Citizenship and Immigration Committee on March 31st, 2015

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

We will suspend.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

We will reconvene.

For the second hour we have representatives from two departments, from the Department of Justice and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration.

I'd like to welcome Gillian Blackell, who is senior counsel of the family, children, and youth sector; Joanne Klineberg, senior counsel of the criminal law policy section; and Lisa Hitch, senior counsel, family, children, and youth sector. Good morning to you.

From Citizenship and Immigration, we have Maureen Tsai, who is the director of the admissibility branch; we have Karen Clarke, who is the deputy director of the admissibility branch; and Paul Yurack, who is legal counsel, will be joining us soon.

We've heard from the minister so there may be some technical questions that my colleagues have.

Mr. Eglinski.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you.

Thank you again for being here. Throughout my years on the force within the RCMP I spent a lot of time in remote communities. I was surprised at the time when I was doing the investigation to find out that there was no age...in Canada. I found a number of cases where we had complaints levied of young people getting involved in a marriage at the age sometimes of 14 and 15.

I'll go back. I believe it's more of a cultural practice. I'm talking about very remote and isolated communities within Canada where they really haven't progressed at the rate that the rest of us have. They're very happy with the very remote lifestyle that they live, living off the land. Their grandparents probably got married at the age of 14 and 15, and maybe their parents did, and maybe they find that's acceptable. I think that as the youth of today in Canada and across this country have more access to the computer Internet system, we definitely need an age bracket put in the act.

I wonder if I could ask Joanne if she would just clarify the real meaning behind the change in the Civil Marriage Act that will come because of Bill S-7, and the requirement for that age factor to be in there?

[Joanne Klineberg]

I will actually defer that particular question to my colleague Lisa.

[Lisa Hitch, Senior Counsel, Family, Children and Youth Sector, Department of Justice]

Thank you very much.

There is, as you point out, currently no national minimum age for marriage. This is an area that is very confusing to many people because they assume, as you point out, that there is one. The Province of Quebec is the only jurisdiction in Canada that has an actual minimum age for marriage in legislation. It's in federal legislation. The Federal Law—Civil Law Harmonization Act, No. 1 provides age 16 as the minimum age for marriage.

In other jurisdictions in Canada what happens is that there are many ages for marriage. The provinces will provide that the age of majority is the age for independent consent. Below the age of majority—for example, from 19 to 16 in some jurisdictions, or from 18 to 16—one can get married with parental consent. Where parental consent is not available, there are court orders that are available.

In many jurisdictions they then go further and provide that under 16 there are further requirements, for example a court order, or in some jurisdictions, proof of pregnancy of the female, as it says in legislation, or proof that a girl child is the mother of a live child before the marriage can take place.

What is a little bit worrisome is that if you look even further, in most of the provincial statutes there is another provision that says that even if the children marry under that age, the marriage cannot be invalidated if the marriage has been consummated, or if there was intercourse before the marriage, or if the pair have lived together as husband and wife after the marriage. Even if it's under those ages, it can't be invalidated. This is because it's within federal jurisdiction to provide the absolute minimum age or the floor age below which no marriage would be valid. That has not been provided in legislation federally and therefore the common law applies.

The common law is extremely old in this particular regard. That's why, as the minister mentioned, there's some confusion. Generally, it's interpreted as age 14 for boys and age 12 for girls. There is older case law that does go below that, but the general interpretation is age 14 for boys and age 12 for girls.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you.

Are you aware of the youngest age that we know of in Canada where something like that has taken place? You're referring basically to common law, but do we have any actual cases that come to your mind that you can explain to us?

[Gillian Blackell]

Thank you.

We have had some discussions with the provinces and territories about this issue. They've consulted their vital statistics and have looked at marriages that were registered in the provinces and territories, and the ages, over the past decade or so. There certainly are marriages under the age of 16, including 15-year-olds. In the case of Saskatchewan, there were two marriages at age 14 that were registered. There were none registered below that age, but these are still fairly young for these times.

[Lisa Hitch]

I should add that this minimum age is a capacity issue that travels with the child. If the child is ordinarily resident in Canada or a Canadian citizen, the minimum age for marriage would apply regardless of where in the world the child is married.

There are also some anecdotal reports of Canadian children being married as young as 12 for girls and 14 for boys, but none below that common law age in the last couple of decades.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you.

In regard to dealing with these forced marriages, I believe there's been some confusion here, as you've just said, about who would be charged. This bill says that people who engage or are involved in a forced marriage would be, and some people think that even the guests at such a function would be subject to charges. I wonder if I can have that clarified so people clearly understand what we're referring to in that portion.

[Joanne Klineberg]

I can address this one.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you.

[Joanne Klineberg]

The words that are included in the new offences, the verbs, if you will, are “celebrates”, “aids”, and “participates”. “Celebrates”, in the context of marriage, refers to the formalities of the marriage itself. In this particular context, in regard to someone who knowingly celebrates an early or forced marriage, it would be understood to be the actions of the official who is presiding over the ceremony itself. That's a fairly limited class of individuals.

In terms of aiding and participating, these are the types of words that are used in a variety of different criminal contexts. This is not the first time that the Criminal Code would be using “aids” or “participates” in a certain type of conduct. For instance, there's an offence of aiding a person to commit suicide. The person who commits suicide is not committing an offence, but the one who aids them to do so is.

“Participating” is also an action verb that is used in offences related to terrorism and organized crime. Any person who participates in the activities of an organized crime group or a terrorist group is also committing an offence.

These are also long-standing principles of criminal law. A person who aids another person to commit an offence can also be found guilty of that offence.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you, Ms. Klineberg.

Ms. Mathyssen has some questions.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for being here.

I appreciate your expertise and I'd like to go back to some of the questions I asked of the minister, just to get a sense of what the department has been doing. The minister said that there had been extensive teamwork with regard to the creation of this bill. I want to know, based on that and on the fact that polygamy, for example is addressed under the IRPA, to what extent you found there were polygamous families in Canada. The minister said there were dozens. I wondered how you determined that and whether you had some hard numbers in that regard.

[Maureen Tsai, Director, Admissibility Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

Thank you for the question.

I believe the minister spoke to the fact that this is something we have seen on an anecdotal basis. We don't have studies that would give us the numbers of polygamous families, but we have heard through consultation. For example, the minister held consultations over the summer. He had round tables in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver on this subject, and he spoke to stakeholder organizations that work with victims of early and forced marriages. The issue of polygamy was raised specifically, and again, while they didn't give specific numbers, certain stakeholders acknowledged that it is an issue and that it happens.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you.

I want to come back to the point about unintended consequences with regard to a situation in which polygamy is discovered and some of the family is deported and there are consequences for children who may be born here. In your discussions, what did you hear from organizations or from groups with regard to the potential harm of deporting some of the family and leaving some here, or departing all members of the family?

[Maureen Tsai]

To my knowledge that issue was not raised specifically. Certainly it is an issue that has been raised by stakeholders in the legislative process. As our minister indicated, the framework of IRPA sets out very specific inadmissibilities, and those inadmissibilities are very clear. However, our law also gives us a number of facilitative mechanisms that can be used on a case-by-case basis. For example, we do have the ability to use humanitarian and compassionate considerations, and humanitarian and compassionate considerations do consider, for example, the best interests of the child.

The situations in question would be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. Generally officers look at the benefit of allowing someone to remain in Canada versus the risks of allowing them to remain here.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Okay, and you're referring to already existing laws instead of to Bill S-7.

[Maureen Tsai]

That's correct.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

So there are already existing laws that provide protection.

[Maureen Tsai]

Certainly, and this is within the broader framework. As I said, polygamy would be a new inadmissibility, but the other provisions that we already have in the act could be applied on a case-by-case basis.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you very much.

One of the things the minister referred to was help and support with regard to addressing those who are harmed unintentionally. I'm wondering what consultations by various departments have determined with regard to providing additional safe and affordable housing, investing in counselling, and helping often very traumatized people to navigate the system, particularly if they've been criminalized. Have there been discussions, and to what degree is the government planning to provide those supports now?

[Gillian Blackell]

Thank you for the question.

If I may, the Department of Justice has been looking at these issues for a number of years and has held seven sector-specific round tables or workshops with police, crown prosecutors, victim services workers, child protection workers, shelter workers, and academics to talk about some of the gaps, challenges, and promising practices in dealing with this wide range of harmful cultural practices, if you will, or what the UN will sometimes call “customary practices”. As a result we've also funded a number of projects.

In 2013, we held a letter of intent for projects to respond specifically to forced marriage, which resulted in half a million dollars in funding over three years for four projects, including for SALCO for awareness raising, training, and risk assessment. So we fund some of the work of the key service providers through that program.

Status of Women Canada has also funded over $2.8 million for early and forced marriage, and honour-based violence-related community-based projects. They had a specific call for proposals in 2012 on honour-related violence. At the federal level we cannot directly fund some of these services, but we can fund NGOs and other community-based organizations that provide these services. This is something we have been doing for number of years and will continue to do.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Thank you.

Can you comment on the realities? You talked about projects and proposals. Is there something concrete? For example, do we have new housing, or housing that's been made available so those who are unintentionally impacted can find safe housing?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Be very brief, if you can. We're running out of time.