Compulsory after-sentence treatment for sex offenders could be on the cards for Bermuda, it was revealed yesterday.

Canadian prisons supremo Ole Ingstrup said Canada now had laws to ensure supervision outside prison walls.

And he said: "We would be more than happy to share -- it's a highly successful programme.

"Anything we have of that nature will be made available to you if you want to avail yourselves of these programmes.'' The news came Mr. Ingstrup told Bermuda prison officers that pioneering treatment for sex offenders has cut the repeat offence rate by 50 percent.

He added that Canada now has a law which allows for supervision in the community for up to 10 years after a sentence has been completed.

But Mr. Ingstrup said: "In Bermuda, there are no strings attached, so it will have to be on a totally voluntary basis.'' He added: "If a person is willing to go into a treatment programme, they will probably benefit from it.'' Mr. Ingstrup, a Dane who has been in charge of the Canadian Correctional Service for a decade, was speaking as he and Bermuda Commissioner of Prisons Ed Dyer signed a new deal guaranteeing two-way cooperation between the jail systems of the two countries.

Among the benefits will be exchange programmes and Bermudian access through Canada to the latest thinking in prison systems worldwide.

Mr. Dyer said he had already had discussions on supervision outside prison walls.

He added: "We recognise something is needed for that kind of offender and other kinds of offender who pose a threat to the public.'' But he said: "Unless you do it at the front end of the sentence, you can't impose it at the end of the sentence.

"There is really nothing we can legally do right now which can encroach on a prisoner's life.'' Mr. Dyer added, however: "We don't have the legislation which Canada has right now..but that is something we will be giving consideration to.'' But he said any change in the law would have to backed by Parliament and Governor Thorold Masefield.

Mr. Dyer added that Bermuda had already moved towards special programmes for prisoners jailed for crimes sex, violence and drugs -- but that Canada was further down that road than the Island.

Home Affairs and Public Safety Minister Paula Cox did not return calls from The Royal Gazette yesterday.

Mr. Ingstrup added that the Canadian philosophy was to use the parole system as much as possible -- for humanitarian and cost reasons.

He said: "We try to use the parole system as much as we can -- we use it a lot at the moment and we intend to use it even more.'' Mr. Ingstrup added that churches had got together to set up support programmes for prisoners on parole, which helped with readjustment to normal life.

But he said the low rate of repeat offending -- between 10 and 15 per cent compared to Bermuda's 70 percent or more, although there are differences in measuring the success rate -- was down to two factors.

Mr. Ingstrup explained: "We have very good programmes in our institutions these days -- we're totally programme-based in our release programmes.'' He added that not only sex offenders were covered, but also violent offenders and drug or alcohol addicts.

And he said: "We have also developed quite effective risk assessment -- nothing is certain in the science of humans, but we have achieved fairly high levels of predicability.'' But Mr. Ingstrup warned that early release was of little value unless there were sufficient numbers of support professionals and parole officers to supervise ex-cons.

He said: "It makes no sense to me to release someone into the community to a supervisor who has 125 cases to look after. We try to keep our caseload in the community down to about 20.'' But he pointed out: "It costs $50,000 a year to keep someone in jail -- we can almost give them a social worker each and still come out ahead.''