THUNDER BAY - The loss of front-line staff at local correctional centres led to an information protest outside the facility on Tuesday.
Correctional officers are at odds with administration after the provincial government's decision to eliminate the Offender Transport Unit within Ontario's correctional service on Sept. 9.
Shawn Bradshaw, president of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union Local 708, says correctional officers have now been tasked with the job of transporting inmates from detention or correctional facilities, mental health institutions, and court locations.
It’s a job they aren’t trained to do.
“The specific training involves one weekend in a classroom, and several shadowing opportunities with an experienced bailiff. That’s been denied to us,” he said.
Bradshaw, who also works as a correction officer, claims administration has started sending correctional officers home without pay for refusing to the job previously performed by an offender transportation officer.
“That’s brought it to its tipping point,” Bradshaw said.
Bailiff department slashed
According to the government of Ontario’s website, the job of an offender transportation officer (also referred to as a provincial bailiff) was to maintain the custody of offenders being transported between facilities, and to ensure the proper working order of security equipment and OPP vehicles used in the performance of duties.
The department that makes up offender transportation officers has been cut by the Doug Ford government, and assigned to correctional officers, which Bradshaw describes as a safety concern.
“If you’re in a correctional centre, there’s several other correctional officers to back you up; sergeants, management team... and none of that truly exists on the road,” Bradshaw said.
Offender transportation officers within the region transported inmates from a range of facilities that ran as far west as Winnipeg, to nearly 1,300 kilometres east in Sault Ste. Marie.
“We’re not dealing with a guard on a mill at a construction site. We’re dealing with volatile inmates that have been determined to be a risk to the public,” Bradshaw said.
On Tuesday, Bradshaw and a group of correctional officers blocked the entrance at both the Thunder Bay Correctional Facility and the Thunder Bay Jail as sergeants tried to move inmates between facilities.
“We don’t have the right to strike. This is just a peaceful information picket,” Bradshaw said. “We just want to be able to do our work in the safest manner.”
A spokesperson with Ministry of the Solicitor General told Dougall Media via email, "The ministry is aware of a demonstration taking place at Thunder Bay correctional facilities. The ministry understands that the group is raising concerns about inmate transportation... (and) respects individuals' right to peacefully protest and remains available to the union to discuss any labour concerns."
Jail continues to suffer from overcrowding
The issue of overcrowding continues to plague the Thunder Bay Jail.
Bradshaw said the jail currently has more than 200 inmates, despite the facility only being designed to accommodate 147 inmates.
“It’s brutally overcrowded. You have inmates sleeping in areas they are not designed to sleep human beings. They don’t have washroom facilities in some of the cells,” he said.
In April, the province announced it would fund a new, 325-bed, correctional complex that would combine the district jail and correctional facility.
Bradshaw said the new facility would add resources, and ease some pressure on the current staff.
“I’m confident it will get built but no timeline has been established.”
