Better Solution for Criminal Justice
The problem:
Recidivism (repeat offenses) is at an unacceptably high level. Police feel handicapped by lax court decisions: offenders are often back on the streets before the police have completed the paper-work for their arrests! Rigged statistics trumpet allegedly lower rates of crime, but citizens do not feel safe. Drug gangs stage gun-fights on the streets; in BC, marijuana has surpassed forestry and tourism in “business” volume.
Current Government strategy: (and how it falls short)
Crime was the top local issue for Canadians polled in 10 cities across Canada. The Tories claim to be the Party that is tough on crime, yet of the government’s 21 crime bills introduced in the last session of Parliament, 18 died on the Order Paper because Mr. Harper prorogued Parliament. Three had passed all stages in both houses of Parliament and received Royal Assent, yet the government delayed making them law. This is posturing of the worst kind. Canadians deserve to have a government that will act in the best interests of citizens to keep them and their families safe. This issue is too important for phony posturing.
With information from http://www.nationalpost.com/related/links/story.html?id=2634701
Opposition strategy: (and how it falls short)
The present “bleeding heart strategies” of all opposition parties sees the criminal as the victim, rather than innocent Canadians on whom they prey, who simply want to live in peace and security in their towns and cities. All opposition parties fail to see justice as the right consequence for illegal conduct by the perpetrator and worthy of punishment by the government.
The CHP’s Better Solution:
Restitution and Public Safety
The CHP’s criminal justice policy focuses on restitution and public safety. Up to two-thirds of our prison spaces are occupied by non-violent criminals; these people should not be in jail. Instead they should be working to earn money to support their families and pay restitution to their victims. Restitution has a profoundly rehabilitative effect on offenders. Truly dangerous offenders—violent and sexual criminals, those who use guns in the commission of their crimes, and peddlers of drugs and child pornography—should be kept behind bars until we are convinced they are no longer a threat to public safety.
Revise the Young Offenders Act
The Young Offenders’ Act needs serious revision. One of those revisions would be to name offenders who commit ‘adult’ crimes—i.e., serious offenses, including violent and sexual offenses. Murder, rape, assault, armed robbery, etc. should all be raised to adult court—although there should be special rehabilitation facilities for these young offenders.
As with all violent offenders, we reject concurrent sentencing and the bargaining away of mandatory sentences for weapons offences.
The Young Offenders’ Act has created a situation in which adult criminals exploit juveniles to acts as their “cat’s-paws”, because the juveniles will receive sentences irrelevant to the offences. However, we do not agree that young offenders should “do adult time” in adult prisons; that would merely educate them to be more clever criminals. We urgently need a youth reformatory system that re-trains young offenders and rehabilitates them. They must also be made to pay restitution to their victims, because this brings them face-to-face with the real consequences of their actions, which has been shown to have strong rehabilitative effect.
No votes for prison inmates
The court decision which ruled that prison inmates should be allowed to vote was a logical absurdity that amply illustrates why the CHP wants to make an election issue of the urgent need to restrain the judiciary and make the courts accountable for the constitutionality of their decisions.
Elections are held to choose the people to whom we delegate the citizens’ power of enacting and enforcing laws. Those we elect must have respect for the law. Therefore the people who elect them must also have respect for the law.
Convicted law-breakers, until they have been rehabilitated, have demonstrated that they lack respect for the law—and therefore they have no right to participate in making the laws they refuse to obey.
Sentencing must be made more meaningful: no “double time” credit for time awaiting trial, no “volume discounts” for multiple offences, and no early release for violent and sexual criminals. And convicted felons should not be allowed to vote until their terms have been completed.
Criminal Justice and Young Offenders Act
Better Solution for Criminal Justice
The problem:
Recidivism (repeat offenses) is at an unacceptably high level. Police feel handicapped by lax court decisions: offenders are often back on the streets before the police have completed the paper-work for their arrests! Rigged statistics trumpet allegedly lower rates of crime, but citizens do not feel safe. Drug gangs stage gun-fights on the streets; in BC, marijuana has surpassed forestry and tourism in “business” volume.
Current Government strategy: (and how it falls short)
Crime was the top local issue for Canadians polled in 10 cities across Canada. The Tories claim to be the Party that is tough on crime, yet of the government’s 21 crime bills introduced in the last session of Parliament, 18 died on the Order Paper because Mr. Harper prorogued Parliament. Three had passed all stages in both houses of Parliament and received Royal Assent, yet the government delayed making them law. This is posturing of the worst kind. Canadians deserve to have a government that will act in the best interests of citizens to keep them and their families safe. This issue is too important for phony posturing.
With information from http://www.nationalpost.com/related/links/story.html?id=2634701
Opposition strategy: (and how it falls short)
The present “bleeding heart strategies” of all opposition parties sees the criminal as the victim, rather than innocent Canadians on whom they prey, who simply want to live in peace and security in their towns and cities. All opposition parties fail to see justice as the right consequence for illegal conduct by the perpetrator and worthy of punishment by the government.
The CHP’s Better Solution:
Restitution and Public Safety
The CHP’s criminal justice policy focuses on restitution and public safety. Up to two-thirds of our prison spaces are occupied by non-violent criminals; these people should not be in jail. Instead they should be working to earn money to support their families and pay restitution to their victims. Restitution has a profoundly rehabilitative effect on offenders. Truly dangerous offenders—violent and sexual criminals, those who use guns in the commission of their crimes, and peddlers of drugs and child pornography—should be kept behind bars until we are convinced they are no longer a threat to public safety.
Revise the Young Offenders Act
The Young Offenders’ Act needs serious revision. One of those revisions would be to name offenders who commit ‘adult’ crimes—i.e., serious offenses, including violent and sexual offenses. Murder, rape, assault, armed robbery, etc. should all be raised to adult court—although there should be special rehabilitation facilities for these young offenders.
As with all violent offenders, we reject concurrent sentencing and the bargaining away of mandatory sentences for weapons offences.
The Young Offenders’ Act has created a situation in which adult criminals exploit juveniles to acts as their “cat’s-paws”, because the juveniles will receive sentences irrelevant to the offences. However, we do not agree that young offenders should “do adult time” in adult prisons; that would merely educate them to be more clever criminals. We urgently need a youth reformatory system that re-trains young offenders and rehabilitates them. They must also be made to pay restitution to their victims, because this brings them face-to-face with the real consequences of their actions, which has been shown to have strong rehabilitative effect.
No votes for prison inmates
The court decision which ruled that prison inmates should be allowed to vote was a logical absurdity that amply illustrates why the CHP wants to make an election issue of the urgent need to restrain the judiciary and make the courts accountable for the constitutionality of their decisions.
Elections are held to choose the people to whom we delegate the citizens’ power of enacting and enforcing laws. Those we elect must have respect for the law. Therefore the people who elect them must also have respect for the law.
Convicted law-breakers, until they have been rehabilitated, have demonstrated that they lack respect for the law—and therefore they have no right to participate in making the laws they refuse to obey.
Sentencing must be made more meaningful: no “double time” credit for time awaiting trial, no “volume discounts” for multiple offences, and no early release for violent and sexual criminals. And convicted felons should not be allowed to vote until their terms have been completed.