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THE DARTMOUTH LAKER - Feb. 2006
Halifax recently was recognized as the most violent city in Canada. According to a Statistics Canada report in November, 2005 HRM had the highest rate of violent crime (assaults, homicides, sexual assaults, robberies) per capita in the country.
This is a dubious honour for our city. And if the statistics were not enough, recent crimes in the city and, in particular, the Cole Harbour area, are proof that we have a problem with community safety.
The first reaction of the Tory Government is to blame the Federal Government for lax laws relating to crime and punishment. While it is true the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA) is even more lenient towards youth then the Young Offenders Act, the Province must take responsibility for this problem.
The YCJA was passed in 2002 as a result of complaints with regard to the Young Offenders Act. Many saw that Act as too forgiving towards youth who commit crimes. The law was amended to make it easier to sentence some violent offenders as adults, but it also lessened the consequences for breaking most other laws. As a result, youth now have less to fear from the YCJA then they did under the Young Offenders Act.
But the YCJA applies the same to Halifax as it does to Red Deer or Timmins. We cannot blame that law for the increase in violent crime in our city. The Provincial Government must recognize that it has a major role to play in reducing crime and addressing the causes of crime.
The NDP has done its part. We have introduced legislation to shut down facilities and homes in communities that become chronic centres for criminal activity (drug houses, chop shops, illegal gaming venues). The Tories have agreed to pass the legislation in the Spring of this year.
But more must be done. Our Crown Attorneys must seek no bail for defendants who use a gun in the commission of a crime. Weapon prohibition orders must be sought by prosecutors where guns are involved. These measures can be accomplished by the Provincial Government without any assistance from the Federal Government.
We must also look at the causes of crime. Halifax has seen a significant increase in homelessness in the past number of years. This has happened, in part, because of the Tory cutbacks in assistance and, more recently, changes to how we release mental health patients into the community.
Our education system is so poorly funded that we are unable to address the needs of those students with behavioural problems that are most likely to be at risk of committing crimes. We do not have the resources to assess and identify these children and youth, let alone the resources to support them once they are diagnosed.
And the lack of any concrete childcare plan for the province is another example of how the Tories have ignored factors that result in higher crime rates. The more daycare spaces we create and the better we pay our daycare workers, the better off our children will be. Such early education support will go along way towards helping parents who have children who are at-risk of committing crimes in the years to come.
Ignoring the need for regulated daycare spaces will result in more youth who are not identified as having behavioural problems and, therefore, are not provided with the support they need and, in turn, become more likely to offend.
It is time the government took seriously community safety. The label of “Most Violent City in Canada” is not something to be proud of – and neither is a government that is soft on crime and soft on the causes of crime.
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