One thing we need to do is to look at a question that has been raised at this committee before, which is if you leave it to individual groups representing their communities to record and analyze the data, there is perhaps a chance that the data or the analysis will be somewhat skewed.
I think the important thing is that there be a way of collecting the data and sharing it both between government and affected communities and between all affected communities themselves, so that we can make sense of it. This is one reason we suggest that there could be an opportunity for a stakeholder forum or a council that involves government, parliamentarians, providers and affected communities.
In our discussions with Statistics Canada, for example, we've said that while they collect hate crimes data, we also include hate incidents or anti-Semitic incidents. Is there a way that they can also collect data on incidents? I know that they're discussing that with the Canadian Association Of Chiefs Of Police, as are we. Would police forces have the capacity to do that?
We have suggested that if police encounter an incident that falls below the threshold of a crime, they should be given advice to refer the person to organizations such as ours—in the case of the Jewish community—so that we can record the data.
I hope I'm not speaking out of line here. I know Statistics Canada is also looking at the option of perhaps including a self-reporting online portal on their site that would allow people who experience something that has perhaps not been reported to the police or another organization to go online and report it, so Statistics Canada can put it into their data.