When it comes to its management of violent crimes and overall public safety, every province and territory in Canada has gotten worse over the last five years by nearly every metric.
The Macdonald Laurier Institute released its third-ever “Justice System Report Card,” this year and the results show that Canada continues to become increasingly dangerous. It found that Canada’s performance has declined by almost every metric over the last five years.
The report gave every province and territory a letter grade based on several metrics, such as its level of public safety, support for victims of crime, cost and management of resources, and efficiency.
The report said, “While some provinces, notably Alberta, have increased overall rankings (compared to the other provinces), the trends do not paint a positive picture across the country.”
According to the report, Canada’s Violent Crime Severity Index is at its highest point since 2007, the homicide rate is the highest it’s been in 30 years, and reports of sexual assault are at the highest level since 1995.
The report uses a collection of stats and surveys and relies mostly on Statistics Canada’s annual public safety reporting up to 2022.
However, the updated crime severity index for 2023, released after the report was written, still indicates a rise in both violent and non-violent crime. There was a 0.4% rise in violent crimes in 2023—in contrast, there was a 5.7% increase in violent crimes from 2021 to 2022.
“The trend of a sharp rise over the previous couple of years did not continue, but it still went up, and it’s still high, and that’s concerning,” Dave Snow, one of the report card’s authors, told True North in an interview.
The report also found that police use of force-related deaths has increased over the years, and conversely, there has also been an uptick in violence against police.
“Canada averaged fewer than two police officer killings for almost three decades. In a seven-month period from September 2022 to March 2023, eight police officers were killed – often by repeat violent offenders,” the report said.
The report also showed that Canadians have lost confidence in the justice system overall, with only 46% saying they are confident.
Using data from a Leger poll, MLI found that 79% of Canadians think that too many repeat offenders are offered bail, 78% agree that it is too lenient toward violent criminals, and 91% agree that repeat violent offenders should not have access to bail.
The one area where most provinces and territories saw reduced crime was the number of Canadians charged with breaching their probation. Though Snow notes this is likely due to Liberal government changes, which emphasized reducing “administration of justice offence” charges, the numbers on that front decreased.
“Breach of probation per 1000 offences is the one category that is undoubtedly getting better. I think if you say that statement to most Canadians, that’s not going to assuage their concerns,” Snow said.
The authors theorize that this change is tied to the Government’s Bill C-75.
“Bill C-75 contained provisions that provided police and the Crown greater discretion to avoid laying charges for “administration of justice offences” such as failure to appear, failure to comply, breach of probation, and unlawfully at large.” the report said.
With the government emphasizing reducing “administration of justice offence” charges, the numbers on that front decreased.
Snow thinks the government should focus most of its efforts on reducing violent crime instead of administrative issues. However, he wished for the report to remain an objective analysis of the state of the country.
“A defining feature of our criminal justice system is that a disproportionately small number of offenders are responsible for a disproportionately large volume of crime,” he said. “To the extent that our criminal justice system focuses on minor administrative issues, that would be a bad thing. To the extent it’s focusing on violent crime reduction, that is a good thing.”
Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s office blamed the uptick in crime on the NDP-Liberal coalition that has “unleashed a crime wave” across the country.
“Trudeau’s Bill C-75 has all but guaranteed that even the worst violent offenders will be released on bail shortly after they’re arrested,” a spokesperson for Pierre Poilievre said in a statement. “Since Trudeau became Prime Minister, violent crime is up by nearly 50%. Homicides are up 28%, while sexual assaults, auto theft and extortion are up 74%, 45% and 357%, respectively.”
The Conservatives believe that “ending the Liberal soft-on-crime approach,” by repealing Bills C-75 and C-5, which repealed mandatory minimum sentences and made bail more accessible,will help take repeat violent criminals off the streets and improve the otherwise declining state of public safety in Canada.