III. Recommendations for Revisions to the CCRA

A. Penitentiary Placement

The history of women's corrections federally began with the incarceration of women in a wing of the Kingston Penitentiary. They were kept in the men's prison in what were considered to be oppressive and restrictive conditions of confinement. Eventually, the Prison for Women was built across the street from the Kingston Penitentiary and in 1934 the women were moved there. Within four years, the Prison for Women (P4W) was described as "unfit for bears" by the Archambault Royal Commission to Investigate the Penal System of Canada.

The 1990 Task Force on Federally Sentenced Women was the fifteenth federal report to chronicle inadequacies of the correctional programs and carceral placement options for women sentenced to terms of imprisonment of two or more years. The 1990 Task Force recommended the closure of P4W and the construction of five new regional prisons for women, as well as a national healing lodge for First Nations women. The Task Force concluded that new regional prisons were required to provide women with greater access to their families and communities whilst they were incarcerated. It was never contemplated that certain categories of women would be excluded from the new prisons.

Prior to the opening of the new prisons, however, CSC took a big step backward in terms of women's corrections. On May 6, 1994, approximately two weeks after the April 1994 incidents at the Prison for Women, six women were involuntarily transferred to a segregated range in the Kingston Penitentiary. Upon application to the Ontario Court, General Division, the Court ordered that the women be moved back to P4W from Kingston Penitentiary. Moreover, the Court held that the confinement of women in men's prisons would require a legislative amendment. This transfer was part of the subject of inquiry of the Arbour Commission. In reviewing the 1994 transfer to Kingston Penitentiary, the Report of the Arbour Commission concluded that:

The placement of women in male institutions, as was done in this case, is fraught with difficulties. For one thing, there is, if nothing more, an appearance of oppression in confining women in an institution which will inevitably contain a large number of sexual offenders. This was particularly true of the Regional Treatment Centre. More troublesome, in my opinion, is the fact that the placement of a small group of women in a male prison effectively precludes their interaction with the general population of that institution. If transfer inevitably means segregation, the decision to transfer should take into account the limitations on the permissible use of administrative segregation (p. 104).

In spite of the conclusions of the Arbour Commission, the decision of the Ontario Court General Division, and the history of the deprivation imposed on women in men's prisons, federally sentenced women are presently confined in four federal penitentiaries for men. A proposed transfer of a group of women in 1997 to Kingston Penitentiary was stopped only after a court action was initiated by the affected prisoners. CAEFS intervened in this action. After losing an appeal to the Ontario Court of Appeal of a preliminary motion, CSC decided not to pursue the transfer, and thus terminated the court action.

The living conditions to which women are subjected in men's prisons are harsh, punitive and restrictive. At Springhill Institution, the Regional Reception Centre at Ste. Anne-des-Plaines, the Saskatchewan Penitentiary in Prince Albert, and the Regional Psychiatric Centre in Saskatoon, federally sentenced women are confined in very restricted units and have either very limited or no access to recreation areas and work areas enjoyed by the men in the general populations of the prisons. In addition to living in such segregated conditions, the women are offered very little programming of any kind, and have no access to meaningful employment or vocational skills acquisition. They are kept in virtual isolation, with the population of the units generally ranging from 1 to 12 women.

A significant number of the federally sentenced women have been transferred to men's prisons because they are identified by CSC as having mental health needs. A range in a men's prison is clearly not a therapeutic environment in which to treat mental health problems. Furthermore, CAEFS believes that the imposition of harsh conditions of confinement on prisoners who have a mental disability infringes the s. 15 equality provision of the Charter, by imposing a burden on them by reason of their disability. Accordingly, given CSC's historical and current practice of confining women in oppressive conditions in men's prisons, CAEFS believes it is essential that a provision be included in the CCRA which specifically prohibits the incarceration of women in federal penitentiaries for men.