Thank you, Chair.
I'm pleased to be speaking today as a representative of the Canadian Teachers' Federation, an organization comprising teachers' unions in every province and territory. I am a teacher with over 20 years of experience in the classroom.
I would like to acknowledge that I work and play on the unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people.
As you know, I'm here to talk about Bill C-273, a bill that seeks to repeal section 43 of the Criminal Code. With this, I need to state first and foremost that the federation fully endorses all TRC calls to action, including call to action number six. We also fully condemn any form of corporal punishment.
That being said, the federation cannot support this legislation passing unamended. The risk of unintended consequences that could make classrooms more unsafe is too great. Teachers need to be able to physically intervene in certain classroom situations. This is the reality of dealing with complex classrooms with complex needs.
I'm sharing my time today with teacher colleague Tesa Fiddler. Tesa is a member of the federation's advisory committee on indigenous education, and she's also a member of Education International's indigenous reference group, so I'm really pleased to present Tesa.