Western Standard - June 15, 2023


Marco Mendicino under fire

Topics
Mr. Bernardo decision and victims' rights
Mentioned
Leslie Mahaffey Kristen French Paul Bernardo Louis
Cory Morgan Show. Subsidized media is controlled media The federal standoff over CCP interference

Episode Stats


Length

7 minutes

Words per minute

164.41

Word count

1,259

Sentence count

63


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, Minister of Public Safety and Correctional Service of Canada, Jean-Christine Blanquer, answers questions from the media and the victims of the Bernardo case about why no one was informed of the inmate transfer before it was made public.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Minister, can you please tell us what happened?
00:00:07.860 Just before you all start clamoring for answers to questions, let me say a few
00:00:13.920 things with regards to the Bernardo affair. As I said yesterday in the House
00:00:18.600 of Commons, I was informed personally on May 30th. When I found out about his
00:00:25.200 being transferred to a medium security institution, I took the action that was
00:00:30.300 necessary, which was to contact the Commissioner to express what I thought
00:00:34.440 were the completely justifiable concerns of the families of Leslie Mahaffey and
00:00:38.800 Kristen French, to express, you know, my concerns on behalf of Canadians that this
00:00:45.120 decision would spark the backlash that you now see. In addition to that, I've also
00:00:50.940 had the opportunity to speak with the representative for the Mahaffey
00:00:55.140 and French families to ensure that he knows that I'll do whatever I can to
00:01:00.300 support them, as no doubt this has caused them great anguish and grief. With
00:01:04.920 regards to the timing of when I was briefed, because I know this has been the
00:01:07.820 subject of a lot of intense scrutiny over the last number of days, look, it is very
00:01:14.200 clear that I should have been briefed at the time and that is something that I
00:01:17.260 made abundantly clear to my staff. And as I said yesterday in the House of Commons,
00:01:22.320 I have taken the corrective steps to ensure that that does not happen again. I
00:01:27.480 think more importantly than that though, the new directions which will be coming
00:01:32.580 from my office to the Correctional Service of Canada will ensure a number of
00:01:36.060 things. First, and most importantly, that victims' rights and sensitivities are
00:01:41.480 appropriately taken into account when any decisions regarding inmate transfers are
00:01:48.100 made. That's important. Secondly, that I am directly briefed in cases that are
00:01:55.280 similar in terms of there being high profile or where there are dangerous
00:01:58.280 offenders. And third, and again most importantly, and out of respect for those
00:02:03.920 who could be re-traumatized by these decisions, that victims' families are notified.
00:02:09.260 And the current lay of the land is that there are protocols in place that do allow
00:02:14.300 the Correctional Service of Canada to navigate around what are legitimate
00:02:17.300 security concerns, what are legitimate privacy current concerns, where inmates are
00:02:21.920 transferred to minimum security institutions, but not medium security
00:02:26.360 institutions. And so we have taken the concrete steps to rectify that with this
00:02:30.380 direction. And I will be working very closely with the CSC. So this is, I think, a very
00:02:37.420 good and thorough summation of the actions that we've taken today.
00:02:40.760 How is it credible that all of the most senior staff who are paid for by
00:02:58.100 taxpayers in government and PCO and the Prime Minister's office and your office
00:03:01.100 knew, but somehow you and the Prime Minister were only told after the fact? How is
00:03:04.760 that in any way credible to the average person who goes to their job and does
00:03:08.760 their job every day?
00:03:09.480 Okay. First of all, let's all take a breath. And I want to be responsive to
00:03:14.240 your questions. What I said was, is that I would be coming down to take more
00:03:16.800 questions in this afternoon. But what I would say, what I, well, I'm here right now and I
00:03:25.380 will be here again. Absolutely. But I agree with you that there is a challenge there, which
00:03:31.800 is why we have taken steps to address that through corrective actions internally, as well
00:03:36.460 as by making sure that the CSC works very closely with victims' families going forward.
00:03:41.460 Why didn't your staff tell you? Why didn't your staff tell you? What's the explanation?
00:03:47.460 Yes, I have no response.
00:03:49.460 So, as I mentioned, I was going to take a concrete action on the questions of my team.
00:03:56.460 I told everyone that, yes, it is absolutely necessary that I received the briefings at
00:04:04.460 the time, when he received the information. But in addition, I had published a new
00:04:11.460 ministerial direction to ensure that the CSC will work together with victims' families.
00:04:18.460 Why didn't your staff tell you? Is it standard operating procedure at your office that you
00:04:23.460 are kept in the dark? And will you let anyone go in response to the handling of this?
00:04:27.460 Of course not. And my job as the Minister of Public Safety is to make sure that we are
00:04:32.460 identifying issues where there are challenges on information flow. And so what I have done
00:04:37.460 in each and every one of these cases is to be responsive to those challenges by issuing
00:04:42.460 ministerial directives to clarify so that we are strengthening our ability to get the information
00:04:47.460 that we need. So that has been done, certainly in the case of Bernardo, through the issuing
00:04:52.460 of a new ministerial directive. As far as internal matters, I've dealt with it.
00:04:57.460 What does that mean?
00:05:00.460 Why didn't your staff tell you?
00:05:02.460 Minister, what is the explanation? If it's not to keep you in the dark, what's the explanation?
00:05:06.460 So, again, I can not answer all of the questions when they're coming at the same time.
00:05:11.460 So why didn't your staff tell you? What's the explanation? What was the explanation from your staff as to why they didn't tell you?
00:05:16.460 So look, the short answer is it is unacceptable. And my job is to make sure that it doesn't happen again.
00:05:22.460 That's not answering the question.
00:05:24.460 Why did it happen in the first place?
00:05:26.460 It's not your first day in the cabinet, right? You're many years into cabinet. It's not a new…
00:05:31.460 Bernardo going back to maximum security or not.
00:05:35.460 So I'm going to come back to that question. But first, what's important is that these issues are identified and they're corrected.
00:05:41.460 And so that is what I have done with my team to be sure that there is no further breakdown in information flow.
00:05:48.460 It is important that I get those briefings in a timely manner. That is made abundantly clear.
00:05:53.460 More importantly than that, back to the question that was posed.
00:05:57.460 I believe that the decision to transfer Paul Bernardo to a medium security institution does not sit well with Canadians
00:06:04.460 because it is in the front to the victims, in particular of Leslie Mahaffey and Kristen French.
00:06:10.460 And that is why we are going to support them. We're going to make sure that victims' rights are at the centre of these decisions.
00:06:17.460 And that, going forward, victims are notified in a timely manner before those decisions are taken.
00:06:23.460 So will he be back?
00:06:24.460 No, no, no. Last question back, Mr. Louis.
00:06:27.460 Will you…
00:06:28.460 Okay.
00:06:29.460 Acceptez-vous une part du plan?
00:06:30.460 Yes, yes.
00:06:31.460 I will repeat in French, and I will take more questions a little later today.
00:06:35.460 So there will be another opportunity for us to speak again.
00:06:39.460 As I have imagined, yes, it is very important that I have addressed the challenges in my office.
00:06:46.460 That is exactly what I did yesterday with my team.
00:06:51.460 The corrections actions are complete.
00:06:54.460 And in addition to that, we will work together with the SEC to support families of victims.
00:07:01.460 So, on the subject of Mr. Bernardo, I think it's very clear that the decision is offensive to the families of Leslie Mahaffey and Kristen French.
00:07:15.460 And in addition to that, we need to prevent other incidents like that.
00:07:22.460 Because we need to take the approach and put the rights of the victims' rights to the centre of the decisions that are involved in the militants.
00:07:36.460 Are you going to be issuing a direct ministerial?
00:07:38.460 Thank you.