The rationale is that we heard a number of witnesses testify that consulting women's organizations that have on-the-ground experience and experience with survivors of sexual assault...be able to formally inform the training of judges. We heard Mr. Sabourin say, “I welcome the involvement, and we want to do that at the CJC, working with NJI to involve community groups in the development” and that not consulting would be “a very bad idea”.
We also had an overwhelming number of witnesses who have experience with supporting victims of sexual assault who said that they were never consulted. Jackie Stevens, from the Avalon Sexual Assault Centre, said that they have had many experts from the community working hands-on with these issues who wanted to be involved.
Nneka MacGregor, executive director of the Women's Centre for Social Justice, said that we must include the voices of those individuals who have lived through the justice system, because it's their experience “that is actually going to change the perception and the understanding”.
We also had testimony from Marlihan Lopez, a liaison officer. She said:
It's very important with these types of initiatives that the groups on the ground that have the expertise be consulted. I see it over and over again. [These] groups aren't consulted, then these projects are pushed forward, and finally they don't address the realities that victims, or survivors face in sexual assault.
Finally, Jeremy Dias, executive director of the Canadian Centre for Gender and Sexual Diversity, said that civil society should not be left out of the conversation. “Step one is opening the doors so we can engage with them in having that conversation.”
The subamendment that I propose would be to formally bring those organizations in to shape on the type of sexual assault training that judges receive.