00:00:55.440and it made us all pause for a few minutes and say is this a real thing apparently uh it is a real
00:01:03.020thing yeah very real so it came from an internal correction services of canada notice to staff
00:01:11.340and they posted it on their social media which then got picked up from a few other outlets and
00:01:17.900as you were saying people are going wait what what are we doing in these uh in these prisons
00:01:24.060And actually, the CSC communications officer confirmed that it is genuine as well and was developed to provide information to all employees regarding the expansion of harm reduction products.
00:01:37.180And so what is being handed out is paper straws for safer snorting, is what they say, intended for inhaling substances in powdered form or inhaling vapor from heated substances.
00:01:52.380Then you've also got foil strips for safer smoking, testing strips to detect fentanyl, benzodiazepine in xylapine, and then also health services staff handing them out to prisoners.
00:02:11.240And so this is their new way to tackle the drug issue in prisons.
00:02:38.420And it makes me wonder, you know, a lot of the precautions that we're talking
00:02:42.420about here are being made on the streets during this pilot project.
00:02:46.220in Vancouver that has blown up so tragically and if you've been on East Hastings you'll know what
00:02:52.680I'm talking about but this sounds like we are potentially headed in that direction right there
00:02:58.500in our very own prisons how far do we kind of let this slide before somebody says why are we
00:03:06.460providing paraphernalia for drugs in prison hey before we go any further please hit the subscribe
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00:03:29.240way out of all the social issues mike that's uh that's that's the way to fix crime and fix
00:03:35.560addiction is is pure love and uh because i mean it's it's it's largely built on that false
00:03:42.200premises that if somebody has an issue with these kind of things, then it is a cultural issue. It's
00:03:49.500a societal issue. And so the way to fix that then is to change the environment and it will change
00:03:55.940the individual. And obviously that is not what we see actually happen because it's built on a false
00:04:01.640pretense about human nature. And I think it was Leo Tolstoy who said something I'm slightly
00:04:08.660paraphrasing here but uh when you tolerate the wicked you don't get less of it you get more
00:04:15.540and i think that is exactly exactly what we're seeing no i don't disagree i mean at a time when
00:04:22.160uh one of one of canada's largest police forces the toronto uh police service is self-investigating
00:04:29.760and under investigation for one of the most corrupt moments in canadian policing history
00:04:35.680uh that is tied directly to the prisons we're also simultaneously hearing okay here's how we're
00:04:41.540going to handle the drugs that commit right right yeah i mean across the board whether it's
00:04:47.860the bc safe supply program whether it's the corruption in the police it's like when you
00:04:52.720take a false approach to crime you're not as i was saying you're not going to get uh you're going to
00:04:58.420get less of it you're not going to get less of it you're going to get a hell of a lot more and
00:05:02.300we're even seeing that within those prisons as well where the number one way that the drugs are
00:05:09.900finding their way into prisons now are through drone drop-offs so you'll have a drone carrying
00:05:17.500a package that flies over the prison and then detaches that that package into the yard and
00:05:24.780There was 1,064 incidents in 2024 alone, which was up from 900 in 2023.
00:05:36.480And so there's been, and then there's almost 3,000 since 2023.
00:05:42.040And so, yeah, this is becoming very, very common.
00:05:45.340It's a disturbing moment when we start to hear that technology is catching up with us in that manner.
00:05:50.660But it makes perfect sense that, you know, it is a possibility in some of the prisons.
00:05:54.780You know, the other element of this is that it, you know, we talk about trying to create an environment or change an environment for people that have existed within an environment that might have changed their behavior.
00:06:05.460But this is not that. This is enabling. This is enabling, as you point out, behavior that probably put them behind bars to some degree in the first place.
00:06:14.760You know, bad decision making should not continue in prison, I don't think.
00:06:18.620I think that's the moment we have to actually rehabilitate people, to actually turn them around.
00:06:23.600But for whatever reason, whether it's love or laziness or corruption, it's just deteriorating more and more.
00:06:32.960And when you give me those numbers, you have to think about just how much is actually being reported and how much has just occurred.
00:06:44.400Well, and to that, the numbers that I was giving there were just drone drop offs.
00:06:49.120But if you look at even drug seizures within the prisons, that number is up 170% since 2015, where there was 2,444 drug related seizures. And yeah, now there was 6,586.
00:07:07.860And so actually, and this is this is a crazy stat from it as well, where Stony Mountain, Manitoba, there was more than one million dollars in contraband intercepted between just February and April of 2026.
00:07:23.020And so, oh, my God, it sounds like they're processing drugs there.
00:07:26.600Yeah. I mean, it's an entire it's an entire industry at this point.
00:07:30.540That is the problem. I do think that it has become an industrial issue.
00:07:34.020I think that there's enough people making money just in this paper route, if you will, to make it worthwhile.
00:07:41.640And the more that we make it worthwhile, the more corruption seems to seep in.
00:07:45.960The Toronto prison system, you know, obviously was infiltrated by negative forces from within the force that were being fought from within the prison.
00:07:56.140So, in other words, you know, people are calling out violent acts against prison guards from within the prison.
00:08:04.020The prison guards are trying to protect themselves and each, you know, each other in that scenario from both the criminal element and police.
00:08:13.560This is a moment that we found ourselves in that was delivered based on drugs.
00:08:18.740And I think that at this moment in Canadian history, we need to say, OK, the tough love thing needs to happen, not just the love thing.
00:08:25.420We need to get people actually resourced into situations where they're getting healed, where they're actually getting rebuilt as humans.
00:08:34.020otherwise we're going to have repeat offenders the doing drugs in prison apparently is a non-option
00:08:40.580based on how addictive the drugs are that are on the street that we've allowed to be there
00:08:45.060that we've given credence to uh showing love through letting people do whatever they want
00:08:52.820that is just it's it's it's a snake biting it's eating its own tail like it's it's an unending
00:08:59.140cycle if we don't stop it in some way i don't see any province any city really taking measure to do
00:09:05.140that no because it goes against our cultural sentiments for sure which are based on even to
00:09:12.820the idea that everybody wants to change everybody wants to get better and it's like no that's not
00:09:18.980the case at all you even see that when it comes to say some homeless shelters and stuff when the
00:09:25.620rule is that you're not allowed to do drugs or be high on drugs when you come into the center
00:09:32.740then there's a lot of them that just completely forego it so it's not as simple as just giving
00:09:37.940these people quote unquote what they need right it's like they don't want those things they are
00:09:43.380prioritizing the drugs over it and so i think a good good analogy to essentially how we've
00:09:50.580been approaching this whether it's in the prison system or whether it's in more public areas like
00:09:55.940with the safe supply stuff it's the equivalent of if you had a family member who has become an
00:10:01.780alcoholic and is creating and making moonshine in their in their bathtub and you think the fix of it
00:10:09.860is to drop off a two four of beer at the front door and be like hey i'm really concerned about
00:10:15.300the way you're doing those drugs we want to get you on a better path here's here's the uh here's
00:10:19.620the case appear for you here's some paps blue ribbon for you yeah yeah yeah no that it does
00:10:25.140kind of feel like that you know and that is us abandoning uh humanity not not caring for it uh
00:10:32.340you know the other thing that i find when i this really caught my attention when we talked about
00:10:37.140it in our writers meeting because it just sounded like somebody had given up that it was just easier
00:10:45.380to give paper straws than it was to find a solution. Paper straws is not a solution.
00:10:53.280You know, tinfoil making it safer is not a solution. I don't know if there is a solution
00:11:01.840to this except that we need better policing from within so that there are less drops happening at
00:11:10.140these prisons that there is less uh blind eye turning as drugs approach uh the prison system
00:11:17.620i think that that really it's time that we really took a hard hard line on that yeah and i think
00:11:25.220it it's it's a real big issue because it does require people to fundamentally change how they
00:11:34.320view humanity. It's all built on this kind of blank slate idea where, and this comes out of
00:11:41.660our universities, which guide, I mean, if you think about the pipeline, people go from universities
00:11:46.800into these positions where they now create public policy and all of this kind of stuff. And if you
00:11:51.120look at the ideas that are undergirding our university system today, they are all based on
00:11:56.900this blank slate idea, which is that humans naturally are well put together people and
00:12:05.200society corrupts them. And so, yeah, if you have somebody like a criminal or a drug user or
00:12:10.700something of this nature, then it is just society's fault. And so until that myth has
00:12:17.400been shattered, these people will keep pulling for that same lever. And I think there's multiple
00:12:23.460groups, where there are the types of people, as you're saying, where it just becomes an easy
00:12:31.360proposal. I don't actually have to deal with this issue. Just give them some paper straws.
00:12:35.540But then there is, I think, the ideological issue as well. And I think that is the much more
00:12:41.260pervasive side of things. I feel that, to be honest with you, Liam, I can see that we have
00:12:46.980a certain philosophy toward humanity, especially in Canada, especially out of our university system
00:12:53.860that lacks that lived experience element. You know, you get into the colleges and the more
00:13:00.280practical programs in this country and the people that are working front lines with homeless, with,
00:13:06.200you know, street drugs, with, you know, trying to create policy that helps people.
00:13:11.000Those people have experience that will tell you that more harsh measures need taken than
00:21:04.580And I think the issue is that when one of those people comes along
00:21:10.500and disagrees with the common public sentiment on that,
00:21:18.300then they get framed as the mean guy, like I was saying at the party.
00:21:23.480Yeah, I see that. That framing is not nice.
00:21:26.840Yeah, exactly. And so, I mean, we even saw it too whenever, for instance, the Trump administration was pushing way back in the day on the fentanyl stuff in Canada.
00:21:37.140It's like our, which is definitely an issue. We have major super labs. We've busted some of them. Most of them are still operating.
00:21:46.520we have we have a major issue in this country when it comes to drug trafficking and but it's
00:21:55.160because well I don't like that guy because he's mean and so therefore I'm going to argue against
00:22:00.760this idea and I see that playing out a lot of the times where it's it's it's not the not the idea
00:22:09.800that is being judged but it's the person and so even if that person has a good idea uh outside of
00:22:17.000even if it's within our borders then all of a sudden the uh the idea that is tied to them
00:22:23.240gets labeled the same way it's so that is a sad scenario because we lose so many good concepts
00:22:28.680that way uh just by people thinking oh it's too harsh i can't get behind that well liam i'll tell
00:22:34.200you this uh i don't know what to say about straws made of paper for snorting stuff in prison
00:22:41.560but i do know that that was an obvious red flag i think a lot of canadians are going to be taking
00:22:47.960a look at how we handle our business in these prisons probably over the next coming uh couple
00:22:52.760of years um because i when it surfaces like this it's not just isolated to ontario it's happening
00:23:01.080in prisons across Canada, and it's certainly happening politically across Canada.
00:23:06.140A divided debate always on how we handle drugs in this country.