Certainly, we need to start on the ground. Organizations such as CanAge and others have done a brilliant job of educating the police on how to investigate these types of offences in a careful, considered and victim-focused fashion.
We need to ensure that the police who prosecute these offences receive that training. Once a charge is laid, the Criminal Code provides for protections for claimants from accused persons. There are bail conditions and release conditions that require that an accused person not contact directly, or indirectly, an alleged victim, not be within 100 meters, and not be in restricted areas. All of these protections come into play once a charge is laid. The first step would be to help these organizations train the police.
The federal government has a role to play in legislating mandatory minimum standards for long-term care facilities, and in creating centres of excellence where police forces and Crown prosecutors from across the country can be trained in order to have uniform tools, applications and a knowledge-base. All of these are within the federal mandate. All of these would increase accountability for elder abuse, which must be stopped.