The federal government is being urged to follow through with its commitment to develop a Black Canadian justice strategy.
The Liberal government is committed to such a strategy in its 2021 election campaign after advocacy groups and the United Nations raised serious concerns over it. anti black racism in the Canadian criminal justice system.
Black Canadians are consistently over-represented in Canadian prisons: Black people make up less than four percent of Canada’s population, but about eight percent of the federal prison population.
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Justice Minister David Lamentie’s office said it is working with members of black communities to develop the strategy and “will have more to say soon.”
“The priority in doing so is access to fair and just treatment before the law for Black Canadians,” Lametee’s press secretary Diana Ebadi said in a written statement.
“Canada’s Black Justice Strategy will move us toward a more just and equitable society by addressing systemic discrimination and the overrepresentation of Black people in the criminal justice system, including for victims of crime.”
According to the Black Legal Action Center, black people are more likely to be stopped, searched, charged and arrested by the police. Police are also more likely to use force or seriously injure black people.
The House of Commons Public Safety Committee said in a 2021 report that systemic racism in policing was a “real and urgent problem requiring solution”.
It recommended creating a national strategy to address the disproportionately high rates of racialized people in the criminal justice system.
Mukisa Kakembo, a lawyer with the prisoner advocacy group PATH Legal in Nova Scotia, said it is important that the federal government recognizes racism as systemic and that it is one of the reasons Black Canadians are over-represented in the criminal justice system.
“It’s important to have a strategy that recognizes that and actually takes concrete steps to address that racism and combat racism,” she said.
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Kakembo said the strategy needed to include better oversight of the police and courts to ensure that cases of racism are properly reported and treated seriously.
He said steps should also be taken to deport black people who are currently languishing in prisons and jails.
“If we can accept that black people are over-represented in the criminal justice system, then I think action should be taken to improve that,” she said.
She said this could be done by ensuring that more people are released on bail with fewer conditions, and by reducing over-surveillance of black communities by the police.
“It is up to the discretion of the Crown to decide whether a case proceeds,” she said. “The Crown needs to be actively anti-racist in its decision to prosecute, and also be aware of black accused in the context of diversion programs and trying to resolve charges outside the criminal justice system.”
There have long been calls to reform the system, including from the Parliamentary Black Caucus. In 2020, it issued a statement calling on the federal government to implement a Black Canadian justice strategy.
In 2016, a United Nations expert panel warned that there were serious concerns about systemic anti-Black racism in Canadian courts as well as recommended developing a strategy.
“There is clear evidence that racial profiling is endemic in the strategies and practices used by law enforcement,” Ricardo Sunga, head of the expert panel, said in a statement at the time.
Matthew Green, NDP MP and member of the Parliamentary Black Caucus, said the legal system does not provide full, fair, equal justice to Black Canadians and that it is not enough for the federal government to simply announce funding to address the issue. Do.
“This is a government which, at the time of elections, speaks at length on issues relating to justice and equity and equality,” he said.
“And yet, when it comes to providing policies that actually deliver meaningful results, they seem to have fallen short.”
Kakembo said a Black Canadian justice strategy also needs to measure the action that has been taken.
“There needs to be a system of analysis for what exactly needs to be accomplished, and when it has been accomplished,” he said.
In a statement celebrating February as Black History Month, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the strategy is “part of the work that still needs to be done.”
“[The strategy]will help address systemic discrimination and overrepresentation of members of Black communities in our criminal justice system,” the statement said.
© 2023 The Canadian Press