Mr. Speaker, I am so pleased to speak today to Bill C-332, an act to amend the Criminal Code, introduced on May 18 by the member for Victoria. This bill seeks to achieve the critically important objective of greater protection from coercive and controlling conduct in intimate partner relationships.
Coercive control is a pervasive, long-term form of intimate partner violence that is intended to deprive victims of their autonomy. While some behaviours may constitute criminal offences in themselves, coercive control has to do with the cumulative impact of a series of behaviours, most of which do not constitute separate criminal offences.
Coercive control is a pervasive form of intimate partner violence. It takes place over time and serves to deprive victims of their autonomy. While some types of conduct, in and of themselves, may constitute separate criminal offences, coercive control concerns the cumulative impact of a range of behaviours, most of which do not.
Before I speak to this important piece of proposed legislation, I would like to express my deep condolences and sorrow to the families, friends and communities of the victims of intimate partner violence across Canada, including recently in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario; Truro, Nova Scotia; and Renfrew County, Ontario.
As someone who spent many years covering criminal court, I have graphic images and horrific details burned into my brain. They will never leave my head. I have come to know countless grieving families over the years, and they will never leave my heart.
These losses are immeasurable. Gender-based violence and intimate partner violence have no place in Canada, and each instance of these crimes is a tragedy. I echo the Minister of Justice in calling gender-based violence an epidemic in Canada that must be stopped.
We know that women are most often the victims of intimate partner violence, including coercive control, and that it is commonly perpetrated by men. In fact, 44% of Canadian women report having experienced some form of intimate partner violence in their lifetime. In 2021, women and girls represented 79% of police-reported victims of intimate partner violence. Between 2011 and 2021, two-thirds of all women and girls who were victims of gender-related murder were killed by an intimate partner. These are significant and distressing figures. Clearly, more needs to be done.
Our government is committed to ending the gender-based violence epidemic. I want to thank my colleague from Victoria and my colleague from Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke for their hard work on this issue.
Prior to Bill C-332, in 2020 and 2021, two private members' bills were tabled. They proposed almost identical reforms. Parliamentarians have also recently studied the issue of coercive control.
For example, the April 2021 report of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights entitled “The Shadow Pandemic: Stopping Coercive and Controlling Behaviour in Intimate Relationships” recommended that the Minister of Justice engage with provincial and territorial counterparts to study the possibility of creating a new coercive control Criminal Code offence. I am pleased to note that this work is under way. Justice officials are collaborating with their provincial and territorial partners, and they are engaging stakeholders to inform that work.
Furthermore, the Ontario Renfrew County coroner's inquest recommended criminalizing coercive control, and the Minister of Justice's response to the inquest recommendations reiterated openness to criminalizing control and noted the ongoing work at the federal, provincial and territorial levels. I understand this work is also informed by the insights from the Nova Scotia Mass Casualty Commission's final report, which included a number of recommendations related to coercive control.
We know from parliamentarians' study and Justice Canada's engagement that there are diverse views on creating a new coercive control offence. In particular, a number of concerns have been raised, including that an offence could disproportionately negatively impact indigenous people, racialized and marginalized communities. It could also exacerbate their overrepresentation in the criminal justice system. Perpetrators of intimate partner violence may also use a potential coercive control offence to further abuse their victims, for example, by accusing victims of committing coercive control, including to gain an advantage in family court. Victims may be charged with the offence, especially when they are defending themselves or their children.
The offence may be difficult for criminal justice actors to understand, enforce and prosecute because coercive control involves ongoing behaviour that serves to deprive the victim of their autonomy, which may be difficult to identify. Survivors may be revictimized by the criminal justice system when they testify.
Those who do support a coercive control offence spoke to the benefits of enacting such an offence, including that a new offence would better capture the actual experiences of victims, which concerns the impact of ongoing abusive conduct, rather than individual abusive incidents. A new offence could assist justice system actors in understanding and responding to intimate partner violence, including coercive control. A new offence could serve to prevent future violence, because coercive control often occurs prior to physical forms of violence and is a risk factor for its most serious forms, such as what is referred to as femicide. A new offence would be symbolically powerful and thus would empower victims of coercive control.
The experience of other jurisdictions may also assist us in examining this important issue. Specifically, England was the first jurisdiction to enact a coercive control offence in 2015, followed by Scotland in 2018, Ireland in 2019 and New South Wales in 2022. England's 2021 evaluation of their offence outlined a number of policy concerns, including that only a small number of incidents have come to the attention of police, indicating difficulties for both victims and police in recognizing the offence, missed opportunities for recording the offence as coercive control, and the necessity for training and specialized resources. A very high proportion of charges were withdrawn due to evidentiary difficulties, including where victims withdrew from the process, which highlights that gathering evidence in such cases is a significant challenge for police and prosecutors. Most prosecutions involved charges for other offences, for example, violent offences, which may indicate that the offence is more likely to be reported or identified by the police when another offence is committed.
Last May, Scotland published an evaluation of its coercive control offence. The conclusion was that there are no intrinsic problems with how the legislation is drafted, but there are problems with how it is enforced. One such problem is the degree to which the police are equipped to interpret and enforce the legislation.
These evaluations no doubt explain, at least in part, why stakeholders expressed support for the Scottish approach rather than the English approach. The findings of the evaluations also support an approach that would delay the coming into force of a new offence of coercive control in order to allow time to address enforcement issues, such as training.
Bill C-332, which is modelled on England's offence, proposes to criminalize repeated or continuous controlling or coercive conduct towards a spouse or other family member where that conduct has a significant impact on the person subjected to the conduct.
I am proud to support Bill C-332. However, I encourage committee members to compare the English and Scottish approaches and draw lessons that can be used to optimize Canada's path forward.