Mr. Speaker, I think what we are trying to get across as a justice committee and as members of Parliament is that there is a failure to recognize that coercive and controlling behaviour is, in and of itself, a form of violence.
As I said in my brief remarks, this is really not about creating a new criminal offence. It is about moving that goalpost to where people can get assistance when they are in problematic relationships instead of making them wait until there is physical harm before social service agencies, law enforcement or whoever else can step in to assist them in escaping coercive and controlling behaviour.
I think that this is where we are starting, by recognizing this as a form of violence and doing so explicitly in the Criminal Code of Canada.