Government polling showed Canadians' drug decriminalization fears
CBC
Months before British Columbia sought to scale back its drug decriminalization pilot project, the federal government's own polling suggested to officials that a majority of Canadians believed the policy would lead to an increase in overdoses.
The results of the 11-page survey by the Privy Council Office, the wing of federal bureaucracy that supports the Prime Minister's Office, also suggests Canadians were split over whether decriminalization would make their community any less safe.
"I guess what people are thinking is that [decriminalization] will somehow enable drug use," said Thomas Kerr, a professor and head of the division of social medicine at the University of British Columbia and the director of research at the B.C. Centre on Substance Use.
Similar opinions were expressed over supervised drug consumption sites and even needle exchanges, Kerr said, adding that fears they would lead to increased use didn't play out "in reality."
"People have really overestimated the impacts of decriminalization, both positive and negative," he said.
Decriminalization has grown into a political lightning rod over recent weeks after the B.C. NDP government reversed course and asked that police again be empowered to arrest people or seize illicit drugs when they are being used in public spaces.
The move followed months of concern over public drug use, including inside hospitals.
The federal Conservatives have seized on the issue and pressed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's Liberals to rule out granting a federal exemption to any other jurisdictions wishing to pursue decriminalization programs in an effort to curb opioid deaths.
Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre describes the policy as the legalization of hard drugs.
Federal Mental Health and Addictions Minister Ya'ara Saks has defended the decision to allow B.C.'s pilot project as one tool to combat the overdose crisis, which she says is being fuelled by an increasingly toxic drug supply.
She recently rejected Toronto's longstanding application to undertake a similar program, telling The Canadian Press it was because its application lacked limits on the amount of drugs an individual could possess and any age restrictions.
There is currently no new application from the city or from places like Halifax or Montreal, Saks recently told the House of Commons after being pressed by the Tories.
"People are dying because of street drugs; they are not dying because of decriminalization," Saks said.
More than 40,000 people have died from opioid-related deaths since 2016, which is when Health Canada started tracking what Kerr called "Canada's worst public health crisis in modern history."
If Allan Speight wants to make a phone call, he has to drive about eight kilometres down the road to the Welsford Irving gas station.
Quebec’s third-largest city is switching from weekly garbage and recycling collection to every two weeks in a cost-saving move it says is better for the environment. But the plan is getting mixed reaction from residents and opposition councillors.
If you’re driving through rural Manitoba next summer, you might not see a big increase in the number of golden flowering fields adjacent to the highways, according to some provincial canola producers.
Saskatchewan RCMP say a drone was instrumental when two people needed rescue from a forested area on a dark night in frigid temperatures.
Lori Cheverie has received her fair share of teasing for always having her nose in a book — but for the next few months, that habit will serve a greater purpose, one that goes beyond the love of reading.
Hundreds of Kashechewan First Nation evacuees have arrived in Niagara Falls, one of the Ontario cities taking in people from the Cree community as it endures a weeks-long water crisis due to a damaged treatment plant.
Windsor-based Dainty Foods to separate Canadian, American production as it launches new product line
A Windsor-based company that’s known for its rice products has just launched a new line of pasta side dishes.
According to polling by the Environics Institute, 70 per cent of Canadians are either very or somewhat satisfied with "the way democracy works in Canada."
A plan to partially demolish a 139-year-old church has set off an uproar in a Cabbagetown neighbourhood.
A 33-year-old man has died after being shot by police in Brantford, Ont., Friday morning, the province's police watchdog says.
A Whitehorse resident says gaps in the hospital system are affecting continuity of care – and he has 2,000 pages of documentation to prove it.
A Newfoundland and Labrador judge postponed a decision Friday about whether a man charged with three attempted murders is fit to stand trial, in a case where the accused's family says the health-care system failed him and his alleged victims.
A doctor in Nova Scotia's Pictou County has been handed a professional reprimand for the way he treated a 30-year-old woman who died after being admitted to the Aberdeen Regional Hospital in New Glasgow, N.S., in August 2023.