Evidence of meeting #18 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 judges.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Dominique Vien Conservative Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC
I would like a clarification.
I put a question to the first panel about the applications related to the remote monitoring device. I was told that the judge could make a decision if the Attorney General requested it. I did not have the document in front of me earlier. As I understand it now, the judge can order that a person wear a monitoring device only if a prosecutor requests it, but he cannot impose it on his own.
I believe this issue is within your purview.
Senior Counsel, Criminal Law and Policy Section, Policy Sector, Department of Justice
That is correct.
Conservative
Dominique Vien Conservative Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC
The judge cannot recommend the wearing of this device if the Crown prosecutor...
Senior Counsel, Criminal Law and Policy Section, Policy Sector, Department of Justice
No, [Technical difficulty—Editor] judges can already make the necessary provisions to protect victims and witnesses. The provisions of the bill specify that the judge must consider the device in certain cases and may impose it, if deemed necessary.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
Awesome. Thank you so much.
I'm going to pass the next five minutes over to Ya'ara. Ya'ara, you have the floor for five minutes.
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
Thank you so much, Madam Chair.
I want to thank our witnesses, and actually all the members of this committee. This bill is very close to my heart, as I have worked with MPs Dhillon and Damoff, as well as Dr. Kagan and Mr. Viater, to get us to this place. I want to thank everyone for the collaborative efforts to really unpack this issue so that we can move forward to protect partners and children.
The issue of coercive control, as well as electronic monitoring, has been part of national conversations in a number of like-minded jurisdictions, including Australia and the United Kingdom, as well as here in Canada.
To be clear, when we talk about coercive control and domestic violence, the Department of Justice did a paper on the differing understandings of the nature of domestic violence in “Enhancing Safety”. It says:
“Coercive domestic violence”...is normally a cumulative, patterned process that occurs when an adult intimate or former intimate partner attempts by emotional/psychological, physical, economic or sexual means to coerce, dominate, monitor, intimidate or otherwise control the other.
The subsequent paragraph goes on as follows:
Coercive domestic violence can involve a pattern of emotional, financial or psychological monitoring, domination, degradation, intimidation, coercion, or control without physical or sexual violence.
I think that's really important in relation to this bill. My understanding is that other aspects of training at the moment that refer to sexual abuse or intimate partner violence involved training in understanding physical impact, meaning looking for warning signs that have a physical presentation on victims. What we're understanding more and more is that this cumulative behaviour of violence escalates over time in a systematic pattern that then results in an explosion of violence against victims, potentially children or partners. The claims are that “we didn't see it coming”, when the signs were actually there.
I would ask this to either Ms. Moor or Ms. Davis-Ermuth: In the current training, where it lists only sexual abuse and intimate partner violence, would the “coercive control” piece that we're adding enhance the education of the judges to have a deeper understanding of the warning signs?
Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
Thank you for that question.
I'm not able to provide information on what is included in current training for judges and what might be included in future training in terms of content. Judicial independence requires that judges control judicial education, including the content of training—
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
I'm sorry. I'm going to interrupt you.
I understand that. However, currently, Bill C-3 as it was passed does list sexual abuse as a listed training for judges. Is that not correct?
Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
The Judges Act as amended by former Bill C-3 lists training on matters related to sexual assault law and social context as topics on which the CJC may establish seminars.
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
Thank you.
I'm going to be brief. I have very specific questions on this.
Is it the case that psychological and emotional violence, which really fall under coercive control, currently aren't specifically listed in the training?
Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
The only topics that are currently listed are sexual assault law and social context; however, the CJC is able to establish seminars on other topics.
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
Okay. Let's just be clear that this is a national conversation in families across this country on the impact of coercive control and the ongoing impacts that it has in the multiple courtrooms of the judicial process. It's not always just in family court. It spills into other disputes that are happening in courtrooms across this country. This is why we feel that this training is essential.
I'm going to go on to the reporting question now. One of my colleagues asked about this aspect earlier.
In subsection 62.1(1) of the Judges Act, the list of trainings that are provided to judges each year are meant to be reported to the justice department. Correct me if I'm wrong.
Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
At the moment, that provision encourages the CJC to provide a report to the Minister of Justice on seminars on sexual assault law training and on social context that have been offered in the previous year.
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
With this amendment to include coercive control, would seminars of this nature be added to that reporting list?
Counsel, Judicial Affairs Section, Public Law and Legislative Services Sector, Department of Justice
That's correct. The CJC would be encouraged to report on those seminars as well.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
You have about 13 seconds.
Go ahead. We're being very flex. We're fluid.
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
Thank you. I appreciate it, because I really think we need to go here.
The reason this bill is in two parts is that we not only want to make sure the education on the warning signs is there for the judiciary, but also to have impactful tools available in terms of electronic monitoring. As I mentioned earlier, Australia, the U.K. and other like-minded Commonwealth countries are having discussions on the use of this—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Karen Vecchio
Yes. Could you wrap up?
Is there any response?
We do have two more questioners before we close.
Liberal
Ya'ara Saks Liberal York Centre, ON
Will it be a useful tool? That's my question. Will it be a useful tool, yes or no?
Senior Counsel, Criminal Law and Policy Section, Policy Sector, Department of Justice
Unfortunately, that's not something that I think we can speculate on.