Scott Reid

Mr. Speaker, I am returning to a question I raised regarding CORCAN last week. CORCAN is the inmate skills development wing of Corrections Canada. Last week, I asked why CORCAN employs 608 individuals, at a cost of $66 million in salaries alone, to train only 1,056 inmates in rudimentary tasks like farm chores, apple picking and sewing. The public safety minister responded to my question with a heartwarming story about a trip he took with the Governor General to a prison in Saskatchewan. That was a very unsatisfactory answer, so I am back again to point out that the per-prisoner cost of a CORCAN education per year is $62,000, which is half the tuition at Harvard University and is also more than the average Canadian earns in a year. At this price, one would assume that the investment is justified by astoundingly good public safety outcomes and a very low rate of recidivism for people who receive CORCAN training, but as it turns out, that is not the case. The government has defended CORCAN by pointing over and over again, when I raise these questions in this place, to a research report by Corrections Canada published in 2014 that found that former inmates who find post-release employment are less likely to reoffend. Of course that is true, but I am not sure that the government read the rest of the research report, because it concludes, based on measurable data, that “Involvement in CORCAN employment [while incarcerated] was not found to have a significant impact on the length of time that offenders retained their first job post-release” and that “CORCAN participation was not directly linked to reductions in recidivism.” In other words, CORCAN does not make a person any more likely to maintain employment after serving time in prison and therefore makes no difference to that person's employment status and does not reduce their likelihood of reoffending. In fact, the research in the same study found “no significant differences” whether prisoners worked for CORCAN, worked a non-CORCAN job in prison or did nothing at all. Here is an interesting fact. Eight times as many prisoners, 7,944 to be exact, worked while incarcerated in non-CORCAN jobs last year compared to only 1,056 in CORCAN jobs, at a much lower cost. CORCAN is therefore as redundant as it is inefficient and expensive. Why are we spending $66 million to add nothing at all to the skills prisoners receive? The minister asked us to look at what he calls the remarkable success of CORCAN. I see no success whatsoever. Why does this program exist at all?

Mr. Speaker, the government asked Corrections Canada to make cuts to save $132 million over the next three years. To that end, Corrections Canada has eliminated 25 community employment coordinators. These are the people who actually help prisoners find jobs after they are in prison. Firing these employment coordinators saved $2.7 million. Now, it seems to me the wrong cuts are being made. Eliminating a totally unnecessary and ineffective program like CORCAN would save at least $198 million, and that is just the salaries, over the next three years and would save the jobs of the employment coordinators, who actually make a difference in finding jobs for ex-convicts and making our communities safer. Does the government have it backwards? Were the researchers at Corrections Canada right when they said, in a report to the minister, “CORCAN is an outdated model”?

Mr. Speaker, CORCAN is the inmate skills development wing of Corrections Canada. Last year, it employed 608 individuals, at a cost of $66 million, to educate only 1,056 inmates. That is an annual per-student cost of $62,000, about half the cost of tuition at Harvard University. What kind of education did the inmates get? They were taught rudimentary tasks like shovelling manure, picking apples and sewing pillowcases, none of which will help them to find jobs upon release. Why does the government allow CORCAN to achieve so little at so great a cost to taxpayers?

Mr. Speaker, during question period, the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands was repeatedly carrying on a very high-volume monologue, the purpose of which, I believe, was to interrupt the ability of members who were posing questions to concentrate and to ask their questions properly. That, of course, would be a violation of Standing Order 16(2), which states, “When a member is speaking, no member shall pass between that member and the chair, nor interrupt him or her, except to raise a point of order.” During my own remarks, which were dealing with an aspect of Canadian correctional services, the member was speaking so loudly that it was very difficult for me to concentrate. One of the goals of producing an effective debate in the House is to have us be capable of speaking in a normal speaking voice, as I am doing now, as opposed to yelling at each other. Had I been yelling, I think I could have successfully drowned out the member's yelling, but it is very difficult to carry on a civilized debate when this kind of, frankly, uncivilized behaviour is going on. I have no idea if that constitutes something for which the member should apologize. One cannot retract a loud voice, but whatever the situation is, I seek your guidance on this, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, I hope that all colleagues have reviewed the seating plan that has been proposed for our return to Centre Block. Faced with a growing number of MPs in a fixed space, the government's solution is, number one, to expand by about 30% the size of the desks assigned to cabinet so the Prime Minister will feel like he is back home on his favourite luxury jet, and number two, having thereby caused an artificial space shortage for everyone else, to shove 300 MPs into four rows of bleachers, so tightly packed that MPs will no longer have a usable workspace and will have to tread on each other's toes to get to their seat. A better idea would be to use the Quebec legislature's new seating plan as our model. We could have five rows, with each row containing 36 members, connected by four aisles. This would result in wider seats, retention of desks instead of bleachers, and enough room for members to circulate behind each other's seat rather than over each other's feet. All we need for this to happen is to acknowledge the ancient principle that all MPs are treated and seated equally. Let us do that.