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37th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION

Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Tuesday, May 21, 2002

1435

The Chair (Ms. Paddy Torsney (Burlington, Lib.))

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Professor Cameron Wild (Centre for Health Promotion Studies, University of Alberta)

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The Chair

Dr. Marcia Johnson (Deputy Medical Officer of Health, Capital Health Authority)

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Mr. Ed Sawka (Director, Research Services, Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission)

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The Chair

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc (Beauséjour—Petitcodiac, Lib.)

Dr. Marcia Johnson

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Prof. Cameron Wild

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

Prof. Cameron Wild

1520

Mr. Ed Sawka

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

The Chair

Prof. Cameron Wild

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The Chair

Prof. Cameron Wild

The Chair

Dr. Marcia Johnson

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

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Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

The Chair

Prof. Cameron Wild

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

Prof. Cameron Wild

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Dr. Marcia Johnson

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

Prof. Cameron Wild

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The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

Dr. Marcia Johnson

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The Chair

Dr. Marcia Johnson

The Chair

Dr. Marcia Johnson

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

Prof. Cameron Wild

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The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

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Dr. Marcia Johnson

Prof. Cameron Wild

The Chair

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

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Prof. Cameron Wild

The Chair

Prof. Cameron Wild

The Chair

Prof. Cameron Wild

The Chair

Dr. Marcia Johnson

Prof. Cameron Wild

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The Chair

Dr. Marcia Johnson

The Chair

Prof. Cameron Wild

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

Mr. Ed Sawka

The Chair

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Dr. Marcia Johnson

The Chair

Dr. Marcia Johnson

The Chair

1620

Staff Sergeant Doug Carruthers (Royal Canadian Mounted Police)

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The Chair

Corporal Jim Jancsek (Royal Canadian Mounted Police)

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The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

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Cpl Jim Jancsek

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

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Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

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Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

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Cpl Jim Jancsek

The Chair

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Ms. Marilyn Pilon (Committee Researcher)

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

Ms. Marilyn Pilon

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers

The Chair

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc

The Chair

CANADA

Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs

NUMBER 043

1st SESSION

37th PARLIAMENT

EVIDENCE

Tuesday, May 21, 2002

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

¸ (1435)

[English]

The Chair (Ms. Paddy Torsney (Burlington, Lib.)): I'll call this meeting to order.

We are representatives of the Special Committee on Non-medical Use of Drugs, and we are pleased to be here in Edmonton. This committee was struck by order of the House of Commons on Thursday, May 17, 2001, to consider the factors underlying or relating to the non-medical use of drugs. As a second order from the House of Commons, on Wednesday, April 17, 2002, we were referred the subject matter of Bill C-344, an act to amend the Contraventions Act and the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, respecting marijuana.

We're very pleased to have with us on our first panel today, from the University of Alberta, Professor Cam Wild, who's from the Centre for Health Promotion Studies. Welcome, Professor Wild. We have from the Capital Health Authority Dr. Marcia Johnson, who's the deputy medical officer of health. Welcome to you. We have from the Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission, AADAC, as it's commonly known, Ed Sawka, who's the director of research services. We may have a fourth person joining you, but we'll just start with you.

I think you've all prepared presentations, and we'll start with you, Professor Wild.

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Professor Cameron Wild (Centre for Health Promotion Studies, University of Alberta): Thank you very much for inviting me to speak today. I appreciate the opportunity.

I'm Dr. Cam Wild, from the Centre for Health Promotion Studies and the Department of Public Health Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry, at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. I'm director of the Addiction and Mental Health Research Laboratory at the University of Alberta. My area of research is addictive behaviours, and projects ongoing in our lab include injection-drug use, problem drinking, youth tobacco use, smoking cessation, and social policy in relation to addictions.

The comments I'd like to make today to the special committee are from the perspective of an addictions researcher working in the current Canadian milieu. I'm going to comment on four areas for the committee: first, drug use in Canada and Edmonton; second, the Canadian versus the U.S. research climate for addiction research; third, the lack of research infrastructure to make informed policy decisions about non-medical drug use in Canada; and last, perceptions of the political climate in relation to non-medical drug use.

First, I'll make some general comments on drug use in Canada and Edmonton. Canadians continue to experience individual and community problems resulting from and related to non-medical drug use. In 1992 alone the cost to the Canadian economy resulting from use and misuse of alcohol and other drugs was over $18 billion, including more than $4 billion in direct health care costs. Alcohol and tobacco are two of the three leading contributors to premature death in Canada. More than one in five deaths and hundreds of thousands of hospitalizations result from substance misuse every year.

At the national level, addictions issues are taking new forms. For example, rising rates of injection-drug use in the last decade have been accompanied by the emergence of injection-drug use as a major risk factor for HIV/AIDS, hepatitis, and other blood-borne pathogens and diseases. Indications are that illicit drug use is increasing among adolescents, especially because of the increased availability of designer drugs such as ecstasy.

Increasingly, health service providers are recognizing that addictions coexist with a wide array of medical, psychiatric, and social problems, such as homelessness. The impacts of addiction are increasingly felt among socially and economically disadvantaged groups, such as first nations people and street youth.

Edmonton mirrors these national trends, at the same time showing that we have some unique problems here. My brief, which I submitted for your review, provides a snapshot of drug use in Edmonton pieced together from data provided by treatment providers, health service providers, enforcement officials, and other stakeholders. One highlight of that brief is that alcohol is the most frequently used drug among Edmontonians and remains the greatest contributor to premature death and hospitalization. Over 80% of Edmontonians consume alcohol, and most adults from the Edmonton area who seek treatment from AADAC do so for alcohol problems.

Cocaine is the second largest treatment group among Edmonton adults served by AADAC. Cocaine is also the drug of choice among injection-drug users in Edmonton. About 64% of all injection-drug users seeking treatment in the Edmonton area inject cocaine, as opposed to about 22% of users who inject heroin. Injection-drug use was identified as the primary or secondary risk factor in almost 80% of the hepatitis C cases reported in the capital health region in 1999. I refer you to the brief for more details.

Shifting from a general picture of Edmonton and Canada, I'm going to talk a little bit about the Canadian versus the U.S. climate for addiction research. In this regard, I'm a case study in the ongoing debate over the brain drain to the States. After I completed my PhD, I moved to Rochester, New York, to do a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Rochester. This experience taught me about the large differences in funding, climate, and research support between the two countries. My desire to return to Canada won out over the greater opportunities to do research and live in the United States. I eventually took the position of returning to Edmonton in 1997. I'm eager to be here to contribute to local, provincial, and national initiatives on drug use. However, I'm very aware that my personal career might benefit more from the research climate available in the U.S.

Lessons I have learned include the following. Canada's drug strategy sunsetted in 1997 and has not been replaced by a comprehensive approach at the national level for non-medical drug use. The United States funds proportionately much more research per capita on addiction than Canada does. Canadian addiction researchers actually receive more funding from U.S. grant sources than Canadian sources. For example, in 1998-1999 the U.S. government awarded six times as much money to support addiction research conducted in Canada by Canadians as the Canadian government did. The U.S. has developed sophisticated systems to monitor non-medical drug use, and it uses these systems to help on both the drug supply and drug demand sides of the equation. These are essential tools for researchers in the States, for prevention and treatment systems to monitor the impact of their initiatives. There are no comparable systems in place in Canada. We can say very little about the impact of treatment and prevention initiatives in the country.

As I mentioned, Canada's drug strategy sunsetted in 1997. In my opinion, there has been a leadership vacuum on non-medical drug use since that time. While the federal government has not entirely disengaged itself from the issue, it removed an overarching and comprehensive national framework that had brought together partners from different jurisdictions to address pressing social, health, and economic impacts of substance abuse. On the federal scene today there is no visible government champion for non-medical drug use. This is a shame, because leadership in addiction research and policy requires a coordinated strategy involving multiple sectors, including the health, enforcement, judicial, and research sectors.

From a research perspective, we can now see the devastating fallout from this leadership vacuum. First, there has not been a national survey on alcohol and other drug use since 1994. This situation is totally inadequate for tracking trends in drug use in the general population. There are few incentives for researchers to address this gap. As I mentioned earlier, more money is available elsewhere in other jurisdictions. While the creation of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research is a tremendous boost to health research in Canada, addictions have been lumped together with neurosciences and mental health in the largest of the CIHR institutes. Addictions researchers in the country continue to be concerned about the low profile of their work, despite the demonstrated and large impacts on Canadian society relating to substance use and abuse. Provincial bodies dedicated to addictions have either been scrapped entirely or have seen their research capacity seriously eroded.

I'll conclude with some perceptions of the political climate. As I am an outsider to the political process, my impressions from afar are as follows. Relative to other democracies, Canada continues to put addiction and drug abuse issues on a low national priority level. Regional efforts to address addiction suffer because of local cutbacks, downloading from the federal government to the provinces and municipalities, and lack of a coordinated research strategy at the national level. Since at least the Le Dain commission of 30 years ago policy-making on drug use and abuse in this country continues to adopt one of two extreme approaches, panic in times of public uproar and indifference when public uproar subsides.

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I would argue that now is the time to create a national drug strategy that will address the gaping holes in research and policy-making left in this country. Leaving this important health issue in the hands of a committee of assistant deputy ministers who meet infrequently to formulate input to two interdepartmental drug committees simply will not do. I would also argue strongly in favour of shifting the balance of economic resources to achieve a more equal balance between treatment, prevention, and enforcement; currently, we have massive over-emphasis on the enforcement side of the equation.

I thank you for the opportunity.

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The Chair: Thank you very much, Professor Wild.

We'll now hear from Dr. Johnson.

Dr. Marcia Johnson (Deputy Medical Officer of Health, Capital Health Authority): Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. I echo Dr. Wild in appreciating the opportunity to talk to some decision-makers in this field for Canada.

For a bit of background, Capital Health is a fully regionalized and integrated health authority, with a population of nearly one million people, including Edmonton and the surrounding municipalities and counties. We serve not just Edmonton, but also a larger population of the surrounding areas.

You are much more aware than I that the problems associated with substance abuse cross all jurisdictions and affect virtually every aspect of life. I just want today to give three messages. Of course, my part of this gigantic elephant of a problem has to do more with health effects and, hopefully, prevention.

The first comments I want to concentrate on are the infectious diseases associated with intravenous drug use. As Dr. Wild has previously mentioned, there are what we are calling blood-borne pathogens. Those include as of major importance human immuno-deficiency virus, HIV, hepatitis C, and hepatitis B.

For your information, and to my horror, HIV numbers in Capital Health are continuing to climb, such that in 1999 we had 73 cases of newly diagnosed HIV infections, in the year 2000 we had 79, in the year 2001 we had 98, and in the year 2002 our numbers are climbing and indicating we are going to have yet another bumper year. In 2001 two-thirds of these new HIV cases were in people who were involved with intravenous drug use. We never know for sure which was the transmission that actually caused the disease to develop in the new person in the chain, but the majority of these people who were newly diagnosed were also sexually active with people who were involved with intravenous drug use.

In Capital I must say of even greater concern to me is the increasing proportion of the new cases who are of aboriginal origin. Although the people of aboriginal background make up only 5% officially of our population here in Capital Health, according to the Canada Census, in 2001 40 of our new HIV cases occurred in the aboriginal population, while 46 occurred in people of Caucasian background. This translates to a rate in aboriginal people in Capital Health of 80 per 100,000, compared with less than 6 per 100,000 in Caucasian people. This is outrageous.

Hepatitis C is a similar story, except that the numbers look as if they're going down. In fact, hepatitis C testing is relatively new and is unable to tell whether you're newly infected or have been infected 30 years ago and are just newly discovered to be infected. Our numbers in 1999 were 1,036, in 2000 934, and in 2001 848. What this means to me is that we have a very significant problem with hepatitis C and it's not going away. Again, more of these cases than should be are occurring in aboriginal populations. A quarter of our cases in 2001 occurred in that population, and half in 2001 were attributed to intravenous drug use.

Hepatitis B is a concern, but, fortunately, for hepatitis B we have an effective vaccine. In Alberta we have used it in a universal program in a staged multiple-pronged campaign, so that now well over 90% of our population under the age of 20 and a great number of older people have been immunized against hepatitis B. That is good news.

The issues with the blood-borne pathogens involve not only primary prevention of intravenous drug use, but real and meaningful support for strategies that will reduce the associated harm to those who are unwilling or unable to stop. The Capital Health Authoriity supports such strategies. We support the strategies of needle exchange, methadone maintenance programs, safe housing, and improved--if only we could improve--mental health service initiatives, among others. We would be pleased to lead, cooperate, or do whatever we can to make new thoughtful initiatives, such as safe injection sites and heroin sites, if our community partners, such as community organizations, municipalities, and police, are open to these new strategies and if resources are available for full, meaningful implementation and evaluation. Unfortunately, in Capital Health Authority most of the harm reduction and prevention strategies are not fully resourced or are funded under temporary arrangements, making planning and long-term evaluation very difficult.

The accountability for health outcomes in aboriginal populations, particularly as they intersect with urban health determinants, is unclear. Most funding for public health programming for aboriginal populations, as you well know, is handled through the first nations and Inuit health branch and administered through the federal bureaucracy directly to native bands. There is little true collaboration on planning and implementing prevention strategies between urban regional health authorities and native bands. It has to be done. Obviously, Capital Health Authority has to grapple with the issue of blood-borne pathogen prevention generally, and in aboriginal people specifically. We have to find new ways of doing business, because what we're doing isn't working. And mechanisms have to be developed for much better collaboration and planning between our urban regional health authorities and the aboriginal populations.

Another point in this area is that prisons and the risks to the health of prison populations, and by extension, the communities the inmates return to on release, form a huge issue. Again, people of aboriginal origin are overrepresented in prison populations. Blood-borne pathogens are spread within prisons. Effective preventive programs have not been implemented in prisons, and the lack of such programs is a disaster for our communities.

The second point I want to make on this topic is about one of the recurring themes that is repeated in the terms of reference for the Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs: what is the appropriate role for the federal government? Operationally, a myriad of options are available. However, I'd ask that you please keep in mind that it is the mandate of regional health authorities, or however any province chooses to organize its health services, specifically in public health, to monitor the health of their population and to develop strategies to maintain and improve the population's health. This is our job. It's our job yesterday, it's our job today, it'll be our job tomorrow.

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Prevention is chronically rich in rhetoric--everyone believes in prevention--chronically poor in real resources. Federal and provincial programs come and go, depending on political whims and government priorities, but we are always here on the ground. From our viewpoint, a disturbing trend is that as the higher levels of government tentatively re-engage in preventive initiatives, the preferred model seems to be disease-based or problem-based programs, which are stovepiped into our communities for varying periods of time with little real commitment to solutions and no accountability to the local population. At a minimum, these initiatives need to be coordinated with local health authorities, as well as with community agencies, in ways that will leave a stronger local infrastructure as a legacy. Even better from our viewpoint, of course, would be support for meaningful strengthening of local public health infrastructure for surveillance, for disease control, and for population health strategies in research and evaluation.

If I may, I'll point to the same message being made by a report that was written for the deputy minister and discussed in the Canadian Medical Association Journal last week. The report had been commissioned for March 2000. The message of that report was that local public health infrastructure has been grossly weakened over the past 10 or 15 years.

My last point is that the determinants of substance abuse are intricately related to the strength of a person's self-worth and the connections that person makes to society. The fixed internal belief that you, as a person, are a valued member of your community and that society's rules and expectations not only apply to you, but will benefit you makes the concept of substance abuse as a lifestyle much less attractive or viable. Investment in a comprehensive, compassionate support program for young families, specifically compensatory day care programming, for example, the head start type of programming, has been demonstrated to pay dividends in more school success, more employment success, less crime, fewer teenage pregnancies, and by extension, less substance abuse. It takes strong leadership to invest now, expecting to reap the benefits only two to three elections away, but that is the kind of leadership and commitment we need in Canada to significantly change the demand side of the demand-supply equation.

Thank you very much for your time.

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The Chair: Thank you, Dr. Johnson.

Mr. Sawka.

Mr. Ed Sawka (Director, Research Services, Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission): Thank you, Madam Chair, and good afternoon. I too appreciate the opportunity to speak to this parliamentary committee today.

As an organization, we in AADAC have just passed our 50th year of addressing addictions issues in Alberta. Briefly, to set some context, AADAC is a grant-funded crown agency. Our enabling legislation is the Alberta Alcohol and Drug Abuse Act. Ours is a policy board consisting of up to 12 commission board members. Our chair is Mr. LeRoy Johnson, who is the MLA for Wetaskiwin-Camrose. Our commission reports through the Minister of Health and Wellness.

The core businesses of AADAC are in the areas of addictions information, prevention, and treatment. Under our legislation we can also undertake and support research, although we are primarily a service delivery organization, with province-wide direct service delivery made possible by partnering with funded agencies. Through this network, we have a presence in about 42 communities throughout the province, and through mobile and satellite services, we are able to reach many others.

AADAC's mission is very broad. It's to assist Albertans in achieving freedom from the abuse of alcohol, other drugs, and gambling. The problem gambling mandate was added to our work in 1994. More recently--in fact, this year--a comprehensive tobacco reduction initiative was introduced. Our budget for 2002-2003 is about $58 million, and we have an estimated number of treatment clients of about 35,000 a year. Not only does AADAC treat clients, many thousands of Albertans participate in prevention programs or receive addictions-related information each year.

Over the years addictions programming has drawn from models of public health and health promotion. We've come to recognize the complexity of addictions. Addictions problems arise from many factors through complex interactions. The population health model, for example, has helped us broaden our understanding and thinking to recognize that there are numerous pathways to addiction. Addiction outcomes can be linked to a variety of factors, such as income, opportunities for education and employment, and family and community supports, this in addition to more proximate factors, such as family history, health behaviours, and the availability of drugs.

We do not see addiction as a primary determinant of health, but as a powerful mediator to health and well-being at both the individual and the population levels. For example, it's been estimated that about 20% of deaths in Canada are linked directly or indirectly in some way to substance use or abuse, and the strongest example of this is in the area of tobacco. This is a very large and preventable burden of disease and death on society. The costs to Alberta are estimated conservatively at about $728 million annually. That's an older estimate.

Increasingly, prevention programs focus on risk and protective factors, especially for children and youth. Now the emphasis is on increasing protective factors within the individual and his or her environment. That's reducing risk factors in those domains that contribute to substance abuse and problem gambling.

In AADAC's view, our first principles are for policy development that leads to well-grounded, pragmatic responses. This involves a number of basic, but important points, the first being recognizing the complexity of the issues and of addictions and the factors associated with them, the interdependence of these factors that operate through the availability of substances or behaviour. We like to focus on people in the context of their family and their communities. This tends to make us skeptical of one-shot or one-off, magic bullet solutions. Responses should be rational and balanced with risks. We've placed an emphasis on collaborative strategies. It's very important to engage all those with a stake in the issues of addictions--and there are many--and this involves shared responsibility and leadership.

There are two parts to our research perspective. Addiction services, like other areas of health and social services, have experienced a recent trend to become more effective and accountable and to ensure that products and services continue to improve. Research has played a very key role in supporting the field to meet these ever more demanding requirements. In this regard, leadership and investment are also needed at all levels, from the community up to the national level. Solid research agendas are needed to support the strategic directions of health and social services, the ones on the ground delivering the services.

These agendas have many parts and players. I would outline some of the key components as follows. Basic research is research into biological, behavioural, and environmental factors and their interactions, both at the individual and at the population level. Program development involves qualitative and quantitative studies to inform policy and program development. In the areas of best and promising practice we have evaluation and synthesis research to improve programs, to provide results that can help us improve programs. Knowledge transfer is very important, and that's in both directions, from practitioner to researcher and back the other way. Capacity building generates evidence, and then the organizations involved have the capacity to absorb and use the evidence, to put it in the hands of people who deliver the services. In the area of methods and tools we must improve the quality of the research to enable us to do better research in the future.

Obviously, we cannot afford to live in isolation. For the necessary research to get done, it means shared responsibility and leadership. Here again my colleagues note a crucial federal role. There are a number of areas, including adequately sustaining funding for high-quality research through such mechanisms as the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, which is a very good example, and the Institute of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Addiction, as well as other funding programs to support peer-reviewed, community-based researchers. Supporting key national agencies, such as the work of the Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse, the CCSA, an agency that provides a national focus from the demand reduction side, is very critical. We have not had a good national population prevalence study on illicit drug use since the mid-nineties, as Professor Wild has noted. There's a key gap here, and as we're trying to keep track of impacts of programs and how to better deliver our programs, we need this kind of trend information.

In fairness, Health Canada has prepared a number of best practice summaries on key addictions issues, substance use and concurrent disorders, prevention programming for youth, for example, which are very informative for program planners. These are important contributions to research synthesis and dissemination that should be encouraged and, we hope, sustained.

Thank you.

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The Chair: Thank you very much, Mr. Sawka.

I think I was remiss in not introducing the rest of the people at the table, so I should do that for you. We have two researchers with us today, Chantal Collin and Marilyn Pilon. They're our two committee researchers, and they do a great job. We have a substitute clerk for today, Eugene Morawski.

Dominic LeBlanc is a member of Parliament from Atlantic Canada, from Moncton. We have, of course, on this committee representation from all political parties, but they are not in the room with us. They will have the information from this hearing available on the parliamentary website and through the committee “blues“ right away. Anybody who is interested can get that information. Generally, we turn to the opposition, but we've mixed it all up for you today. If Mr. LeBlanc directs a question to one of you, but somebody else would like to answer, we're pretty easy here, so just tell me.

Mr. LeBlanc.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc (Beauséjour—Petitcodiac, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chairman, and thank you very much, Professor Wild, Dr. Johnson, and Mr. Sawka. It was an interesting presentation, and I thought quite a good overview of some of the issues in this province. Paddy and I come from other regions of the country. To have a chance to hear from you about some of the challenges in Alberta and some of the things that are similar in other parts of the country where we've travelled is very useful, so I thank you.

I wanted to try to touch on three specific areas. One is the federal-provincial relationship. Professor Wild said there was no federal champion. I don't disagree with that statement. Dr. Johnson talked about the federal role in strengthening local public health infrastructure; if I understood, you thought that would be worthwhile. I agree. In Alberta the history of the federal-provincial relationship on health care hasn't always been cozy. At various times there has been a disagreement between the national government and the provincial government over health care. You live here, you've seen it more than I have.

I'm wondering, first, if you think a strong national role in the whole issue of the non-medical use of drugs at one point is going to run into the inevitable provincial challenge, as they have the responsibility, particularly for the delivery of the health-care component of it. I recognize there are enforcement issues and research issues, but with delivery of health care services, I think some provinces--this being one, and certainly Quebec, for different reasons, but equally aggressively--at various times will say to the federal government, you don't take a national role on this, certainly for the health care side; give us the money and we'll implement a comparable program in our province. I'm wondering if you see an inevitable federal-provincial confusion--conflict may be too strong a word--or if you think the provincial government would be open to the national government's taking a strong championing role, to use Professor Wild's term. I'm wondering how you see that relationship.

Dr. Marcia Johnson: I could step in and give you my view on it and see if that's what you want.

I think the feds made a mistake about 10 years ago when they divested themselves of so much investment in health matters. They said, here it is, you guys do it. It was pretty much a shock. The provinces did take responsibility. In fact, the local jurisdictions sometimes feel as though they're the third person who has had the same thing happen to them, where you get all the responsibility, but the resources are pretty limited, so you're having to make hard choices.

From my perspective, it looks as if the federal government has to play a little bit of catch-up in studying the agenda in health, and that means a reinvestment. Given that health is really a provincial jurisdiction under the Constitution, or the way it's organized, I think the federal government has to provide leadership and more carrots and sticks, because you don't have very many sticks in your bag.

If you have an agenda, one of the big things the federal government is able to do in health care is bring people together, share ideas, reach consensus. In this huge country, without someone willing to take on that role, we will develop into even more isolated approaches to any problem. The consensus documents and the guidelines Mr. Sawka was mentioning are very useful as exactly that, guidelines. If the federal government chooses to champion an issue, developing best practices and positive encouragement, because of all the sensitivities around jurisdictional authority, it will have to say, these are some resources to address such-and-such a problem, but these are the hard outcomes we would expect. The way you get there is up to your local jurisdiction or your province. All the operational details may not be vested in the federal government, but the outcomes expected for x investments should be put forward and accountability required for the investment, now there is enough investment to realistically get to some of the outcomes.

It would be very useful if the federal government wanted to take on that role, because at least from program evaluation as to what works in the Canadian context or what works in the prairie context, you should be able to get some good information and be able to rehone and rethink your best practices. That approach worked in this jurisdiction, maybe something similar could be applied in another.

Those are my thoughts on that issue.

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Prof. Cameron Wild: My feeling is that it would be a mistake to cast this issue within the context of health care jurisdiction. I believe the federal government should seize an opportunity to develop innovative strategies that cut across traditional ministries. This is a public health problem on a national scale. To address it effectively requires broader thinking than about who's going to squabble over the delivery of services. Frankly, it requires the involvement of enforcement and all the other sectors you mentioned before in a creative way that avoids some of those traditional problems: we just do that in this ministry, and at that level of jurisdiction you guys do something else. I believe the public health scope of addictions issues demands a strategy that is broader than who controls the health services delivery.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: I don't want to interrupt before Mr. Sawka speaks, but your sense is that the provincial government in Alberta would be comfortable with the national government saying they're going to take a leadership role. Your word was a champion. Do you think the provincial government of Alberta would say, okay, the national government is going to look--and I agree with you--beyond traditional health care delivery? It is enforcement, it's customs, it's research. You're the experts, I'm not. I agree, it's much more than ministry to ministry, jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Do you think this province would be comfortable with the national government saying, we're going to bring together all these different participants and try to forge a national approach?

Prof. Cameron Wild: I'm not confident about how the government would react, but I do think there is openness to innovation, so if an innovative argument were put forward, my guess is that it would be listened to. Whether or not it would result in the desired outcome from all parties concerned, I'm not sure, but I do believe there's a hunger for an innovative approach that would avoid some of these problems we're experiencing.

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Mr. Ed Sawka: I'm not really in a position to speak on behalf of the Government of Alberta, but from the standpoint of an addiction service provider, I see the complexities of the jurisdictional situation and the arrangements for responsibility for service delivery. This is particularly the case in the aboriginal context, where on-reserve services are typically provided through the federal government. Elsewhere in the province they are a provincial responsibility, or it is a community's responsibility to deliver services. It is very complex, it is mired in all the issues you're familiar with.

I would like to build on what Professor Wild was saying about the need for broadened thinking that cuts across these issues and gets out of the narrower stovepipes. We certainly see a need for a strong federal presence or role. I tried to outline in my remarks what that could be, particularly in the information development and dissemination area. That's one area where none of the provinces really has the capacity the federal government has. The latter can bring an umbrella perspective to this. It is an extremely important and unique role the federal government could play. To make these roles work, my sense is that a combination could be made with the provinces.

I would point to recent history, Canada's drug strategy when it was first developed. It was an example of the federal government of the day taking a stronger interest in this area and expressing it in solid planning and working arrangements. Through various budget cycles, it was reduced from its original form. Nevertheless, I think it was a strong presence at the time. It did serve a very useful role, as it was an initiative balanced towards both the demand and supply reduction sides. There are some historical precedents that can be built on here.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: Mr. Sawka talked about an umbrella role as the rain hit the verandah outside.

There has been a lot of media attention on the issue of decriminalizing the possession of marijuana. Some of the people we've heard from, including a lot of law enforcement authorities, have said decriminalizing, let alone legalizing, possession of cannabis, which would be the further step, would be a mistake. They believe marijuana is an addictive substance. Their argument is that it's a gateway drug, that many people now using hard drugs began by using marijuana. I'm wondering if you have any views about decriminalizing possession of marijuana. Do you think it's an addictive substance, a gateway drug that in many cases, but not inevitably, leads to further drug abuse? I appreciate these may be your personal views, not those of the Capital Health Authority or the Government of Alberta. That's the luxury Professor Wild has: with his academic freedom, he can speak from his own experience.

The Chair: Everyone's eagerly trying to answer that question.

Professor Wild.

Prof. Cameron Wild: Cannabis is almost never associated with death. Its toxicity is minimal. From that point of view, it's clearly superior as a drug of choice over alcohol. The gateway theory is weakly supported by the research evidence, if at all. By the same logic, we should ban milk, because those who went along to heroin use probably had milk in their childhood. Inevitably, milk leads to heroin abuse.

The question you should consider is, why is it the case that the majority of people who use cannabis do not develop major problems? There's no sense of inevitability in its leading to a deep involvement in drug use, although that does occur. That dismantling of the gateway theory is actually fairly far down the road in the scientific literature. From the point of view of investment, a case could be made that the amount of enforcement dollars invested in cannabis control of various kinds is grossly disproportionate to the amount of good it does, particularly from the point of view of criminal records and limited public health benefits. So I would be in favour of decriminalization.

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The Chair: Just of marijuana?

Prof. Cameron Wild: Yes.

The Chair: Dr. Johnson.

Dr. Marcia Johnson: I'm glad Dr. Wild went first. As a physician, I had it drilled into me that we're supposed to practise evidence-based medicine, and it often hits me that other jurisdictions don't practise that very much. The illegality of marijuana hasn't really made any difference. As Dr. Wild was saying, it's really hard to tell what is the benefit of trying to enforce this. In terms of a health equation, it's hard to see that the benefit of criminalization of the possession of marijuana is demonstrable, in that there are definitely detrimental effects. That's all I'd like to say.

The Chair: Mr. Sawka.

Mr. Ed Sawka: We have taken the position that we do not favour decriminalization of cannabis. This is informed by the recognition that a significant number of clients who come to our services for help have problems with cannabis, so it's not a benign drug in that sense. In the order of 12% of our clients do have it as the drug most frequently used. That's among adults. Among youth clients it's even higher. So it does show that significant numbers of people do get into difficulty with it to the point where they need professional assistance. That takes our board to the point of not advocating the decriminalization of cannabis and taking the conservative stand on it.

That said, there is growing recognition of the cost benefit of pursuing rigorous law enforcement and a supply elimination approach, the risks and harm of putting people through the criminal justice process and potentially into prison, relative to the harm of using cannabis itself. I think that's another equation that needs to be looked at as part of this conversation.

The Chair: Before I turn to Mr. LeBlanc, who I think has another question, you gave some statistics on how many people present with a problem use of cannabis as adults and children. Do those people just use cannabis, or are they also smoking and drinking alcohol?

Mr. Ed Sawka: Very often they're multiple drug users, but they would identify cannabis as their drug most frequently used.

The Chair: Were they were referred to you after being charged or because they just said, I'm not happy with the amount of marijuana I use, or, somebody's not happy with me using this amount of marijuana?

Mr. Ed Sawka: It would be more the latter. They may refer themselves or they may be referred by a family member or the justice system. The point in that arrangement is that their cannabis use is problematic for them in some way. They've identified that drug as the drug they use most frequently, although they may very well use other drugs, and typically do, by the time they reach our services.

The Chair: And the other drugs are more socially acceptable at this point, because they're legal under certain conditions.

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Mr. Ed Sawka: They may be socially acceptable drugs, tobacco often, or alcohol, but also other illegal substances.

The Chair: Okay.

Mr. LeBlanc.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: Thank you, Madam Chairman.

Thank you for your answers. It's interesting that even at the same table there could be different points of view on this issue.

The other issue the media has focused on a lot, and some colleagues on this committee, for example, those from the downtown east side of Vancouver, have spoken about this a lot, is safe injection sites. You somewhat addressed the research value of having such a site. You're the professionals in research and in health. Paddy and I have the misfortune of having to get elected every three and a half or four years, it seems. Put yourselves in our shoes for a minute--well, maybe not in Paddy's shoes. How would you express to the people in rural New Brunswick, for example, the communities I represent, that there's anything safe about injecting drugs? For people who aren't familiar with some of the large urban centres and the health problems drug use can create, a safe injection site is a hard sell politically. They have been brought up to think this is a very illegal substance, with a lot of organized crime involved in the distribution, importation, and manufacturing of some of these substances, and we would have the government organize some kind of site where people could go and practise something that, in their minds, is highly illegal .

If this committee is going to look at those issues, I'm wondering what advice you have for us as to how we can explain, very much in layman's terms, to a retired schoolteacher in rural New Brunswick or a fisherman in my community that the Government of Canada should financially, or even legally, participate in something that, in their minds, is a great distance from their reality. I'm wondering what your own views are on safe injection sites, but also whether you think there's some medical or research value to be achieved from such an experiment. Do you have any advice on how to explain this on the wharf in rural New Brunswick?

The Chair: Professor Wild.

Prof. Cameron Wild: I'm in favour of safe injection sites to a limited degree, insofar as they are taken as an opportunity to rigorously evaluate the practice. I believe, in the Canadian context, we simply do not know whether this would reduce harm in urban areas or the population level, but not to try an intervention that could plausibly have such great public impact would be ethically questionable.

If I were on the wharf with one of your constituents, I would try to ask the person whether he or she would agree to have a friend who had picked up an infectious disease quarantined. Would they support government resources being used to protect the rest of the community in such cases? I would take the line with this person that safe injection sites may provide an opportunity that would not have existed before to intervene in someone's life; if that is so, this may be one of the only chances we have, as a body of citizens, to help people who need help for a debilitating condition, a chronic, relapsing condition.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: But couldn't some of that be achieved by the current needle exchange programs?

Prof. Cameron Wild: I do think the evidence on the efficacy of needle exchange is quite good, but clean needles do not address all the social complexities of why, when, and under what conditions people inject. Because we have a moral and ethical responsibility to our fellow citizens, we should try reasonable means to intervene, and be prepared to give up that mode of intervention should a rigorous evaluation show that it has no impact, but to try such a controversial social experiment without having sufficient evaluation in place is suicide. Your constituents will quite rightly take you up on that.

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Dr. Marcia Johnson: I too would support safe injection sites under certain conditions. Fortunately, Canada is a relatively compassionate society. We do take responsibility and are willing to care for people who are ill. Safe injection sites can be seen as an extension of the needle exchange program. The reason the needle exchange programs are supported is that they help to reduce the harm to society of behaviour that's taking place anyway. The safe injection sites would do the same thing. They would help reduce the harm to the individual people and the cost to society of people becoming ill with blood-borne pathogens or local infections due to injecting in unsafe, dirty, dark environments or situations.

The reason I would tentatively support safe injection sites is that there is evidence from other jurisdictions that they do indeed work, in Switzerland and Australia, in the latest reading I've done. So it's not that we're just making it up, we are basing it on other people who have tried to look creatively at ways to reduce harm for behaviour that's happening anyway.

The other benefit that needle exchange programs have is that they allow an engagement with the people who are dealing with addictive behaviour. They allow an opportunity, over time, to look at other associated areas. Typically, as was alluded to many times, drug addiction isn't a problem in isolation. There are all kinds of things that make a person susceptible to initiating drug use and being unable to stop. So the needle exchange programs and, I would expect, the safe injection sites too, allow that further engagement and strengthen the person's ability to see a way forward, to adapt their behaviour as much as possible. In some cases that might mean, in the end, actually quitting. That would be great, that's what we'd all love to see. But at least along the continuum, there would be support for any positive step that could be taken. I think many people would support that kind of concept.

The Chair: Mr. Sawka.

Mr. Ed Sawka: I would suggest that constituents in Alberta are just as difficult to convince or as skeptical as they are in New Brunswick, sir, but that's a very good question to ask, in many ways.

Speaking more personally, I think we have a need to look at the option of safe injection sites if we are committed to the idea of evidence-based practice. Indeed, if there is evidence out there in the literature and in experience, I suggest this may be a helpful intervention for some of the people, at least some of the time. We have a responsibility to look at it seriously. We have to be skeptical at the same time, to not inadvertently increase drug use and the attendant harms. That may happen as well, so we have to be very careful in how we would do that, drawing on experience and research from other parts of the world.

They may have a place. I don't think it's a yes/no answer, at least in my own mind at this point, but I think we should be open to the possibility. It does provide an opportunity, as my colleagues have noted, for humane intervention with people who are very difficult to reach and aren't amenable to our usual kinds of messages, coming to the office and sitting down with a counsellor, beginning to develop a little plan, and then carrying on and being successful. I think many of these people's life situations are very much harder than that, and we shouldn't be surprised if they're difficult to reach. This is another opportunity to try to do that.

The benefit there is a trade-off in pain, suffering, and cost. For the constituents, I would remind them that there are costs and pains associated with continuing along that lifestyle for that person and for society more broadly. One of the possible benefits of the safe injection site might be to reduce the cost for that person and for the community further down the road. It's a hard concept for some people to grasp, but I think that's part of the argument.

Prof. Cameron Wild: It seems to me that your job of trying to convince your constituents would be facilitated to a greater extent if you could draw on a creative, innovative federal drug strategy that crossed jurisdictions and sectors. Part of the reason we have so many difficulties talking about these issues to different constituents is that it is all seen as either a legal, criminal issue or not. A creative, innovative federal approach to educate the population on the interdependence of these issues and on the need to link enforcement to treatment and to have everyone working on a common problem could go a long way towards communicating that to your constituents.

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The Chair: Thank you.

I have a couple of questions. Mr. Sawka, you commented that there's been no national survey done on drug use since 1994. When was the last Alberta survey?

Mr. Ed Sawka: We haven't done an Alberta-based survey of adult alcohol and drug use for some time.

The Chair: Some provinces do their own surveys, and that is the most up-to-date information. So you haven't done, since 1994, a survey of Alberta?

Mr. Ed Sawka: AADAC has not done an alcohol or drug use survey here. We've worked in the gambling area, and we have plans in place to do a survey of student drug , alcohol, tobacco, and gambling use, but not for adults, although there are others, probably Professor Wild, who have done work in the area.

The Chair: Yes, the Edmonton one. I just wonder how you inform policy in Alberta if you don't have any surveys.

Mr. Ed Sawka: Well, we do. Historically, we do it based on Statistics Canada data, the National Population Health Survey, and the more recent surveys that are going to be releasing results soon. It's difficult, yes. There's a gap, especially in the illicit drug area.

The Chair: Right.

How long do people wait to get treatment in Alberta? Dr. Johnson would probably know for Edmonton, but say they present themselves in Red Deer, Calgary, or Fort McMurray.

Mr. Ed Sawka: I think the experience may vary a bit around the province. Depending on the facility and the need, it can take a couple of weeks to get into counselling. If it's an emergency situation, we try to make arrangements more expeditiously.

The Chair: How many beds are there for treatment for adults and how many for children?

Mr. Ed Sawka: I'm sorry, I don't have those numbers off the top of my head.

The Chair: Can you get those for us?

Mr. Ed Sawka: Yes. My colleagues will be speaking about that to the committee tomorrow, as a matter of fact, so we'll be able to get you that information.

The Chair: Are there needle exchanges in the province of Alberta? Is that mandated by the provincial government?

Mr. Ed Sawka: No.

The Chair: I see. My province of Ontario, which some would argue is just as conservative as this province, or even more so, has a provincial mandate for every regional health authority to have a needle exchange program. Of course, the design of that for some of the rural areas would be quite a bit different than for an urban centre, but there is some great success there. They came in so quietly that I don't think most people, except the people who need to know, know they're there.

Are there methadone and heroin maintenance programs being discussed or in existence in this province?

Mr. Ed Sawka: AADAC operates a provincially based methadone maintenance program out of Edmonton, providing services for Albertans. There is no heroin maintenance program in the province.

The Chair: Is it being discussed anywhere?

Dr. Marcia Johnson: Methadone maintenance, it's fair to say, could be greatly enhanced in Alberta. It has been a problem that Calgary does not have a methadone maintenance program, but I understand progress has recently been made in that jurisdiction. Part of it is that for needle exchanges or methadone maintenance, not to mention safe injection sites, it's not a health or an AADAC decision. You need to have buy-in from the whole community, including the police and things like that. So in Alberta it has been a community-by-community thing for needle exchange, and as I said, methadone maintenance needs to be expanded in Alberta.

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The Chair: In the Capital Health Authority how much time would be spent on prevention or reducing risky behaviour among young people or adults?

Dr. Marcia Johnson: I work with the public health division, so that is our work, but as for the proportion of resources in the global budget for the health authority, prevention typically gets relatively small amounts. So we have mandated programs that are bread and butter, like immunization, restaurant and food, water, air inspection, safe homes. We have a fair prevention mandate, but prevention resources are extremely limited.

The Chair: What percentage would be related to addictions?

Dr. Marcia Johnson: We do not have specific budget items for addiction. We deal a lot with infection prevention, and that's where we work with our community agencies. We're talking about how federally there should be a lot of integration across jurisdictions, and we can't do our business without integration across jurisdictions. So we work with our needle exchange program. Our needle exchange program is not run by the Capital Health Authority. We support a certain amount of their costs, but the needle exchange program also has to look for funding from other agencies. As part of my presentation, I was saying our preventive services are not fully resourced and could certainly be doing some more.

In the matter of Capital Health Authority and what we do with addiction, AADAC works with the actually counselling of addiction. If people are hospitalized or run into any health problems that require health services, a visit to an emergency room, liver problems, anything like that, that's all covered through our health delivery systems, but the most primary prevention level is linked to our well child programming, strengthening of family programming. We have some initiatives that are temporary, innovative funds, and that's including primary care, working through our needle exchange program, trying to do more education. There's a stovepipe federal program that talks about hepatitis-C for a different group of people. It's an extremely patchwork business in Edmonton.

The Chair: What percentage of AADAC's budget is spent on prevention? Is there a provincial program for young people to get education about substance abuse?

Mr. Ed Sawka: Very much so. I don't have the dollar amount that's provided for prevention, but we can get you that tomorrow. I know a significant amount of our resources do go into the prevention area. We have a number of programs aimed at youth. It's a very important part of AADAC's programming.

The Chair: To clarify, you don't work with the Capital Health Authority or the regional health authorities to deliver some of these programs or to get some cohesive messaging going?

Mr. Ed Sawka: We do have programs where our counsellors work with other service providers, the school system, and other community-based providers to address addiction issues among their clientele, for example, within justice. And yes, the intent is that we develop strong communication and programming on addictions issues for youth. That's very much part of our school-based programming, for example.

Prof. Cameron Wild: I do not want to discourage my colleagues in any way, shape, or form. I think AADAC and Capital Health do tremendous work with the resources they have. But in my view, this situation is summed up well in the following quote from a report that was made to the Government of B.C. in May 2000 by the Kaiser Youth Foundation about addictions in B.C. I think it applies endemically across the country.

...ADS suffers from having a very low priority and profile, no clear provincial strategy, a lack of focus and leadership, inadequate consultation and coordination, inconsistent and unreliable funding, miniscule prevention efforts, and little or no research.

Again, I'm not trying to disparage my colleagues' work or the support of their organizations, but there is a patchwork that is inadequately serving this issue in any jurisdiction you want to go to in the country. The way Ontario would handle it would be different than the way Alberta would handle it, but nonetheless, there is a patchwork. There are some programs that apply for certain disease conditions that have a link to addiction, but not others, and some services are provided municipally, some provincially, and so on, and on and on we go.

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The Chair: To that very point, Professor Wild, you and several other people mentioned that most Canadians would think we have a balanced approach, that we're supposed to be working on demand reduction and supply reduction. In fact, the Auditor General's study before Christmas pointed out that at the federal level, which is the level she can examine, there is 95% on supply reduction and 5% on demand reduction. Part of that is because most of the demand reduction activities, education, delivery of health care, are on provincial budgets, although, of course, supply reduction would also be provincial in municipal police forces and, depending on your province, provincial police forces. So we're trying to see if anyone has any provincial numbers. We've sent a letter to all the ministers of health asking for some kind of study. While I don't disagree that there's a need for a national coordinated strategy, it seems that strategy will have to rely on individual provinces doing the things that are appropriate for their province and individual cities and health authorities doing what's appropriate for their city or rural area.

Here you have a smaller operating space and a smaller group of people, and this province doesn't seem to have much coordination. Yet the very areas of real opportunity are prevention and treatment, which is part of prevention as well. So I'm trying to see what you have and what might be an example for other parts. I don't deny there's no federal coordination, but I'm surprised there are so few provincial initiatives, when you also have gambling in a big way.

Mr. Ed Sawka: I wouldn't characterize the situation as having no provincial coordination. On the contrary, remember that the initiatives within the provincial government sphere have been on cross-government moves to do precisely that. It has been in the areas of FAS, working with children in schools, early childhood development, a number of these kinds of initiatives that have involved coordination across the ministries of government, along with other community-based partners. The tobacco strategy we're initiating this year is very much based on that model. The realization over the last five years or so has been on taking the lessons from the population health model that does tie addictions to all these factors and increasingly working across the stovepipes of a number of ministries and players to address those factors.

The Chair: I guess you heard slightly different testimony this afternoon from what I heard, because I heard that there were gaping holes and some great silo programs. I interpreted that not just to be at the federal level, but to be a provincial challenge as well. There may be some nice coordination on certain activities, but it seems there are a few things missing within the areas this province is directly responsible for. We don't have to find a solution here. We don't have to make it right. It exists.

Dr. Johnson, you raised the whole issue of harm reduction, and I was pleased to have that. It's unfortunate that some of our colleagues aren't here, because it would seem that's a good strategy, by and large. Some people have suggested that it's harm extension, yet the people who are even closer to it, the people who are working with individuals on the streets, are saying, yes, get them into a needle exchange, and we might be able to intervene. Get them into a rehab program or into a safe injection site, and you might be able to keep them healthy and alive long enough to make some changes. A lot of the debate seems to be not just about whether it's harm extension or harm reduction, but some of our colleagues want to define clearly what harm reduction is, thinking one size needs to fit all across this province and across this country. What do you say to that? If they were here, they'd be asking you that.

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Dr. Marcia Johnson: Sometimes I too want to remind people who are in harm reduction that there is also another alternative, that harm reduction doesn't have to go on forever, although in certain cases that may be as close as you get. When your internal voice or some signs are telling you that maybe it's time to quit, that should be encouraged too. So it has to be balanced.

But again, if we're going to be compassionate, we have to recognize that addictive behaviour is just exactly that. It's not as if everyone has 100% self-esteem, has a completely organized and non-chaotic life, and has mental health issues completely under control. There are all kinds of very complex human situations that people find themselves in, and some people deal with that through substance abuse or non-medical use of drugs. So it isn't possible for some people to say, okay, I quit today, I'm not going to do it any more. The question should be asked intermittently, do you think it's time you should consider this?

The addictive behaviour, the substance abuse, is not healthy for people, and not using is always a good option to entertain, but we have to be pragmatic and realistic. People are misusing drugs and making themselves and their families very unhappy as a result, and there are strategies that can help the person stay healthy, help society stay healthier, or at least less harmed, and still support them to make healthier choices along the way. That's why we fully endorse harm reduction as part of an approach to the problem of the non-medical use of drugs.

The Chair: Thank you.

Does either of you want to comment?

Prof. Cameron Wild: To me, harm reduction is intervening from the frame of reference appropriate to the person. If that means a person is ready to use a clean needle instead of a dirty one, that's a harm reduction intervention. If it means they're ready to stop, that's a harm reduction intervention. There is an increasing awareness that one-size-fits-all interventions do not work for chronic relapsing conditions like addictions, so we have to develop a full slate of options and be prepared to intervene wherever the people need them and require them. Not to do so is morally questionable.

The Chair: Mr. Sawka.

Mr. Ed Sawka: I would add, from AADAC's perspective, that in providing for this full slate of options, one of the options has to be encouraging people to engage in treatment and to move to safer patterns of use, or non-use if they are dependent and we can move them to abstinence. But we wouldn't go there first with all clients, especially in those kinds of circumstances, because abstaining is not uppermost in their mind at that point. So you begin where the client is at, to use the cliché, and then work towards safer use and, if they're capable of doing it, abstinence. I think that's the broader perspective AADAC takes, in conjunction with harm reduction.

The Chair: Okay.

Why cocaine and not heroin in Edmonton? Is there something different?

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Prof. Cameron Wild: It's a good question. I wish we knew fully. It's not to say heroin doesn't exist in Edmonton, but it's not like Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal. The prescription opiates are more abused, and there is a thriving culture of heroin in this city and in other prairie cities. I would urge you to enquire about that, if you have a chance. The main public health concern, of course, is that the half-life of heroin in the body is much greater than that of cocaine. We've had reports of people injecting cocaine 20 or 30 times a day, which greatly increases the risk of communicable disease. So cocaine injection and the subpopulation of users form a tremendously important health issue we have to deal with in this city.

The Chair: Are prescription opiates a big problem in this province?

Prof. Cameron Wild: On the basis of our data, we know prescription opiate abuse is thriving in Edmonton, as it is in other prairie cities.

The Chair: It seems to be in Atlantic cities as well.

Is Dilaudid primarily used here?

Prof. Cameron Wild: Dilaudid, Oxycontin, and MS Contin.

The Chair: That's the first time anyone's mentioned Oxycontin.

Dr. Johnson, what would you see on the list of things the federal government should suggest provinces invest in, and what kind of outcome will we get?

Dr. Marcia Johnson: Again, it can be reduced to the question of lack of research in the whole area, which would allow us to know this is an outcome you can expect. Take tobacco use. We know it can be beaten, or at least be turned around, if you're really serious about it. California has given us a very good example of what a multifactorial approach can do if you're serious about a topic. If you were talking about tobacco reduction, it's a little bit easier, because we do more surveys on tobacco use. In fact, because it's legal, we can count the tobacco sales. We don't even have to depend on self-reported surveys. We know how much tobacco is moving, at least legally, through a jurisdiction. We know how much lung cancer there is. So the outcomes there are easy.

With injection-drug use, because it is illegal, some of your outcomes are quite a bit murkier. The use of injection-drugs is always going to be self-reported or based on key witnesses, through needle exchanges, for example. The fact a substance is illegal means outcomes in respect of use will be much more difficult to identify. You will be looking at key informants for surveys, but because the substance is illegal, the surveys will always be suspect. The outcomes, such as your blood-borne pathogens, are notifiable. Typically, you either have it or you don't. So we have relatively good and stable estimates of the epidemiology of some of these diseases.

Hepatitis C is going to be a huge problem in Canada, because of liver disease and death due to liver failure or the requirements for transplants. So the hard outcomes are there. But with the illegal substances, I agree, the intermediate or process outcome you might want to look at, such as the proportion of certain age groups who are using these substances, would be a little softer.

We mention creativity quite a bit. I think there can be creativity here if there is investment in surveillance of different health statuses in the population. That could also be something. Anyway, I'm just limited in my own creativity now. I know there are outcomes that could be measured.

Prof. Cameron Wild: In that regard, the U.S. has proved much more creative in the way they do drug surveillance. Notwithstanding their massive overemphasis on the enforcement side, they have coordinated data surveillance systems that can track seizures through police data, link them to occurrences of overdoses in hospital rooms, and so on. All these are integrated systems that serve the public health interest of monitoring the health status of a population. We simply don't have the infrastructure or creativity to pull those things together in a comprehensive way. No one measure, as Dr. Johnson has said, will be a perfect one, but if you use multiple measures, you'll get a better triangulation on what you're trying to establish. My point is simply that we haven't even dedicated any resources at the federal level to do any of this.

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The Chair: From some witnesses we've heard that they're so starved for actual treatment dollars they don't really care about a survey. They just want to stop people and help people where they're at. If it's a choice between different ways to spend funds, they said, just spend them on treatment, we'll see the numbers.

Dr. Marcia Johnson: You've just hit a sore point with me. That is one problem prevention hits. In the area of, say, motor vehicle accidents, our health care, and rightly so, is compassionate enough that no matter how many teenage boys get drunk and drive themselves into a telephone pole, we will always find the money to give them intensive care. We'll go the whole ball of wax to give those people care, and rightly so. I'm not sure we shouldn't. That's eminently elastic, whereas prevention is eminently squishable, and it's the first thing that's off your agenda. If you could only pay for those teenage boys who drive themselves into a telephone pole and at the same time solidly invest in motor vehicle accident prevention, safer telephone poles, smarter kids, and all kinds of things, in the end--it would take about 20 years--you would win. Constantly taking prevention dollars to do treatment is going to get us nowhere fast.

The Chair: The seat belt and child car seat analogy, something some people have raised, is a great example of teaching people about prevention and having them embrace it, and it is probably a good example of things we could do on the drug front. This is instead of a “just say no” or “wear your seat belt, because you're going to get caught” message. They actually understand the process of why you ought to wear a seat belt.

Prof. Cameron Wild: I think it would take a lot of courage for folks in your position, elected every three or four years and so on, to strongly advocate for an end point you may not see in your term. That would take a lot of courage. I encourage you not to back away.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: A 30-year timeline for me is fine.

Voices: Oh, oh!

Mr. Ed Sawka: My comment would be that you can look at outcomes at the population level and at smaller, subgroup levels. At the population level, you'd want to monitor prevalence of use, other basic levels of use, or other kinds of indicators as to what seems politically and community manageable, what is within an acceptable range. Recognizing that the alcohol and drug abuse issue will never go away, you want to manage it as efficiently as you can, minimizing the harms in the most cost-efficient way possible. Within particular subgroups, you may want to look at more specific harms or outcomes, reducing blood-borne pathogens or current incidence and prevalence of infection particular to types of use, inhalant use, for example, among some populations. Depending on the population of interest, you look at outcomes that fit them, that are achievable within your means, and that are within your strategies of influence.

The Chair: Before I end this, Dr. Johnson, you raised something when you were talking about the incidence of use in surveys. It was that the illegality of the substance makes it difficult to get hard information. What if we changed the whole legislative regime, put everything out there, and said, we'll stop focusing just on tobacco, we'll stop focusing just on alcohol, we'll say, there are substances, whether prescription drugs or what are now illegal drugs, that aren't so good for you under certain conditions, they may not be so bad for you under others. Then we'll do a risk-based approach and say to young people, evaluate what the risks are. Do you want to drive? Then you might not want to get high, however you get high. If you want to play sports, you might not want to pollute your body.

I've heard from young people who really got the tobacco message, but didn't understand there's tar in marijuana. They really get the “don't drink and drive” message, so they get high, because they can't get busted by a breathalyzer. So they're not getting the “don't harm yourself and your friends” message, they're getting the legality stuff. They seem to be incredibly ignorant about their choices. Then we have people across all age ranges who say, but the doctor gave it to me, it's safe, there's no problem with this, I can just keep taking it, whatever the drug is. They're not making really informed choices.

Is there a better way to do this whole prevention thing or this whole regulation of substances? Would that include stopping the siphoning on certain products, legal or otherwise, and changing how we approach drug education and dealing with substances in Canada?

º (1610)

Dr. Marcia Johnson: Other people around the table could really make an informed comment. What you describe sounds great, but I worry about people caring enough about themselves to always make good decisions. It goes back to my point that to make a good decision, you have to really think you're important and that it's important to you to look after yourself and other people. Our system won't work, with all its illegality, until people actually care enough about themselves to make good decisions, and then have the opportunity to be educated about what a good decision looks like. If it were a complete smorgasbord, we'd still have the same problem. If people don't care enough about themselves to make the decision, they won't internalize messages about what is a good decision and they won't always make informed choices.

I am more than happy to say there are better approaches than having these things criminalized. I would be happy to entertain that idea, to try strategies and evaluate what the difference is. But in my heart of hearts, I really think it boils down to having people who are capable of caring about themselves.

The Chair: Dr. Christiane Poulin's research at Dalhousie seems to have a subset of people who are engaged in very high risk behaviour. Perhaps it's a lack of self-esteem or whatever that's driving them. It's sex, it's cigarettes, it's alcohol, it's marijuana. For some of them it will go on to be heroin, cocaine, Dilaudid, or whatever. Figuring out who those kids are is a bit of a challenge.

Dr. Marcia Johnson: Trying strategies and making really good evaluations about what does and doesn't work opens your mind to the realization that the present situation may not be best. I don't think there's a magic answer here. I think it's going to take some hard slogging work with some good leadership at whatever level, provincial or federal or local. We're all dealing with the same issues.

The Chair: Probably all of the above.

Thank you all very much for the time you've put into your presentations today. I know this is the second call from this committee. We apologize for that. I'm very happy that we were able to hear from you and that we did have support from our opposition parties to allow these hearings to go forward the second time. This committee will hear witnesses, probably, until close to the end of June, which is fast approaching. Then we'll try to do some work through the summer and in the fall. We have a November 2002 report time. So if there's a study, if there's something else you want to say, if there's somebody else you think we should have heard from, please let us know. When Eugene is not here, we have a clerk named Carol Chafe, who some of you will have spoken with, and we have an e-mail address, so we encourage people to let us know. If you have other people in your workplaces who want to participate, or your kids, we'd be happy to hear from them too.

To each of you, on behalf of the whole committee, thank you for the work you do each and every day, and keep up the good work.

I'll just suspend for about three minutes, and then we'll get our next witnesses.

º (1610)

º (1613)

The Chair: I'll call this meeting back to order.

We are the Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs. Generally, there are more members around this table, but we've had a whole collision of circumstances, and you should know that all of this is being recorded for the official record. We're very pleased to have the support of our colleagues who are not in the room for allowing these meetings to continue.

We have on our panel on law enforcement, from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Staff Sergeant Doug Carruthers and Corporal Jim Jancsek. I think you've prepared a presentation for us, so let's have you start with that, and then we'll be ready for some questions.

º (1620)

Staff Sergeant Doug Carruthers (Royal Canadian Mounted Police): Chair, members of the House, Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs, thank you for the invitation to participate in these hearings.

My name is Doug Carruthers. I'm a staff sergeant in charge of the Edmonton RCMP drug unit. I have 31 years service with the RCMP, of which 17 have been dedicated to enforcement of Canadian drug laws, 9 years as a proceeds of crime investigator, and 5 years as a general duty officer. I've been accepted as an expert witness at the Court of Queen's Bench and the Provincial Court in Alberta and the Supreme Court and Provincial Court in B.C. and the Yukon. I've had the opportunity to live through and see the changes in drug use through the 1970s to the present day.

I'm joined here today by Corporal Jim Jancsek, who is presently stationed in Fort McMurray, Alberta, and is prepared to speak on drug use and its effects on the modern city in northern Alberta.

Throughout my career I've had the opportunity to gain experience. I was stationed with the Vancouver drug unit from 1973 to 1977, the Calgary drug unit from 1978 to 1988, and with the RCMP headquarters drug enforcement directorate in Ottawa from 1988 to 1992. I've been with the Edmonton drug unit from 1996 to the present day as a unit commander. My experiences lead me to believe that different cities have varied tolerances and determinations towards drug abuse, but a common factor is that the vast majority of our citizens have zero tolerance for drug abuse in their neighbourhoods. They tend to take an ostrich approach until their personal lives are affected by someone who, under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol, affects their lives.

One must ask why we tend to tolerate things that will ultimately affect our personal rights of being able to live in safe communities and to drive on our roads safely and not have to worry about the other driver's being under the influence of a mind altering drug. I suggest one answer to this question is that the Canadian public has been blindsided by a vocal minority who are adamantly pursuing their personal crusade to live life under their terms, being able to use illegal drugs freely and as they see fit. I suspect there will come a time when they will also expect to be fully provided with their drugs at public expense, which may already be occurring in some aspects of our heroin maintenance programs that are out there now.

There has never been a war on drugs in Canada. We have never experienced a common strategy. There has been no constant education to provide knowledge. There has been no leadership or coordinated effort on a national basis. The Canadian population is confused when it comes to drug abuse. Until such time as all Canadian political parties come to a common drug policy, our citizens will continue to live in the dark until their personal life is affected and they start to take a proactive look at what drug abuse is all about and how it is detrimental.

If thousands of Canadians have become addicted in a period when drugs are illegal, socially unacceptable, and generally difficult to get, tens of thousands more will surely become addicts when drugs are legal and easily obtainable. Harm reduction is a modern phrase that is actually harm promotion. Treatment of drug abuse is now redefined as maintenance, which tends to teach addiction as an acceptable practice. Our education programs teach us about drugs, not about being against drugs. Non-standardized programs teach us that if drugs are used safely, they are right things to do. These types of messages are wrong and leading us in the wrong direction.

The same message comes out when we reduce the consequences of drug abuse. Does this mean it's not bad any more? I suggest that perception of harm in drug abuse lowers drug use. Canada needs a social consensus, which is not presently existing across the country.

Needle exchange programs are really needle distribution programs. A trip to Vancouver's distribution area leads one to ask, who really is the victim? Businesses located in the immediate area are surrounded by fencing. Addicts who don't get into the injection sites are lying around on the streets. Dirty needles are scattered all over the place. Is this what we want to promote for business and tourism in our communities and in our country?

Physicians and scientists should be partners in dealing with drug abuse matters. When it comes to issues of marijuana being used for medical purposes, there is no scientific evidence that supports its use. Marijuana contains 60 psychoactive elements, 360 inert ingredients, and 11 known cannibinoids. I know of no known medicine doctors prescribe where the patient is asked to smoke the substance. One marijuana joint equals three-quarters of a pack of tobacco cigarettes, and it contains three times the tar. Our society seems to be winning challenges regarding the use of tobacco and alcohol, so why are we giving up so soon on challenges with legal drug use? There are no studies of interaction with THC and other drugs that may be prescribed to patients. In turn, mixtures of prescription drugs with marijuana may be a fatal combination, we don't know.

I recently heard a promoter of marijuana advise a group of students that because marijuana is organically grown, it cannot harm you. This is the wrong message our media are allowing to get out to Canadians. This leads to our kids being basically seduced by the drug dealers, who promote legalization for three reasons, money, money, and money. The real issue here is protection of our future society, and prior to any decisions being made at all, scientific benchmarks must be explored to validate what the real consequences will be.

When this is all over, do you want your children to be educated by someone who may be influenced by psychoactive substances? Do you want your taxi driver to be under the influence, your commercial pilot to have just smoked a joint prior to takeoff? What matters is the future of our kids. People here in Edmonton are very smart. Despite all the media hype promoting legalization, they realize that users never admit that marijuana burns up brain cells, and legalization is not something they want in their neighbourhoods.

We must re-examine our drug strategy, learn from successes such as seatbelts, drinking and driving, and smoking promotions. Prevention, treatment and enforcement are currently not working together, but they can and should, with a revitalized approach to our current and future drug problems in Canada.

I recently attended the International Drug Education and Awareness Symposium in Vancouver. This was a powerful presentation of successes and failures from around the world that strongly indicated that any effort towards legalization is not the road to take to win this fight. Beware of simple solutions to complex problems. Drugs are not a threat to Canadian society because they are illegal, they are illegal because they are a threat to Canadian society. Whether you call it legalization, decriminalization, or drug policy reform, the bottom line is that any of the aforementioned will put more drugs into the hands of our children and make drugs more available on the streets of Canada.

Thank you.

º (1625)

The Chair: Thank you.

Corporal Jancsek.

Corporal Jim Jancsek (Royal Canadian Mounted Police): I received a notice of attendance rather late, and I didn't prepare a presentation as Staff Sergeant Carruthers has. However, I did prepare some speaking notes, of which I left a copy.

I'll start off by letting you know that I have approximately 22 years experience with the RCMP, of which 10 years is general duty experience. I did three and a half years with the Burnaby, British Columbia, drug section, and then I went on to just over six years of drug enforcement at the federal level at the Vancouver drug section. I was transferred to Fort McMurray almost two years ago, and after six months of general duty work I joined the drug section there, where I have been for the last year and a half.

Fort McMurray--I don't know if you're familiar with its location--is a small city in the northeast part of the province. It has a population of approximately 47,000 people within the city limits and a transient population of approximately 11,000 in various camps associated with the oil industry. Cannabis and cocaine are almost the exclusive drugs of choice in this region. Illegal drug abuse is rampant in this and surrounding communities. It has no economic, cultural, or age constraints. Both drugs can be obtained in quantities of grams to pounds. Pound levels are greater at any time, on any given day, through a large, ever-growing supplier base. Cocaine is brought in from larger centres of Alberta and British Columbia. From interviews with those involved in the drug subculture, it's a well-known fact that Fort McMurray is a wide open area, with a large user base willing to pay exorbitant amounts for inferior quality and quantity of cocaine. The profit margins are astronomical.

Cannabis use is thoroughly entrenched in this area and knows no limitations with regard to abusers. It is enjoyed by the youth of the community, as well as the older, established, fully employed citizens. Cannabis, according to sources of believed reliability, is readily available in the camps outside town that house the oil industy employees. Of the search warrants executed by our section at Fort McMurray involving cannabis possession for the purpose of trafficking the majority have been for the latter individuals, gainfully employed at one of the plants or mines, and they admit to trafficking to fellow employees.

Cannabis arrives in our community in various manners. It's normally transported in vehicles from growing labs in British Columbia. The cannabis is vacuum-sealed in plastic bags, and a shipment usually consists of between four and ten pounds at a time. In addition to multi-pound deliveries, our section has been aware of numerous smaller shipments of cannabis sent to individuals at the various camps by way of commercial courier or shipped by bus. Dozens of these shipments are intercepted every year. Their weights range from 14 grams to several ounces. These shipments are the ones we are aware of, and it's suspected that hundreds more are successfully delivered, unimpeded by police. Detection of the smaller shipments is accidental and usually based on poor packaging by the sender.

Without exception, every cocaine trafficker arrested in our community has used or is using cannabis. Most cocaine and cannabis traffickers have been or are currently employed at one of the oil industry plants. Typically, the cannabis traffickers remain employed in the region's industry, while most of the cocaine traffickers have resigned for the far more lucrative and less time-consuming trade of supplying cocaine.

º (1630)

The Chair: Can I just ask about that last part? The cannabis dealers are still employed, but the cocaine dealers are just living in the community, not employed.

Cpl Jim Jancsek: It's far more lucrative for them just to traffic cocaine with the user base we have and the profit they are making.

The Chair: Thank you to both of you, and thank you for outlining your experience, because it's really helpful in understanding where you're at.

Mr. LeBlanc.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: One of the arguments we hear a lot from those who are in favour of decriminalizing possession of cannabis is that it leaves somebody convicted of possession, for example, with a criminal record, that they're incarcerated, that they go to jail. From your extensive experience--I recognize that it's anecdotal and we'd have to talk to the Department of Justice prosecutors or something--can you give us a portrait of somebody who is charged with possession of cannabis? I remember from previous witnesses that the vast majority of those charges are laid in conjunction with other criminal activity, that somebody is arrested holding up a corner store and they happen to have marijuana in their wallet. There are other charges that accompany a possession charge. The percentage of possession charges alone, with no other charges in conjunction, is very low, which would mean that law enforcement is not targeting simple possession of cannabis as an offence in and of itself. I'm wondering if you could comment on that.

I practised law for a number of years, but didn't do much criminal law, and I don't remember the kind of sentence. Let's say some high school or university kid is charged with possession of cannabis. Typically, what kind of sentence would they get? I realize that it'll change from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and from judge to judge. I have a sense that the argument that they go to jail is exaggerated, the argument that they have a criminal record that isn't erased quickly is exaggerated, and the argument that they can never cross an international border again without huge problems is also exaggerated. But those are the arguments we hear, advanced by those who want us to recommend legislative changes, including decriminalizing possession.

It would be useful to hear about the kind of person who gets convicted of possession. What happens to them, what kind of sentence would they get, and what are the consequences down the line? It's more compelling if we're told they'll never be able to enter the United States again without a huge problem at the border. That's the kind of argument we hear. I have a sense that it's exaggerated, and I would be very interested in hearing how you view that according to your experience.

º (1635)

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: It would be a struggle to find somebody incarcerated for possession of cannabis. There is probably nobody in jail for possession in Canada. I was recently at a conference that also provided me with strong evidence that in the United States nobody has been incarcerated for simple possession of marijuana. I would suggest the same is true for possession of almost any drug, be it cocaine, heroin, whatever. They normally do not go to jail for those particular offences. I don't think the system could handle that.

I agree with your comments that for the vast majority of people who have been charged with possession of marijuana, those charges have arisen subsequent to an arrest for another criminal act. At my office we do not target people for simple possession. If we happen to arrest somebody and they do happen to have it on them, we will charge them. We will not necessarily proceed with that charge, because we have a charge on a more serious offence to pursue. So yes, I would say, when you find possession of marijuana charges, there's usually something else that's associated with it. The police just don't have the time to go out and target people for simple possession of marijuana.

As far as going across the border is concerned, the Americans are very non-tolerant of drug abuse, but I know of people who have had their criminal records done away with through application after three or four years. I also know people with drug records who have gone to the Americans and filled out various documents, and now they're accepted across the country. But if they find that you have a drug record, it may impede your international travel to the United States. That's their choosing of who they want to come and visit their country.

When it comes to cannabis offences here in Alberta, in my particular office I have a dedicated group of people who work jointly with the Edmonton city police, who I believe you'll hear from later on. We do target hydroponic operations in northern Alberta. Our court system here is still strongly against that. They still receive fairly harsh sentences here in the province of Alberta for a hydroponic growing operation. People are incarcerated for serious offences or for large growing operations outside B.C., where they do receive a fine. I have two people in my office dedicated to that project, and there are two Edmonton city policy officers dedicated to it as well.

Other than that, because of money and resources and the fact that the whole justice system would be unable to handle the number of cases that could be out there, we basically look towards organized crime cases. Those are where they control the drug trade, including the growing operations, and are bringing in large shipments of various products to Edmonton for our supply, mainly from Vancouver. That's where we generate our thoughts. We don't target people for abuse, for use of the substances, or for simple possession. We target trafficking and above.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: Sergeant Carruthers, I appreciate that you're not directly targeting somebody for possession, and I was interested to hear that includes harder drugs than simply marijuana. But from your experience, what if somebody is convicted in this jurisdiction for possession of marijuana? Let's say it's a first offence. Some high school party goes bad, and somebody gets busted and is convicted. What kind of sentence would they typically get? What is the range of sentences? Is it all conditional discharges with community service? Do they get some probation?

º (1640)

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Most of them would probably get a conditional discharge. I think the courts are very wise about what harm may come to them if they do have a criminal record. Conditional discharges are becoming very common here also. If they're repeat offenders, obviously, there's a different mindset to it.

The Chair: So if there are people who have been arrested before and had a conditional discharge, they would be convicted for possession?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: They would be, but they're still not going to go to jail for possession.

The Chair: In your first answer you said people aren't being targeted, but they are being convicted?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: They are convicted if they get caught subsequent to another arrest.

The Chair: And what happens on the second arrest?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: They're probably looking at a fine.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: Remind me, because I didn't pay much attention to this stuff in law school, does a conditional discharge leave you with a criminal record?

The Chair: In the U.S. it does.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Up here, eventually, you will have a criminal record.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: That's why some of the questions are phrased, “Have you ever been found guilty of an offence?”. On a conditional discharge, you're found guilty, but not convicted. That's why the question comes in that form. You'd have to answer yes to that question if you'd been given a conditional discharge for possession of marijuana, right?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: That's right.

The Chair: I've had constituents who have had to go through the process of getting their record cleaned, and you have to do both. You have to pay a lot of money and fill in a lot of forms with the Americans to get across. I've had several constituents who have had that happen.

Cpl Jim Jancsek: I'm in agreement with Sergeant Carruthers. We don't target individuals who are simply users of any of the drugs of choice in Fort McMurray for simple possession. Usually, if they're caught with possession of cannabis, it's as a result of another offence or another complaint. If they are charged, typically, the sentencing in Fort McMurray, if it's a first-time offender, involves alternative measures. They donate a certain amount of money to charity, do some community service, and they're allowed to go scot-free. If they don't go that method, the fine is around $100. No one goes to jail. I've never seen anybody, in 22 years, go to jail for simple possession of cannabis.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: Staff Sergeant Carruthers mentioned organized crime. Witnesses from different law enforcement agencies, including your own, have described some aspects of the role organized crime plays in the importing and distributing of drugs, and trafficking, obviously. In some provinces it's the Hells Angels who appear to be controlling a great deal of the drug trade. I'm wondering if there are biker gangs in this province involved in that kind of activity. What are some of the other consequences of organized crime controlling some of the importation and trafficking of drugs, if in fact they are? I assume they are in the majority of cases. I'm thinking of things like prostitution. Have you done a lot of proceeds of crime investigations? Have you laid a lot of charges under the proceeds of crime provisions of the Criminal Code? In my own province of New Brunswick your colleagues recently had a fairly substantive and successful prosecution--including some lawyers, which was even more disturbing--for proceeds of crime and money laundering from drug trafficking. I'm wondering if there is a similar situation in Alberta.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: There is. I normally won't undertake any investigations in my office unless proceeds of crime is an element of it, because I'm a firm believer that simply to have a person incarcerated for a serious offence and leave his assets available to him when he gets out allows him to start over from where he began. We've been very successful in this jurisdiction in dealing with organized groups, basically taking their assets away from them, and when they've got out of jail, they've had to start from ground zero.

In our area here the organized crime groups do control certain aspects of the drug trade. We've seen Outlaw motorcycle gang groups controlling the hydroponic operations. They control certain aspects of street drugs in certain parts of the city. They have a very strong influence on methamphetamines, speed. The kinds of drugs that are sold in certain areas must come from them. The same is true for a number of cultural organized crime groups we've encountered here in Edmonton. We've been very successful in bringing to the justice system several large groups that were making millions of dollars in profit trafficking in several tens of kilos of cocaine in the city here. When we catch them, because the market's lucrative, there's always a replacement to move in and take over.

One of the biggest aspects I've realized in the past five years is the violent context that comes with it. It is huge. About ten years ago, when I used to do drug investigations, we weren't concerned about violence in a lot of respects when it came to dealing between people. Now, when I take on a drug investigation, one of the key things I always must be prepared for is that all my officers may face somebody on any given night who's going to get shot on the street or in a fight between the gangs. They are ruthless. They have zero respect for our justice system. All they think about is themselves and money, money, money. Different groups fight amongst themselves for territory in the city here, and that leads to violence also. As far as the violence is concerned within their groups where people don't pay their debts, we see the end result on many occasions. We don't get much warning before it happens, but when it does, we do an investigation, and we find ourselves more and more often having to go to people and forewarn them that their partner in business or the people they're dealing with are going to terminate them or cause serious harm to them. That is becoming more and more prevalent in our investigations right now.

But when it comes to proceeds of crime, as I said, it is one of the main focuses of our investigation. To date, I'm saying, it's a very good piece of legislation and has gone a long way to curbing our problems.

º (1645)

The Chair: “Cultural organized crime”: I assume that's not the arts centre. What is cultural organized crime?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Peer groups. Most of the organized crime groups have a cultural bond, whether it's that they're from the same racial origin or that they have a common language.

The Chair: Okay, what's present here in Edmonton?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Asian organized crime is very prevalent.

The Chair: And are they moving heroin specifically?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Cocaine. They are also becoming strongly involved in hydroponic operations. More and more hydroponic operations, we find now, are under the control of Asian organized crime groups. They do bring in heroin; we have purchased heroin from these organized crime groups. But the market here is smaller than in the cities of Vancouver and the port cities, where it's prevalent. Cocaine is the high-profit drug they're making their money from.

The Chair: And where is it originating from?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Most of it comes from Vancouver, from the port city. In Edmonton we have what I'll call a medium-sized to significant heroin population. We've made significant seizures from them over the past few years. They are a very close-knit group. We have a methadone treatment centre here, which plays a role in why we have a population here. Our climate is not conducive to heroin addicts, the way it affects their body and things like that, so the methadone clinic helps maintain them while they're here. Talwin and Ritalin use is strong on the streets here. There is a heroin problem here, but we don't seize kilos of it, we don't seize pounds of it. Cocaine is the drug of preference.

Also, at the present time, methamphetamines are virtually out of control. The mom-and-pop labs that are around producing methamphetamines and speed are increasing daily. The amounts of methamphetamines on our streets are so abundant at this time that recently the cost of buying methamphetamines has been reduced to half. When I send my teams out to rural Alberta to buy cocaine, it's very difficult. When they go out there to buy methamphetamines, it's like buying candy from the corner store. It is very prevalent out there, for a lot of reasons. It gives them a very good rush, lasts for a long time, and is very cheap. And it does not have the stigma right now that heroin and cocaine do. As it grows more common and we see how much more damage it does to people and it does get a stigma, it might turn back, but it's a huge problem right now. Unfortunately, I don't have the resources to target it.

The Chair Corporal Jancsek.

º (1650)

Cpl Jim Jancsek: We also tackle the proceeds of crime in our investigations. They're not as large in scale as they would be in a municipality the size of Edmonton, but we do manage to make some significant seizures in relation to cash moneys. Most residential housing up there that our suppliers are living in is rented. Because of the cost of living up there, it's too expensive to buy a house. They would rather rent one and move on.

There are tentacles of organized crime in Fort McMurray. The Outlaw motorcycle gang has reached there. They're living in our community. There are rumours that they are running certain businesses. That hasn't been substantiated yet. Cocaine coming into town is predominantly through the organized crime motorcycle gangs. We have been informed that the Asian organized crime out of Edmonton has found Fort McMurray to be quite lucrative for supplying their cocaine.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: We've found that the organized crime groups based out of Edmonton do substantially supply Grande Prairie, Fort McMurray, Peace River, and Red Deer. As I said, virtually all the sources for here are in Vancouver.

The Chair: Mr. LeBlanc.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: Thank you for that answer. It was an interesting picture of many of the issues surrounding organized crime control. It's not some local dealer who has a little plot in his or her backyard and distributes marijuana to people at parties. There's a misconception in some cases that the dealing can be your friendly local operation.

I wanted to ask you this. The profit margins in this kind of business, from what we're told, are huge. Probably not a lot of tax is paid on many of these transactions, which leaves the person doing the transaction with a greater net proceed than other businesses. What happens to all this money? If it's Asian crime gangs, if it's motorcycle gangs, if millions of dollars can be made in various transactions up and down the chain, does this money find its own head office somewhere? Does it get invested into businesses, as you said, perhaps as a way to launder the money? What typically happens to these proceeds of crime?

I congratulate you for the effort you're making at attacking the proceeds of crime. I always found it strange that somebody can go to prison for a period of time, having been convicted of an offence, and come back and benefit from all the material assets they accumulated during their criminal activity. I'm glad to hear that legislation is useful and you're using it to the greatest extent possible. What happens to all this money?

º (1655)

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I can tell you for a fact that a lot of it does go offshore. A lot of it goes back to their homeland and is buried there, so we cannot get access to it. A lot of countries they're from don't cooperate with the protocols the United Nations has set up, so we can't get at that money. We know it's there.

A lot of the money goes into buying businesses. We've seen that people have bought businesses to try to legitimize their income. Of course, these people enjoy a very high lifestyle. They don't work. They travel and party a lot. They buy all the toys you could think of. I know of examples of individuals who have five or six very costly antique cars, all the ski-doos you could think of, a trailer that could hold 10 ski-doos, and motorcycles. They live life to the fullest.

As I said, a lot of it goes offshore and we can't get at it. We recently did an investigation where we knew there was $700,000 offshore, but the country where it was wouldn't deal with us so we could get that money back. Those were U.S. funds. All that money was generated in the city of Edmonton by one individual, who had a very small organization of about eight people.

We have cases involving quite large organizations that are before the courts right now, so I must be careful about what I say. These organized crime groups are run like businesses. They have a day shift and a night shift. They have people who work on the weekends. They come to work and they change shifts. They swap the telephones from the day shift to the night shift. They swap the cars that are being used by the dial-a-dopers from the day shift to the night shift. If you don't show up for work, you'd better have a good excuse, because they need you on shift. They have more people working on shift when we get closer to the time the welfare cheques come out, because they know those are big business days. It's run just like a business.

It comes right down to the process where they bring the drugs into town and change the cocaine into crack cocaine, which is what everybody wants to do nowadays, because it's very strong and prevalent. Turning that cocaine powder into crack cocaine is another business process. They rent apartments. We have strong evidence to show that they have shifts working there. They have people who do nothing but cook, which is turning the powder into crack, people who do nothing but break it up and weigh it, and people who do nothing but package it.

Organized crime is not some mom-and pop-operation where they're selling drugs in the local nightclubs and on the street. It's run like a business. They have rules and regulations. They keep books in some cases. If you go to certain clubs around town, you can always buy drugs. The organized crime people have their drug runners out there, and they have to sell so much a day. If they don't, they're going to be spoken to. It's very well-organized and in most cases very well run. They run on intimidation, but they also pay these people well. They pay for their lawyer when they get caught. After a certain period they probably get a car, an apartment to live in, things of that nature. It's very sophisticated.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: When you say they're spoken to, that doesn't mean an entry is put in their personnel file.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Well, what can I say?

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: Does “spoken to” mean that if they don't sell a certain amount of drugs on a particular day, there will be physical consequences?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I would suggest that happens most of the time.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: I'd like to bring up one last issue. I was interested to hear your description of some of the attendant social problems with needle exchanges and safe injection sites and some of the community concerns that might develop around some of these facilities. As Paddy mentioned, a number of our colleagues are great advocates for a harm reduction approach. Some try to define it, others don't seem so concerned, they just think anything that reduces harm is positive. The truth may be somewhere in the middle in all of these issues. Maybe we should think some of the terminology through. There's not much I think is safe about injecting drugs. We have trouble with the language. As Paddy said, the whole notion of what harm reduction is and so on will never be properly defined, and there will always be people on either side of those issues.

You described a picture of the kinds of people who hang out around these community sites. Are there other criminal activities that typically take place in these areas? If you worry about some neighbourhood welcoming either needle exchanges or safe injection sites, if that's the right term, what is your argument for a community like that to resist such a facility?

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I can't see a community or neighbourhood asking to have one of those in their neighbourhood. I don't know if you've visited Vancouver and had the opportunity to go to the east end and down to the needle exchange sites, but they don't give a very positive aspect to the people and the businesses that are around them and the people who live there. I was recently at the IDEAS conference in Vancouver, and some speakers there who live in the neighbourhood had complained to the police about the needles they found in their backyards. One had children. They found out that she had complained, and next thing you know, they were throwing bags of needles into her backyard just to bother this person. So she was in a no-win situation.

The thing about the safe injection sites is that they started out being for heroin addicts to go in and fix, and then they could go. Now we have the cocaine people visiting those sites, and they go more often than the heroin people. They're only open so many hours a day, and they only have so many beds and number of rooms they can go to.

The Chair: Where are these sites?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I'm talking about the Vancouver one.

The Chair: There isn't a safe injection site. That's why I'm wondering what site you're referring to. You also mentioned heroin maintenance earlier, and there isn't a program in Canada. So I'm wondering what you're referring to.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I'm quite sure there was one in Vancouver.

The Chair: There was one open for a day in Vancouver, asked for by the community and set up by the United Church.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I was talking to people, and I was quite sure when I went down there that they were complaining, and the person spoke about how the needles were ending up in the backyard. Excuse me, I meant the needle exchange site.

The Chair: Yes, there are needle exchange programs, but there are no safe injection sites.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Sorry.

What's happening is that the people who aren't exchanging the needles are coming and getting the needles and not bringing them back. They grab a bunch, and they sell a lot of the needles, things like that. So I think you start getting the cocaine people and the amphetamine people coming there, and you ask, can we handle this? It would have to be like a hospital. There would be a lot of people coming to those sites.

The other thing with the needle sites is that people bring their own drugs. We don't supply the drugs to those people so far, so there are a lot of dealers out there who target that particular area to get to these people before they do it.

As far as the other criminal activity is concerned, I can't comment on that. There will be some people speaking to you from the Edmonton city police who work on our joint forces street team, and they'll be able to talk to you specifically about what they see on the streets here.

The Chair: Corporal Jancsek.

Cpl Jim Jancsek: I had only limited experience with needle exchange in Vancouver when I was stationed there. If you haven't had the opportunity to go to the lower east side of Vancouver and stay there at three o'clock in the morning, you really should take that opportunity. I've been down there lots of times at that time of day, and I know people who receive clean needles or syringes. That's a great thing, but when they're done with those syringes and needles, they're not being disposed of in a safe and normal fashion. A lot of them are discarded in the back alley, and a lot of them are sold for the wash. When you inject heroin, you're going to flag a vein to make sure you're going to get a vein, if they haven't collapsed, and the wash that's left in that syringe after you've injected is going to have a certain amount of heroin left in it. They're selling that for $20 a syringe. So the exchange is one way. A user will get a clean syringe , they're going to use their heroin, and then sell the wash off. The next person down the road is getting their exchange needle .

Does it work? I don't think so. I don't think the heroin user population really cares that much. The first person on the line does, on occasion, but normally not.

The Chair: Certainly, if it were your sister or brother with a heroin problem, and if they were present enough to be able to get a clean needle and to have contact with a health professional or some caring organization, I would think you would believe that to be a good thing, wouldn't you? Or would you prefer that they continue to get their needles from people in the underground economy?

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Cpl Jim Jancsek: Certainly, if it were an immediate relative of mine, it would be a good thing. I'd also take steps to try to get the person immediately into some sort of treatment.

The Chair: Sure.

Would a safe injection site, where needles were given out for the person to both inject and they could later dispose of their needle, so somebody could make sure they were not overdosing or causing further harm to themselves, be better than an alley?

Cpl Jim Jancsek: Certainly, that would be preferable to an alley, but I don't think you would find a heroin abuser who would go to a safe injection site.

The Chair: They did set up a site for a day in Vancouver. People did use it. We've both been to Vancouver's east side, which is a fairly contained neighbourhood. There's one serious alley there in which a lot of people seemed to be. It was like a mini-program there. There was an incredible sense of community, of people looking out for each other. In fact, not only did the guy who gave us the tour check on a couple of people, he was also headed for a rehab program the next day. He had had enough. He had been kept alive until that point through various programs. While you and Sergeant Carruthers know people who haven't been so thrilled with it, I guess there are other citizens who have been happy with some of the interventions made.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: With the present treatments we have, I'd say the numbers of people who beat heroin are small compared with the people who don't get off of heroin.

The Chair: Based on that perception, do you think we should not facilitate these interventions, because I guess there's this other group of people, such as people with backyards, who matter more? I think you actually said harm reduction was harm maintenance.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying these other programs are all well and good as long as their goal is eventually to break this person from their dependency and addiction to the drugs. Simply to have a program that is only going to maintain that habit for the rest of their life, until they perish, seems to be going through a revolving door. I have no problem with some of the programs out there you're talking about as long as we combine them with something else as a goal, to get these people back working, living a semi-normal life, not being totally dependent on the government and us to keep them supplied with their drugs the rest of their lives. We have to go beyond simply the maintenance part of it.

The Chair: Okay, but I'll have to check the record, as your opening statement was pretty emphatically against harm reduction strategies.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I think harm reduction is not well defined and not standardized at this time. Isn't that right? In my view, harm reduction is basically a maintenance program or a promotion at this time. If we're promoting a message that drugs aren't bad and can be used safely, are we not telling our future people drugs are okay to use, as long as they have a paramedic nearby in case they have a problem or overdose? We have to go beyond that. These programs are good, but we have to combine them with other programs to go ahead.

The Chair: I guess this is where the challenge is. Harm reduction means reducing harm. That's what it means. It has a variety of components for different people, in different places, appropriate to their use or to their situation. It's a harm reduction for you to alert someone who is about to have to repay a debt with his or her life. You figure there must be some value for the person's family or whoever in keeping the person alive, even if he or she is a pretty awful individual. You wouldn't necessarily like these people all that much, but you keep them alive. That's a harm reduction strategy applied to that person at that time.

I think part of your opposition comes from the fact that some of the needle exchanges don't scream abstinence, abstinence, abstinence. They don't seem to have that as an apparent goal. When you are alerting people who are about to be killed for drug debts, do you only alert the ones who say they'll abstain in future, or do you alert all of them?

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: The users normally aren't involved in that particular aspect. They're down at the bottom end. The people we're working with are at the top end. They've got carried away and have spent money they are not paying back. The people at the bottom end have probably paid for their small amount of drugs.

The Chair: The people you alert, who cares what their activity is? They're generally involved in the drug trade.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Yes, that's right.

The Chair: Do you only alert the ones who tell you they're going to stop what they're doing, or do you alert all those who are about to be killed?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Oh, we would notify everyone. No matter what a person does or where he is in the organization or in society, I cannot sit back and willingly or knowingly let him be harmed. We go to all these people and let them know. If we know, we will go and warn these people.

The Chair: And some of those people might turn away from the lives they've been dealing with and some of them won't. Some of them will go right back into it.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: That's correct.

The Chair: Isn't that a bit like the needle exchange in the Vancouver east side?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Many of them have a different way of thinking. Some think they can go back and convince the person who's mad at them that they will make it up to them. With the lifestyle they're in, they don't know any better way, there are no other options open to them.

The Chair: That's not unlike heroin users on the Vancouver east side. Some might be ready to get out, some might have a support network, some might be so darn sick at that particular moment that a needle exchange is the only thing keeping them alive, because they're not buying a wash. Maybe they are, but a one-wash needle is better than a two- and three- and five-wash needle, isn't it?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: But don't we have to combine that with something to help them move forward?

The Chair: Sure, but there are different approaches at different times for different people, depending on where people are. To suggest that harm reduction strategies are harm maintenance, and so throw them all out, is pretty inconsistent with what you told me you were actually doing.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I'm not saying we should throw them all out, but let's standardize them and coordinate them so we're all working together and we have a common idea about where we want to go. If we want to get to the final end, we can't have this program and that program not working together. Putting people in jail doesn't solve anything either.

The Chair: No. So let's say we have a common end. I would argue that abstinence and better decision-making would be a common end for everybody, but frankly, for some of those really hard-core users, getting them out of the alley and into a facility that happens to open up off the alley, so we can at least see them in daylight, is appropriate. It's probably not appropriate in Fort McMurray and it's probably not appropriate in my community, but it might be there, in those particular circumstances, because we've all agreed that those situations are pretty horrible.

Getting one common message, like “abstinence eventually,” is fine--“reduce, reduce, reduce” is what I think the message should be--but that standardizing wouldn't necessarily be a good thing. I don't think we need a safe injection site in my community, we do need the needle exchange for some people. Different places would need different things. So perhaps we need a message that says reduce the harm and intervene in ways that are appropriate for your community, to get everyone to understand the choices they're making at much a deeper level and to let them have real choices.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: As I said in my comments, different communities have different tolerances of the drug scene. And of course, tolerances change if someone's situation has affected you personally. But I strongly believe we need a national strategy to start us up and get us going. We haven't had a strong spokesperson to promote such a strategy. I think we need a person to do that. And then we can go from there to get people together.

The Chair: I think you're saying we have the RCMP, we have the Criminal Code, you enforce it appropriately, given your circumstances. You always enforce it, but there are certain things you're more active on than others. Obviously, if it falls in your face, you're going to deal with something, but you have certain strategies based on certain communities. For instance, organized crime might not be big in Tuktoyaktuk, but it may be bigger in Edmonton.

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Right. I've listened to many doctors. Their position on the marijuana and the cannabis products is that they strongly feel not enough research has been done and maybe we're speaking too soon, without having that research done on how marijuana is going to affect us. It used to be 5% THC, and now we've seen it up to 35% and 40%. Now it is a very strong psychoactive drug. I think we have to do research to see whether people are becoming addicted to it, as opposed to just being dependent upon it.

The Chair: I absolutely agree. I think one of the best things about getting the medical use issue under way will be to actually do research, to separate myth from reality, and to help define under what conditions it is appropriate. The sooner we can get that research under way, the better, I think, and I imagine you'd agree.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Right, I agree.

The Chair: Fort McMurray is a smaller community. You have this captive audience. What kind of initiatives are you working on with the companies that are employing these individuals, with the public health authorities? Are you guys involved in trying to change the conditions there? You have a heck of a lot of demands.

Cpl Jim Jancsek: There is very little we can do in the camp structure itself up in the oil industry. They have their own security, their own unions. We can't routinely go in there and look through the place. It's a close, tight- knit, tight-lipped community up in the oil field camps. When they come into town is usually when we have our most interaction with them. We do have speaking engagements, an education process, with the management of certain oil field industries.

The Chair: With the unions too?

Cpl Jim Jancsek: They are in attendance at these speaking engagements. We have a three-man section up there. Our resources are limited, unfortunately. We could easily be a six-man or a nine-man section. There's enough work up there for us.

The Chair: If you could turn off the demand in that particular environment, it would go a long way to solving your problem in the bigger community, wouldn't it?

Cpl Jim Jancsek: It would to some degree. Our traffickers are hard-core traffickers. The larger-scale ones in town have such a large client base that they don't have to actively go out. Some of them will do deliveries out to a camp; they'll deliver say an eight-baller, 3.5 grams of cocaine, out to a camp. Most of their clients are right in town. The people in camp will import their own drugs through the mail system, bus system, or private courier and deal from the camp sites. Unless there is a reliable and confidential source that can provide us with who is doing what, when, and where, the elements we need to proceed with the investigation, what we hear afterwards is usually historical information. We can't really act so much in the camps.

The Chair: This committee, when we started out, had presentations from the various departments that were involved in any way with the drug file. One of our most impressive presentations was from the RCMP, about all the work they do to turn off demand. I'm wondering if there isn't some more opportunity in Fort McMurray and some of our other communities where you've got a camp-like setting to really institute a whole new approach to turn that off. To combine that, today in the Edmonton airport there was a dog running around checking all the luggage and telephones. He was quite a busy dog. I gather he was one of your team. Is there a possibility of more interdiction, maybe with the bus routes, with the dogs?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: We have one police service dog that serves Fort McMurray and the surrounding communities of Fort McKay, Chard, Janvier.

The Chair: He's a busy dog.

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S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Yes, he is a busy dog, and sadly, the dog is sick right now and not available to work. We have great community involvement from the businesses. The bus stations and the courier companies invite us regularly to come up there and run the dog through the premises. It's a question of getting up there, having the dog available to do it, and our having the time to go with him.

The Chair: We'll tell the minister you need another dog.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Do you see that black Lab dog?

The Chair: Yes.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: That dog's from my office, and--

The Chair: One of your best employees?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: She's a very good dog. She works the airports quite a bit and the bus station and train station. As far as camps and such places are concerned, we do a lot of work with private industry. They'll give me a call if they have chartered planes going up to northern Alberta, the Northwest Territories, etc., where there's a known problem, and I'll have the dog go and check the luggage of those planes before they depart. We do that as a deterrent. At times we do find narcotics at those places. We probably, most times, will not prosecute those offences. We leave it up to the company to decide what they want to do with the employee. We will seize the drugs, depending on the circumstances, but quite often the employee who's going up north is dealt with by the employer, because a lot of these companies have working agreements that if you get caught with drugs, you're terminated. The reason they're not prosecuted is that there are a lot of legal things involved, such as search warrants to get into the luggage or into the duffle bag. At times it doesn't happen. If we can work the process and are able to get the search warrant and all that, we'll take a look at prosecution. But it doesn't always happen that way.

That is one dog that looks after northern Alberta. The dog gets tired after a few hours of going around, so it's a tough sale for the dog.

The Chair: Do we need some legislative changes for these kinds of environments where there are fly-in operations?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I don't think so.

The Chair: But if you have the same guy, if Bob Jones is continually getting his luggage busted...?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: The thing is, the Supreme Court has set out our guidelines. The guidelines are pretty good, and we know we have to get warrants to do things, but when you're in Timbuktu and there are not things available, you just can't get at it. We've learned to live with that. To have legislation to deal with those specific environmental conditions is probably not something I would suggest is in the cards. The Charter of Rights is for every Canadian citizen. Just because you're in a remote area of the north, I don't think your rights should be degraded.

The Chair: Okay, but let me just clarify one thing you said. It's the Parliament of Canada that determines what the laws are, not the Supreme Court; they interpret them. If we don't like their interpretation, we pass new laws. So we pass them, you enforce them, they make the decision, ultimately, whether we both got it right.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: And they make other determinations after that.

The Chair: I hear you on the rights thing, but if there's a specific problem, we may need to be creative in trying to address it. I hate to portray the camps in the same way, but ultimately, it's a bit like the controlled environment. Ultimately, these people leave the camps somewhat in the way people leave jails--not that the camps are jails, but if they're bringing a problem back out, that's a problem for all of us.

Cpl Jim Jancsek: Our camps are interesting. If you are found guilty of a drug offence, you're an employee at one of the mines or one of the plant sites, and you live in the camps, and even if you don't live in one of the camps, but you're an employee up there, the oil industry will terminate your employment, and it's immediate. The thing is that when that individual leaves our town or our community and goes off to some other fair community to ply his trade, there is another individual taking his spot immediately. There's a large lineup; it's a very lucrative industry up there. The average household income is more than double that of the rest of Canada. People will come up there in droves, and if one or two leave or three go to jail, there'll be three coming back to take their spots. How do you regulate who those people are, what kind of moral character they have, whether they're going to be drug users or drug traffickers?

The Chair: Or develop a habit while they're there because it's so boring.

Cpl Jim Jancsek: Exactly.

The Chair: Do you have communication with any of your counterparts in Scotland? I understand Scotland has a similar problem in some of the towns where people come in from the offshore oil rigs. They're seeing a huge incidence of drug use and huge challenges. I would think there could be similar approaches on shipments.

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Cpl Jim Jancsek: I wasn't aware of that, but I'll certainly be looking into it.

The Chair: Yes, you should check the Royal Constabulary or somebody, because this is apparently an emerging problem. I have the impression, having been to Scotland, that there is much more drug use in the general population, but then you have these very well paid individuals coming into towns and changing the drug culture in the smaller communities. It may be that you can figure out innovative strategies together through the e-mail system.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: I was involved with Dome Petroleum in the Arctic, which is probably showing my age, because they've come and gone. Back then they did have problems up there. I happened to go up on several occasions, and the company rectified that problem very quickly. When they found people who had narcotics on them, it was almost a public showing. The person was fired on the spot, forfeiting huge amounts of money in wages. The message got across very quickly that when you're here for your two to four weeks, you live by our rules; you can live by your own rules when you leave. That message got across when people lost their jobs, and that was the big deterrent there.

Ms. Marilyn Pilon (Committee Researcher): You mentioned there's a methadone maintenance program here.

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: Yes, there is.

Ms. Marilyn Pilon: I got the impression that there were some problems with that. Was that the wrong impression?

S/Sgt Doug Carruthers: The methadone clinic here, as you know, is a maintenance program for people when they can't get the other narcotics they're used to. I'm just suggesting that because we have a clinic they can resort to, our heroin population is greater than in Calgary. I'm not aware that they can resort to that in the city of Calgary, and that's all I was referring to. It's there to help them get through their pain and their needs. I have nothing negative to say about the program itself.

The Chair: Mr. LeBlanc.

Mr. Dominic LeBlanc: I'd like to thank you very much.

The Chair: On behalf of all the committee, both the ones present and the ones not present, thank you very much for taking the time to prepare your presentations--even on the fly, Corporal Jancsek--and for spending the time with us and debating some of the issues. It's very difficult for Dominic and me, representing only one party, to remember all the questions our colleagues would have asked, but we've done a good job of coming at you from a couple of different perspectives, which will be helpful for the official record. As distinct from some committees, this committee is really rather non-partisan. We are all struggling very hard with these issues, and it's been quite interesting for us. We've met many dedicated people, such as both of you, and have learned about the work you do. We thank you for that and encourage you to continue doing good work for Canadians. Thank you very much. If you have anything else to send or offer us or have other colleagues who might want to send us a note to tell us their ideas, you're all more than encouraged to do that.

The meeting is adjourned.