The Wildrose Party has launched a new initiative that will consult with Albertans about the state of the justice system.

The Alberta Crime Task Force will be chaired by Airdrie MLA and Shadow Justice Minister Angela Pitt who says she, along with other Wildrose caucus members will tour the province to listen to Albertans directly about the impact of rising crime.

According to Pitt, the task force is planning to engage stakeholders in conversations and coming up with a list of solutions that they can present to the NDP government in an effort to help with the rising crime situation.

"I've heard from a number of constituents that have been repetitively broken into, business owners who are extremely frustrated because they're the ones who pay for this crime at the end of the day.  We know that in rural Alberta many people are actually fearful in their homes right now and those are issues we need to address and we hope that we can with this task force."

Albertans can fill out the feedback survey at www.crimetaskforce.ca.  The task force will also receive feedback on previous policies advocated for by the Wildrose including increasing monitoring of violent offenders, stricter enforcement of conditions of release and pushing for tougher sentences for trafficking and production of dangerous opioids.

Pitt feels the way to come up with solutions is by consulting with Albertans, "That's exactly why we need to form this task force and consult right across this province with the experts in industry and with regular Albertans who are affected by this...We're just summing up some of the details and some of the final members within this constituency."

According to the Wildrose,  the most recent Crime Severity Index shows that Alberta reported an 18 per cent increase in crime, giving Alberta the third highest Crime Severity Index rating of all Canadian provinces.

 

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