Mr. Chair, according to what I understood of Ms. Moran's explanations, the section in the Canada Labour Code applies much more broadly, of course, but we are talking about a context where the person sustains a psychological or physical injury.
What is interesting in the bill on harassment we are studying now is not necessarily the impact of reprehensible behaviour, but the behaviour as such. It may happen that a sexual harassment situation is not judged according to the impact on the affected person. Our objective is to prevent that behaviour. That is one more reason to include the term “occurrences of harassment” in the definition, as my New Democrat colleague has proposed.
Do you understand, Ms. Dabrusin? You presented a good argument. The Canada Labour Code aims to determine whether the person has suffered an injury. In this case, however, we are not seeking to determine whether the harassing behaviour injured the person; the harassment as such is unacceptable and that is what we are trying to target. That is why this is indeed innovative, and a new element in the Canada Labour Code. It is the legislator's role to take this reality into account.
Our purpose is really to target harassment, and not necessarily the consequences it may entail. The law already takes the consequences of harassment into account. If a person suffers psychological or physical injuries because of harassment, we take that into account; that said, we deal with the symptom. In this case, however, we want to attack the source, i.e. the occurrence of harassment.