Our goal: Safer street within the first 100 days
Wild Rose Report: A column by MP Blake Richards
Our Conservative government strongly believes that the justice system should put the rights of law-abiding citizens ahead of the rights of criminals. Since first taking office in 2006, we’ve strived to restore balance to a system that all too often concerns itself first with the perpetrators of crime rather than their victims.
In five years of minority government, we managed to pass a number of important laws that are making our streets safer for Canadians. For example, we’ve toughened sentencing and bail for serious gun crimes; ended sentence discounts for multiple murders; abolished the faint-hope clause that granted early parole for murderers and cracked down on auto theft and trafficking in stolen property, to name just a few.
Unfortunately, however, progress on our law-and-order agenda just as often fell victim to the soft-on-crime ideology of opposition parties. Prior to the recent election, many of our government’s bills faced co-ordinated obstruction by opposition parties who are apologists for criminals. In the election, Canadians showed their support for our government’s efforts to put victims of crime first. Our government’s renewed majority mandate means we can now proceed with common-sense reforms to protect law-abiding Canadians.
Canadians have waited long enough for these measures. We promised during the election that a majority Conservative government would bundle and pass into law our outstanding and delayed justice bills within Parliament’s first 100 days and that is just what we intend to do.
This comprehensive legislation will include new measures that will: crack down on organized drug crime; end house arrest for violent criminals and sexual offenders; eliminate pardons for serious criminals; establish tougher sentences and mandatory jail time for sexual offences against children; strengthen the handling of violent and repeat young offenders; give police and courts the tools they need to investigate and prevent acts of terrorism; and streamline long and complex trials, to ensure justice is delivered swiftly.
The comprehensive bill is in addition to new measures we outlined during the election that will combat drug use in prisons, combat human trafficking, crack down on elder abuse and strengthening laws on self-defence for citizens.
Our government believes that punishment should fit the crime and is moving quickly on outstanding measures to protect the vulnerable and to better hold criminals to account.
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Comments
Crime and punishment: Inside the Tories’ plan to overhaul the justice system
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/05/21/crime-and-punishment-inside-the-tories-plan-to-overhaul-the-justice-system/
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message ID: 332058
Post On: May 22, 2011
Posted by User #: Frank D
Posted by IP:
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Related article:
Crime and punishment: Inside the Tories’ plan to overhaul the justice system
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/05/21/crime-and-punishment-inside-the-tories-plan-to-overhaul-the-justice-system/
Please consider using your next column to respond to the information I've provided on the expense and ineffectiveness of mandatory minimum sentencing for drug offences.
Thank you.
-FrankD
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message ID: 332018
Post On: May 17, 2011
Posted by User #: Frank D
Posted by IP:
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Mr. Richards,
Please consider using your next column to respond to the information I've provided on the expense and ineffectiveness of mandatory minimum sentencing for drug offences.
Thank you.
-FrankD
Maybe you could use your next column as a response to the information I've made you aware of in regards to the expense and ineffectiveness of Mandatory Minimum Sentencing for drug crimes?
Thank you.
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message ID: 332017
Post On: May 17, 2011
Posted by User #: Frank D
Posted by IP:
message:
Mr. Richards,
Maybe you could use your next column as a response to the information I've made you aware of in regards to the expense and ineffectiveness of Mandatory Minimum Sentencing for drug crimes?
Thank you.
I thought you might benefit from reading some excerpts from a recent OpEd in the National Post by Conrad Black and Evan Wood, MD PhD...
"Drug prohibition is dumb on crime"
May 14, 2011 - National Post
http://natpo.st...
Excerpts:
"Unfortunately, like archaic cultures that clung to the belief that the Earth was flat, those who support mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes are willfully ignorant of the near universal consensus that mandatory minimum sentences are both extremely costly and ineffective."
...
"Conservative support for tough drug laws is paradoxical, given that the failure of mandatory minimum sentencing schemes is explained by the free-market economic principles that many conservatives hold dear — particularly the simple law of supply and demand. This principle requires that effectively cutting drug supply by taking a drug dealer off the street will have the perverse effect of making it that much more profitable for new players to get into the market."
...
"One can only hope that this happens soon. Failed mandatory minimum sentencing legislation is currently being repealed in various U.S. states, including New York, Michigan, Massachusetts and Connecticut, and it will be a sad legacy for Canadian conservatives if we sit quietly and ignore how U.S. society has been remarkably weakened by the same laws our government is now hell-bent on enacting."
MP Blake Richards, thank you for your prompt attention to this very important matter.
-FrankD
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message ID: 332016
Post On: May 16, 2011
Posted by User #: Frank D
Posted by IP:
message:
Mr. Richards,
I thought you might benefit from reading some excerpts from a recent OpEd in the National Post by Conrad Black and Evan Wood, MD PhD...
"Drug prohibition is dumb on crime"
May 14, 2011 - National Post
http://natpo.st/iLsBfc
Excerpts:
"Unfortunately, like archaic cultures that clung to the belief that the Earth was flat, those who support mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes are willfully ignorant of the near universal consensus that mandatory minimum sentences are both extremely costly and ineffective."
...
"Conservative support for tough drug laws is paradoxical, given that the failure of mandatory minimum sentencing schemes is explained by the free-market economic principles that many conservatives hold dear — particularly the simple law of supply and demand. This principle requires that effectively cutting drug supply by taking a drug dealer off the street will have the perverse effect of making it that much more profitable for new players to get into the market."
...
"One can only hope that this happens soon. Failed mandatory minimum sentencing legislation is currently being repealed in various U.S. states, including New York, Michigan, Massachusetts and Connecticut, and it will be a sad legacy for Canadian conservatives if we sit quietly and ignore how U.S. society has been remarkably weakened by the same laws our government is now hell-bent on enacting."
MP Blake Richards, thank you for your prompt attention to this very important matter.
-FrankD
Sounds like someone wanted to be a cop but couldn't? What about issues like GAS prices, FOOD costs, wages!!! help make survival easier to achieve, to stop criminal happenings at the root!!!!
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message ID: 332007
Post On: May 14, 2011
Posted by User #: K Mac
Posted by IP:
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Blake Richards = Fail.
Sounds like someone wanted to be a cop but couldn't? What about issues like GAS prices, FOOD costs, wages!!! help make survival easier to achieve, to stop criminal happenings at the root!!!!
One highly controversial bill that will be included in this omnibus bill would usher in mandatory minimum sentences for drug offences. This legislation, previously titled, "Bill S-10: Penalties for organized drug crime act," has been overwhelmingly opposed by experts, as a step in the wrong direction, a policy disaster and expensive waste of taxpayer money. Even the U.S. drug czar opposes them, saying that U.S. states are now moving away from mandatory minimum sentences, after recognizing they have been an expensive failure. Last, but not least, two studies done for the Canadian Justice Department conclude the same thing!
What kind of governement would go through with legislation that is certain to fail?
Opposition to Mandatory Minimum Sentencing
http://www.cannabisfacts.ca...
Do any of these warnings causing the Harper Conservatives to reconsider mandatory minimum sentencing for drug offences? No. The facts and evidence are not important to Stephen Harper, and they are obviously not important to MP Blake Richards either! Shame on them.
Despite the impression the bill's title gives ("Penalties for organized drug crime"), this legislation will bring in mandatory prison sentences, not for organized criminals, but for low-level drug offences, including an AUTOMATIC prison sentence for a 6 plant "grow op" -- or for a student who exchanges a pill of ecstasy with a classmate.
Building and filling prisons with people who shouldn't be there as an economic stimulus plan is pitiful statement about this Conservative government and is very un-Canadian.
I encourage all concerned citizens in MP Blake Richards riding to contact him and ask him how his conscience can allow him to ignore the available evidence that mandatory minimum sentencing will be an expensive policy disaster.
I also encourage Mr. Richards to educate himself more fully on this matter, then put aside partisanship and do what is best for Canada -- to oppose mandatory minimum sentencing. This policy disaster can be averted if a large enough numbers of Canadians contact their elected representatives to voice their opposition.
More info on MMS legislation
http://www.cannabisfacts.ca...
MP Blake Richards, thank you for your prompt attention to this very important matter.
-FrankD
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message ID: 332005
Post On: May 14, 2011
Posted by User #: Frank D
Posted by IP:
message:
Either MP Blake Richards is ignorant of the facts or is morally bankrupt in his championing of the Conservative government's plan to combine 11 crime bills into one huge "omnibus" bill and pass it within 100 days.
One highly controversial bill that will be included in this omnibus bill would usher in mandatory minimum sentences for drug offences. This legislation, previously titled, "Bill S-10: Penalties for organized drug crime act," has been overwhelmingly opposed by experts, as a step in the wrong direction, a policy disaster and expensive waste of taxpayer money. Even the U.S. drug czar opposes them, saying that U.S. states are now moving away from mandatory minimum sentences, after recognizing they have been an expensive failure. Last, but not least, two studies done for the Canadian Justice Department conclude the same thing!
What kind of governement would go through with legislation that is certain to fail?
Opposition to Mandatory Minimum Sentencing
http://www.cannabisfacts.ca/Bill-S10-opposition.html
Do any of these warnings causing the Harper Conservatives to reconsider mandatory minimum sentencing for drug offences? No. The facts and evidence are not important to Stephen Harper, and they are obviously not important to MP Blake Richards either! Shame on them.
Despite the impression the bill's title gives ("Penalties for organized drug crime"), this legislation will bring in mandatory prison sentences, not for organized criminals, but for low-level drug offences, including an AUTOMATIC prison sentence for a 6 plant "grow op" -- or for a student who exchanges a pill of ecstasy with a classmate.
Building and filling prisons with people who shouldn't be there as an economic stimulus plan is pitiful statement about this Conservative government and is very un-Canadian.
I encourage all concerned citizens in MP Blake Richards riding to contact him and ask him how his conscience can allow him to ignore the available evidence that mandatory minimum sentencing will be an expensive policy disaster.
I also encourage Mr. Richards to educate himself more fully on this matter, then put aside partisanship and do what is best for Canada -- to oppose mandatory minimum sentencing. This policy disaster can be averted if a large enough numbers of Canadians contact their elected representatives to voice their opposition.
More info on MMS legislation
http://www.cannabisfacts.ca/mandatoryminimums.html
MP Blake Richards, thank you for your prompt attention to this very important matter.
-FrankD