Yes, sure.
One of the studies I have included is a study from Statistics Canada which looked at measuring risks against women. They looked at aboriginal women, women who were born here, immigrant women, and women living in rural and urban areas. They found that education level and income have no bearing whatsoever on the risk faced by the women as to whether or not they will become victims of violence. They also found that actually immigrant woman have a lower risk of facing violence. Of course, there is a debate as to why that may be the case, but those are the statistics that are in front of you.
Given that violence against women in Canada is a Canadian issue and that education level and income level have no bearing on the risk of whether violence will take place, I appreciate the concern about sponsored immigrant women, but I'm just not sure whether this is where the focus should be in terms of imposing language requirements or imposing income requirements on spousal sponsorship. In particular, imposing a financial requirement on spousal sponsorship is not going to stop violence from happening. Rather, it would just have a discriminatory impact on who can apply to sponsor a spouse. Only those who are rich enough will be able to sponsor a spouse, and those who are poor will not be able to do that.
As to the language requirement or the education requirement, again the study doesn't show that education level will have any impact whatsoever on whether violence will take place. Rather than helping women, probably this requirement would just simply mean that fewer women will be able to come to Canada under the spousal sponsorship program because they are not able to meet the language requirement. It also sends a wrong message as if somehow the women themselves are to be blamed because if they had more education, then perhaps they wouldn't be abused, or if they spoke English, perhaps they would not be abused when in fact it has nothing to do with whether or not the abuse would have taken place.
There are other viable options for the committee to consider, and I will just name some of them.
First of all, on the conditional permanent resident regulations that came into effect in October 2012, I'm sure the committee has heard others comment on this. It actually put the lives of sponsored women in danger. Notwithstanding the exemptions that exist for cases of abuse and neglect, the reality is that many women who are abused will still be forced to choose between coming forward and reporting the abuse or staying in the abusive relationship, so that should go. Repeal that requirement and that will reduce violence.
Second, many immigrant women experience isolation due to a lack of family support. Oftentimes, in my experience serving some of these clients, the only family member they have in Canada is the husband who sponsored them, and in some cases it is the husband who is abusing them. In order to reduce the isolation, I would suggest reducing or eliminating the LICO, low-income cutoff, requirement for sponsorship in cases where women are subject to abuse.
Third, we have also seen cases where women are being sponsored within Canada by the spouse under the inland spousal sponsorship program. A lot of times the sponsorship has been revoked by the husband or the sponsor when women went to the police to report abuse. In those cases, women can seek permanent residence status under agency application, but that is completely at the discretion of the immigration officer. Even though, in theory, officers are supposed to be sensitive to the issue of violence, we have seen cases where violence has been proven and yet the women are still being denied landing in those kinds of situations. I would recommend a special program be created to address these issues to allow these women to stay in Canada in those kinds of situations.
I also think that more funding should be provided to community organizations. I agree that education is important. Resources are important. Women need to know where they can get help, and if those services can be made available in the first language they speak, it will assist these women as well, so support and settlement services for immigrant women should be maintained and should be strengthened.
Finally, I also believe, and I agree with the ministers, that employment opportunities for immigrant women will also be one way of strengthening their resolve. Many of them, because they're racialized, face additional barriers in accessing employment.
Perhaps something the government could do is to strengthen the Employment Equity Act at the federal level, but also work with the provinces to make it easier for some of these women, immigrants in general, to get recognition for their foreign credentials.
In closing, we have many ways we can protect these women. It is important to protect women from violence by ensuring that these women have access to unconditional permanent residence status without fear of removal when they report abuse and by providing them with financial, social, and familial support when they find themselves victims of violence.
Thank you.