CANADA House of Commons Debates VOLUME 144 Ï NUMBER 035 Ï 2nd SESSION Ï 40th PARLIAMENT OFFICIAL REPORT (HANSARD) Friday, March 27, 2009 Speaker: The Honourable Peter Milliken CONTENTS (Table of Contents appears at back of this issue.) Also available on the Parliament of Canada Web Site at the following address: http://www.parl.gc.ca 2055 HOUSE OF COMMONS Friday, March 27, 2009 The House met at 10 a.m. It is very easy in our society to vilify and demonize drug users. It is very easy to label people as “criminals” and to label a drug user as a trafficker. In fact, under the law, even passing a joint to someone would be characterized as trafficking. Prayers Not only were we trying to overcome the severe health and safety GOVERNMENT ORDERS impacts in terms of drug use in the downtown eastside but also Ï (1005) trying to deal with the terrible stigma and stereotyping that surrounds drug users. [English] CONTROLLED DRUGS AND SUBSTANCE ACT The House resumed from March 26 consideration of the motion The fact is that drug use exists at all levels of society. There are that Bill C-15, An Act to amend the Controlled Drugs and lawyers, professionals, engineers and all kinds of people who use Substances Act and to make related and consequential amendments drugs, whether medical or non-medical. If it is a prescription, that to other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee. might be a substance use problem as well, whether a person gets it from a doctor or gets it on the street. It may be that a person is using Ms. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP): Mr. Speaker, I am drugs for recreational purposes, maybe marijuana. pleased to be up first on this Friday morning to speak to Bill C-15, which deals with mandatory minimum sentencing for drug crimes and amends the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. It exists at all levels of society, but it is very much a class issue, This is a very important debate on the bill. It is one of the bills that because the enforcement regime that we have in this country, similar the Conservative government, with the support of the Liberals, had to the United States, is very much levelled at visible drug use on the wanted to rush through the House with no debate. We think the bill street, basically people who are poor, people who are facing that needs debate because it is really at a juncture where it is telling us stigma, and often people facing challenges of mental health. what direction Canada will go in terms of its drug policy. From that point of view, it is a very significant bill and it deserves full public debate and input. I hope that will happen at committee as well. We need to hear from witnesses. It is very important that we be on the In Vancouver, for example, with the deinstitutionalization of record in terms of our position around the bill. Riverview, people were literally sent out on the street with no support and ended up in the downtown eastside with very poor I represent the riding of Vancouver East and, as many people housing and no resources. People, in effect, started self-medicating know, it is a riding that has been hit very hard with the seriousness of and suddenly found themselves in this terrible environment of being drug issues. For a number of years, when I was first elected, the “criminal”, and being harassed and chased by police and maybe number of overdoses in the downtown eastside was the leading cause arrested. of death. It was horribly alarming. It was the number one public health issue where people were dying needlessly. These were preventable deaths from drug overdoses because of prohibition and because of the illegal drug market, the black market, where people It is very much an issue that pertains to the poorest in our society were buying things on the street and they did not know what they who are involved in drug use and the enforcement, primarily in this were. The level of overdoses was just horrific, causing chaos, pain country, as in the United States, has been levelled at those people. and suffering in the downtown eastside. That still goes on today to some extent, but over the last 10 years, because of enormous efforts by the community and indeed right About 73% of federal dollars on drug policy in Canada go toward across Canada, particularly by drug users themselves who began to enforcement. Only 2.6% goes to prevention, only 2.6% goes to harm speak out about their own experience, the situation began to change. reduction and about 14% to treatment. That is a very uneven balance. 2056 COMMONS DEBATES March 27, 2009 Government Orders For example, when the Auditor General audited drug policy in this with that. This bill will not change that situation. In fact, the country a few years ago, she remarked upon this and posed some evidence from both Canada and the United States shows us that the questions: What was the impact? What was the value? What were we opposite will happen. It will only make the situation worse. getting for such a high emphasis on an enforcement and interdiction regime when drug use was actually going up in Canada? Ï (1010) I want to note for the record that a Department of Justice study in 2002 concluded that mandatory minimum sentences were the least It might interest people to know that in 1994, 28% of Canadians effective in relation to drug offences. The report said: reported having used illicit drugs, but by 2004 that number was at 45%. Certainly, the policies we have had that have been so focused on the criminal regime and the criminalization of drug users have Mandatory minimum sentences do not appear to influence drug consumption or been completely ineffective. We only have to look south of the drug-related crime in any measurable way. A variety of research methods concludes border, where the so-called war on drugs has unleashed billions and that treatment-based approaches are more cost effective than lengthy prison terms. billions of dollars. We see massive numbers of people incarcerated MMS are blunt instruments that fail to distinguish between low and high-level, as well as hardcore versus transient drug dealers. indicating what a failure it is. I was very interested to read in the paper yesterday Hillary Clinton talking about how the war on drugs in Mexico has been a failure. It When one looks at what is going on in the United States, where is first time the U.S. administration has talked about this. There was mandatory minimum sentencing began, there is now a whole a headline saying that it failed. This has been the wrong approach. movement away from mandatory minimum sentencing. We know We are hoping very much that with the new administration in the U. that California, in 2000, repealed some of its mandatory minimum S. things will begin to change. I wanted to give that backdrop. sentencing requirements for drug offences. In fact, California is now considering regulating marijuana. In 2004 Michigan repealed some Bill C-15 was brought in, in an earlier Parliament, as Bill C-26 of its MMSs. Delaware and Massachusetts are undergoing similar and died on the order paper. It does raise the question of how urgent legislative reviews. this was for the Conservatives when they brought it in so late and just let it go because they wanted to have an election. However, Bill C-15 is completely focused around the premise that mandatory Ï (1015) minimum sentencing is going to work for drug crimes. That is what the bill is about. It is not a bill about broader enforcement regimes. It is about mandatory minimum sentencing. It does pose the question There is a whole history of reports in the U.S. in the American and I believe we have a responsibility to answer this question as to Bar Association and the U.S. sentencing committee. I will not go at whether or not the evidence shows that mandatory minimum length into those reports, but suffice it to say that there has been a sentencing will actually be an effective tool. huge amount of research done on this. I find it most ironic that the I have done a fair amount of research on this as the drug policy Conservative government, for the last couple of years, when it critic for our party. Because of my involvement in Vancouver East announced its so-called drug strategy in 2007, was launching on this and the downtown eastside, I have to say I have become very course of following the United States, when what is actually involved in this issue. I have worked very closely with drug users happening in reality is that the war on drugs in the United States has and I have learned a lot from what this experience is about, what now been shown to be a colossal failure. happens to people under the current regime, and what it is that we need to change. I found it interesting that at the new President's town hall meeting I am deeply concerned that the government is embarking on a very online yesterday, and I am sure people have read today, most of the significant departure. Canada did have what was called the four- questions had to do with marijuana, saying to the President that it pillar approach, which was enforcement, harm reduction, prevention would be a good idea to regulate, legalize and actually provide a and treatment.