INTERNATIONAL CHILD AND YOUTH CARE NETWORK

8 FEBRUARY 2001 EXTRA
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In Today for 5 February (see index at left) we printed a government backgrounder to Canada's new youth justice legislation. Today the Montreal Gazette comments in it editorial

Follow Quebec on youth crime

Among Western democracies, the country with the lowest age of criminal responsibility is Britain, where it is 10. That country also locks up more children and teenagers than any other in Europe, a trend that shows no sign of stopping. The number of young people in British prisons rose by 11 per cent in 2000, even as the crime rate continued to fall for the sixth year in a row.

Is that what Canadians want in a revised Young Offenders Act? Ever younger children in prison in greater than ever numbers? Justice Minister Anne McLellan, in reintroducing her bill to replace the act Monday, seemed to be pushing in that direction. Her Youth Justice Act is substantially the same bill she introduced in 1999, the one that died on the order paper when last year's election was called.

Unfortunately, rather than take advantage of the fresh start provided by her government's third majority victory, Ms. McLellan has brought in essentially the same bill with the same provisions, except that this time, apart from the area of major crimes such as homicide, they're optional.

This means that if a youngster were to beat up a classmate, in Quebec he or she would likely be sent into a community service program. The same young person in Saskatchewan would find himself in prison, his name published as a violent offender and quite possibly facing adult court.

This is patently absurd and unfair. Adults face roughly the same system of criminal justice wherever they are in Canada. Why should young people be treated so differently?

The flaws of the revised legislation stem from the Liberal Party's desire to curry political favour in all regions of the country, no matter how disparate and irreconcilable their philosophies are. While bowing to what it perceives as the West's desire for tougher youth laws, the new legislation backs away from insisting that all provinces follow the same road.

Why couldn't it instead have the courage to choose the jurisdiction that has had the greatest success in dealing with young offenders - Quebec - and choose that model for the rest of the country?

Quebec has been moving away from a prison-oriented model of treating young offenders since 1984 and now has, along with Prince Edward Island, the lowest rate of youths charged in the country - a rate of 54 youths charged per 10,000 youngsters, compared with 153 per 10,000 in Manitoba. Youth crime is 50 per cent lower in Quebec than elsewhere in the country.

Everywhere in the world where authorities have made a genuine effort to try alternative measures, success has followed. Research from around the world, including groundbreaking work in Quebec headed by Richard Tremblay at the Universite de Montreal, shows that early intervention is the best weapon against juvenile criminality. It's time to trust that knowledge and make our laws reflect it.

http://www.montrealgazette.com/editorial/pages/010207/5133051.html