An organization that advocates for those involved in the criminal justice system was hoping for something more substantive than a “back to the drawing board” type announcement on the replacement for HMP yesterday.
Costs have ballooned and government is not much further ahead now than it was 15 years ago. In some cases, judges are reducing the amount of time a person convicted of a crime will spend at the penitentiary because of conditions at the aging facility.
Cindy Murphy, Executive Director of the John Howard Society, says it’s not only bad for inmates, but also staff. She says abut 80 per cent of the population at the prison is on remand, but that’s time to look at alternatives through the bail program.
Cindy Murphy (File photo)
Eighty per cent of the inmates either have not had their day in court or have been convicted but not sentenced, she says. That’s a large number of people who may be able to be supervised in the community until they go back to court, yet we hear nothing from the province about the bail program.
Government has promised that shovels will be in the ground in 2025 and to take temporary measures to alleviate overcrowding until the gates of a new facility open.
