Making a bad idea worse

The CP reports on a proposal to fund the federal government's new wiretap requirements through property seized as the proceeds of crime:

Money forfeited through the federal proceeds-of-crime program should help pay for the new eavesdropping initiatives, says the ad-hoc coalition of police chiefs and communications companies.

The idea, spelled out in a recent confidential letter to the Public Safety Department, is intended to avoid a public outcry from phone and Internet subscribers, who might otherwise be stuck with the tab...

Under the federal proposals, service providers would be required, when upgrading their systems, to build in the technical capabilities needed by police and intelligence agencies, such as the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, to easily tap communications.

The controversy revolves around the ongoing costs of looking up phone numbers, hooking up to networks and relaying communications from one city to another - individual services that may cost anywhere from pocket change to thousands of dollars.

Now, I'll readily agree with the coalition to the extent that individual users of communications technology shouldn't be stuck with the bill for wiretaps.

But the article indicates that in most recent years, the proceeds-of-crime program has actually run a deficit rather than a surplus. And we surely don't want to see police work diverted in any way toward trying to hunt down proceeds of crime (as opposed to, say, perpetrators) solely because that's the only way to keep programs funded.

If the wiretap technology is necessary for the government's use (and I'm not sure that's anywhere close to being proven), then it should be general government revenues that pay the bill. Maybe the government will be lucky enough to see the proceeds of crime pay the entire cost. But neither the implementation of the program, nor the conduct of police, should be altered based on whether or not that happens to be true.