Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen members of Parliament, good morning.
My name is Madeline Lamboley and I am a Ph.D. candidate in criminology at the University of Montreal. I recently submitted my doctoral thesis on the forced marriage of immigrant women in Quebec.
Today, I am here to share my point of view on the criminalization of forced marriage. I thank you for this initiative.
My doctoral thesis is based on a qualitative approach built around “life story” interviews with 11 women between 18 and 50 who were living in, had been in or had been threatened with a forced marriage in Quebec. I completed that with 17 “experience narrative” interviews with key information providers from the police, the justice system, and the social and community environments.
During the preparation of my thesis, I wondered if the specific criminalization of forced marriage would be a solution.
Analysis of my data shows that despite the great vulnerability of the victims of forced marriages who live in Canada, for the moment, the express criminalization of this type of conjugal union does not appear to be a solution.
Why? There are four reasons.
We have to understand before we act. Several key information providers agree that before criminalizing forced marriage, it is essential to understand all aspects of it and to agree on a common definition, first of all, so that we all have the same reading of the issue. However, we have not yet reached that point.
Moreover, there are virtually no quantitative data on the topic; we are not aware of its true scope. Forced marriages exist in Quebec and in Canada, but in what numbers? We need an answer to that question before undertaking any kind of action to legislate or take other measures. There are other avenues that make it possible to criminalize nefarious behaviours that arise in forced marriages, however.
Even if this gave the authorities greater power to act, Canada does not seem ready to take such a measure. In fact, is it even necessary? Does the state not already have all of the necessary legal resources to intervene? Canada is not without means to face this issue already, to the extent that it is possible to intervene legally under the criminal system to sanction reprehensible actions that arise in a large number of situations in forced marriages (threats, aggression, sexual assault, kidnapping, confinement, false marriages, extortion, intimidation, battery, murder, attempted murder, and so on); these however are not specific only to forced marriages.
There remains a host of more insidious situations that have already been well-documented, and that can be the hallmark of forced marriages: exploitation, domestic servitude, and even in some extreme cases, slavery. These situations are much more difficult to bring to justice, or even to social awareness. We have to strengthen the legal measures that are already in place.
I asked myself whether, in the context of immigration and in the absence of a specific international instrument to protect victims of forced marriage, it would be relevant to consider the application of the Protocol to prevent, suppress and punish trafficking in persons. The protocol was ratified by many countries, including Canada. Its purpose is to implement measures to ensure the physical safety of persons and examine the possibility of legislative means to allow the victims to stay in the country temporarily or on a permanent basis. Since we have no specific sanctions, the protocol would be one possible solution to explore.
If the express criminalization of forced marriage is not advisable and cannot be considered, could forced marriage be added to the conjugal context to form an aggravating factor when violence rears its head; this could be considered in tandem with exploitation.
We have doubts as to the deterrent effect of a criminal law. Several authors, including Ms. Rude-Antoine and Mr. Neyrand, whose opinion I share, have wondered about the feasibility of prohibiting forced marriage. The legal texts are numerous. We are not convinced that this legislative action will be effective and will correspond to the social reality of these forced marriages it wishes to combat.
The difficulty with this penalization objective is twofold. On the one hand, we have to be able to identify the passage from a suggestion, the proposal of an arranged marriage, to the imposition that is the execution of a forced marriage; moreover, that penalization should not stigmatize the parents, the families and their culture of origin, as that may encourage even more young women to grant their consent in spite of themselves.
Who will be affected by criminalization? The parents, the husband, the in-laws, the extended family and the community.
Since some European countries criminalized the practice, how many cases have been prosecuted or have resulted in a sentence? That is the challenge of applying legislation that prohibits a harmful practice.
The legislation is not useless, but eradicating forced marriage requires more than just legal tools. Moreover, it might place an additional burden on the victim. A number of individuals interviewed—both key informants I met, and women—doubt the deterrent effect of a specific criminal provision for forced marriages. Canadian society would express its disagreement with such a practice through the legislation, but could it then protect the women who are its victims? Many people agree that the legislation would further stigmatize the victims who are already vulnerable enough.
Bill S-7 shows that the government is paying attention, and I commend it on that. However, the legislation lacks nuance and could have the opposite effect from that intended by isolating victims of forced marriage a bit more, even exacerbating the violence they are experiencing. In my opinion, the bill is not based on a proper understanding of the complex issues involved in violence against women and children in the context of honour.
If the criminalization approach is not possible at that point in our knowledge, what potential solutions could be implemented or simply used by Canada and Quebec to help victims?
The bill provides that the legal age of marriage be raised to 16, but why not instead bring it up to 18, the age of majority? Moreover, the marriage must be a civil one. In France, for instance, the marriage must be celebrated in a civil ceremony by the appropriate authority before being celebrated in a religious ceremony. That could be an approach to consider. There is a problem related to officiants. A father or mother can become officiants just by signing a form. That causes a lot problems.
Authorities have to educate, train the communities and raise public awareness. They definitely have to provide support services and implement a national action plan encouraging a concerted effort among community institutions and organizations. There needs to be a protocol for fighting against forced marriage. The authorities could also implement a repository for gathering disturbing information as France did; have a policy—