The response from both the Correctional Service of Canada and the federal government was less than enthusiastic. With regard to the recommendation that the CCRA be amended to provide for the adjudication of administrative segregation cases by Independent Chairpersons, the response was this:

The Government proposes an Enhanced Segregation Review process that includes external membership. This model will attempt to balance independent adjudication with the promotion of appropriate operational accountability by the Correctional Service of Canada. This model will be implemented on a pilot basis in all regions and detailed independent evaluation will be undertaken. The development of the pilot may be guided by a Steering Committee comprised of internal and external members. (Government Response at 18)

In response to the recommendation that the CCRA be amended to allow for the appointment of Independent Chairpersons for five-year renewable terms and that the Act set up criteria for selection and appointment of such chairpersons, the Government suggested that its proposals to conduct the pilot project was a full answer to this recommendation. Far from being such an answer, this response completely evaded the recommendation.

The government's proposal for this pilot project in 2000 is one more egregious example of bureaucratic foot-dragging. In 1975, the federally appointed Study Group on Dissociation, building on my 1974 study, had recommended that Independent Chairpersons be appointed for disciplinary hearings on a pilot project basis. No action was taken by the government, and in 1977 the House of Commons Sub-committee on the Penitentiary System found the case for Independent Chairpersons sufficiently compelling to recommend that they be appointed in all institutions immediately. The government responded by implementing independent adjudication for serious disciplinary cases. Twenty years later, the Task Force on Segregation recommended a pilot project of independent adjudication for administrative segregation, a recommendation endorsed by the Task Force on Human Rights. In 2000, the Parliamentary Sub-committee on the CCRA was sufficiently satisfied of the need for independent adjudication that, like its predecessor in 1977, it recommended immediate implementation of a full model. The government's response -- a pilot project for an enhanced segregation review process that included external membership -- was inconsistent with both these recommendations. The CSC's plans for this pilot, to be implemented over a six-month period in 2001-2, are for a segregation review board, composed of a deputy warden and an external member, to sit once a month in one institution in each of the five regions, to review a small sample of cases. Contrary to the Government's response to the Sub-committee's recommendation, the design of the project was not guided by a Steering Committee that included external members.

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