The new Conservative legislation has more to do with appearing tough on crime than actual justice.

Earlier this week, the Truth in Sentencing Act was proclaimed into force by the federal government. The new law restricts judges' discretion to give defendants credit for days served in pre-sentence custody. Defendants being held in medieval conditions while awaiting trial without access to programs aimed at rehabilitation will now be held just a bit longer.

The government says it is going to give longer sentences to defendants who deliberately delay their judgment day in order to get a "dead time" discount. These longer sentences will make us, uh, safer? Not so much.

This law has several aims, but none of them is remotely truth in sentencing.

First, there is the competition for the "law and order" vote. Although this should logically be awarded to opinion leaders who make proposals that are tough on crime, through the perverse alchemy of modern retail politics, tough on crime means the politician who is tough on criminals.

Lately, the leaders in this field are the demagogic Minister of Justice Rob Nicholson and the Attorneys-General for Ontario and B.C. All three strongly support the new law. All three have been challenged by lawyers, criminologists, and the media to explain how longer sentences for people who cannot get bail before trial will make Canadians safer. I still haven't heard the answer. Perhaps they are suffering from exhaustion by press conference.

Another seminal purpose of this law is to convey the message that violent crime, a shrinking problem in Canada in spite of federal criminal laws, can be reduced by eliminating judicial discretion. This old canard, a staple of Tory politics, requires Canadians to believe that our judiciary is populated by not-so-bright liberals who cannot resist releasing violent criminals. As everyone but our headline-craving politicians know, nothing could be further from the truth.

There is no reliable evidence that our sentencing policy is less rational than it has ever been. There is no reliable evidence that the courts routinely ignore Parliament's guidelines about sentencing. Violent criminals typically get tough sentences in Canada. What judges do (and what so riles the fixed sentence crowd) is to treat each case individually. By applying the law to each one and refusing to be distracted by high-profile outliers in violence, judges preserve the integrity of a system that has served us well for over 140 years.

Even the title of this law is misleading. Like "no child left behind," "truth in sentencing" says more by what it omits than what it includes. Lengthy pre-sentence delays are a direct result of business decisions made by the governments to which Mr. Nicholson and the overweening tough guy A.G.'s belong. But nowhere in their beloved legislation or its preamble do they acknowledge that the pre-sentence discount was invented by judges frustrated with delays caused by inadequate resources. They do not acknowledge the negative collateral consequences of imprisonment. They do not admit that implacable sentencing laws have not solved a significant criminal law problem in any Western democracy in our lifetime. And finally, they do not acknowledge that the cornerstone justification for this mean and gratuitous law – the manipulative defendant seeking the "dead time" discount – is an urban myth. In Ontario, judges wised up to that mythic fellow several years ago. The Court of Appeal long ago declared that no credit can be given to someone who deliberately delays his sentencing.

So there you have it; sentencing, but without much truth in it. Just anxious politicians trying to win a ratings war during another law and order season.