More prison guards to wear stab-proof vests
Correctional Service of Canada seeks new supplier, wants to expand use
The Correctional Service of Canada is seeking a new supplier to provide more than 1,200 stab-proof vests to front line staff working in prisons across the country to protect them from possible attacks using homemade weapons, such as “shanks, shivs and ice picks,” according to a request for bids posted on a government-contracting website.
The agency’s original supplier went bankrupt, prompting the search for a new supplier, union officials said Friday. A move is also underway to expand use of the vests among correctional officers.
Up until now, they’ve been provided to officers working in men’s maximum- and medium-security prisons and in maximum-security units at women’s prisons. They will now likely be provided to officers in medium-level units at women’s prisons, too, said Gord Robertson, Pacific-region president of the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers.
A final decision from Ottawa is expected soon, he said.
“They’re heavy and hot — not fun to wear. But it’s something that protects our officers,” Robertson said. “Better safe than sorry.” Robertson referred to an incident in June 2012 in which an inmate slashed the face of a female corrections officer at maximum-security Kent Institution in Agassiz, B.C., using a homemade knife.
Some critics, however, question the need for the vests, particularly in women’s prisons.
Mary Campbell, who recently retired as director general of the corrections and criminal justice directorate at Public Safety Canada, said she worries that the vests create an environment that is “militaristic” and “threat-based.”
How does that lead to respectful, productive relationships between staff and inmates, she asked.
“You’re trying to effect positive change in people. If the first thing a woman (offender) sees is a stabproof vest, as opposed to street clothes, it sets up a different relationship,” she said Friday.
“If you walked into a school and every teacher was wearing a stabproof vest, what message does that send to the students?”
But Robertson said correctional officers will be more likely to engage with inmates if they feel safe.
“It shouldn’t be seen as an impediment to dealing with an inmate. It enhances their ability to do the job,” he said.
A correctional service spokeswoman was unable to say Friday how much the agency plans to spend on the new order of vests.
According to the procurement documents posted online, the government is seeking 837 male vests and 413 female vests with an option to purchase an additional 1,250 vests within two years.