Thank you.
Welcome to the witnesses.
I should say that we support the broad intent of the bill. This argument that it doesn't happen with enough frequency is not something that I've ever subscribed to. We have concerns with specific areas, and we also have a concern with the title. I don't want to take time asking questions about the title, but my position is that they should take away the word “cultural” because these practices apply in many different communities or cultures or religious groups. Some groups, I think notably the Muslim community, have taken the word cultural as an offence or an attack on them. Certain communities have seen it that way.
If you just look at the costs and benefits, the cost of using the word “culture” is that certain Canadians feel alienated or attacked because of it. That's a negative. I don't see any positive. I don't see that word adds anything to the content of the bill. I certainly believe that word should be removed.
In terms of the content, I think in one way it maybe doesn't go far enough, and in another way it may go too far, or at least it requires clarification. On the first point, the marriage of 16- and 17-year-olds, my understanding is that parental consent is sufficient, but the parents might be part of a forced marriage, so a parental consent for a 16-year-old to marry might just be that the parents are complicit in the forced marriage, which this law is trying to prevent. I guess my question is whether there are other things the law could do to set other conditions—in conjunction with provinces, presumably—to have some further safeguard against forced marriages beyond the consent of parents.
One of the lawyers could answer, perhaps.