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| John L. Hill |
Dr. Ivan Zinger, Canada’s correctional investigator, announced he will leave his position two years early, citing significant frustration with the federal government and the Correctional Service of Canada’s (CSC) reluctance to address systemic human rights and mental health issues in prisons.
In his final annual report, which focused on mental health care in federal prisons, Zinger accused CSC and Public Safety Canada of ignoring oversight recommendations and warned their continued inaction will result in costly court challenges.
The importance of this report lies in the fact that Canada’s prisons have become an alternative to provincially run psychiatric hospitals. The process known as “deinstitutionalization,” which involved closing psychiatric hospitals in Canada and the United States, was complex and spanned several decades. It was driven by a combination of ideological, political, medical and economic factors. This movement began in earnest in the 1950s and gained momentum through the 1970s and into the 1990s.
Mid-20th-century civil rights and disability rights advocates started to argue that psychiatric hospitals were inhumane, coercive and violated personal freedoms. Exposés and investigations uncovered abuse, neglect and overcrowding in mental hospitals. There was a growing belief that people with mental illness had the right to live in the community, rather than being warehoused.
Governments pledged to replace hospitals with strong community mental health systems offering outpatient clinics, supportive housing, social workers and crisis teams.
In practice, funding rarely followed patients out of institutions. Many people discharged had no stable housing or supports, which led to an increase in homelessness, incarceration of people with mental illness, and emergency room “revolving door” crises.
This has led many historians and advocates to describe deinstitutionalization as “transinstitutionalization.” It involved shifting people from hospitals to jails, shelters or the streets rather than integrating them into the community. The failure of our society to address mental illness has been a topic at every session of the International Conferences on Law and Mental Health.
Key findings from Zinger’s 162-page report, based on six investigations, include:
- Outdated or missing mental health policies;
- Poor staff training for dealing with mentally ill prisoners;
- Inadequate mental health screening;
- Weak post-release support programs;
- Emphasis on security and force over therapy.
The report found that regional treatment centres (RTCs), the prison system’s psychiatric hospitals, are not fit for purpose, functioning more like geriatric wards than facilities for acute psychiatric care. Zinger recommended transferring inmates with serious, long-term mental illness to external hospitals. Still, CSC rejected this, arguing that community hospitals cannot safely handle such inmates and that the prison system must maintain its own psychiatric capacity.
Zinger also criticized the government’s plan to spend $1.3 billion on a new inmate hospital in New Brunswick, calling it a “misallocation of resources” that should instead support partnerships with existing hospitals. CSC and Public Safety Canada defended the project, describing it as a modern, bilingual, purpose-built facility.
While CSC accepted some of the report’s 21 recommendations, Zinger voiced doubt that meaningful reform would occur, citing a long history of political and institutional resistance.
Despite leaving his position early, Zinger said he is proud of his work, noting that his office’s reports are increasingly used in litigation and class actions, forcing compliance with human rights obligations. He warned that his final report will likely lead to more court-ordered reforms — a reflection, he said, of Ottawa’s failure to act voluntarily.
John L. Hill practised and taught prison law until his retirement. He holds a JD from Queen’s and an LLM in constitutional law from Osgoode Hall. His most recent book, Acts of Darkness (Durvile & UpRoute Books), was released July 1. Hill is also the author of Pine Box Parole: Terry Fitzsimmons and the Quest to End Solitary Confinement (Durvile & UpRoute Books) and The Rest of the (True Crime) Story (AOS Publishing). Contact him at johnlornehill@hotmail.com.
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