This bill was last introduced in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session, which ended in September 2013.
This bill has received Royal Assent and is now law.
This is from the published bill.
This enactment provides for the adoption of First Nation laws and the establishment of provisional rules and procedures that apply during a conjugal relationship, when that relationship breaks down or on the death of a spouse or common-law partner, respecting the use, occupation and possession of family homes on First Nation reserves and the division of the value of any interests or rights held by spouses or common-law partners in or to structures and lands on those reserves.
All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from the Library of Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.
Bill S-2—Time Allocation MotionFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
Some hon. members
Agreed.
No.
Bill S-2—Time Allocation MotionFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
Bill S-2—Time Allocation MotionFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
Some hon. members
Yea.
Bill S-2—Time Allocation MotionFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
Bill S-2—Time Allocation MotionFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
Some hon. members
Nay.
Bill S-2—Time Allocation MotionFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
The Speaker Andrew Scheer
In my opinion the yeas have it.
And five or more members having risen:
Call in the members.
(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)
The House resumed from May 27 consideration of the motion that Bill S-2, An Act respecting family homes situated on First Nation reserves and matrimonial interests or rights in or to structures and lands situated on those reserves, be read the third time and passed.
Third ReadingFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
Conservative
Jim Hillyer Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. Minister for Status of Women. I hope the House will forgive me for using my laptop for my notes, but I cannot stand up and I will lose my pages if I try to.
I appreciate the opportunity to speak today in support of Bill S-2, the Family Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights Act. The bill would provide the courts with a mechanism, where there currently is none, to apply matrimonial real property laws on reserves.
What does that mean? Right now, if the conjugal relationship of a couple living on reserve breaks down, one of the spouses—it is almost always the woman, who is often accompanied by children—is left completely defenceless. The spouse can be forced from the home and there is no legal recourse to protect her if the house is sold and her spouse retains all of the proceeds. The second spouse—usually the woman, as I said—is left without any financial compensation. Financial devastation is commonly, if not always, the outcome.
The spouse has little protection through the band council and no recourse through Canadian law. As a result, these women and children are often left homeless and impoverished.
This has created an unacceptable situation with first nations communities. We live in a society where most of us take the protection of our rights and property for granted. We do not even think about it. We believe that the current situation on reserve cannot continue. The time has come for action.
Of course, the biggest criticism to this bill is not its content, the problem it solves or the solution it provides. The false accusation is that there has been insufficient consultation or debate. Just this morning, the House leader of the official opposition said this bill was being shoved down people's throats. He suggested that somehow the hours, days, weeks, months and years of extensive consultation held throughout the country with first nations leaders and countless individuals do not count as consultation. For some reason, it seems that consultation only counts if someone other than the Conservative Party passes the legislation that results from that consultation.
Consultation has been held. Extensive research has been conducted, and countless hours of parliamentary discourse and debate have been extended. This is not a case of Big Brother handing down a paternalistic non-solution. This bill is a long-overdue response to an oppressed people, perhaps the most vulnerable people in the world, after generations of abuse and abandonment of women and children who, through a technical loophole, have been left unprotected by our Constitution and Charter of Rights and Freedoms. To ignore this situation is nothing but shameful hypocrisy.
Let me briefly review the comprehensive and inclusive process by which Bill S-2—
Suspension of SittingFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
The Speaker Andrew Scheer
The sitting is suspended to the call of the Chair.
(The sitting of the House was suspended at 11:32 a.m.)
(The House resumed at 11:53 a.m.)
The House resumed from May 27 consideration of the motion that Bill S-2, An Act respecting family homes situated on First Nation reserves and matrimonial interests or rights in or to structures and lands situated on those reserves, be read the third time and passed.
Sitting ResumedFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
The Speaker Andrew Scheer
The hon. member for Lethbridge has six and a half minutes to conclude his remarks.
Sitting ResumedFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
Conservative
Jim Hillyer Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Mr. Speaker, I was about to share some information about how much consultation had been conducted on this issue and how much debate had been held in the House of Commons and in the Senate.
Starting in June 2006, the government appointed a ministerial representative on matrimonial real property issues on reserves to start discussions with first nations communities to produce a report on the consultation process and ultimately to provide legislative options to address the issues.
Of course, she did not do this alone. The Assembly of First Nations and the Native Women's Association of Canada collaborated in the consultation process. Dozens of meetings were held to map out the direction and priorities that would take shape during the consultation phase. We had meetings to discuss how we would conduct the meetings. It sounds like a government project.
The Native Women's Association of Canada and the Assembly of First Nations each received $2.7 million to consult not just with leaders, but with the residents of first nations and to record their opinions on the issue. The government also made a total of $11 million available to many other first nation organizations and councils, both national and regional, to provide input into the process. These organizations included, among others, the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, the Indigenous Bar Association, the National Association of Friendship Centres and the National Aboriginal Circle Against Family Violence.
Following the process, the ministerial representative created a comprehensive 500-page report detailing the massive problems that resulted from the lack of proper on-reserve property rights for married couples, especially for women. The report made many recommendations, which now are held within the legislation before us.
I will skip a lot of this because I only have four minutes now, but the point is this. This is not the first time a bill like this has been created. Over the years, since 2006, the bill has been recreated and re-debated many times, with many first nations groups included and many expert witnesses. The legislation contains all the improvements, all the recommendations, that have been included in the debate and research.
This is the point. Process is important. In fact, how we do things is almost as important as what we do, but eventually something must be done.
As I said before in my speech, and it bears repeating, the plight of first nations in our country is our great hypocrisy. It is no secret, even though we do not often face it, that our country shoulders a collective shame for what was done to the first ancestors, then the grandparents and even the parents of first nations. Even though we did not kick them off their land as is often said, our forebearers did, and the posterity of those who were kicked off their lands still lives on the reserves into which they were corralled.
It does not matter much now who caused the countless problems that still plagues our first nations, but they are not only our friends now and our neighbours, they are fellow citizens and even our brothers and our sisters.
I for one will not and cannot standby to let petty politics still hold some of these downtrodden hostage. It is not enough to visit the prisoners, the prisoners must be set free. This may sound dramatic and like so much rhetoric that is often said in politics, it will be just rhetoric unless something is done. This bill must be passed to help protect the women and children in first nations communities.
We talk about this collective shame, about how people were kicked off their land and put into bondage, and we try to solve that problem. At the same time, if we let the people who were in bondage be held in bondage even further because for some reason the Charter of Rights and the Constitution does not apply to them, as I said over and over again, that is hypocrisy and our collective shame and it must stop.
Great effort has been made to include all people involved in the consultation process. This is a great solution for people. We cannot wait until everyone agrees that it will be to their political advantage to pass this law. It is for the people who are repressed.
I am proud to stand in favour of Bill S-2. I encourage all my colleagues in the House to support Bill S-2 and set the prisoners free.
Sitting ResumedFamily Homes on Reserves and Matrimonial Interests or Rights ActGovernment Orders
NDP
Matthew Dubé NDP Chambly—Borduas, QC
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. He did a good job of catching up despite the fact that we had to leave right in the middle of it.
He stated that it was the third time this bill has been introduced because of elections and minority governments. The fact remains that a number of associations that testified identified problems. For example, the bill does nothing to solve the resource shortage, which makes it difficult for women to access the legal aid provided for under this bill. Furthermore, Quebec’s Civil Code is different from the law elsewhere in Canada. This lack of consistency is a problem.
I would like the member to tell me why, despite three attempts, the bill still has major flaws that make it impossible for us to support it.