Front Burner - Does Canada have a violent crime problem?

Episode Date: September 9, 2025

Over the last few weeks, horrific crimes have dominated headlines across the country.There was a father of four who was killed after at least three suspects broke into his home in Vaughan, Ontario. There was a mass stabbing attack on Hollow Water First Nation, just north of Winnipeg. The suspect had been out on bail. Last weekend in Edmonton, a woman was found shot to death in her car. The suspect in that case has a long history of run-ins with the law, including convictions for violent crimes, and was on probation at the time.Politicians from every level of government have been talking about this, saying that we are at crisis levels.So today, we’re trying to figure out what’s real here: is crime going up? For that, Irvin Waller, a Professor Emeritus at the University of Ottawa and the author of Science and Secrets of Ending Violent Crime joins the show. Then, Scott Reid, the co-founder of Feschuk.Reid communications and a political commentator, talks through the politics.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

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This is a CBC podcast. Hey, everybody. It's Jamie. So over the last few weeks, a spate of horrific crimes have really dominated headlines. There was a father of four, 46-year-old Aline Faruqi, who was killed after at least three suspects broken to his home in Vaughn. Close friends say that he was shot in front of his children. I just want to say that my brother died the way he lived. He was a hero. He woke up and, you know, he did what any father would do, try to protect his family. There was a case of a 12-year-old suspect in Markham, who was charged with attempted murder while he was out on bail for unrelated

violent offenses. There's been a number of high-profile violent crimes elsewhere in the country, too. A mass stabbing attack on Hollow Water First Nation just north of Winnipeg. A woman and the suspect her brother are dead. At least seven more have serious injuries. The suspect had been out on bail. Last weekend in Edmonton, a woman was found shot to death in her car. The suspect has a long history of run-ins with the law, including convictions for violent crimes and was on probation at the time.

So today, we're going to try and figure out what's real here. Is crime going up? If it is, what kind of crime and why? For that, I am speaking to Irvin Waller, a professor emeritus at the University of Ottawa and the author of Science and Secrets of Ending Violent Crime. Then Scott Reed will join me. He's the co-founder of Festchuk Reed Communications, a political commentator, and he previously served as communications director for Prime Minister Paul Martin.

He's here to talk about the politics of all of this. How are our politicians creating or grabbing this moment? Who's floundering? and how big of an issue is this becoming for voters? All right, let's start with Irvin. Hi, Irvin. Thank you so much for coming on to Front Burner. It's a pleasure.

Hi, Jamie. So, as I mentioned in the intro, we're hearing all these stories of violent crime in the news. What do the numbers actually say? Is crime actually out? Violent crime is up from, 2014 to today by a bit more than 30 percent. Homicides during that same decade have gone up by more than 50 percent. Those numbers have to be put in context of what the trends were

before. There was a peak in violent crime in Canada and indeed in the U.S. and the early 90s, and then violent crime, both those indicators came steadily down to 2014 and then started going up. Hmm. Why did they come down before you think? And then why are they going back up now? I want to just distinguish between violent crime and property crime. So violent crime, which is assaults, robberies, homicide, and so on.

we don't really know why it came down. It came down slowly and then went up rather more rapidly, but we're talking about a decade for it to increase by, more homicides by 50%. If we were to talk about property crime that are break-ins, car theft, those have been coming steadily down. And we do know quite a bit about why they've come down. And that's because the opportunities to commit them have been counted. So we've got better gadgets in our cars, better gadgets and our homes. When we come to violent crime, what we do know is in the last decade, the number of homicides with a handgun have gone up and probably largely

explained the increase in homicides. Those are associated with some increase in gang-related crime, and they're not associated with any significant change in the proportion of homicides that are domestic, that involve intimate partner of violence or violence within the home. It feels like we've been seeing a lot of headlines about these kind of violent home invasion type crimes, right? The father, who was shot in Vaughn, the person with the crossbow. It happened in Lindsay, a town in Ontario's Coortha Lakes region. Court documents say the alleged intruder Michael Kyle Breen was out on probation and armed with a crossbow. The tenant, Jeremy David McDonald, allegedly fought back with a

knife. Now, he faces charges of aggravated assault and assault with a weapon. Are these kind of cases on the rise? Are we seeing more of these? Why does it feel like we might be seeing more of these? Well, there's quite a big gap between the public impression of what's going on with crime and the actual rates, and the usual explanation for that gap is that the media highlights the sensational and exceptional, what bleeds leads. So I think what we're seeing in the last couple of years is, yes, there's been an increase in violent crime using handguns, and those crimes have had more attention. by the media than those that didn't.

But I've been in this for over 50 years. I was involved in the debates around capital punishment, which was actually the period when homicides were at the highest since we abolished the death penalty. They've come steadily down. But there are always events that are frightening to the public when a young man is killed on a platform of the TTC in Toronto, that scares a lot of people.

Toronto police say 16-year-old Gabriel Magaloisch was sitting on a bench at this Toronto subway station when a man approached him unprovoked. Shortly after, Magalois was stabbed. He was rushed to hospital but died not long after. They are not believed to have known each other. Somebody coming into a home and killing somebody that's really scary because you think it might happen to you. These events, unfortunately, have continued over decades. I didn't say we shouldn't be concerned about them. We should be concerned about them.

But we need to be doing the things that will actually reduce the numbers of those events. Police, politicians, they have all pointed to bail reform as a way to reduce violent crime. We've talked about this case where the father was shot in front of his kids. Even though the suspects in that case have yet to be identified, the city's mayor said changes must be made to the country's criminal justice system saying there is a, quote, revolving door of criminals who are arrested

and then back out on bail, sometimes the same day to offend repeatedly. And I would just be curious to hear how you're reacting to this conversation around bail reform right now? Well, during the 10 years that the violent crime rate has been going up and the homicide rate has been going up more rapidly, we have put more and more people in our local jails. I think we're now around somewhere between 70 to 80 percent of the people sitting in a local jail in Canada are remanded to custody. So, bail has been refused. at least for a time and may be refused the whole way through.

The key thing to reducing violent crime is not being discussed. And the key way to reduce violent crime, and by the way, bail failures, is to tackle the risk factors that contribute to violent crime. If we look at why the pattern of violent crime in the UK has been different from us, well, one of the reasons is that they've actually been using both those well-known ways to reduce violence. They did it initially in Glasgow. It was actually an initiative of a senior police officer to bring in a public health analyst, and they analyzed where the problems were, what were the risk factors, and then they went

after them, and they reduced their levels of violence by 50% within three years. And the UK was slow to learn from that, but it now, in half of the country, is doing something similar to that. they're only getting a 25% reduction, but hey, a 25% reduction is wonderful. The other irony is that the U.S. in the last five years has been extraordinarily successful in reducing their horrific levels of homicide in cities. So Boston, for instance, reduced its homicide rate within two years. by 50% doing the sorts of things that I said,

when you start with a diagnosis and a plan, and then you invest in the things that work. And you see something similar in other cities across the U.S., and we just haven't been doing this. If violent crime comes up, the police say we need more police to respond to it, and so we give them more money to respond to it, but we're not doing the things that stop it in the first place.

So why do you think the conversation around crime right now is being dominated by bail reform? And, I mean, now conservative leader Pierre Polyev and Ontario Premier Jag for, they're talking about Castle laws, right? Changes to the criminal code that would make it legal or easier for people at home to use whatever force they would like against an intruder. Your home is your castle. And you have the right to defend your country. family in your home. It's the weak criminal code that needs to be changed by the federal government. I think part of what happened is that the Trudeau government did nothing about rising crime. If you don't change what you're doing, you don't get different results.

And Pollyearve has focused on the rise in homicide rate, and his statistics are correct. His solutions have been, yes, this focus on reverse onus, but also on penalties because the Harper government had mandatory minimums and the Trudeau government really after the rising crime had taken place, they then abolished some of those mandatory minimum. I think there's a sort of political view that heavier penalties will reduce crime. And this is so obviously not true. I don't know why people don't take them to task. The country that has the heaviest penalties, the highest incarceration in the world, by the way, in the world per capita is the United States, and heavy penalties have not given them safer cities.

There have been some very curious judicial decisions to release people who were clearly dangerous, at least to me. So those bail decisions, I have differently in understanding how they occurred. You then have a series of people who used guns in terms. who were released and then they get caught very soon after, there's no doubt that we need to be looking at those who are engaged in serious injury offenses and who are engaged in using handguns, and we need to be much stricter in whether they get released. The Liberals, before Connie came in, required the court to look at the extent to which a person had been

dangerous in the past. I found it very weak. So yes, I think we need to be looking more carefully at that decision-making. Prime Minister Carney talks about austerity and investment by not tackling the risk factors, we're going to have to pay more and more for policing and probably for prisons. We can invest to reduce both the trauma and injuries of victims and the fear of the public and get a 50% reduction in the violent crime that is occurring within the next five years. That's what the evidence showed. us. Okay. Ervin, thank you so much for this. Really appreciate it. My pleasure. going to use this to say women can't be in combat arms.

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Find commotion with me, Alameen Abdul-Mahmood, wherever you get your podcasts, including YouTube. All right, so for more on how politicians are responding to this recent spate of violent crime and how they say that they will address it, I'm joined by Scott Reed. Scott, hey, thank you so much for being here. Really appreciate it. Oh, thanks for having me. So on Friday, Carney announced that legislation is coming next month to tighten up the bail system. The goal he said was that people accused of violent crimes would, quote,

pay the price they should with consecutive sentencing, that they are not in a position where they commit a crime one day and they're arrested and then out of jail the next. What did you make of his messaging there? you think Carney is doing on the crime file more broadly? I think the crime file is a problem for Carney. And I think that's why he spoke to it. And I think that's why he spoke to it in the fashion he did, which is with more edge than you might anticipate when you look at his politics and his background. But if you look at how the liberals fared in the last federal election and think about the issue of crime in the GTA, the greater Toronto area. Think up with the last 10, 12 days of the campaign. Think about the fact that the liberals appeared to be on track for a

sizable majority. And then something happened in that last couple of weeks. Something sagged in seats that the liberals themselves, much less all of us, Smarty Boots, pundits, thought they had in the bag, like the Bramptons, the Mississauga's, the Scarboroughs. They started leaking. And I think that arguably crime was an important factor in that leakage. I think it was a challenge for the Liberals then. I think it's remained a challenge. I think it's become a hotter issue over the course of the summer. And I think Carney recognizes that for him, it's a defensive issue. He's got to protect himself on it. He's got to be seen to responding to it. Or he will suffer some erosion. If you were advising him right now, what would you tell him to do? Do you think what he did last

week is enough? Is it on the right track? Well, we'll have to see what the specific measures are. And bail reform can be tough because so much of it can be ruled as unconstitutional, much of it would be criticized by experts as not inherently effective. But it does get at the heart of the emotional demand that so many people have, which is, I want to see people who have committed violent crime remain behind bars, particularly when our television screens and our phone screens are littered with anecdotes and examples and horrifying instances of people having been out on bail, committing a violent crime, and they look to their political leaders and say, why are you not doing more about this?

And I know this much. I know the surest way to lose a political argument is to look at somebody that's anxious about the invasiveness of someone coming into their driveway, steps from their front door, taking their car and driving it away, or God help us, actual home invasions, or someone's shot in front of their kids. I know the surest way to lose an argument with people who are worried about that is to say to them, you're wrong. Crime is actually getting better. It's not getting worse.

Violent crime isn't the problem you think it is. And the right way to go about it is completely different from the way you're thinking. That is the surest way to lose that argument. And if you lose that argument, you're not going to be in a position to do anything about it. Right. I mean, we just talked to an expert about this. And he surprisingly said that car thefts were down, which, you know, you certainly wouldn't think that. after reading all the headlines the last couple of years,

though violent crime, he did say, is up. But the other argument that he made, which kind of ties into what you were just saying, is that, you know, this is a government that talks a lot about data and investments. And he's not hearing anything about programs and initiatives that tackle the root causes of crime as opposed to these tougher penalties on criminals.

And we know that there are lots of programs out there and initiatives that do work. Is there some space for this government to start talking about that stuff? Or is that not where people are right now? Would that, like, would that be a misstep for them, cynically? It would be a misstep if that was the exclusive response to this problem. Because this is an emotional problem right now. This is a, people are literally thinking about that man who was shot in front of his children.

And they are saying, we need to do something about this. And perhaps that's irrational and perhaps that's emotional, but it is real. I think it's premature to say, oh, they're not doing anything around preventative measures or longer term, the causes and roots of crime. That's not generally the recipe you get from a liberal government. You usually say, we're going to be tough on crime and tough on the roots on crime. And so my guess is when the prime minister comes out with something, he will lead with the emotion. He will lead with we need to keep violent criminals behind bars where they're going to. They cannot repeat the harm they cause, but then he will couple it likely, I think, with some of those other measures and say at the same time we need to be tackling the roots of crime.

There's kind of two ways to approach this once you've agreed that you're going to go down this road. One is you can defuse the bomb by trying to address people's concerns and taking a suite of measures that hopefully in combination address the immediate concerns but also address long-term concerns and hopefully do some good. or you can explode the bomb. And you can simply prey on people's fears, tell them that what's bad is going to get worse and what's worse is going to kill you and hope that that carries you to elected office. On that note, what role do you think Pierre Pauly

is playing in contributing to the national conversation on crime right now. Look, there's two things about Pure Polyov. One, he's an opposition leader. So it is only natural that he is going to focus on the problem and place it at the feet of the government and say, whether it's carjackings, whether it's violent crimes and home invasions, whether it's your SUV being taken from your driveway, these things are bad and getting worse. And it's the government's fault and it's a turnstile approach to the justice system and you'll lard that all up. to the criminal thugs who are invading the homes of Canadians in unprecedented numbers because

of liberal laws is that you should be in serious danger if you go into someone's house illegally and try to harm them. If you don't want to be harmed, then don't invade someone's house and don't threaten their security. That's what almost any opposition leader is going to do. But then the other aspect of it is, I think that Pierre Polyev is a sincere disciple of hang him high and hang them always. And so he does not have, I think, any particular dilemma when it comes to addressing this issue in the harshest and most exclusive terms. And by exclusive, I mean, I'm not going to talk about any those roots of crime stuff. That's for psychologists and apologists. I think that's what you'll hear from him.

And right now he's winning on this issue. That's why you're seeing the government take steps. That's why you're seeing Carney address it because this issue is front of mind for people, particularly in the GTA and Lower Mainland in Vancouver and B.C. But it's true all over the country. Can you talk to me a little bit more earlier? You were talking about how the liberals drop support in some of the suburban areas around Toronto. And like, why would they have shed some support?

support in those areas on the issue of crime? Why would that be so important to those constituencies? I think because you see two kinds of demographics in those areas. In the suburbs, you see lower income communities who feel the sharp edge of crime. They see it occurring and they worry about their own children being affected by that life. And then you get more affluent suburban communities in the GTA who see the range roller being taken out. And then you you add to that being taken out of the driveway, then you add to that the way in which, you know, they call them the soccer mom demographic, right? You think about suburban moms. Think about Mississauga, York, right? The mother that's dropping the kids at school or picking the

kid up after soccer practice and hockey practice and thinking about, will there be a carjacking. So I think when you look at those communities and you feel that this is an issue that is foremost on their mind. And perhaps they're not as anxious about macroeconomic considerations like tariff battles and, you know, whether or not we can find new markets in Europe. They're a little bit more worried about the crime there or might show up literally on their front door. Yeah, I remember it wasn't too long ago that it felt like Trudeau, that Trudeau liberals were really pushed to do something on car thefts. They were really taking it on the chin. Yeah. We're convening this summit because Canadians,

need serious action. A catchy slogan won't stop auto theft. A two-minute YouTube video won't disrupt organized crime. Cracking down on auto theft means bringing law enforcement, border services, port authorities, car makers, and insurance companies together. Do you think there's a political lesson there for Carney from that time? Unquestionably. And I think it's one that he's half learning based on the evidence to date. And that is, do not wait until the issue is so overwhelming that your action will be dismissed as a give to politics rather than a sincere expression of concern. And I think that even when the liberals under Trudeau did move, and arguably now, some of the results are starting to bear out, you know, the police have more resources. You're

seeing task force. You see press conference or they say we got, you know, 50 guys or trying to get rid of 1500 cars and so forth. But they appear to be so reluctant and so slow and so dismissive that they never got credit for the action they took. I think Carney is trying to get ahead of that somewhat. But he knows this is not an issue set that he's going to win on. He just has to defend himself from losing on. We've been really focusing on the feds right now on the federal level, but I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on what you're seeing at other levels here. Like Premier Doug Ford has been really banging on about the bail system being broken for a while now, about crime in general. This is the weak system the federal government needs to change.

Bail reform. Rather than our judiciary system that has totally failed, the people of Ontario, these weak-kneed judges that let these people out on bail not once, not twice, not three times, four and five times, just to go repeat the crime. There's no consequences at all for these people. It's absolutely sickening that Canada and Ontario is in this position. He's not just attacking criminals, but the judges. And do you think that that's been a successful strategy for him? Does it play to be attacking judges in Canada?

to a degree when it's coupled with live front of mind examples of people turn styling their way out of the court into criminal activity. But I think, you know, for Doug Ford's voter coalition, he is a conservative. He may not be a hard-edged, you know, mega-conservative, but he is a conservative. So whose voter coalition is going to be comfortable with some of that rhetoric? Also, in his case, if I were to say that Carney is trying to move. move from a defensive perspective to try to insulate himself against losing votes on this. I think Ford is moving proactively because all of that rhetoric around judges is really intended to deflect the focus from the administration of justice at the provincial level, from the

availability of holding cells and adequate jail facilities and making certain that it's laid at the feet of the federal government. So by focusing on bail, by focusing on judges, he not only has the benefit of looking like he's expressing the concern that's on the mind of those voters, conservative, suburban, but he's fixing blame at another level of government. And that's probably wise. Finally, do you think politicians on the local level, like mayors, have to approach the issue of crime differently than other levels of government, since they're the closest to it, really, in many ways? They can't change federal laws, but of course, they do have a

lot of leavers, including police budgets, a big role to play in social programs and cities. No question. Mayors who are inattentive to this issue can really lose control of it very rapidly because mayors do sit on the local police commission. They do have a direct hand in setting the budget for their policing service. They do have a direct hand in choosing the leadership with their police services. And they're the first stop when a violent crime occurs and people want to get a reaction from someone in charge. Often the playbook for a municipal leader is to do what we were just talking about with Doug Ford. That is to ascribe blame to others and to point at all other targets and say, even as we increase police budgets, you know, the province isn't doing

enough to make certain that our jails are well equipped with sufficient guards and the feds aren't doing enough on bail reform. But depending on your political strife at the local level, you may not want to go that way. And so the biggest concern is, of people, when they see a lot of crime in a community, their view of local leaders can be, you've lost control. You've lost control of my community. And that can be a past, fail, issue. Scott, thank you so much for this. Really interesting. Always great to have you by. Thanks so much. Always fun to be. All right. That's all for today. I'm Jamie Puezzon. Thanks so much for listening.

Talk to you tomorrow.