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The ruling does not mean that all mandatory minimums in Canadian law violate the Charter. As the dissenting opinion from three of the court’s justices noted, some past decisions found that mandatory minimums are not by themselves unconstitutional.

The majority advised, though, that parliament should consider narrowing the reach of mandatory minimums. That — combined with a 2015 ruling that quashed the three-year mandatory minimum prison sentence for some gun-related crimes — means the Liberals are on the right track, having already tasked the justice minister with a review of recent changes in the criminal justice system.

Mandatory minimum sentences sound like a good idea in theory, but Canadians know that the application of justice can be uneven. One need only look at the disproportionate number of First Nations people in the system to know that all is not right.

Statistics Canada reported that violent crime continued to drop across the country in 2014 and that serious crime was at its lowest level since 1969. Yet the federal prison population grew by 10 per cent between 2005 and 2015, according to correctional investigator Howard Sapers 2014-15 annual report.

Nobody wants someone found guilty of committing a serious crime such as murder to walk away consequence free. That’s not justice.

But the problem with applying mandatory minimum sentences to a wide range of minor crimes is that it sets up a straightforward equation with no room for variables. Commit crime X and face the obligatory punishment of Y number of years in jail or prison.

That makes for easy sound bites, but that calculation does not automatically add up to justice either.

Local editorials are the consensus opinion of the Journal’s editorial board, comprising Lorne Motley, Kathy Kerr, Sarah O’Donnell and David Evans.