Let's Talk

Commissioner's Editorial

CSC’s Public Safety Contribution

A new federal government took office on February 6, 2006 and the Honourable Stockwell Day was appointed as our Minister of Public Safety. Since then, he has been actively engaged in getting to know the Public Safety portfolio.

I joined the Minister on tours of institutions and facilities in the Kingston and Abbotsford areas, as well as at William Head Institution in Victoria and Nova Institution for Women in Truro. He appreciated these early opportunities to see our front-line personnel in action, and has expressed an interest in seeing more of CSC’s operations including our centres and offices in communities.

One of the top priorities of the new government is “protecting Canadian families and communities by strengthening the justice system.” The correctional system is an integral part of the broader criminal justice system, and the challenges for all of us in CSC will be to work together to strengthen our approaches in both institutions and communities so that we can make the best possible contribution to achieving the government’s objectives in this area.

In this context, I have had some early discussions with our Minister on CSC’s proposed key strategic priorities for fiscal year 2006-07. You may recall from the last issue of Let’s Talk that we have been developing our strategic focus on four operational priorities that will help us make a stronger contribution to the public safety of Canadians:

• Safe transition of offenders into the community
• Safety and security for staff and offenders in our institutions
• Enhanced capacities to provide effective interventions for First Nations, Métis and Inuit offenders
• Improved capacities to address mental health needs of offenders

As well, we will place a high priority on strengthening our management practices to improve the way we deliver on these key strategic priorities and, more generally, on all aspects of our mandate.

I will continue to engage the Minister in the coming weeks to receive his input and direction on these strategic priorities, which he fully supports. I will share more with you in my next editorial, including my thoughts on the key challenges we will face as we move ahead. In the meantime, these priorities are all discussed to varying degrees in this edition of Let’s Talk.

In the final analysis, the required results in these areas will be achieved only through the work of dedicated staff members in institutions, centres and offices all across Canada, supported by their colleagues in headquarters.

In this context, it is absolutely essential that our entire team understands and supports our key priorities. To this end, in the next edition of Let’s Talk, we will include more detailed information on our implementation plans.♦

Keith Coulter
Commissioner
Correctional Service of Canada