THE ONTARIO GOVERNMENT’S estimate that the province’s taxpayers will have to pay about $1 billion a year once the federal government’s omnibus Bill C-10 is in place is clearly at best an educated guess.

As we see it, the cost of this crime legislation could be even higher, depending on the number of persons who wind up serving significant sentences in provincial prisons who would otherwise have been given “conditional” sentences served in the community or sentences well short of the maximum two years less a day for non-penitentiary time.

What we do know, of course, is that housing a prisoner is an expensive task, the cost often being calculated as in the neighbourhood of $100,000 a year. So if our prison population goes up by just 1,000 inmates, the annual cost to the Province would be $100 million, and the $1 billion mark would be reached if the prison population jumped by 10,000.

The problem is that we have no idea what those numbers will turn out to be. All we can safely say is that many of those facing significant jail time are persons found in possession of relatively small amounts of marijuana. (A conviction for growing six marijuana plants would mean at least six months in jail.)

As we see it, the real problem with the Harper government’s approach to combatting crime is that there is no evidence that the same approach has worked elsewhere.

For example, most U.S. states have similar laws setting mandatory sentences for drug offences, and we’ve seen no evidence that these laws reduced the flow of illicit drugs but plenty that they succeed in filling existing jails and requiring new ones.

The reason, obviously, is that those who commit crimes really don’t care what the prison time might be because they have no intention of getting caught. (That’s the same reason capital punishment has never succeeded in reducing murder rates.)

In the circumstances, one might wonder why the federal Conservatives are so determined to do something they surely know will both be terribly costly and won’t accomplish its objective.

The answer, we think, is that those measures, as well as killing the long gun registry, have been great vote-getters, and the last thing the Harper government wants is to be portrayed as not living up to its promises.

One suggestion we have is that the legislation be amended slightly to include a time limit on its tougher measures. The “sunset law” would see those measures expire in two years if research proved they weren’t achieving their objective.

Interestingly, the crime bill came along at a time when statistics show that the rate of violent crime in Canada is at its lowest level since 1973 and polls show most Canadians think the emphasis should be on prevention, not sanctions.

It also comes at a time when both the federal and provincial governments are running huge deficits and need to reduce their spending.

It would be interesting, indeed, to see the results of an opinion poll asking Canadians whether they would prefer to see the federal government spend their tax dollars on new prisons rather than maintenance of the Old Age Pension system with eligibility at age 65.

It will also be interesting to see whether portions of the crime legislation will face constitutional challenges.

In particular, we see a real likelihood of some judges inviting such challenges when they find themselves faced with a requirement to impose a minimum sentence which they see as amounting to “cruel and unusual punishment” in the particular circumstances of the case before them.