IN A COUNTERING MOVE, DION GETS TOUGH ON CRIME

VANCOUVER and OTTAWA -- Seeking to blunt Conservative attacks that he
is soft on crime, Liberal Leader Stephane Dion will unveil his own
law-and-order script today -- including hundreds of millions of
dollars to put thousands more police on Canadian streets.

The Opposition Leader, who will announce those measures in a Toronto
speech, will also offer support for tougher bail measures, according
to an excerpt of his text obtained by The Globe and Mail.

And in Vancouver yesterday, Mr. Dion said a Liberal government would
also act to improve how the justice system deals with violent
criminals who serve their sentences and are released into the
community, rather than imprisoned indefinitely as dangerous offenders.

Mr. Dion's counteroffensive on crime comes a day after Prime Minister
Stephen Harper announced his government's latest environmental
funding -- aimed at eroding the Liberal edge on green issues.

In Vancouver, Mr. Dion gave a hint of his law-and-order agenda,
saying he is taking a "tough and smart" approach to fighting crime.

Last week, The Globe and Mail reported that Ontario Attorney-General
Michael Bryant had written a position paper urging the federal party
to scrap an approach to crime "stuck in the summer of love." Instead,
the paper favoured a strategy that more strongly emphasized tough
measures, including a reverse-onus clause for some crimes -- in which
defendants must prove they should be released.

Mr. Dion appears to have taken that advice to heart, saying yesterday
in Vancouver that fighting crime will be a top priority for any
government he leads. "We can't build a strong Canada if Canadians
feel unsafe in their communities," he said. In his speech today, he
will commit the Liberals to supporting reverse-onus bail for gun crimes.

The Conservative government has already tabled a bill calling for
reverse-onus bail in the House of Commons, although it has yet to be
passed through the Commons justice committee.

Mr. Dion will assert that the Liberals support tougher sentences for
some crimes, but argue that more efforts to "catch and convict"
criminals through better policing is more effective at cutting crime.

"The most effective way to protect our homes and our rights is to
catch and convict more criminals. When a potential criminal believes
he won't be caught -- or, if he is caught, he won't be convicted --
he's more likely to commit the crime," Mr. Dion's text states.

"There's no question that sentences are an important part of the
solution: Serious crimes should carry serious penalties. But fighting
crime with longer sentences alone doesn't work," Mr. Dion's text states.

Yesterday in Vancouver, he criticized Mr. Harper for failing to
deliver on a promise to put 2,500 more municipal police officers on
the streets of Canadian cities.

"He talks the talk, but does not walk the walk," Mr. Dion said. "To
date, he has not provided a single dollar for additional municipal
police on our streets. Not one dollar."

He said Mr. Harper puts politics ahead of policy when it comes to
fighting crime. "His only game is to try to describe the opposition,
as he calls it, soft."

Mr. Dion will sound that theme again today in Toronto, and will
promise to provide funds for those 2,500 officers immediately upon
taking office.