Justice Committee on June 3rd, 2021

[Heidi Illingworth]

This is not an area that comes to the attention of my office, but I understand what you're saying. We recognize that having a parent incarcerated is an adverse childhood experience, and the more adverse childhood experiences that people have growing up as they are developing, the more that can lead to negative social and health consequences down the road.

This is a concern. Part of the work that we've been doing at our office is to call for more funding for prevention of violence across Canada and preventing these sort of traumatic adverse childhood experiences from happening in the first place. We can do a lot more to prevent family violence and these experiences from happening.

I think this is where we can do work collectively to address—

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

If I may interrupt—

[Heidi Illingworth]

—families of offenders and victims.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Excuse me, but time is of the essence, Ms. Illingworth.

I understand your point very well, and I agree with you completely. However, I don't want to talk about domestic violence, because it's kind of a given. We know that if the father kills the mother, the children are collateral victims. That goes without saying, and we agree on that. I wanted to talk about the more conventional crimes, such as when a person kills someone who isn't part of their family.

I'll quickly come back to another topic before we conclude our discussion. You said earlier that victims weren't well‑informed about their rights. I think that's a concern we should have, because it's important.

Do you have frequent meetings on this subject with people from the Department of Justice Canada or Public Safety Canada? Do you frequently discuss this issue with your colleagues in other departments involved in this?

[Heidi Illingworth]

Yes, it is, and it is part of the work that has been ongoing since my office was created in 2007, but especially since the bill was passed in 2015.

Last year, we launched our progress report, highlighting what we hear from victims across the country. We just launched a recent report as well, about access to information for victims and how information is that gateway or foundational right that needs to be provided to victims, because they can't exercise their other rights.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

In the 30 seconds we have left, can you tell me what you plan to do to improve the situation?

[Heidi Illingworth]

Well, I believe that criminal justice officials must be mandated to provide it to victims. I think the bill needs to be amended to say that. That's going to make a big difference on the front line for people getting the information about their rights that they need.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

How will they get that information?

[Heidi Illingworth]

Criminal justice officials, police, Crowns, people working in the system, victims services—all across the line—have to be mandated to provide the information to victims about their rights and the services available to them.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Ms. Illingworth.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Thank you, Monsieur Fortin.

We'll now go to Mr. Garrison for six minutes.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I want to thank Ms. Illingworth for being with us today, and for all of the work th she and her office do on behalf of victims across the country, and, of course, express our apologies. When we scheduled this discussion, we had no way of knowing that we would have such a horrific discovery in Kamloops, or that the national action plan on missing and murdered aboriginal women would be released today. I'm sorry that we tore you away from that important ceremony. However, I think this is an important session that we are undertaking here, because of the lack of a statutory review.

I wonder if you could comment briefly on any communication you've had with the minister about the delay in the statutory review, and what response you had from the government as to why this review hasn't taken place.

[Heidi Illingworth]

I have discussed it with the minister, and he's well aware that it's due and he expects the House leaders to work together to set the review. At my office we've sent letters to the House leaders to request that the review take place, and I know there have been some petitions submitted to the House as well, so we're hopeful that it's going to take place soon.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

I will consider that homework assigned to me, and I hope that the rest of the members of the committee will also consider that homework, to speak to their House leaders to echo the importance of getting that review under way.

I know your report from last November, I believe, was quite comprehensive, and you made recommendations for everything from legislative amendments to very practical suggestions on how to get information out.

One of those really did catch my attention. That's your recommendation 13, where you talk about replacing the concept of restitution with the notion of reparation. I think that's a very important concept to introduce into victims' rights, and I'd like you to say a little more about what you see as the importance of this recommendation in practice.

[Heidi Illingworth]

I think it's very important to recognize that victims of crime suffer a number of losses when they're victimized. It might be financial, and their safety is impacted, their feelings of security, their overall health, their mental health.

I think certainly the right to seek restitution is important, but allowing victims to seek reparation is a broader concept. It brings more restorative practice, perhaps, into the frame. We know that being a part of restorative justice can be incredibly powerful for victims. They have an actual voice in telling the offender, those other members of the community, how this has affected them, how they have been harmed.

We want to see, because Canada has moved towards.... All the provinces and territories have endorsed the use of restorative justice, but we still don't see it widely enough available. If we had more access to such programs and communities, it would give victims far more opportunities to seek reparation, not just necessarily monetary, but also ways to adjust their safety and these other issues that I've raised.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you for that.

Certainly the victims I've met with have suffered financial losses, but the other losses are much more important to them, and their being able to have restorative justice is really what they're looking for, rather than some kind of cash settlement for the losses they've suffered.

Thank you for that recommendation. I hope we do get to it soon.

In your opening remarks you talked about services for indigenous people in particular, and this week that is certainly on everyone's mind. Your office has set a pretty high benchmark on how to involve indigenous people in the work, and I congratulate you for that.

I want to know if you have any comment on federal government victims programs generally, because what I've noticed is that there's a tendency to say, “Well, these are for victims”, and indigenous people should go somewhere else for special funding. There's a tendency to not think about indigenous people in the general programs aimed at victims.

Have you found this to be the case in your experience?

[Heidi Illingworth]

Yes, I think we certainly need to think about how we can provide more culturally competent and culturally humble services within the realm of victim services, which includes the federal government's providing funding—as through the victims fund—to agencies to hire indigenous staff so that community members feel comfortable to come forward.

We know the federal government has funded the family information liaison units, which have seen a lot of success working with families of MMIWG. In my view, because these are cultural supports that are available to do work with the families, whether it's gatherings, seeking medicine or seeking information that they need, and supporting their healing work, we need to see more of these. They need to be permanent and to be funded and more widely accessible. Let's give money to NGOs that are doing this work, to hire the diverse staff they need. There needs to be representation in all of victim services—Black, indigenous, people of colour—so that community members feel comfortable to come forward. Then we can also fund these very specialized programs as well, like the FILUs.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

How are we doing for time, Madam Chair? We have some delays going on here.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Go ahead for one more question.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

In my opening remarks, I mentioned that some members of the Canadian public suffer much higher levels of crime as victims: indigenous people, racialized Canadians, the SOGI—sexual orientation and gender identity—community, a term I use, and sex workers. I wonder whether you have seen an adequate response from the federal programs that takes into account this differential impact of crime on certain communities.

[Heidi Illingworth]

There's always room to improve and put more money here. I think I saw a comment in the House this week that $28 million has been allocated through the victims fund over the last six years around the Canadian Victims Bill of Rights. This goes to programming for the provinces and territories and NGOs. However, to me, it is not nearly enough funding to do the work that needs to be done to support communities that are overrepresented as victims, as you said. We need to provide more specialized services, and certainly we can improve that at the federal level, and at the provincial, territorial and local levels as well. It's a shared responsibility and we need to keep talking about this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Thank you, Mr. Garrison.

We'll now go to Mr. Lewis for five minutes.

Go ahead, Mr. Lewis.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks very much, Ms. Illingworth. I think this is the third time I've seen you as a witness somewhere. As usual, your testimony was very in depth and very well-thought-out, so I thank you for that.

You mentioned in your opening remarks that the system often overlooks the victims' concerns and focuses on the accused, and that too often, authorities are not trained to inform victims about the supports and resources that are available. Can you elaborate on what you have heard and how we can make changes to ensure that authorities are knowledgeable of support for victims?

[Heidi Illingworth]

Yes, sure. We have heard that victims are not always treated as such when they come forward to report crimes. We know that in the case of sexual assault, there are particular challenges with being believed when survivors come forward to report to police. We need to make sure that victims are offered the information right from the outset about their rights. They should be, first of all, informed that they have rights and, second of all, informed that there are services to support them, including restorative justice services, if they're interested in them. It's important to provide this information so that survivors have choice at the outset and can decide whether proceeding through the criminal justice system is what they want to do.

We need to ensure there's proper training for officials as well, whether it's on the front line at reporting, in the courts or at the end of the system of corrections and parole, so that at every stage, people are given the proper information they need to exercise their rights and make choices that are best for them in their circumstances.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Thank you very much for that answer.

I believe there have been situations where offenders were able to access social media and use it to post pictures and comments about their victim or victims. Do you have any thoughts on how offenders use social media to continue to harass victims?