Ottawa – Premier is pressurizing Ottawa to implement strict bail rules. The federal government expected the table of bail reform law in the decline, critics are already expressing concern about Ottawa’s plans.
So what is the debate on bail reform?
What is the government promised
During the federal election of this spring, liberals promised to “move aggressively” to implement strict bail laws by presenting a reverse onus for several crimes. A reverse onus prosecutor from the prosecutor leads the accused to further the burden of evidence – meaning that he is being granted bail.
The criminal code is already an opposite for bail for several serious crimes including murder. Liberals will add new crimes to the list, including violence -related car theft or a criminal organization, and home invasion and some human trafficking and smuggling crimes.
Justice Minister Sean Fraser told Canadian Press that he was planning to bring forward a crime bill in the decline. It is not clear what will happen in this – Fraser said that the government would consider additional reforms, but “on the minimum” will implement the crime policies that were done by the liberalists promised during the election.
Did the liberals not improve bail already?
Yes, through amendment to the Criminal Code in 2023. He expanded the reverse Onas bail provisions to incorporate more firearms and weapons crimes, and more crimes related to intimate fellow violence. In 2019, the government established a reverse onos for those who involved an intimate partner with a violent crime, if they are convicted for a similar crime.
2023 amendments followed the provincial premiere and calls from the police chiefs for the federal government to bring strict bail rules to repeat violent criminals. It followed some high-profile cases-which includes the Ontario Provincial Police Cast. Greg Pierzchala, who was killed in a ditch responding to a vehicle.
In 2024, the Ontario Police Association asked for further improvement, saying that there are several cases “The accused persons are rearranged soon after being granted bail to those who have been granted bail,” some involve some that do not make news.
He said that the public hopes that in the name of public safety, violent and repeated criminals will not be issued on bail unless there is a compelling reason and a wise plan to ensure that they are not in danger of re -being re -having the case waiting. ,
Premier pressure
Premiers said that earlier this month they hope that the federal government would follow its promised reforms.
In a press conference after a premiere meeting in Huntsville, Onts, Ontario Premier Doug Ford said that provincial leaders “talked about the need for real bail reforms that place criminals behind bars and protect our communities.” He said that the premiere would be “accountable” to distribute “completely” to Prime Minister Mark Carney, not “half-cake” improvement.
Ford said he would like to “see a compulsory punishment, so when someone breaks into your house, puts a gun on your head, terrorizes your neighborhood,” that person “does not get out on bail after being out on bail … five times.”
The federal government is responsible for establishing bail laws under the Criminal Code, but the provincial and regional governments sued most criminal offenses, hear bail and implement the conditions of bail.
A spokesperson to Fraser said that the federal government “is working with the provinces and regions and for improving bail and punishment, reiterating, focusing on violent criminals.
Bail why is such a hot political issue?
The Conservative Party has long launched a campaign on the promise of “jailed no bail” and accused liberals of being “soft” on crime and implementing “catch and release” policies. During the recent federal election, Orthodox leader Pierre Poilavere launched a huge campaign on the crime and said he would prevent people guilty of three serious crimes from getting bail.
Professor Emeritus Anthony Dob at the University of Criminology and Socialgle Studies University in Toronto said that calls to harass the bail law are based on false perception that a large number of dangerous people are being released.
“Of course, we are especially listening to are those who have committed a serious and a violent crime,” he said.
“So we are hearing about those cases. But the notion that we have a liberal system, the fact is that our 80 percent of our prisoners in Ontario, in the provincial jails … are now waiting for the test.”
Call is a bad policy to get bail, but easy politics, he argued, because politicians can always point to someone who committed a crime on bail.
“If you are going to detain another one and a few hundred people or a few hundred people to reduce the possibility that a person is going to commit another crime, I think we should be a little alert,” he said.
What are the concerns about hard bail rules?
Shakir Rahim, director of the Criminal Justice Program at the Canadian Civil Liberty Association, said that about 70 percent of the provincial remand centers are waiting for the test – above about 20 percent in 1982.
The result of strict bail rules is that they “is a main security security for innocent,” he said.
“In an environment where we have the record level of bail being denied, and we have further erosion, whether it is through reverse ons provisions or otherwise, we really dilute that security strength.”
Rahim said that “immediately” is a tendency to see those who have been “guilty, or in that way,”, even if only half of cases in Canada have been arrested as a result of only half of the cases.
He said, “The more people who deny bail, it is a prediction that some of them must have been factually innocent,” he said.
Rahim said that the provincial jails are crowded, including a 23-hour-day lockdown and lack of medical care.
“When you take people and you refuse to bail them, it can be up to 30 months before your day in court,” he said. “So one of the issues we are worried about, people are feeling pressure to be guilty for some crimes, just to get out of the terrible circumstances that they are subject to.”
Catherine Latimer, Executive Director, John Howard Society of Canada, said that the prettery custody is “very high.”
It is “Canary in the coal mine to suggest that your system is really seriously faulty … is not enough to think that the answer is to keep more people there using more reverse Onas provisions.”
“We have also not analyzed whether the last set of reverse onas provisions has done anything,” Latimer said.
In 2023, when the federal government introduced the previous bail reform law, the then Justice Minister Arif Virani called the provinces and areas to collect better data on bail and share with the federal government.
Rahim said that we do not have any data about the number of people who resumed while on bail, or are they eventually found guilty.
“So how can we learn about … the status of the bail system, whether reverse ons or other policy changes work, without this information?”
This report of Canadian Press was first published on 30 July 2025.
Anja Kardglija, Canadian Press
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