Canadian prison inmates have staged work stoppages and sent petitions protesting a sudden cut in the wages they make. They are now waiting for a response from corrections authorities.
Photo Credit: Lars Hagberg/CP

Canadian prison inmates upset over cut in wages

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Sudden cuts to already small wages of Canadian prison inmates has caused work stoppages, petitions, and calls for corrections authorities to reconsider the impact of the cuts.

Inmate wages were set in 1981. Since then they were raised 10 cents. For a day’s work earnings are as little as a third of an hourly minimum wage. Now that’s been cut by 22 per cent, and in 2014 by 30 per cent. In addition, toiletries and other such items will no longer be given free to the inmates.

The wages earned by the inmates are often used to prepare for life after they are released. Correctional Services Canada itself emphasizes that this work lets inmates learn skills they can use once they leave the prison system.

Lawyer Todd Sloan says he’s never seen as much reaction from prisoners and their families on any issue as the wage cuts. Sloan is a retired public servant who worked 16 years for the Office of the Correctional Investigator, the ombudsman for federally sentenced inmates.

Sloan now practices law helping inmates. He wrote a letter on behalf of inmates in 12 institutions to the Commissioner of Corrections, Don Head, about the issue of the cut wages.

RCI’s Wojtek Gwiazda talked to Todd Sloan about the cut in wages on October 1 and its impact.

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