Hélène LeBlanc

[International Summit of Cooperatives, October 2nd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, Canada will host the second edition of the International Summit of Cooperatives from October 6 to 9. More than 2,700 participants representing 93 countries will gather in Quebec City to discuss and share best practices and reflect on the challenges facing co-operatives and mutuals.

This summit shows the leadership of Canada's co-operative and mutualist sector. For several years, the gap between the rich and the poor has been growing, but our co-operatives are helping to build an economy that serves people, creating high-quality jobs and providing services that meet the real needs of our communities.

I invite all of my colleagues to celebrate the start of the summit, as well as Co-op Week, which will be held from October 13 to 19. Our co-operatives are essential to keeping our economy sustainable, democratic and 100% Canadian.

[Petitions, October 1st, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to present a petition signed by several residents of LaSalle—Émard about the cuts at Canada Post, specifically with regard to the alleged end of home mail delivery. People are very concerned, and this will have a negative effect on many residents of Montreal's densely populated core neighbourhoods. People are also concerned about job losses and privatization. The people who signed the petition are asking the government to consider alternatives.

[Instruction to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women (violence against women), September 30th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House before such a large audience and speak to the amendment made to Motion No. 504.

As a woman and a parliamentarian, I am pleased to express my support for Motion No. 504, which was moved by the hon. member for Sault Ste. Marie. I am especially pleased to support the amendment proposed by my colleague, the hon. member for Churchill.

I would like to read the amended motion.

That the Standing Committee on the Status of Women be instructed to undertake a study on the subject of best practices in education programs, social programs and policies in Canada that prevent violence against women, and report its findings to the House within one year of the study's initiation.

We need to acknowledge what Canadian society has done over the past few decades in order to achieve gender equality in this country. Pioneers fought—and continue to fight—so that women can fully participate in all areas of endeavour, enjoy financial security and, above all, be protected from violence.

As long as the policies and budgets tabled in the House of Commons do not acknowledge those necessary prerequisites, we will not be able to counter the negative effects of gender inequality.

The motion calls on the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, which I have the honour of chairing, to undertake a study on the education programs, social programs and policies in Canada that prevent violence against women.

In its definition of violence against women, the United Nations includes physical, sexual, emotional or verbal, economic and spiritual violence, and criminal harassment.

I want to reiterate my support for the initiative of the hon. member for Sault Ste. Marie, in co-operation with my colleague from Churchill. Although violent crime in Canada has gone down in the past 40 years, the number of sexual assaults and spousal abuse has remained unchanged.

Canada has to do more to address this serious problem that is omnipresent at every level of our society.

According to Statistics Canada's article, “Homicide in Canada”, in 2009, 67 women were murdered by a current or former spouse, and 3,000 women had to stay in emergency shelters to escape domestic violence.

In 2004, 427,000 women over 15 reported being the victims of sexual abuse. In Montreal, where my riding of LaSalle—Émard is located, the rate of victimization of women in 2006 was 559 per 100,000 residents, whereas for men it was 111 per 100,000 residents over the same period.

I would like to read from a report by the Government of Quebec, entitled “Violence envers les femmes: une problématique toujours d'actualité”, or violence against women: an ongoing problem. The report states:

...violence against women differs from violence against men, particularly in the type of violence and in the fallout from the assault.

The report also states that:

…women are more likely to die after being assaulted by their spouse or another intimate partner. The overwhelming majority of victims of sexual assault are women. In Canada, women account for 92% of victims of sexual assault.

That was taken from the 2010 Vaillancourt report.

Furthermore, in its 2012 report, the Conseil du statut de la femme maintains that all forms of sexual exploitation, including human trafficking and prostitution, are also violent acts whose victims are also overwhelmingly women.

Sadly, these statistics do not include the many cases of assault that are not reported to the police, which makes it impossible to estimate the actual frequency of violence against women and girls.

As parliamentarians, we have a responsibility to work to change this situation, out of respect for the victims and their families. Therefore, it is time to go one step further in defending women's rights.

I acknowledge the relevance and significance of this motion, and of the proposed amendment. However, as my New Democratic colleagues have already pointed out, Motion No. 504 does not go far enough. Violence against women is a serious problem in Canada, and it requires a comprehensive solution. As stated in the report I just referred to, we have to look for a comprehensive, coordinated solution that maintains the focus on prevention.

That is why we are proposing an amendment designed to broaden the scope of the study by adding a reference to the study of policies in Canada. The purpose of the amendment is to ask the Standing Committee on the Status of Women to include in its study the possibility of developing a national action plan, as proposed in Motion No. 444 by our official opposition critic on the status of women, as a response to violence against women.

The action plan could cover various aspects of the issue, as well as short-, medium- and long-term solutions, such as legal aid, the establishment of transition houses and shelters for women, access to health care services, prevention and education.

A number of national and international stakeholders have acknowledged that national action plans can play a valuable coordinating role in the deployment of concerted and sustained efforts to address violence against women.

Our study should provide a platform for civil society and the many organizations that are dealing with violence against women. In its report entitled Mapping Violence Against Women Policy and Opportunities to Inform a Progressive National Action Plan, the Canadian Network of Women’s Shelters and Transition Houses takes a close look at policies, legislation, strategies, research, reports, action plans and statistics from across Canada that have to do with the development of national legislation to address violence against women. This is one of the many organizations with which this study would enable us to collaborate so that together, we can develop lasting solutions to combat this scourge.

In closing, I would like to point out that while Canada has made progress towards the achievement of equality between men and women, there is still a great deal of work to be done in order for women to participate fully in all areas of activity, benefit from financial security and, above all, be free from the threat of violence.

To conclude, I would like to remind hon. members that violence is due largely to the inequalities that persist between men and women.

[Business of Supply, September 23rd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for Trinity—Spadina for his rather interesting speech that included a number of proposals.

I would like my colleague to tell us more about the Liberal Party's motion, more specifically how it relates to his riding of Trinity—Spadina, in the Toronto area. I am not clear about how this motion will be managed and how it will be implemented.

How does he think that this motion could create permanent, well-paying jobs? This opposition motion appears to be a band-aid solution that will not fix the problem and that will not create permanent, high-paying jobs in the industries of the future.

[Business of Supply, September 23rd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the hon. member's speech.

He said that the CLDs in Quebec were “centres locaux d'emploi” or local employment centres. I was surprised to hear him say that because, in fact, they are “centres locaux de développement” or local development centres. That is a topic for another day.

How does the hon. member foresee the Liberals' proposal creating jobs according to their calculations? Their calculation seems a bit off.

Can he provide a concrete and local example of how this motion, in its current form, will truly stimulate job creation, more specifically in his riding of Bourassa?

[Business of Supply, September 23rd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the speeches of the Conservative members, especially when they were talking about their so-called commitment to small businesses. As the critic for co-operatives, I would like to remind the Conservatives that co-operatives are businesses too. I wonder what the Conservatives have against this type of business, because they are always creating obstacles for co-operatives.

Given that the government is praising small businesses and that co-operatives are small businesses, why is the Conservative government always standing in the way of the development and growth of co-operatives?

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, September 22nd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question and for the fact that he recognizes that some bills are designed to punish rather than to prevent. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

I have to say that some of the provisions and amendments we suggested would have made the bill easier to stomach, if I can put it that way. Let us be frank: It is not just the official opposition that is saying so. Witnesses appeared before the committee to study this bill and they gave their expert opinion. They are members of civil society and have studied the issue. They are experts and they also agree with the amendments we proposed to make this bill much more acceptable.

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, September 22nd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board for his question. The message is very clear: in this Parliament, government bills are introduced and they are sent to committee to be studied for a very good reason. It is to ensure that we review a bill once more to ensure that there are no problems, that an in-depth study is conducted and that amendments are made if necessary.

The official opposition always has a clear message. We study bills carefully and we propose amendments. We regret that the government rejects completely reasonable amendments that would improve a bill.

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, September 22nd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, it is with great humility that I rise in the House today, especially after hearing those of my colleagues who are legal experts debate Bill C-13. I would like to contribute based on my own personal experience.

I was a teacher for many years. I was lucky enough to teach many classes and work with many students. As an educator, I realize that in this modern world, education and information play a very important role. These days, young people need to adapt to a society that is quickly evolving. From my teaching days, I remember how students sometimes spoke to one another, how boys and girls talked. Sometimes it was troubling, because I found that the language they used often mimicked what they heard in the media, on TV and perhaps all around them, even on the street. It always troubled me to hear such language spoken between boys and girls. I taught for many years and then I did something else. However, that memory stayed with me.

In our society, social media and the Internet play a very important role in our lives and in the lives of young people. Unlike me, my nieces and nephews have never known a world without the Internet. Protecting privacy was very important in the past. My nieces and nephews were raised in a world in which the Internet plays a very important role. They were born with the Internet, much like I was born with television. We sometimes forget that when we are in our offices or in our rooms in front of a computer, as soon as we connect to the Internet, we are no longer in the privacy of our own space. We are in a public place. We are on display for everyone to see.

That is why my colleague from Chicoutimi—Le Fjord proposed a bullying prevention strategy, as a means of increasing awareness about bullying, including cyberbullying.

We need to keep in mind that the Internet is an absolutely terrific tool for sharing information, but it can be used maliciously. On the one hand, it can be an extraordinary information tool, but on the other hand, it can be a very powerful tool for bullying. As such, it must be used very carefully. To me, education and prevention are very important. We have to know how to use a tool as powerful as the Internet, how to protect ourselves against cyberbullying, what means we can use to do so, and what resources are available if we fall victim to cyberbullying.

By providing information to young girls, young boys, women, the marginalized, and even those who are being bullied, by providing them with the tools to protect themselves and a safe place where they can be protected from these attacks, we are giving them the power to combat bullying and violence. Of course, often awareness, information and education are not enough. However, it is very important that we start with this approach as much as possible.

It is not easy to talk about bullying because it affects not only us as humans and our emotions, but also memories and things that have happened to us. I have to admit that it is not always easy to talk about it.

I am also the chair of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. We recently studied the issue of eating disorders. As part of this study, we spoke about the impact of social media and the Internet. The way in which body image is projected—especially for women—is very interesting, as is the way that the Internet and social media put an incredible amount of pressure on girls and women, when it comes to that body image. There is work to be done when it comes to the media, social media and the Internet. At the end of the day, what can we do to bring this body image more in line with reality?

As many of my colleagues have mentioned, the current title of the bill is unfortunately misleading. The bill is called the Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act. As it has done with many of its bills, the government has included a number of elements in this bill that go far beyond the issue of cybercrime. I want to stress that we are now not only talking about peace officers, but also public officers, which the bill describes as someone “who is appointed or designated to administer or enforce a federal or provincial law”.

I find these excesses troubling. Once again, I want to congratulate our new justice critic and all the members of the official opposition on the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. They presented perfectly reasonable amendments to address the excesses in Bill C-13. For example, the amendments dealt with changing the wording of “reasonable grounds to suspect” to “reasonable grounds to believe”; establishing that the term “peace officer” applies to police officers; and removing the worrisome term of “public officer”, which is poorly defined and could, once again, lead to spillover. They also proposed including a clause to require that the minister report to the House to indicate how many request and orders were submitted, and to include a certain clause.

I want to once again express my support for my colleague from Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca regarding the importance of including a clause on gender equality, in order to protect transgendered people from cyberbullying.

A great many troubling things have been added to this bill, and they have no business being there. That is why the official opposition cannot support this bill.

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, September 22nd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank my colleague from Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca for his speech. He highlighted the hypocrisy demonstrated by this government when it comes to defending the rights of the transgendered community. I wonder if he could elaborate a bit on this issue and talk to us a little more about what is missing from Bill C-13.