Criminal justice in Canada

Criminal Justice in Canada

The Conservative Canadian Government and its "tough on crime" approach

The Conservative Government in Canada has emphasized its attitudes toward crimes by implementing a system that both deters and harshly punishes criminals in an attempt to make the country a safer place. Criminals such as child sex offenders are currently less likely to 'escape' with mild sentences and the authorities have generally been instructed to do everything in their power with the purpose to prevent serious crimes from taking place. This means that penalties have become more significant and the masses are encouraged to play a more active role in protecting the community.

The Conditional Sentencing Reform Bill is among the first principal "tough on crime" reforms that the Conservative Government has adopted since it came to power. "Proposed in 2006, the bill's objective was to restrict the availability of conditional releases (day and full parole and statutory release)." (Kery & Shea 121) The legislation was largely aimed at preventing criminals who had sentences of 10 or more years from having access to conditional release (Kery & Shea 121). Individuals responsible for crimes such as stealing a series of objects or amounts of money worth over $5,000 suddenly came to be refused parole and their condition was thus seriously aggravated.

The government did not stop at changing the conditions associated with parole, as it also began to address things like increasing the incarceration periods for certain offences. This meant that criminals who were responsible for performing particular crimes would be provided with harsher penalties as a consequence of their actions. The move would mainly aim to deter potential criminals from going through with their plans as a consequence of considering the risks involved. Risks were largely a principal factor addressed in the series of reforms adopted during the Conservative Government's leadership -- through implementing laws that would have criminals risk a lot more when performing criminal acts, the government would be more likely to experience success in its effort to prevent crime in general. These respective laws were expected to reduce the number of criminal acts in Canada in general, taking into account that criminals would acknowledge the risks they would take when engaging in certain behaviors.

Question B.

Chapter 6 in Colin Geoff's book "Criminal Justice in Canada" addresses a series of problems associated with the Conservative Government's approach on crime in an attempt to have readers understand why and how this form of policing is ineffective. The chapter goes on to emphasize the series of problems that the authorities experienced as they struggled to use one of the most traditional methods in history. There are numerous reasons why this attempt was ineffective, with the most important being associated with criminals seeing little to no threat in these respective actions -- there were other motives behind crimes and individuals would not stop simply because penalties had become more severe.

What the Conservative Government failed to understand was that they first needed to address concepts that influenced individuals to become criminals in the first place. By taking on such an attitude, the authorities would be more likely to reduce the number of crimes. Simply making penalties worse was actually a violent and ignorant way of dealing with the threat -- criminals basically acknowledged the greater risks they faced, but experienced little to no hesitation as a consequence of this.

Question C.

Many related to how adopting harsher penalties would only increase the number of individuals incarcerated rather than to decrease the number of crimes. Furthermore, this also means that people who are sent to prison are not actually encouraged to change their attitudes. The government largely believed that by putting criminals behind bars it would experience success in having a safer environment in the country as a whole.

When considering present-day conditions in the U.S. And the fact that the country is seriously suffering as a consequence of having the biggest prison populations in the world, it would be safe to say that a tough approach on crime is not as efficient as people might be inclined to think. Canada should thus learn from mistakes that Americans made as they attempted to deter criminals. Simply punishing an individual for his or her crimes is not enough to make the world a better place. The respective person is unlikely to express interest in living an honest life as long as he or she is not provided with incentives. Similarly, other criminals are unlikely to refrain from going through with their plans if they observe penalties becoming harsher. The answer lies with education and with providing it both to people behind bars and to individuals in general. By becoming better acquainted with why and how they can become better people, the masses are probable to at least see matters from a completely different perspective and thus play a more active role in making the world a better place.

The idea of policing is devised with the purpose of penalizing criminals and this makes it difficult for many individuals to differentiate between attitudes that can make the world safer and attitudes that are actually harmful for society as a whole. It's thus essential for the masses to gain a complex understanding of why it would be better for the authorities to focus on preventing crimes rather than to just try and making sure criminals stay for longer periods of time behind bars.