Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to thank my colleague for that amendment. I think it provided more teeth. In the French version, however, if possible, I would like to add the word “et” after “exploitée” so that it reads “qui n'est pas exploitée et vit”. That reads better than “qui n'est pas exploitée vit avec une personne”, which sounds a bit funny to me.
In addition, I'd like to ask Ms. Levman a question about adding “proof that the person exercises control, direction or influence over the movements of that person for the purpose of exploiting them or facilitating their exploitation”. Won't that makes things harder for the police who have to collect the proof, even though the onus is reversed? Under the original clause, as soon as a person who is not exploited lives with a person who is exploited, that person is deemed to be exploiting the person being exploited, in the absence of evidence to the contrary. That is very broad, making the police's job much easier in terms of proving the offence beyond a shadow of a doubt using other methods of investigation.
So doesn't adding the words “control”, “direction” and “influence” create obstacles for police, who have to prove the offence? With the amendment, won't they have to first prove the person exercised control, direction or influence before the reverse onus can be applied?