MANDATORY MINIMUMS WON'T MAKE CANADIAN STREETS SAFER

To toughen up criminal justice, the federal government has chosen to
pursue mandatory minimum sentences for drug dealers.

It's not only cowardly, following the ongoing and vapid assumption
that any anti-drug policy will instantly garner wide public support;
it also shows federal politicians to be dreadfully out of touch with
the Canadian public.

Though the results of opinion surveys vary widely, few any more show
a majority support for continuing or escalating the failed "war on
drugs", which costs taxpayers billions--yes, billions--of enforcement
dollars every year, but does absolutely nothing to lower availability or use.

In fact, as more than 70 major independent scientific studies since
1921 have conclusively demonstrated, attempting to "ban" drug
consumption simply props up a major black market for Canada's
criminal organizations, which make the majority of their profits off
the outrageous market markups caused by the product being illegal.

Secondly, the proposed federal law comes as U. S. states are
repealing mandatory minimum sentencing because it doesn't work.
Canada's proposals aren't worded as broadly as U. S. initiatives, and
therefore will at least avoid the pitfall of jailing for life anyone
involved in the drug trade-- even if the crime was stealing a piece
of pizza while holding drugs, as has happened in California.

Third, there are many areas of existing law that could be toughened
up. Sentencing guidelines for manslaughter in Canada are so low that
first-time offenders can now be out in as little as two years, with
good behaviour. Victims' rights to involvement during the prosecution
process lag behind where they should be, as do compensatory and
counselling services for victims. Canada could also benefit from
toughening provisions allowing the indefinite confinement of repeat
child sex offenders, so that untreatable pedophiles can be weeded out
of society and held until a cure is found.

Fourth, Canada's jails are beginning to mirror the overcrowded,
ridiculous U. S. system, where mandatory minimums have made the
supposedly most free country on earth also the one most likely to
jail you, moreso even than places like China and North Korea, a
system so expensive it was privatized out of necessity, not choice.

Mandatory minimums are cheap public gestures and will not help make
Canadian streets safer. Legalizing, controlling content and
distributing drugs in the same manner as alcohol would take profits
away from criminals, so that they could instead be used for public
benefit, including treating the small percentage that become addicted.