Thank you.
Honourable Chairperson and members of the committee, thank you for the invitation today. It's very nice to meet you all.
Today we are here on the traditional, unceded, unsurrendered territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people. I acknowledge our shared responsibility and my personal responsibility to work to address historical and ongoing colonialism, racism and oppression of indigenous peoples. This includes working together to dismantle the criminalization of indigenous peoples and learn from the resilience and vibrancy of diverse indigenous cultures.
As you may know, I have been recently appointed. I am so thankful for this opportunity to serve victims and survivors of crime in Canada. I am brand new, just three weeks in, so please be patient with me as I get caught up to speed.
I would like to thank the members of this committee for the tireless work on justice and human rights that you do. I know that there have been many recent decisions by the Supreme Court of Canada as well as government and private members' bills that require your attention.
The Office of the Federal Ombudsman for Victims of Crime is an independent resource for victims in Canada. Our office was created to help the federal government honour its commitments to victims of crime. Victims contact our office to learn about rights under federal laws, to learn more about federal services available to them or to make complaints about any federal agencies or federal legislation dealing with victims. We help to problem-solve and find solutions when victims' rights have not been respected, and we collaborate with stakeholders across the country to identify emerging trends or issues that affect victims of crime. Based on this work, when appropriate, we offer recommendations to federal agencies and help to ensure that victims' concerns are considered in the legislative process.
When the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in R. v. Brown that section 33.1 of the Criminal Code was unconstitutional, it had immediate and adverse effects on survivors of violent crime. The wording of the law and the language used by the SCC are difficult to understand and contributed to widespread misinformation about highly traumatic and personal experiences in the lives of Canadians.
Organizations supporting women who have experienced gender-based violence and many young survivors of sexual assault, in particular, believed that the government had allowed space for intoxication to become an allowable defence for violence imposed on the bodies of women and girls. This belief caused considerable distress, resurfacing of traumatic memories, and protests in high schools where young survivors shared personal experiences, sometimes without the resources to do that safely.
As ombudsperson for victims of crime, I believe that there was an urgent need to act, and I am thankful for the way the whole government moved quickly to respond to the SCC ruling. I also appreciate the clear messaging from the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, the Honourable David Lametti, when he said repeatedly, “Being drunk or high is not a defence for committing criminal acts like sexual assault.” I think that this showed empathy and it reflects a hopeful posture to act on other concerns raised by victims of crime.
I also understand that the unconventional approach to passing this legislation before it could be fully considered and weighed in our parliamentary committees has created an obligation to meaningfully engage in that process now.
The full continuum of intoxication caused by alcohol and other substances is a very present reality in many of the contexts that lead to criminal victimization. In the messy realities of these situations, people can slip in and out of their awareness of their behaviour and their impact on others, making it difficult to establish objective criteria about culpability. Other witnesses will explain that the defence of extreme intoxication is predominantly advanced by men perpetrating violence against women. As the Government of Canada launches its national action plan to end gender-based violence, I urge you to consider this legislation through that lens.
Our office has a few simple recommendations that I will leave you with. Number one is clear language. Continued misinformation about this legislation will have consequences on women and girls. The wording of Bill C-28 is complicated, and we recommend continued and clear messaging to the public.
The second recommendation is meaningful consultation. The diverse perspectives of Canadians emerging in the committee need to shape the legislation. We recommend making revisions to the legislation if significant concerns are identified.
Number three is monitoring. Intoxication is very common in contexts of violent crime, and you've heard significant concerns from women’s groups and survivors about the possibility of this defence being abused. We recommend a formal review after two years to evaluate how the defence has been used in court.
Thank you again for your time. I look forward to the conversation.