Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I want to begin by thanking Ms. Riendeau for her outstanding work at Regroupement des maisons pour femmes victimes de violence conjugale. In my riding, Vaudreuil—Soulanges, there is a group called Hébergement La Passerelle that does remarkable work. On their behalf and from all citizens in my community, thank you.
I would like to say the same to you, Ms. Martin, and to you, Ms. MacDougall, for your exceptional work.
In a brief submitted by the Canadian Women's Foundation to the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security in May 2018, they highlighted the fact that, “In Canadian households, the presence of firearms in the home is the single greatest risk factor for lethality of domestic violence.” It's something that overwhelmingly impacts women, because 80% of those killed by intimate partner violence are women.
Ms. Martin, I appreciate the statistics you gave in your opening remarks that showed that this actually increased since 2019 and I appreciate your sharing that with us.
I also want to thank all three of you for sharing your amendments and the changes you suggested in your opening remarks.
What I'm hoping you can do—and I'm going to give you each 45 seconds to a minute to do this—is to touch upon one or two aspects of this bill that are going to make a difference. A witness who appeared this morning said that this will do nothing at all to combat violence against women and violence related to guns in Canada. Based on your experience and your expertise, if you could choose one or two things in this bill that you know will make a difference, what would those be and why?
I don't know who to start with.
Perhaps I'll start with you, Ms. MacDougall. I see you nodding your head, and I apologize for putting you on the spot.