Inmates and Civil Rights: Their New Country Club

It is something that I can not help but feel strongly about having worked in my current industry of retail loss prevention for over 7 years. It is an opinion that you may not share so I have included references for you to access further information if you choose to do so.
In my opinion inmates should not be given the full spectrum of rights offered to other citizens during the incarceration phase of their punishment. The incarceration phase of a sentence should be for punishment and punishment only. The rights that are cherished to law abiding citizens living free and honestly in Canada should not be offered to those within the walls of our prison institutions. Incarceration is used by the courts as a last resort for the most serious of crimes and for repeat offenders. If Canadians are going to regain trust in the Correctional Services of Canada (and other branches of the criminal justice system) then it is important that we begin to once again punish those that are threatening our way of life through both specific and general deterrence.
The Canadian Charter of Rights is the basic rights that are available for every citizen living in Canada. The written legislation is 34 paragraphs and only a few pages long. On the other hand there is a section of the International Prison Policy Development document from July of 2001 (taken from the UBC law website) that is the equivalent of the Charter for inmates. This document on inmate rights (section III only) is considered a guideline for Canadian correctional institutions. This section III document is the primary section that focuses on prisoner rights but refers the reader often to other sections of the document. It is just short of being100 pages long compared to the Charter’s measly few pages.
I am forced to ask myself then; “why do inmates essentially have more rights in Canada than the average citizen?” Why do they have rights that are not in the nature of punishment but can be construed as more of a privilege than a fundamental right? Why do they have rights that allow them to continue to be a threat to the rest of society?
The Charter of Rights says that everyone has the right to free association and peaceful assembly. In prison they have another way to phrase these rights. Inmates call prison “con college.” Prison has become a place to meet up with old friends and forge new ones. It is a place to develop alliances and establish business arrangements both inside and outside of the facility. Prison also gives the criminal much more than a means to a social network. Serving any type of sentence gives the criminal street status.
Corrections often use reoffending as a yardstick as to whether or not a criminal has committed a new crime or series of crimes. The reality of the situation is that while providing inmates with restaurant like eating facilities, libraries, outdoor gardens and a wide array of recreational activities, the inmate is given an opportunity to interact with fellow inmates. It is well documented that inmates exchange information on law evasion and illegal profit enhancement in a swap meet of ideas. This mockery of Canadian Justice needs to stop and it should not be tolerated by law abiding citizens.
Incarceration should be about punishment, while community release programs and halfway houses should be used for the rehabilitation phase of a sentence. There is no legitimate reason that there should be a fundamental right to be social in a correctional facility. It is time that Canadian prisons stopped being summer camps.
In the name of rehabilitation many facilities offer social activities such as horseback riding, golf, movie nights, sports, arts and crafts, classes, and weight room facilities. How many normal people have access to all of these luxuries? If we did, how many of us are given an opportunity to do these things with scores of likeminded individuals who share similar mindsets and philosophies? Should these likeminded individuals be given an opportunity to evolve collectively? The answer is no. They have been sentenced by the courts to be punished. Why then do we have prisons full of active gang members openly wearing their colors or identifiers?
In October of 2002 the Supreme Court of Canada in Suave v. Canada with a 5-4 majority decision gave prisoners the right to vote. The reason given was so that inmates could learn democratic values and social responsibility. In other words, the right to vote for prisoners in Canada is nothing more than a rehabilitation tool. According to Elections Canada, 9,250 of a total of 36,378 prisoners voted in the 2004 election.
Some people have suggested that the prison vote will not affect the Canadian elections but this is a short sighted and socially irresponsible position. Former Health Minister Anne McLellan won one election by 11 votes. In the 2004 elections 58 seats were won by a margin of 5% or less. Also in 2004 the independent Chuck Cadman turned out to have been given tremendous amount of power when the House of Commons was split almost exactly in half between a Bloc / Conservative alliance and a NDP / Liberal alliance. It turned out that his one vote (which could sway depending on the issue) was extremely important.
The cost of housing prisoners is also a huge concern in Canada. On top of the unnecessary costs of miscellaneous fun and games from finger painting to sport hunting (Nunavut) lets now add the 2.75 million dollars used in 2004 so that the 9000 prisoners could vote. Is allowing prisoners to vote a good use of tax dollars? Is it socially responsible of us to allow the killers and pedophiles to influence and shape our country?
During the 2006 election there was a tremendous amount of pressure on inmates inside the prisons to vote Liberal. The Conservatives with their ‘get tough on crime’ approach made it unpopular amongst the inmates to even consider voting anything else but Liberal. Should our Parliament be shaped by the threats of violence between prisoners?
As I have already mentioned the Supreme Court of Canada voted 5-4 in favor of the prisoner’s right to vote. Suave who was a member of the Satan’s Choice motorcycle gang and was incarcerated for first degree murder became the poster boy for the ill treated murderers, rapists and child killers also serving serious crimes. What is most alarming of all is that such an important decision in Canada had such a small margin of victory, one vote in the Supreme Court of Canada. How’s that for a statement on the power of one vote?
Speaking on behalf of the Justices who felt prisoners should not be given the right to vote was Justice Gonthier. The Justice said the decision allowing prisoners to vote was based on philosophical and scientifically unsound information and did not base its decision on the Charter of Rights which was supposed to be the topic of the appeal. Justice Gonthier stated the Charter, “Reasonable limits prescribed by law” was adequate reason to not allow prisoners to vote.
An incarcerated individual has the right to think and feel how they will. They have a right to see god in their own unique way and practice their personal religion, if it is reasonable, in the confines of their cell on their own time.
There is a split personality in corrections today because prisons were created to punish. Why are prisoners coming back then? In 1995 a sample of 14,000 prisoners serving 2 years or more had been convicted of an average of 29.5 offences. There needs to be punishment brought back into Canadian Corrections so that people stop committing crimes or are separated from society once and for all.
Corrections should divide itself into a punishment phase for incarcerated individuals followed by a treatment phase. I am not saying whether or not this is how our legal system is constructed. I know that this is not how things are in Canada. What I am suggesting is simply how things ought to be. I believe that society’s dissatisfaction with corrections mirrors my own and that fundamental changes are needed if justice is to be served in Canada.
If you agree with me please pass this on. Shanon Fenske @
http://blog.myspace.com/shanon_fenske

References
1)2004 Canadian Elections Results. SFU Political Science Department: Elections, Retrieved from http://www.sfu.ca/~aheard/elections/2004-results.html
2)All Inmates Can Vote. (2002, October). CBC Archives, Retrieved from http://archives.cbc.ca/IDC-1-73-1450-9561/politics_economy/voting_rights/
3)Archer, J. (2002). A Prison Diary. New York: St. Martin’s.
4)Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, ss. 1, 2, 3.
5)Bonokoski, M. (2004, June 30). Pearls Before the Swine: Supreme Court Gave Inmates the Vote But Very Few Bothered. The Toronto Sun. Retrieved from http://www.cbcwatch.ca/?q=node/view/277
6)CTV.ca News Staff. (2006, January 11). Prisoners Exercise Their Right to Vote, Retrieved from http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060112/elxn_prisoners_vote_060111/20060113?s_name=election2006&no_ads
7)Dhami, M. (2005, December). Prisoner Disenfranchisement Policy: A Threat to Democracy? Analysas of Social Issues and Public Policy, 235-247.
8)Elections Canada. (2004, December 14). Report of the Chief Electoral Officer of Canadaon the 38th General Election Held on June 28, 2004. Retrieved from http://www.elections.ca/content.asp?section=gen&document=part2_div8&dir=rep/re2/sta2004&lang=e&textonly=false
9)Muntingh, L. (2004, December). South African Constitutional Court Rules on Inmates’ Right to Vote. Corrections Today. 76-90.
10)Peter, S. (2002, December 16). Taxpayers Funded the Prisoners’ Right to Vote Battle, Newsmagazine, 19.
11)Suave v. Canada (Chief Electoral Officer), [2002] 3 S.C.R. 519, 2002 SCC 68
12)UN International Prison Policy Development Instrument. (2001), III. Inmate Rights and Treatment of Prisoners, Retrieved from http://www.icclr.law.ubc.ca/Site%20Map/Publications%20Page/Corrections.htm