credit has been an issue for several years,
and this government should have acted on it," said Dosanjh, a former
B.C. premier and attorney general. "The electronic surveillance issue
has been there for a long, long time. In fact the Liberal government
in 2005 brought a bill forward. That bill died on the order paper
because of the election, and this government hasn't seen fit to bring
that forward."

Harper said progress has been slow with a minority government, but
called stiffer penalties for violent crime "an indispensable part of
toughening the criminal justice regime in this country."

Going into his own meeting with Harper on Thursday, Premier Gordon
Campbell said B.C.'s priorities, in addition to remand policy and
wiretaps, include simplifying rules for disclosure of evidence.

B.C. NDP public safety critic Mike Farnworth said that despite
Campbell's recent announcement of more police and prosecutors to
tackle organized crime, there are still staffing shortages that
threaten to get worse in the years ahead.

Farnworth endorsed the idea of modernizing wiretap laws to deal with
cell phone and text message communication.

He said the B.C. government dismissed his recent suggestion to
regulate the sale of body armour, but now appears to be considering
it. They should also ask Ottawa for a Criminal Code amendment to make
use of body armour an aggravating factor in sentencing.

Farnworth said the federal government should also hire a team of 50
tax auditors to specialize in tracking money and identifying proceeds
of crime such as cars and real estate.

On Friday, Rob Nicholson, the federal Minister of Justice and
Attorney General, staged a press conference in Vancouver to announce
the Conservative government was reviving a proposal to impose
mandatory minimum sentences for drug-related offences.

The law would set a mandatory one-year term for selling marijuana if
the drug dealer is linked to organized crime, and two years for
selling harder drugs like cocaine, heroin or meth to young people or
selling them near a school.