Good afternoon, Ms. Khalid and members of the justice committee. Thank you for having me today and for providing me with the opportunity to discuss a topic I am incredibly passionate about: coercive control as a framework for understanding and addressing violence.
I am the executive director of Sagesse Domestic Violence Prevention Society, which is a provincial organization in Alberta that supports individuals, organizations and communities to disrupt the structures of violence. I am also a graduate student at the University of Salford in Manchester, United Kingdom, working towards the completion of my master's degree in the psychology of coercive control.
Coercive control is a pattern of behaviour that seeks to strip away a person's freedom and their sense of self. It is a liberty crime. Focusing on coercive control as a criminal offence is crucially important in devising measurements of criminality, because it reflects the multiple tactics of coercion and control employed by perpetrators of violence.
The current framework of criminal offence does not reflect the experiences of victimization or the harm perpetrated to victims of domestic violence. This is evidenced by high attrition rates, sentencing data and low conviction rates in cases of domestic violence.
Relationships with coercive control result in greater injury to the victim and are characterized by more frequent and severe violence that's less likely to desist. The increase in severity makes the need for legal intervention in cases of coercive control even more imperative, in order to interrupt the escalation and frequency of abuse.
Because the current criminal framework to address domestic violence does not take into account coercive control, the justice system is not viewed by many victims or victims' advocates as a tool to address domestic violence in society. This is evident not only through the low conviction rates and high attrition rates I already mentioned, but also through the fact that less than a quarter of victims of domestic violence report it to the police.
It should be noted that when the justice system in the United Kingdom changed its working definition of domestic violence—years before the legal system changed to make coercive control a criminal offence—calls to the police increased by 31%. This is because once the definition changed to encompass the true experience of the severity of coercive control, victims believed that the abuse they were experiencing would be addressed by the police and, by extension, the courts.
Because our current criminal justice system focuses only on events that are deemed criminal offences, it ends up excluding many other threats that make up ongoing coercive control, blinding the justice system and leaving it without the tools to actually address violence in our society.
I've been working in the domestic violence sector for over 20 years, and I believe that including coercive control as a criminal offence is a game-changer. It's going to give the justice system the opportunity to intervene in violence before it escalates. Coercive control is present in 95% of relationships where there's domestic violence. It's one of the best indicators of lethality. If the police and justice system have the ability to address coercive and controlling behaviour criminally, it's going to allow them to prevent the escalation of domestic violence.
It will change how society views domestic violence. If our justice system puts the lens of coercive control on domestic violence, it will create a discourse in the public in which all Canadians will understand that violence is much more than a black eye and that people stay in violent relationships because of a loss of personal agency. It will destigmatize domestic violence, allowing us as a society to do a better job of addressing violence.
It will save our system of care—non-profit agencies, police and health—and businesses money. It's way more economical to intervene before the domestic abuse becomes physical. It allows the perpetrators to get support before the lethality of their crime increases. It breaks the stigma around domestic violence, allowing both victims and perpetrators to get support.
Domestic violence is at epidemic rates in Canada and is rapidly increasing due to the effects of COVID. We need to improve and innovate our approach to addressing and stopping the violence before it escalates. Making coercive control a criminal offence in Canada is our opportunity to do this.
I'd like to end by making four recommendations. The first is that we immediately implement a new nationwide working definition of domestic violence to reflect coercive and controlling behaviour. The second is that the Canadian criminal law be changed to reflect the criminality of coercive and controlling behaviour. The third is that support be provided for nationwide training for police, judges and Crown prosectors on the framework of coercive control and domestic violence. The last is that we appoint a coercive control and abuse commissioner for Canada, with expertise in all forms of abuse, to provide public leadership and expertise to legislators about abuse issues and to play a key role in overseeing and monitoring the provision of abuse responses with a focus on coercive control.
I want to take this opportunity to thank Mr. Garrison for bringing forward his private member's bill and bringing attention to this issue, and I want to thank the committee for allowing me the opportunity to present to you today on an issue that is so important to me and for all Canadians.
I look forward to the opportunity to answer any questions and to continuing this dialogue.