Justice Committee on Oct. 29th, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

We'll discuss that during committee business after we finish with the minister on the main estimates. We'll come back to your concerns, Ms. Findlay, but I see your time is up now.

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

I will move to Mr. Maloney.

You have five minutes, sir. Please go ahead.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I appreciate the opportunity.

Minister, thank you for taking time out of what we all know is a very busy schedule in order to answer our questions.

I have a couple of questions. My first question relates to access to justice and to judges in particular. As everybody knows, we just completed our discussion on Bill C-3 earlier this week. One takeaway from it is that I believe we are all united in our view that we have the greatest court system in the world, and nobody questions the integrity of our court system.

As an aside, I was glad to hear your answer with respect to the process for appointing judges, because I believe the same applies with respect to our appointment process. Everybody believes in the integrity of the process, and when people do question it publicly, it is likely done only as a political jab meant to get some headlines and it's not a genuinely held belief. That's just my perspective.

In any event, on the access to justice front, which is important to all of us, we need access to a fair and equitable justice system, as has been mentioned today, and you've mentioned it in your opening remarks. In my view, one of the greatest barriers to access to justice is the number of judges we have available. Access to justice has different challenges in different parts of the country, but in Ontario, where I'm from, and in Toronto in particular, the wait time to get a case heard is extraordinary.

We're familiar with the Jordan case and the impact it has had. Family law matters are delayed. Civil matters are a third cousin in this issue. In Toronto or other jurisdictions nearby, you could be waiting up to two years to get a trial date, after you've listed it for trial and the case was already a few years old, and then you'd get close to the date only to find out that we don't have enough judges or enough courtrooms.

Has there been consideration given to increasing the complement of superior court judges across the country? I realize there's a coinciding cost to that, which is partially a provincial responsibility because court services and courthouses are matters that the province deals with.

I have a follow-up question related to that too. Sorry for the long introduction.

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

James, thank you for your question, and thank you for your work on Bill C-3 and for your committee work.

The short answer to the question is “Yes, continually”. There's always back-and-forth between the federal government and the provincial governments with respect to the number of judges. These are the federally appointed judges at the superior court level across Canada. You're right to say that there is a shared cost with the provinces, because provinces have the responsibility for the administration of justice. Requests come and get evaluated, and that's pretty much a continual process, year over year.

However, I agree that we need to address delays in the justice system and I share your observation that because of Jordan, the criminal stuff goes first and the civil stuff gets relegated. We've worked hard in my ministry, as did Minister Wilson-Raybould before me, to try to address the Jordan decision and make the system more efficient and effective through Bill C-75 and other provisions.

You're right that it would mainly be for the provinces to try to figure out a way to make sure that civil cases move forward more quickly. That falls within their jurisdiction, but we need to continue looking at solutions on all fronts, because you're right to identify the waiting times as being too long.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Thank you, Minister. I'll go to my follow-up question.

COVID has caused the court system to adapt in ways that they've been thinking about for a long time but didn't get around to. One of them is the use of the kind of technology that we're using right now. There are many proceedings that are being done by Zoom and other technology, which means that lawyers don't have to leave their offices and courtrooms and whatnot are not required. That might provide an opportunity, because you could have more judges without necessarily needing more courtrooms. At this point, it's too early to tell what the cost of COVID is on the court system, but I know that some of it has been used for technology.

Is there thought being put towards making some of that permanent and building it into the conversation raised in my previous question?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

The short answer is yes. It's a subject of discussions with my provincial and territorial counterparts during COVID, which will continue, as well as with the action committee and the chief magistrates from across Canada and other court administrators. We're all trying to get resources to make permanent and more efficient some of the technological changes in response to the COVID crisis. We're trying to use the situation to modernize.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Thank you, Minister. I appreciate your short response to that.

I'm going to stop here for a second. I note that we have one round of questions left, with about 15 minutes on the clock, because we have committee business that we need to discuss with respect to the next meetings. Obviously we need to vote on the main estimates as well.

What I'm going to do is to give one round to Mr. Lewis for five minutes, Mr. Zuberi for five minutes, Monsieur Fortin for two and half minutes and Mr. Garrison for two and a half minutes. Then we will thank the minister for his attendance here today.

Mr. Lewis, you have the floor for five minutes. Please go ahead, sir.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

We certainly appreciate the minister's coming to committee today

Thank you so much, Minister.

I'm going to build on the line of questioning by Mr. Sangha with regard to legal aid. As you may or not may be aware, I'm the Ontario Conservative on the justice committee, and so I would be remiss not to bring this up.

Minister, community legal clinics across the country, particularly in Ontario, have been asking the federal government for support from the federal government. They say that COVID-19 has impacted their financial model and that without support they risk severe consequences.

For example, the Durham Region Law Association recently wrote to raise significant concerns over the shortfall that has developed. What dialogue has the minister had with his department or provincial stakeholders on this question to date?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

The short answer is, a great deal, both with Minister Downey in Ontario and between our two teams, as well as with stakeholders from across Ontario and with MPs such as you, Mr. Lewis, and also a number of MPs in my caucus led by parliamentary secretary Virani, who has been one of the loudest.

We're following this very closely. We're well aware that there are current asks of me, if you don't mind my putting it that way, that are being evaluated. Again, we're working closely with Doug Downey.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Minister.

As a supplementary question to that, legal aid organizations are raising concerns that the funding shortfall impacts their ability to help vulnerable Canadians. Does the minister expect the situation to grow worse in the coming months?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

On the one hand, I expect there to be more need. I hinted at this in a previous answer. Because of COVID, we're seeing more stress on families and businesses, and so we're going to see more recourse to legal aid on the non-criminal side. We're also going to see more on the criminal side because of intimate partner violence, and we still have the same pressures of immigration, refugees, etc.

On that side, I think this is going to continue.

The funding picture is more complicated, and it differs from province to province. I don't know that there's one response across Canada, but again, we're working closely with provincial and territorial counterparts to try to address this issue as it comes up.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Minister.

Let's switch gears now to domestic violence. I know that there has been some discussion of it this morning/afternoon, but more specifically, COVID-19 has led to a rise in domestic violence across Canada over the course of this year. What discussions have taken place within the department on this, and what actions has the department taken to address it?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

In addition to work on the legal aid questions, there has been a discussion between the department and my team with WAGE, the ministry led by Minister Monsef, which has specifically put funding in place during COVID—I mentioned the figure $19 million—to help address.... I'm sorry, it's not $19 million—that's a different figure—but it has put forward a program to help address intimate partner violence.

We are, then, aware of it. Both my department and Minister Monsef's department and our ministerial teams are working with organizations on the ground, and we work closely with our provincial counterparts in that regard as well.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

The issue of rural crime has been in the news numerous times over the past year. The minister can appreciate that in rural communities such as mine, it takes much longer for law enforcement authorities to show up.

Does the minister have a timeline for when we could see greater action on rural crime?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

This is a question that was first raised by a former Alberta justice minister, Doug Schweitzer, at a federal-provincial-territorial meeting. Since then, my deputy minister, Nathalie Drouin, and other deputies across Canada, both federal and provincial, have been working on studying that question. However, I don't have a timeline.

Deputy Minister Drouin, if you could quickly give an idea of where that work stands, I think Mr. Lewis would be appreciative.

[Nathalie Drouin]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and Minister Lametti.

Indeed, we do have a working group, co-chaired by our colleagues from Alberta, to work on rural crime. We will have an interim report to present at the next FPT meeting, which is planned for December, so we have advanced a great deal.

I cannot commit to a specific timeline right now, but I can confirm that we are progressing well with the support from Alberta.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Minister.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Thank you very much. I really appreciate that you guys are sticking to your time.

Mr. Zuberi, it's your turn, for five minutes. Go ahead.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to thank the minister for being here today.

I'll start with a question about indigenous people.

In Canada, the rate of violent victimization of indigenous people is more than double that of non-indigenous people. This is particularly concerning for indigenous women and girls.

What is your department doing to support indigenous women and girls?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Thank you for the question, Mr. Zuberi.

That is a very important issue. My department introduced a program to support indigenous women and girls. I already mentioned the family information liaison units, or FILUs, which work on the ground, providing services to the families of missing indigenous women and girls. The FILU program has been renewed for another three years.

We also work very closely with other departments specifically to provide assistance and support to women and girls. Of course, Minister Bennett is responsible for responding to the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls report, and I believe her response is expected in the next few weeks or months.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you.

My next question will touch upon the issue of sexual harassment in the workplace. I'll highlight that this is something we're seized with as a country, and have been over the last several months. Prior to COVID, there was a very robust #MeToo movement, and we'd like to have some responses about that to know what the government is doing.

Everybody, regardless of their gender or gender identity, has a right to work in a harassment-free workplace.

Can you tell us what the Department of Justice is doing to combat sexual harassment in the workplace?

I'd like you to elaborate on that, please.

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Thank you for your question.

Last year, when budget 2019 came out, I announced $50 million in funding over three years, precisely to address workplace harassment. Half of that, so $25 million, was meant to make it easier for complainants to access legal aid in cases involving workplace harassment. The other half was meant for organizations to help them provide information on the subject and raise awareness.

I announced initiatives all over the country. Organizations on the ground welcomed the funding. I hope it makes a difference. You're right when you say that people have a right to work in a harassment-free environment.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you, Minister.

I have a minute for one last question.

I'd like to touch upon Black Lives Matter. At the beginning of COVID, we saw a very robust conversation around Black Lives Matter. This led to the parliamentary Black caucus sending a letter to the government asking for movement on the file. We also are seeing many concerns around indigenous people.

Can you please inform us about what your ministry is doing with respect to racialized Canadians, Black Canadians and indigenous peoples?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Thank you very much for that important question, Sameer.

There is systemic racism in our justice system. We have to admit that first and foremost. There is overrepresentation of Black and indigenous peoples in our justice system. That falls directly within my mandate. The Speech from the Throne has admitted that....

And I signed that letter, by the way, in my qualities as a member of Parliament.

I believe we need to address this. It's in the Speech from the Throne. There will be measures from a wide variety of ministers and ministries and departments trying to address the overrepresentation and other issues raised by Black and indigenous and other visible minority leadership across Canada.

I look forward to being able to announce soon what's being done by the Minister of Justice.