I was referring not necessarily to needing more police. I think you're right, that it's targeted. Sometimes it's very difficult to investigate and uphold sexual assault charges, and in our experience, and certainly in my experience now—I'm at the law school with Ms. Gilbert right now teaching a course around these lines—it's very clear that the ability and the will to police and protect children and women when they're in abusive situations is problematic, and that's what I was referring to.
If in fact our interest—and your interest, as you've articulated—is protection of children and youth, then I would argue that there are already provisions that we need to be focusing on implementing, not necessarily spending more time or money creating new laws that create a perception of more protection when in fact, if it's still not taken seriously at the forefront, we may not see any greater protection.
In fact this provision, as I went on to say, also creates the potential for ending up inadvertently with more young women in particular who might be in exploitive situations being criminalized if they're unwilling to testify, which is already an issue that we know exists in violent relationships to start with; that women who are for whatever reason fearful, children who are fearful to proceed after they initially report, then often will end up being charged themselves. That's the concern I was trying to raise.
Thank you.