Performance Monitoring Report 2006-2007

Conditional Release is by far the largest business line of the National Parole Board. Its activities include: the review of offenders' cases and the making of quality conditional release decisions; provision of in-depth training on how to assess the risk of re-offending in order to assist Board members in the decision-making process; coordination of program delivery throughout the Board and with the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) and other key partners; and the provision of information to victims and other interested parties within the community.

The majority of the information in this report is presented in table format showing data over a five-year period. Where possible, the information in each section is presented at national and regional levels and by offence type, by Aboriginal and race as well as by gender.

It should be noted that some of the data included may be different than reported in previous years. This is due to ongoing updates and refinements of the Offender Management System (OMS) and the Conditional Release Information Management System (CRIMS).

It should also be noted that due to rounding the percentages in the tables in the report do not always total 100.

5.1 PROGRAM DELIVERY CONTEXT

OFFENDER POPULATION TRENDS

The National Parole Board and the Correctional Service of Canada have agreed to use the following definitions in reporting offender population information to ensure consistency:

• Incarcerated includes: offenders serving federal sentences in penitentiaries and in provincial facilities, those housed as inmates in Community Correctional Centres (as distinguished from conditionally released offenders), and those temporarily absent from the institution on some form of temporary release (Temporary Absence or Work Release).
• Conditional Release includes: those federal offenders conditionally released on day parole, full parole, statutory release and long term supervision including those paroled for deportation and temporary detainees whether detained in a penitentiary or a provincial jail.

Excluded from offender populations are escapees, those on bail and those who are unlawfully at large (UAL) from supervision. This report provides information on exclusions for the most recent year where appropriate.

Table 5

Top of Page

Over the last seventeen years, the federal offender population has steadily increased, then steadily decreased and is now once again on an upward trend. The offender population increased until March 1995, then decreased until March 2004, except for a minor increase in March 1999, and has increased in each of the last three years. The offender population is at its highest level since March 2001.

While the number of warrant of committal admissions has varied since 1994/95, there was a downward trend between 1999/2000 and 2003/04 with a slight increase in 2002/03. Since then, the number of warrant of committal admissions has increased and was 5,080 in 2006/07, the highest number in the last 13 years. The number of offenders who reached warrant expiry has been fairly stable since 1998/99, varying between 4,470 and 4,608. As the number of offenders who reached warrant expiry was greater that the number of warrant of committal admissions between 1995/96 and 2003/04 (except in 1998/99), the total offender population decreased. The opposite has been true since that time resulting in an increase in the offender population.

The trends in the federal offender population usually mirror the trends in the crime rate in Canada, with the effect being seen in the federal offender population two years later, after the offender has had his/her case heard in court. As the crime rate in Canada decreased slightly in 2004, it was expected that the federal offender population was going to either stabilize or decrease slightly in 2006/07. However, the federal offender population actually increased by 2.8% in 2006/07.

This can be explained, in part, by the overall increase in federal admissions to institutions in 2006/07 (  3.7%) as well as the increase in the number of warrant of committal admissions (  5.8%) during the same period. The increase in the number of warrant of committal admissions over the past three years can be attributed, in part, to changes in police enforcement practices. For example, police focused efforts on those involved in the drug trade and the establishment of police units which specifically target drug, gun and gang related crimes resulted in an increase in the number of charges being laid in the past few years.

Table 6

Since 2002/03, the Quebec region is the only region which has seen a decrease in its federal offender population (  3.7%). All the other regions have seen increases with the Atlantic region seeing the biggest increase
(  10.8%).

Each year since 2002/03, the Quebec region has had greater numbers reaching warrant expiry than the number of warrant of committal admissions, except in 2006/07 where these numbers were virtually the same (there was one more warrant of committal admissions). Between 2002/03 and 2006/07, the Quebec region had 287 more offenders reaching warrant expiry than warrant of committal admissions. During the same period, the Pacific region had 242 more warrant of committal admissions than offenders reaching warrant expiry, the Atlantic region had 201, the Prairie region had 149, and the Ontario region had 65.

Top of Page

Table 7

The Prairies region has seen the biggest increase in its federal incarcerated population since 2005/06 (  8.9%). During the same period, the Atlantic region saw an increase of 7.4%, while the Pacific region increased 3.9% and the Ontario region increased 2.1%. The Quebec region remained relatively stable (  10).

Table 8

Of the Aboriginal, Asian, Black and White federal incarcerated populations, the Black population showed the biggest increase in 2006/07 (  9.9%), followed by the Aboriginal (  8.7%), the Asian (  5.1%) and the White (  1.7%) populations.

Compared to the Census of 2001, federal incarcerated Aboriginal and Black offenders are the only groups who are over-represented when compared to their proportions in the total Canadian population. (Aboriginal 19.6% compared to 3.3%, Black 6.7% compared to 2.2%).

Top of Page

Table 9

The female federal incarcerated population increased 16.7% (  68) in 2006/07 and their proportion of the federal incarcerated population increased to 3.6%. This is the highest number of female federal incarcerated offenders in the last ten years.

Table 10

NOTE: Excluded UAL from supervision accounted for 123 DP (9.0% of total DPs), 168 FP (4.0% of total FPs), 358 SR (10.5% of total SRs) and 2 LTS (1.2% of total LTSs) as of April 8, 2007 .
DEFINITION: Conditional release population includes those federal offenders conditionally released on day parole, full parole, statutory release and long term supervision, including those paroled for deportation and temporary detainees whether detained in a penitentiary or in a provincial jail.

The number of federal offenders on day parole and full parole both decreased in 2006/07 (DP  2.8% and FP  1.0%), while the number of statutory release increased by 3.8%.

Typically, the size of the federal offender populations on day parole and to a lesser extent the full parole populations follow the trend in the number of warrant of committal admissions about a year later. As the number of warrant of committal admissions increased 5.1% in 2005/06, it was expected that both the federal day and full parole populations would increase in 2006/07. However, both numbers decreased this past year. This is due, in part, to a decline in the federal day and full parole grant rates in 2006/07 (  4.1% and  1.9% respectively) despite an increase in the total number of federal day and full parole release decisions taken during the period (  4.4% and  2.1% respectively).

The steady increase, over the last twelve years, in the statutory release population is due in part to the increase in the number of offenders who are waiving all full parole reviews or withdrawing all parole applications. Since 1998/99, the number of full parole reviews that were waived and parole applications that were withdrawn has increased 29.1%, while during the same period the statutory release population increased 8.4%.

The long-term supervision population has increased from 6 in 2000/01 to 169 in 2006/07. This population is expected to continue to increase in the coming years as there are 252 federal offenders who will be subject to long-term supervision orders once they reach their warrant expiry dates.

Top of Page

Table 11

Since 2002/03, the Quebec is the only region to have seen a decrease in its federal conditional release population (  5.4%). During the same period, the conditional release population in the Ontario (  17) and Prairie (  16) regions remained relatively stable, while the conditional release populations increased in both the Atlantic (  4.1%) and Pacific regions with the Pacific region seeing the biggest increase (  14.2%).

Since 2002/03, the federal day parole population has increased 31.7% in the Pacific region, 6.1% in the Ontario region and 1.0% in the Prairie region, while it has decreased in the Atlantic and Quebec regions (  11.6% and  9.4% respectively). During the same period, the federal full parole population increased in the Pacific region (  5.9%), while it remained relatively stable in the Atlantic region (  1) and decreased in all the other regions with the Quebec region seeing the biggest decrease (  10.9%), followed by the Ontario (  8.8%) and the Prairie (  6.8%) regions.

Since 2002/03, the statutory release population has seen an increase in most of the regions with the Atlantic region seeing the biggest increase (  15.1%), followed by the Pacific (  11.0%), the Ontario (  8.2%) and the Prairie regions (  2.3%), while it has remained virtually unchanged in the Quebec region (  4).

In 2006/07, the proportions of the conditional release population on day parole ranged from 12.5% in the Quebec region to 19.9% in the Pacific region. The proportions on full parole ranged from 43.0% in the Prairie region to 50.5% in the Atlantic region and the proportions on statutory release ranged from 31.1% in the Pacific region to 39.1% in the Prairie region.

Table 12

Of the Aboriginal, Asian, Black and White offender groups, Aboriginal and Black offenders were the only ones in 2006/07 whose proportions within the federal conditional release population were lower than their proportions within the federal incarcerated population. This has been true for Aboriginal offenders in each of the last five years. For Black offenders, this is the third year in a row that the proportions of Black offenders within the conditional release population were lower than their proportions within the federal incarcerated population. Asian and White offenders' proportions within the federal conditional release population have been higher than their proportions within the federal incarcerated population in each of the last five years.

In 2006/07, 47% of the Aboriginal federal conditional release population was on statutory release, whereas 71% of the Asian, 48% of the White and 45% of the Black federal conditional release populations were on full parole.

Top of Page

Table 13

The proportion of female offenders within the federal conditional release population was higher than their proportion within the federal incarcerated population. The contrary was true for male offenders.

In 2006/07, female offenders on federal conditional release had higher proportions on day parole (22.0% vs. 14.3%) and full parole (61.2% vs. 46.4%) than male offenders and a lower proportion on statutory release (16.2% vs. 37.2%).

Table 14

Since 2002/03, the provincial parole population has increased 19.2% (  41), with the Pacific region seeing the biggest increase from 1 to 88. The increase in the Pacific parole population can be explained by the decision of the government of British Columbia (B.C.) to disband its provincial parole board. As such, on April 1, 2007, the British Columbia Board of Parole (BCBP) was officially disbanded and the National Parole Board (NPB) and the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) assumed responsibility for parole administration and the supervision of provincial offenders.