Evidence of meeting #127 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 femicide.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Alison Irons  As an Individual
Megan Walker  Advocate to End Male Violence Against Women, As an Individual
Cait Alexander  Founder, End Violence Everywhere
Shelina Jeshani  Director, Strategic Partnerships and Collaboration, Safe Centre of Peel
Anuradha Dugal  Executive Director, Women's Shelters Canada

Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON

Thank you.

12:25 p.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman

I gently remind everyone to speak through the chair. Thank you.

Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON

There's another thing we've been talking about. We just finished a study in this committee, about coercive control, and a lot of the examples we heard today began, at least, with coercive control. We heard, especially, from Alison Irons, before she was unable to rejoin the meeting, that her daughter wasn't physically attacked by her partner until she was killed, but there were lots of examples of coercive control leading up to that.

To start with the Safe Centre of Peel, if we criminalize coercive control, how much of an impact do you think that would have on our incidence of domestic violence?

12:25 p.m.

Director, Strategic Partnerships and Collaboration, Safe Centre of Peel

Shelina Jeshani

There are a few things to be thinking about when you think about coercive control. One is that we have to start naming it. We have to start understanding what coercive control actually looks like, how it escalates to other forms of violence and, yes, to femicide. Putting it into the Criminal Code is one way, but it's not the only way. I think that's why we need a holistic approach when we talk about coercive control. We need to educate people in the community and build capacity around service providers like health care professionals, as well as judges and law enforcement, so that they can start to pay attention to these signs and ask questions—so that there is that understanding of all these various elements.

Again, it comes back to the education, at the early point in those teen years, when they're first starting those relationships. What is a healthy relationship? What does coercive control look like—

Lisa Hepfner Liberal Hamilton Mountain, ON

I'm sorry. I don't mean to cut you off, but I have 20 seconds left.

I want to go quickly to Ms. Dugal from Women's Shelters Canada. Our government invested, actually, more than half a billion dollars across the country in women's shelters, but we hear regularly that it's not enough. How would you like to see women's shelters funded across the country?

October 28th, 2024 / 12:25 p.m.

Executive Director, Women's Shelters Canada

Anuradha Dugal

Women's shelters need funding for capital expenses—to renew their infrastructure, to build more shelters and to have more shelter beds—and we need to increase the number of second-stage shelters, the transitional housing, for longer-term stays. Most shelters, 64%, have not received any kind of annual cost of living increase from their main government funder; 74% of shelters say that insufficient funding is a major challenge for them in housing the women who need the services they offer. All levels of government need to get together and fund shelters adequately.

12:25 p.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman

Thank you, MP Hepfner.

Next we begin our third round. MP Ferreri, you have the floor for five minutes.

12:25 p.m.

Conservative

Michelle Ferreri Conservative Peterborough—Kawartha, ON

Thank you so much, Chair, and thank you to our witnesses.

We certainly wouldn't want to bring you here and tell you how the legal system is working, when it's clearly not, which is what it feels like a Liberal member just did to you. I think that's the whole point. It comes back to the same point that I asked you.

Why would a woman or anybody who's a victim, a survivor, come forward when they know nothing is going to happen, and why would an abuser stop doing that if they know there are no consequences? This is all law. Everything you've said today, Cait, makes the point that there are no consequences in this current justice system. There is nothing in place to stop someone from actively going out and murdering someone in broad daylight—in broad daylight. I don't know how much more serious we can get today, folks.

We see the Liberal member sitting across the way, saying, “Oh, well, let's go into the weeds here. Bill C-75 is doing a great job.” It's not. It's not working. People are dying. Let's cut it and do what needs to happen here.

Bill C-75 was supposed to make it better, and it has made it worse. The stats are here. Those are cold, hard facts.

I guess I would turn to Ms. Alexander again. I think one of the things people don't understand is Jordan's rule. How could you have somebody who literally “bludgeoned” you—in your words—almost to death...? You have video evidence. He was out on bail for $500 the very next day. Is that the only time he ever served?

12:30 p.m.

Founder, End Violence Everywhere

12:30 p.m.

Conservative

Michelle Ferreri Conservative Peterborough—Kawartha, ON

It was thrown out. The entire case was thrown out, and this guy is walking free. Explain that to people at home, because it makes no sense.

12:30 p.m.

Founder, End Violence Everywhere

Cait Alexander

Nobody understands it, because I have spoken to judges and to prosecutors in America, and they ask, “What are you guys doing up there?”

It's a national embarrassment, and the criminals know this, which is why they park themselves in this country. That is why Canada is fourth in the world for human trafficking and why we're seeing such staggering numbers, into the hundreds of per cent increase. All these stats are people. All these stats are people like me. They're your sisters. They're your siblings. They're your relatives. They're your neighbours. For so long, there has been no justice system in this country.

I'm really sick and tired of having to repeat this when it's so blatantly obvious. I am losing a sibling—a survivor sibling—every single day. I can't handle the phone calls anymore, the text messages, the Facebook messages, the emails: “Hey, she's dead,” or, “Hey, he's free,” or, “Hey, he's out on bail,” or, “I have 38 charges against him, but he gets permission to see my child, and he just raped me and impregnated me again.”

I'm not kidding you. This is what's happening in this country. They keep doing it, because you don't put them in custody.

12:30 p.m.

Conservative

Michelle Ferreri Conservative Peterborough—Kawartha, ON

There are no consequences.

I want to ask about the most dangerous time. There was a bill put forward by a senator whose own daughter was murdered. It was Bill S-205. It dealt with that vulnerable period when the abuser is charged and is then let out on bail or on a surety.

Would you say, Ms. Walker, that it is the most vulnerable time, when violence and potential murder are most likely to happen?

12:30 p.m.

Advocate to End Male Violence Against Women, As an Individual

Megan Walker

I think the most dangerous time for that to happen is at the time of separation, but yes, the criminal justice system's failure also impacts the ability of women to seek help. When you have a situation in which somebody has been incarcerated overnight, or whatever it is, and then released, even if they're released with an order that they have to stay 25 metres away or whatever it is, we have abusers who sit on that 25-metre line and watch the woman come and go. She is never safe, and a peace bond is not even worth the paper it's written on. This is what women and girls are facing.

12:30 p.m.

Conservative

Michelle Ferreri Conservative Peterborough—Kawartha, ON

In that bill, they wanted to give the authority to the survivor, so that she or whoever.... Men are victims of this as well. Let's point that out. They took that out of the bill—that they would be notified, that they had the power and authority to water that down.

These are the kinds of things that were.... You have to change the law if you are going to change this.

The last point I'll make is about incarceration. We have these crazy stories of these children witnessing this violence. What are those children going to go on to do? They're going to go on to have violent relationships. Let's just call a spade a spade. If we don't have programming in place in the jails to support men, to understand why they are violent—they can't be walking free, because they're not capable of that—and if we don't fix the inside of our prison systems, we are going to have a merry-go-round.

12:35 p.m.

Advocate to End Male Violence Against Women, As an Individual

Megan Walker

We totally agree.

12:35 p.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman

Thank you, MP Ferreri.

Next, I'd like to welcome MP Damoff.

You have the floor for five minutes.

Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON

Thanks a lot, Chair.

I think everybody here—the witnesses and all members of this committee—agrees that what's happening is not working. The level of femicide is atrocious. I was on this committee for four years when I first got elected, and we're still talking about it. One of the things we recommended early on, as a committee, was a national action plan. We didn't think we were going to get it. Marc Serré might have been on the committee with me at the time. We now have $500 million invested in that national action plan, but the problem is huge.

I have a request for our analysts, if I may, because a number of things have come up.

Look, I don't want to point fingers at federal, provincial or municipal.... Municipal is responsible for police services that don't act properly, either. We need to make sure everybody is doing everything they possibly can. The National Police Federation has said, “In much of Canada, especially in Ontario, it is Justices of the Peace...who are Order-in-Council appointments, but usually have no legal practice experience as a lawyer or law degree, who preside over almost all bail hearings in much of Canada.” Those are provincial appointments. In my region of Halton, the government cancelled the new jail. Do you know what's happening? Judges won't sit in Halton Region, because there's mould. When you talk about Jordan's rule.... The province hasn't built a courthouse in Halton. It's crumbling, and people are being released. Trust me, I think it's horrific that this is happening and that provincial jails are triple-bunked so judges won't send them to provincial jails. We all need to take responsibility for this.

There are a couple of things I would ask the analysts. Could they do a division of who is responsible for what in the criminal justice system? Also, there's a StatsCan report called “Average counts of adults in provincial and territorial correctional programs” that shows, year by year, the number of people who are held and the alternative—who is released on bail. I went back and looked at those numbers. In 2010-11, 59% of people were being held on bail. Today, it's 80%. The stats don't correspond to what's happening in the justice system.

I forgot to put my timer on, Chair. I'm sorry. I got so emotional there.

12:35 p.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman

You have about two minutes and 10 seconds.

Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON

Okay.

When we studied Rona Ambrose's bill on sexual assault, one of the things we heard is that women think Crown prosecutors are representing them, when, in fact, they're representing the Crown. The defendant has someone in court, and the woman often thinks she has someone in court, too, when, in fact, deals are made that don't represent her.

Maybe you could all comment on this.

I'm wondering whether you think there should be support for women through the court system. Quebec has done a much better job than we have in the courts where this is dealt with.

12:35 p.m.

Founder, End Violence Everywhere

Cait Alexander

I'll answer very quickly.

That's what my organization does. It's end-to-end private advocacy based on an American model, again, because we don't have that in this country. Victim services are inefficient and retraumatizing, and they are sponsored by the government. I sat in on a Crown attorney meeting for another woman who was nearly bludgeoned to death with a hammer. The Crown lied to her face the same way my Crown lied to me about Jordan's rule. That's what we provide. I said, “Nope, you're lying to her. Be honest.”

That is literally what we do: end-to-end advocacy services, whether financial, medical, therapeutic or housing. You name it, and we figure it out for that survivor.

12:35 p.m.

Advocate to End Male Violence Against Women, As an Individual

Megan Walker

It's important to remember that what exists now is this: Somebody from victim services gives a tour of the courthouse and does other stuff as needed, but what these women need is somebody to sit with them during the entire process. That happens sometimes, but it's rare.

Pam Damoff Liberal Oakville North—Burlington, ON

We'll go to the Safe Centre of Peel, then to Women's Shelters Canada.

12:40 p.m.

Director, Strategic Partnerships and Collaboration, Safe Centre of Peel

Shelina Jeshani

I agree one hundred per cent. Women have told us over and over again that they need somebody to hold their hand. The most difficult system to go through is the justice system. When somebody is struggling in so many different areas—there may be cultural or language barriers—having to understand the legal system is very daunting. Having somebody hold their hand.... In our community, we have the victim-witness assistance program, but they are so inundated with cases that they don't have time to provide as much support as women really need.

You're absolutely right. The Crown is not there to support the victim.

12:40 p.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative Shelby Kramp-Neuman

Thank you.

12:40 p.m.

Director, Strategic Partnerships and Collaboration, Safe Centre of Peel

Shelina Jeshani

The Crown has a different role.