Public Safety
|
The CCLA’s Public Safety Program promotes the importance of civil liberties in relation to policing and the criminal justice system. Our work recognizes the important role that governments play in protecting public safety and advocates for the striking of an appropriate balance between public safety and civil liberties in this context. We believe that governments should treat the promotion of public safety and the protection of civil liberties as mutually reinforcing objectives and approach our public safety work from this perspective.
The CCLA monitors the legal and policy frameworks that govern policing and the administration of justice in Canada to ensure that they are sufficiently respectful of civil liberties and Charter rights. When an issue of concern is identified, action is taken to encourage governments to be more respectful of civil liberties. The CCLA has a long history or promoting civil liberties in the public safety sphere and continues to build upon this expertise through its ongoing efforts in the following four key issue areas:
Police Powers
The CCLA seeks to ensure that police powers are used in a manner that is necessary, proportionate and consistent with constitutional standards. Specific police powers that the CCLA has focussed on include detention and arrest, the use of force, and search and seizure.
Police Accountability
The CCLA seeks to ensure that police services and individual officers are accountable for their actions. Accountability mechanisms, such as police complaints and external investigative bodies must be independent and effective in order to enhance public faith in policing.
Privacy and Policing
The CCLA seeks to ensure that personal privacy is adequately respected by police when they are handling personal information. This is particularly important in the context of procedures that may result in the disclosure of personal information, such as background checks.
Liberty and Due-Process
The CCLA seeks to ensure that the criminal law is flexible enough to allow the judiciary to fashion appropriate and proportionate responses to criminal conduct on a case-by-case basis.
|
 |
- Update on the Ashley Smith Inquest – May 2013
By Communications on May 21, 2013 Ashley Smith died tragically at the age of 19 inside her prison cell after tying a ligature around her neck, while prison guards – instructed not to intervene before she stopped breathing – watched. This took place in 2007 at Grand Valley Institution for Women in Kitchener. There is an inquest into her death. Public [...]
Category: Activities, Discrimination, Equality, Gender, Liberty and Due Process, News Highlights, Youth - LIVE BLOG: From local to international, Challenging Canada’s human rights record at the UN
By Dora Chan on April 29, 2013 Can’t make it to our “From Local to International: Challenging Canada’s Human Rights Record at the UN” event? We’ll be live blogging the event today – check it out below! More information about the event can be found here, and more info about CCLA’s submissions to the UPR Process can be found here.
Category: Activities, Charter Rights, Discrimination, Equality, Multimedia and Features, National Security, News Highlights, Public Safety - CCLA Supports Repeal of Controversial Montreal Protest Bylaw
By Cara Zwibel on April 22, 2013 CCLA has written to Montreal Councillor Alex Norris who planned to introduce a motion to repeal Montreal’s controversial bylaw: P-6. The bylaw requires individuals to provide prior notice to police of their meeting places and demonstration itineraries regardless of the size of the planned protest and without making any exceptions for spontaneous assemblies. The bylaw [...]
Category: Activities, Announcements, Freedom of Assembly, Freedom of Association, Freedom of Expression, Fundamental Freedoms, News Highlights, Police Powers, Public Safety - CCLA before Supreme Court to promote meaningful police accountability and oversight
By Abby Deshman on April 19, 2013 The CCLA is before the Supreme Court today, arguing that police officers involved in an investigation by the Special Investigations Unit (SIU) into the use of force resulting in death or serious injury to a civilian are not entitled to the assistance of legal counsel in the preparation of their duty notes of the incident. [...]
Category: Court Cases, Liberty and Due Process, News Highlights, Police Accountability, Public Safety - Toronto Event: FROM LOCAL TO INTERNATIONAL Challenging Canada’s Human Rights Record At the UN
By Dora Chan on April 16, 2013 The United Nations Human Rights Council is now conducting its comprehensive review of Canada’s compliance with international human rights laws – its Universal Periodic Review (UPR).
A delegation of Canadian civil society groups was in Geneva last month, March 2013, to attend a meeting of the UN Human Rights Council – to tell the Council the [...]
Category: Activities, Charter Rights, Discrimination, Equality, Fundamental Freedoms, National Security, News Highlights, Past Events, Public Safety
|
|
