Request for Statistics about Indigenous Peoples and Federal and Provincial Justice Systems

April 20, 2021

Question:
I’ve had a question from a faculty member developing a course, and I'm hoping someone might have some ideas of where I could look for data (preferably aggregate data/tables as they aren't looking to analyze the data but rather have asked for published statistics). They are looking for topics (and statistics) related to Aboriginal Justice and have specifically requested:

• "I am looking for information by region in Canada, gender, age, federal incarceration, provincial incarceration, and recidivism rates too." 
• "I am looking for published statistics of incarceration of Indigenous people in federal/provincial institutions. Is there any information on the number of sentencing circles held? Another area that I would like specific information is about Indigenous rape/sexual assault across the age spectrum, even sex trafficking."

I have found tables in CANSIM (Table 35100128 Adult correctional services, admissions to provincial and territorial programs, Table 35100016 Adult custody admissions to correctional services by aboriginal identity, and Table 35100007 Youth admissions to correctional services, by Aboriginal identity and sex), but I'm wondering where else I should be looking. If anyone has suggestions, I would really appreciate them.

Answer:

We have a trove of Correctional data in these tables; https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/201221/dq201221b-cansim-eng.htm

 

Included is average counts of youth and adults in Federal and Provincial correctional facilities, by Province/Territory, and admissions counts by gender, age groupings and Aboriginal status. Our data does not break down by recidivism or sentencing circles, but there is some more in-depth discussion of Aboriginal issues around sentencing/incarceration in the associated report: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2020001/article/00016-eng.htm