Canadian Heritage Committee on June 11th, 2024

[Marc-Antoine Vachon]

Exactly. There is no pre-established network. We have not seen any. They are really crimes of opportunity—

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

The time is up, Martin.

Just finish your answer, Lieutenant Vachon.

[Marc-Antoine Vachon]

Crimes of opportunity that are committed by parents, uncles, aunts and so on, people who are very close to the children and cause irreparable harm.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much.

Niki, you have two and a half minutes, please.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Thank you. I have just a quick question.

Is Dr. Laidlaw still online?

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

No, Dr. Laidlaw left at about six o'clock.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Thank you for that.

My question is to you, Ms. Todd.

You spoke powerfully about the role of education, and I was hoping you could talk a bit more about the role that education can play in keeping children safe.

I know that in Finland, for example, through its KiVa program, they've done a lot of good work in terms of reducing the social rewards that bullies receive by empowering youth to withhold those rewards, effectively trusting kids to make the right decisions once given the right information and by explaining to them the harmful effects of cyberbullying and explaining consent.

What role do you think empowering youth through education should play?

[Carol Todd]

Thanks, Niki.

I have to apologize for my passion. My passion comes out as a parent and also as an educator.

I work in the third-largest school district in British Columbia, and my role as a digital literacy and online safety educator comes into play. When going out to schools or talking to parents.... If you think about it, who has the ears of children every single day? It's educators in the school system.

We work in the prevention method and then the end result of a crime being committed. We talk to kids as young as four or five years old in preschool, pre-kindergarten or kindergarten, and there's a time to talk about online safety, social and emotional learning, respect and how to interact with others. That is the core, and you build upon it year after year.

Working with a variety of teachers all over the place, we find that some teachers aren't getting it. They aren't seeing the importance. They feel that reading, writing, social studies and science are more important than teaching about digital literacy, online safety and citizenship.

We need to ensure that this is done in the schools and that we are talking to our kids and, more importantly, to parents. Parents out there are unknowing. They're handing devices to their kids as early as seven and eight years old, and then they're complaining that this or that happened or whatever. We need to educate, and we need to bring more awareness. The question is this: How are we going to do that?

My role as an educator and as a parent is to get that information out to those who need it. Yes, the tech industry and governments all need to be part of that, but this is multi-level. If you want to look at bubbles all around, there are multiple things that need to be done in this area.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Madam Chair, how long do I have left?

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have 24 seconds.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Okay.

We know some important work has happened in B.C. on this front. There's the B.C. NDP government's work around the Intimate Images Protection Act.

Ms. Todd, what lessons do you think could be learned by the federal government when it comes to B.C.?

[Carol Todd]

The B.C. government has worked really hard on this, on ensuring that there is a reporting tool someplace so that if it's not criminal, there's the civil area. If an image has been shared in public, what a targeted victim can do.... There is the tribunal, where there is counselling provided. There are mentors to help the person figure out what to do next and the steps for civil restitution. Then there are ways to get the image taken down. That is the next step in that process.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much. I'm sorry, Ms. Todd.

Go ahead, Mr. Coteau.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Considering that we have three and a half minutes left, I'd like to move to adjourn.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you.

There's a motion to adjourn. There is no debate.

Is there anyone who does not agree?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Good. Thank you.

The meeting is adjourned.