Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to speak to the second report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. In its report, the committee issues three recommendations for the House: encourage Canadians to hear from victims and survivors of human trafficking; encourage Canadians to raise awareness of the magnitude of modern day slavery in Canada and abroad and to take steps to combat human trafficking; and recognize the 22nd day of February as national human trafficking awareness day. The third recommendation is, in my view, the most important one. Personally, I believe it is the least we can do.
We must remember what the Conservative Party has done on this issue. Let us recall the most recent election campaign, in 2019. Our party made a number of proposals, including renewing the national action plan to combat human trafficking, amending the Criminal Code to reflect the international definition in the Palermo Protocol, ensuring that those responsible for human trafficking serve consecutive sentences for their crime and ending automatic bail for those charged with human trafficking.
As we know, 95% of victims are women, and more than a quarter of them are under 18. Indigenous peoples are disproportionately affected and represent half the victims. This is a subject that concerns me greatly. It is the reason I moved Motion No. 63 a few days ago in the House. The motion seeks to make changes to the Criminal Code with respect to human trafficking and minors.
The motion reads as follows:
That, in the opinion of the House, the government should: (a) recognize the urgent need for concrete legislative measures to (i) combat the scourge of sexual exploitation of minors, (ii) better protect children and other vulnerable persons from sexual exploitation; and (b) amend, as soon as possible, the provisions of the Criminal Code to implement the four important recommendations contained in the unanimous report of the Select Committee on the Sexual Exploitation of Minors established by the National Assembly of Quebec, namely, (i) the implementation of the consecutive sentencing provision for human trafficking, (ii) adding the crime of sexual exploitation to the proceeds of crime forfeiture mechanism, (iii) eliminating the preliminary inquiry in some sexual exploitation and human trafficking cases, (iv) giving law enforcement more effective legal tools to obtain evidence of sexual crimes committed against minors committed in the cyberspace.
The first request made by the Quebec National Assembly's select committee that has implications at the federal level concerns consecutive sentencing. I would like to remind my colleagues that former Bloc Québécois and NDP member Maria Mourani tabled a bill on which the House voted. The bill went through the entire process. It was unanimously adopted by the parties and sent to the Senate. It was supposed to receive royal assent. All this happened a few months before the 2015 election. Unfortunately, after the election, we had a new government. The new government refused to grant Maria Mourani's bill royal assent, and that was that.
This bill addresses consecutive sentences. Based on the unanimous recommendations of the Quebec National Assembly's select committee, whose members cover the entire political spectrum, everyone is asking that the bill be reintroduced and that pimps be given consecutive sentences.
The second element concerns adding crimes of sexual exploitation to the proceeds of crime forfeiture mechanism. The Criminal Code should provide for the forfeiture of proceeds of crime during sentencing. Normally, the Crown must prove that the property in question fits the definition of proceeds of crime. However, the burden of proof is reversed for certain criminal organizations and offences related to drugs and human trafficking. This means that procuring should be included automatically, without needing to prove it.
The third element concerns preliminary inquiries. The Quebec National Assembly’s select committee recommends eliminating preliminary inquiries for procuring cases, since it is very hard for victims to testify and describe the torture they endured. This would lead to much quicker trials.
Fourth, law enforcement agencies want better tools for obtaining evidence in cyberspace, particularly with regard to determining the place of the offence. Take, for example, an online video in which we can see the victim and the aggressor, but we do not know where it was filmed. The definition of place is complex, especially for police investigating crimes. We should therefore pass cybercrime legislation in order to make their job easier.
Motion No. 63, which I tabled in the House, is very important, and I hope it will lead to the introduction of a bill before the next election. We really need to act. The House needs to wake up, and all of us need to recognize, understand and, most importantly, help law enforcement agencies and victims. Victims are often afraid to testify or worried that their pimp will be released too soon.
Criminal organizations have no problem finding young women and girls, including minors. I am referring specifically to minor victims of sexual exploitation, namely girls who are 13, 14, 15 or 16 years old. Earlier, my colleague from the Bloc mentioned his 17-year-old daughter; my own daughter is 15. The exploitation of minors and young women and girls is particularly stressful and worrisome for us.
The Quebec National Assembly’s Select Committee on the Sexual Exploitation of Minors has four specific requests related to the Criminal Code, which are not particularly complicated and, in my opinion, should be easy to grant. The government should not even wait to receive the requests and should be proactive in proposing amendments to the Criminal Code to protect our young women and girls as quickly as possible.
Although a minority government, this government still has the power to act, especially if the opposition parties all agree. Everything can be done quickly when we all agree. This is not a partisan subject. Young girls—and young boys—who are the victims of these pimps need to know that Parliament and the Government of Canada are there to protect and help them first and foremost and that pimps will be punished for their actions and their consequences.
If a pimp in Montreal has 10 minors working as prostitutes, why should he get away with a sentence of a mere three or four years, and concurrent at that? Whether he has one girl or ten, he will get the same sentence. We need to give longer sentences to pimps in order to discourage this type of behaviour in our country.