No Cost Estimate Available for Crime Omnibus Bill

Until the Tories can come up with a reasonable number, let's just say the revamp of our justice system will cost us a gazillion dollars.

As you might recall, the Tories introduced their Safe Streets and Communities Act (holy Orwell ... ) in Parliament yesterday, a massive bill that would introduce mandatory minimum sentences and harsher punishments for young offenders, drug producers, sex offenders, and others. Once passed, the new laws are expected to increase the number of inmates in the country substantially, but, unfortunately, we have no idea how much this little experiment in Hobbesian justice is going to cost us. Justice Minister Rob Nicholson went on CTV this morning to say that, while he assures us the costs are "sustainable," there is no way to accurately predict how much it will cost. Not even a ballpark figure. Like, he could have at least said "we're guessing somewhere between $5 billion and $20 billion," but nope. Bob the Sheriff just countered by saying the costs to victims is too great and that the bill aims to correct that (which it won't, but this little tirade is about the cost of the bill, not its utter lack of logic or reason). As the little sub-header says, henceforth, we will refer to this as the gazillion-dollar pot-grower bill.