The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Submitted by Niki Ashton NDP leadership candidate and Churchill MP Niki Ashton has announced a plan for Canada's criminal justice system. She says it would ensure all Canadians receive equal justice, and would build safer communities instead of bigger prisons. She vowed to reverse what she called the old politics of Stephen Harper on justice. 'Policies like Bill C-10 don't work,' said Ashton, referring to the Harper government's latest criminal justice reforms. 'They've failed everywhere that they've been tried. They are short-sighted and dangerous policies that, far from keeping Canadians safe, will actually put more Canadians' lives at risk.' Regina lawyer Noah Evanchuk said Conservative reforms have eroded the presumption of innocence in the Canadian justice system and made system more expensive for governments and for clients without increasing public safety. He also said the system discriminates against people who can't afford to hire a lawyer and marginalized people. 'Aboriginal Canadians and other marginalized people are more likely to be convicted and more likely to spend time in prison than people with six-figure salaries,' he said. 'They are unable to stand up for their rights in contract disputes or family disputes because others have deeper pockets.' 'We need to ensure that all Canadians are genuinely equal before the law,' said Ashton. 'Any changes to our justice system should be based on solid evidence of what ensures equal justice and builds safer communities, not on narrow Conservative politics that is obsessed with building bigger prisons.' Ashton's new politics plan for equal justice and safer communities includes: Ensuring that sentences fit the crime, as she sees it, by reversing the Conservative changes to the ability of judges and prosecutors to make decisions based on the circumstances of individual cases. See 'Equal...' on pg. 14
