Crime is more than a numbers game

one could easily cherry-pick from the plethora of statistics to show that "CPC tough on crime" is not working. For example, Canada's homicide rate rose seven per cent in 2011 - an unusual result given that the rate has been falling relatively steadily since the 1970s. Various sexual offences against children also increased, with the child pornography rate increasing by 40 per cent, the most of any offence.

And despite the Conservatives' enthusiasm for the war on drugs, the overall drug crime rate also increased, with a seven per cent rise in the rate of cannabis possession offences. (More than half of the 113,100 police-reported drug crimes were for cannabis possession, which should put to rest the widely held belief that police no longer bust people for possessing pot.) So by spinning the stats a certain way, we could argue that the Conservatives' justice program has been an abject failure.