My comments today will focus on just two aspects relating to the sponsorship program: the conditional permanent residence period of two years and its impact on women in domestic abuse situations, as well as the proposed requirement that sponsored female spouses be able to speak one of our official languages.
The government's objective of protecting women from barbaric crimes is commendable. But requiring women to speak one of the official languages does not address the source of the problem. Unfortunately, this new requirement will discriminate against women from certain countries and subject them to shameful consequences. It will also separate families, preventing women in their child-bearing years from starting a family and, in some cases, from having one at all.
Learning a language is not an easy, straightforward or fast process. I would submit that this new requirement violates the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women. What's more, it's an attack on the family and women's rights.
The fact is that the new rule will have no effect whatsoever on many women who come from countries in northwest Africa where honour crimes and forced marriages exist. The reason is that they already speak French.
In addition, there is no research showing that the ability to speak English or French shields women from domestic abuse situations. Resources to help women are what is needed.
In my legal practice over the years, I have seen a great deal of women suffering from domestic abuse. Many of them were from the United States, Canada and even France, just to name a few. They were often well-educated women with careers. However, they were socially isolated, and seeking out support and helping themselves was a challenge.
Violence is a complex problem that won't be solved by learning one of the official languages.
Furthermore, there is absolutely no doubt that Latin, Asian and European women who don't speak English or French and who come from countries where forced marriages and honour crimes don't exist, will be separated from their families and discriminated against unnecessarily, under the proposed requirement.
It's also quite conceivable that some women could face enormous pressure from their husbands to learn English or French quickly so they can be sponsored. And that could cause conflict in families and make women even more vulnerable.
If the objective is to prevent barbaric acts, why not take a targeted approach? I suggest that the government examine the problem directly at its source. Who are the women most at risk of falling victim to an honour crime? What support and information programs are available to those women upon arriving in Canada or before they are sponsored?
Would it be possible for the government to prevent domestic abuse by educating men and women on what constitutes violence against women under the Declaration of the Elimination of Violence against Women, adopted in 1993? According to that declaration, violence can be verbal and leave no physical trace.
Women who are already in extremely vulnerable situations should not be forced to file a police report and further endanger themselves because of the two-year conditional permanent residence period. The conditional two-year period makes women who are victims of domestic abuse more vulnerable, despite the exception put in place by the government. In fact, these women are often asked to provide evidence that they are experiencing domestic abuse. In some cases, what the government is trying to achieve will actually make the abuse these women endure worse, making them even more vulnerable.
The exception in the act should be interpreted very broadly so as to respect the definition of violence in the 1993 declaration, so as to include psychological and verbal violence. Article 1 of the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women states that:
[...] the term “violence against women“ means any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.
A woman should not have to tolerate shouting, insults and psychological and verbal mistreatment, and should not have to prove this mistreatment in order to remain in Canada. The current law puts the sponsored woman between a rock and a hard place.
This problem existed before the advent of the two-year conditional residency. Indeed, women who were being sponsored were often victims of family violence. They could then ask to remain in Canada on humanitarian grounds or be entitled to an exception. I have had some of these women as clients. They had to prove that they had lodged a complaint with the police or that they had marks of physical violence. It was very complicated and traumatizing for them.
Realistically speaking, it has to be said that lodging a complaint with the police can sometimes make violence against certain women worse. In Quebec, I saw cases where following complaints to the police, violent husbands hunted these women down, and tracked them right to the shelters for abused women that are supposed to be anonymous and have secret locations.
That said, my conclusion is that the conditional residency provision prevents these spouses from giving each other a chance to reconcile and undergo therapy, but does not necessarily protect the institution of marriage as well as judges who give couples some time to change their minds. In real life, sometimes couples quarrel. Certain women will forgive acts of violence, that are then not repeated.
In conclusion, I submit that in sponsorship cases, families deserve as much protection from legislators as do other families. Once I saw a young couple with a newborn at my office. The mother had postpartum depression.