Evidence of meeting #122 for Status of Women in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was children.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Dominique Vien Conservative Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC
Thank you very much.
Madam Chair, I will share my time with my colleague. She would like to ask a quick question.
I want to thank all the witnesses who appeared before us today.
Conservative
Michelle Ferreri Conservative Peterborough—Kawartha, ON
Thank you.
I just want to take an opportunity to thank all of you today. It really is courageous. It's important testimony. I just wanted to have that on the record.
Witness 1, because this is a study on coercive control, if you're comfortable, would you mind sharing with the committee—so we can have it on record—examples of your relationship and when coercive control started to show, what it was and how it escalated?
As an Individual
It started in my dating relationship with extreme jealousy. Every phone conversation started with, “Have you talked to any guys?” I was restricted and isolated in terms of interacting with other men in my personal and professional life. It escalated to making comments on my physical appearance, feeding on that insecurity. There was one episode of him putting his hand on my neck to hold me down on a bed.
From there it escalated, whereby he was constantly monitoring my spending, calling me names, putting me down, making negative comments, telling me that the best thing that ever happened to me wasn't being a doctor but marrying him, and telling me that I don't make very much money. It was a lot of disparaging comments.
Then it escalated to me being fearful of him physically. There were very threatening, ominous looks and threatening words, so progressively I became more isolated. I was walking on eggshells and always trying to please him.
Conservative
Michelle Ferreri Conservative Peterborough—Kawartha, ON
I want to put on the record right now that this witness, whose identity is protected for her protection, is a physician. This is an educated, brilliant woman. For people watching, I think they wonder how that could happen to somebody so smart. There's this misconception out there that coercive control only happens to a certain demographic or a certain group of people. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
I guess I would give you this opportunity now to share how you think this can happen to the brightest of women.
As an Individual
I think it's because of its insidious and covert nature. I think men like this prey on women whom they admire and who they feel are respected. They like aligning themselves with those women. In order to keep them, they slowly but surely degrade their self-confidence and self-esteem. Women become ensnared and manipulated and end up being almost enamoured by this person because they feel as though they're lucky to have him. Over time, they start to believe the negative things he says.
I also feel, from a health care perspective, that women who work in areas where they're caring for others are prime targets. Look at Dr. Jennifer Kagan, for example, and her horrific experience. You're a prime target for these men because sometimes they're a little bit flawed and you therefore kind of take them under your wing like you would...in a nurturing manner.
As I said earlier, this has no boundaries. This is truly an epidemic in this country that needs to be addressed.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman
Thank you, Dominique and Michelle.
I believe the last round is with Lisa for five minutes.
Liberal
Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON
Thank you very much.
Once again, we just so appreciate this testimony today. I think it's really valuable.
We've talked about this a little bit today. There is some concern that if we criminalize coercive control, it could be used against victims. It could be used against women. Do any of you have thoughts about how to prevent that from happening? In the U.K., for example, that has been a problem, when they introduced a coercive control bill.
Heidi, you look like you have an answer.
Executive Director, Ottawa Victim Services
I don't have the answer per se, other than to say that there will need to be robust education of frontline officers, like the patrol officers responding on scene. That's a huge task that has to be part of any law that is brought forward. There needs to be training of judges. There needs to be training of Crown prosecutors. There needs to be training of all legal professionals, not just in the criminal law context, because we know that this flows over into the family law context as well.
I don't know that training is the only answer. I think there's public education work to do as well. I think it is going to be a challenge. Implementing laws is always a challenge, and there tend not to be dollars associated with that, with training and changes that need to happen, and that's a problem. We need to think about that, absolutely, because we don't want to see what happens with mandatory charging policies, for example, to continue to be a problem if coercive control is criminalized.
Liberal
Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON
That's a really important point, because how do we monitor it? How do we see if this is happening? It's usually up to the victim to understand what she is going through and then to complain about it, and how do you monitor that? How do you look for that? How do you find that?
I don't know if you have any of those answers today, but I'm interested in your perspective.
Executive Director, Ottawa Victim Services
I don't know if I have good answers to that, but on measuring the impacts of the legislation, we've called for that with the Canadian Victims Bill of Rights. It's a challenge, but it needs to happen. There needs to be some form of monitoring and some form of complaints procedure associated with this. We don't want to see a chilling effect preventing people from reporting, coming forward and seeking assistance.
Liberal
Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON
I'll open this up to Witness 1, Witness 2 or Witness 3.
Do you have any concerns or thoughts about how coercive control can be legislated? Do you foresee any impacts or do you have any fears that it could be used against you? Do you have any other thoughts about that as a law?
As an Individual
Definitely. In terms of parental alienation, right now, we're labelled as “alienators”. From the family court's perspective, we're labelled as someone who's engaged in coercive control and would, therefore, be criminally charged for that.
Definitely, for the alienation, there would have to be wording—and I can only speak to family court—in the legislation for coercive control that includes that once parental alienation is brought forward or if there was previous abuse.... I'm not exactly sure about the legislation or the wording, but those two would go hand in hand.
Liberal
Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON
I think I've heard the concern from other people, too, that parental alienation and coercive control go hand in hand. If you, as the mother, are being labelled as the alienator, you're going to face the charges of coercive control, not necessarily the abusive partner.
Does anybody have ideas about how to mitigate that risk?
As an Individual
Ideally, we'd be putting some type of wording in it to prevent that from happening, like some type of subparagraph that specifically mentions parental alienation or alienation-type accusations. Again, people aren't necessarily using the word “alienation” now. They're kind of skirting around it but accusing the mother of the same type of thing.
I think it has to be pretty black and white in order to prevent further harming women.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, Lisa.
That concludes today's testimony. I'd like to thank all of the witnesses for sharing.
At this point, is the committee in agreement to adjourn the meeting?
Liberal
Emmanuella Lambropoulos Liberal Saint-Laurent, QC
I have a question. How many meetings are left on this issue?
Liberal
Emmanuella Lambropoulos Liberal Saint-Laurent, QC
We have half a meeting left on this. How many witnesses do we have?
Liberal
Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON
Thank you again to all of the witnesses. Your testimony today has been very valuable.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman
Thank you, witnesses.
Is the committee in agreement to adjourn?
