Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise in support of Bill C-211. I thank the member for Cariboo—Prince George for bringing the bill forward. I also thank my colleague from Guelph for his thoughtful remarks.
This bill would create a federal framework for post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. That is a mental condition that can devastate an individual, impacting the individual's family, his or her ability to work, and even his or her ability to perform simple tasks.
As is the case with other mental health conditions, public awareness has often grown in the wake of extreme events, such as wars or natural disasters. Sadly, this has been our experience in Canada as we have seen men and women in the Canadian Forces returning from Afghanistan and struggling for years with the burdens of their experiences there. However, we should not think that this is simply limited to those kinds of extreme events. A soldier returning from a distant combat zone may be the first image in our minds when we talk about PTSD, but more and more, we are learning that stress, trauma, and our body's complex responses to it are issues throughout society, far from battlefields or police precincts or emergency wards.
We see it on university campuses, where students are helping expand access to mental health services and offer more support for survivors of abuse, including sexual abuse.
We see it in workplaces, where employers and workers are finding ways to reduce the stigma of mental illness and encouraging those who once suffered in silence to find the help that they need.
Nearly a decade ago, one academic study pegged the lifetime incidence of post-traumatic stress disorder across the Canadian population at nearly one in 10. In most cases, this could be linked to a single event, such as the unexpected death of a loved one, sexual assault, or witnessing a violent death or injury.
While any Canadian can experience PTSD, certain Canadians are disproportionately likely to shoulder the burden. In particular, I am referring to front-line workers who volunteer for duties that expose them to extraordinary stress. They are police officers and firefighters. They are paramedics and prison guards. They are military personnel and others whose public service can take a great personal toll. Studies have found that members of these professions can experience PTSD at rates at least double that of the general population.
A number of provinces have moved forward on legislation to remove the barriers that Canadians in these professions may face. For instance, in my province of British Columbia, first responders who experience PTSD must prove that it is work-related in order to receive support and compensation.
Last year, in my home province, the NDP labour critic tried to amend a bill in the provincial legislature to fix that problem and make it easier for those first responders, police, firefighters, and others to get the help they need and deserve. It is absolutely shameful that the current Government of British Columbia declined to fix that problem.
Let me share just one story to illustrate why this is so important.
Lisa Jennings was a paramedic in Victoria. In the summer of 2014, Lisa suffered an assault while responding to a call. In the wake of the attack, she suffered flashbacks and suicidal thoughts. After consulting with a psychologist, she filed a claim for workers' compensation. Her claim was denied not once, not twice, but three times, because the board was able to argue that her condition was not the result of the trauma that she had experienced in that assault. In fact, because she had visited a psychologist after her parents and her brother had died in quick succession, she was labelled as having “a well-documented psychiatric history” and her claim was denied. Shameful.
Lisa fought back. With no financial support other than a small disability pension, she appealed the ruling. She even lived in her car while doing so. As Lisa said, “This is for all the first responders in B.C.”
I am happy to report that three weeks ago, Lisa Jennings won her battle. An appeal tribunal reversed the earlier decisions, clearing a path for other first responders to access the support they need after suffering trauma in the line of duty.
A story like that should shock all Canadians and should move us in this place to act. Luckily, we have before us a proposal that would take one step forward, providing the much-needed federal leadership in this context.
What would the bill do? It would instruct the Minister of Health to convene a conference with her colleagues in National Defence and Veterans Affairs, provincial and territorial governments, and stakeholders in the medical community to develop a comprehensive federal strategy framework on post traumatic stress disorder.
This framework would help illuminate the prevalence of PTSD across Canada, as well as its social and economic costs to Canadians, by facilitating better national tracking and data collection by the Public Health Agency of Canada. It would also seek to improve treatment by making it easier to share best practices and by establishing guidelines for diagnosis, treatment, and management of PTSD.
Last, it would broaden awareness of this condition by setting down guidelines for the creation and distribution of educational materials for public health providers across the country.
I want to raise one final issue.
Several months ago, I was contacted by Mark Farrant, a Toronto man who served as a jury foreman on a first degree murder trial. In the course of that trial, he and other jurors were exposed to graphic and disturbing visual evidence and testimony surrounding the brutal murder of a young woman. Jurors are sworn to secrecy, and the moment after the verdict is delivered, released back into their daily lives. In the wake of that experience, Mark began to experience symptoms that would later be diagnosed at PTSD. It would come to disrupt his personal life, his young family, and his successful business career.
Yet, as Mark discovered, jurors in Canada are uniquely unsupported by our justice system. There are supports for judges, court staff, and many others who are exposed to the same graphic evidence and stressful situations, but not for ordinary Canadians who are required to do their civic duty as jurors. It is time that changed. Canadians, no matter where they live, who do their civic duty and serve on a jury, ought to have the proper support services available.
To that end, I raised this issue with my colleagues on the justice committee last year and have written repeatedly to the Minister of Justice, asking that her department assess what steps it can take to address this gap. It is my hope that the justice committee will soon become the first parliamentary committee to study this problem during its upcoming review of the Criminal Code.
While, sadly, we are still waiting for any federal response, I am happy to report that as a result of Mark Farrant's tireless advocacy, and at great personal cost, his home province of Ontario just weeks ago launched a program to provide free counselling to jurors who needed it. Therefore, if Bill C-211 is referred to committee, I will be seeking to develop an amendment to ensure that the issue of juror support is considered in any federal framework on PTSD.
The bill before us today gives us a chance to stand beside Canadians like Mark Farrant in Toronto and Lisa Jennings in Victoria, who swam against the tide at personal cost to do us all a public service. In that spirit, I ask all members to support the bill.