Bill C-78 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Divorce Act, the Family Orders and Agreements Enforcement Assistance Act and the Garnishment, Attachment and Pension Diversion Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act

This enactment amends the Divorce Act to, among other things,
(a) replace terminology related to custody and access with terminology related to parenting;
(b) establish a non-exhaustive list of criteria with respect to the best interests of the child;
(c) create duties for parties and legal advisers to encourage the use of family dispute resolution processes;
(d) introduce measures to assist the courts in addressing family violence;
(e) establish a framework for the relocation of a child; and
(f) simplify certain processes, including those related to family support obligations.
The enactment also amends the Family Orders and Agreements Enforcement Assistance Act to, among other things,
(a) allow the release of information to help obtain and vary a support provision;
(b) expand the release of information to other provincial family justice government entities;
(c) permit the garnishment of federal moneys to recover certain expenses related to family law; and
(d) extend the binding period of a garnishee summons.
The enactment also amends those two Acts to implement
(a) the Convention on Jurisdiction, Applicable Law, Recognition, Enforcement and Co-operation in Respect of Parental Responsibility and Measures for the Protection of Children, concluded at The Hague on October 19, 1996; and
(b) the Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance, concluded at The Hague on November 23, 2007.
The enactment also amends the Garnishment, Attachment and Pension Diversion Act to, among other things,
(a) give priority to family support obligations; and
(b) simplify the processes under the Act.
Finally, this enactment also includes transitional provisions and makes consequential amendments to the Criminal Code.

Bill C-78—Time Allocation Motion

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his good wishes. I have enjoyed our exchanges under past guises.

I will do two things. First, I readily admit that Concordia has a much better football team now than McGill, which has not been good, frankly, since I was a law student, and that was a long time ago. Second, I thank him for his reference to a person who has been a role model to me, the Hon. Justice Peter Cory. Justice Cory is a virtuous, upstanding person who has been a public servant in Canada and remains someone who I look up to.

I assure the hon. member that I feel comfortable advancing the bill in this manner. Canadians have had a great number of opportunities, not just in this parliamentary process in which they have reached out to their members and to committee and have participated with expertise as well as with personal stories. They have also had 20 years in order to advance their opinions on how reform should happen.

Therefore, we are following largely the voices we have heard over the last 20 years, and it is time to push this across the finish line

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Madam Speaker, I feel compelled to rise to defend the McGill Redmen football team, and to avoid a Tory attack ad tomorrow, saying that the minister denigrated McGill.

However, as the minister stated, the committee heard from over 50 witnesses and made numerous amendments. Does the minister believe that the work of the committee enhanced the bill and allowed it to move forward more rapidly as a result of the committee having brought forward the ideas of Canadians who came before it?

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Mount Royal for his leadership on the committee.

A number of important amendments were brought forward at the committee stage. One of them was directly the result of interventions from the hon. member for Mount Royal, introducing official language rights, which was an additional engagement that I made when I presented the bill at third reading. Amendments were also brought forward to protect victims from family violence by explicitly providing that parties may apply to a court to waive or change relocation notice requirements. There were amendments to ensure clarity and reinforce the best interest of the child as well as to clarify factors not to be considered in the best interest of the child. A great deal of good work was done at the committee stage.

Again, as minister, I am very comfortable moving forward with the legislation in this manner.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Madam Speaker, this is the first time I have risen with the Minister of Justice in his seat as the minister. I would like to congratulate him on his appointment, but it is disappointing that on his first bill, there is a time allocation motion.

The member for Calgary Shepard and other Conservatives have mentioned that the Liberals have used time allocation 56 times. That does not come anywhere near the 100 times the Conservatives did in the last Parliament, so there is a little hypocrisy here.

Despite the fact that I am a supporter of the bill and I agree with the minister that great progress is being made, there is an importance to debate in the House that gets missed through time allocation. Members might want to speak at third reading members, like myself who represents both my constituents, some of whom have concerns, and who represents families that are quite diverse. However, sometimes we have other responsibilities in committee or other things we have to do so we cannot get here on that one day when there is a debate, especially when the government House leader has shortened the amount of notice we have of when things will be debated.

It is important that we have debates so all members can represent their constituents, can represent all parts of Canada and, in this case, represent diverse families in Canada.

In my case, I would have liked to have been able to speak so I could reassure those constituents, who have expressed opposition, of the reasons why I support this important reform. In the rush to get things through, sometimes we miss the importance of that debate and the timing of those debates so all parts of the House can be heard.

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his good wishes. His points are well taken. In an ideal world we would be able to have debates which would last forever and in which every member who wanted to speak, at the time they wanted to speak, would be able speak.

The practical reality is that this is an important bill. It embodies the kind of diversity that the hon. member has fought for throughout his whole career. We are comfortable with it substantively. We are comfortable with the answers he will be able to give his constituents and his interlocutors, whether they agree with him or not. This is important, positive legislation that we need to move forward.

I recall as a law student in the late 1980s, studying the Divorce Act recently reformed in 1985, and not a whole lot has been done since then. This is important moving forward.

[Leona Alleslev, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Madam Speaker, this is an important philosophical debate, particularly coming from the Minister of Justice.

Anyone knows that justice is about due process. It is about the structure that we put in place for a trial, for a jury to review things and then for a bill to come into law.

The minister used the argument that this legislation was overly debated at committee, that amendments were made. That is the role of committee to debate amendments, but that does not in any way detract from the purpose of debate in the House.

Then the minister used the argument that the bill was 20 years coming. Clearly then perhaps the legislation should have been brought in earlier. However, by no means does that support the argument for shortening the period of time it is debated at each stage in the House of Commons. It undermines the very purpose of the House of Commons. If we do not need time to debate an important bill in the House of Commons at each phase, then what is the purpose of us being here?

The minister is focusing on the area of consensus, but, again, that is not the point of debate in the House of Commons. It is around those things on which we do not agree.

How can the minister justify shortening the important process of time and the very nature of debate on such important legislation such as the Divorce Act.

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, the intellectual coherence around the bill, the intellectual importance and the practical and ethical importance of the bill is about the best interests of the child and about the benefits that it would bring to families by protecting the best interests of the child, by protecting the ability in many cases of a spouse, who often happens to be the female in a traditional relationship, to get access to resources on settlement. These kinds of measures have been long called for by experts in the field, and they justify moving forward as we are doing.

The legislation supports the ability to reduce poverty. It supports the ability to improve access to justice, coupled with the move toward unified family courts in a number of different provinces, such as Alberta.

The legislation would help, in a tangible way, families, children in particular and spouses in passing through a very difficult period in their life.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Madam Speaker, let me try again. Hopefully, this time, I will be able to make myself understood and the minister will not talk to me about the merits of the bill in his answer. That is not the purpose of the 30 minutes that have been allocated for discussion. This is a procedural debate. I would like the minister to tell me why it is so important or urgent to impose time allocation on a bill for which there is such broad support. Surely there are other ways to come to an agreement between parties.

The work that was done in committee is one thing. The work that must be done in the House is another. We were all elected to do that work. If the government wants to take away our opportunity to debate a bill, there should at least be a discussion among the parties, which does not seem to be the case.

Why is the government imposing time allocation rather than negotiating with the leaders of each party, for example?

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, I once again thank my hon. colleague for his question.

I want to point out that members have had ample time to debate this bill in the House of Commons at first and second reading, and a lot of work was done in committee. Members had ample opportunity to participate in this process, either here in the House or in committee. They had ample time to consult their constituents and to read experts' opinions on the subject.

They had the opportunity to participate in debates and in the development of the bill. We are at a point where we need to move forward.

[Todd Doherty, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Madam Speaker, I find it interesting, just entering into the conversation now, that the hon. minister stands up and talks about how there has been ample time to consult our constituents.

With that, I would like to bring up a constituent, somebody for whom I have been tirelessly advocating. She is Shelley Beyak, whose children, Liam and Mia Tarabichi, were kidnapped by their father, Shelley's ex-husband. The Prime Minister refuses to intervene in this case.

How does the hon. minister, who is new on this file, rationalize the comments today about speeding up a piece of legislation when he and his Prime Minister are failing to act to bring home Liam and Mia Tarabichi, a situation this bill actually touches on? As well, another piece of legislation, Bill C-75, actually lessens the charge for abduction of children under 14 and would again fall to this situation.

How does the minister rationalize his actions on this file while levying time allocation on this important piece of legislation?

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, one of the very important elements of this bill is to provide help to families in situations of family violence, and particularly to help protect the children and help the spouse or married partner who is perhaps the victim of that family violence.

There are important measures contained in this bill to help move that situation forward progressively and protectively. That is of primordial interest, and one of the reasons this bill is of such importance.

[Romeo Saganash, NDP, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Madam Speaker, I have a question for the minister. He just said that members have had ample time to discuss and debate this bill. That is all well and good.

It may be enough for a former university law professor, but mere mortals need time to come to grips with the content of what many people would consider to be a complex and complicated bill.

That being the case, how can he claim that we have had “ample time”? Those were his exact words. How can he say that?

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his question.

I said that because we have had nearly eight hours of debate in the House, on top of the work done in committee and the speeches made before the committee. During this process, MPs have had a chance to consult their constituents. The government feels we have had enough time to understand the details of the bill.

As I just mentioned, there is a consensus on the bill. That became clear during the debates in the House. We agree about moving forward.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Madam Speaker, I would like to ask the minister a substantive question on the bill itself.

One of the things the bill does is codify the factors relating to the best interests of the child, factors that the courts have regularly recognized over the last number of years. However, one factor that is missing is the recognition of the benefit to children of shared parenting. That is not say that shared parenting is desirable in all circumstances—it clearly is not—but more often than not, it is.

At committee there were a number of witnesses who brought forward compelling evidence to demonstrate that this in fact is the case. Moreover, when Parliament last comprehensively reviewed the issue of custody and access, as it did through the special joint committee of 1998, codifying the factors was one of the recommendations. This the government has done, but it was recommended to include in those factors the benefit of a shared parenting relationship.

[David Lametti]

Madam Speaker, indeed the bill places the best interests of the child first, and one of the criteria is maximal contact time with each parent. This was felt to be a better criterion than an equal parenting presumption, which has been tried and has failed in a number of other jurisdictions. The best evidence from experts was that we have chosen the better way to go forward.