Randall Garrison

[Government Business No. 34—Proceedings on Bill C-62, February 13th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, in the previous Parliament, I was the NDP's representative on the medical assistance in dying committee. I do support medical assistance in dying, but it was the most difficult issue I have ever dealt with, and I agree with my colleague from Saanich—Gulf Islands that it was probably the most difficult issue most of us have ever dealt with in the House. For that reason, I agree with the minister that we have to proceed very cautiously and very deliberately in any expansion to medical assistance in dying.

Today I would rather be talking about removing mental illness as the sole underlying condition, but Parliament dealt with that question with the private member's bill from the member for Abbotsford, Bill C-314, so we cannot do that today. We are placed in the awkward position where the Senate added the provision to the original medical assistance in dying legislation, which I think was very ill-advised.

However, we have no choice at this point, I believe, but to support the closure motion to try to get this done so we can prevent the provision from coming into force, when we know clearly we are not ready and when we know some of us have very clear moral reservations about the expansion.

[Criminal Code, February 7th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, in Parliament, unanimous support is a rare thing to see, but on the issue of coercive and controlling behaviour, we have an instance where all parties agree that there is a need to act.

This bill and the associated recommendations from the justice committee have now twice received the support of all parties at the justice committee, and we heard strong speeches in support of this bill from all parties in second reading debate just before the holiday break. Given this degree of support, it is my hope that Bill C-332 can move forward quickly from this point. As we are all too well aware, this is a minority Parliament, and one which is already well past the normal life of minority parliaments in Canada, so the clock is ticking, and we need to act in the House to make sure this bill still has time to get through the other place before the next election.

There is no doubt among any of us here that there is an urgent need to act to combat domestic violence in Canada, and we have shocking statistics that clearly demonstrate the fact that intimate partner violence is a growing problem across Canada. More than 40% of women, that is more than 6.2 million Canadian women, have reported experiencing some kind of psychological, physical or sexual abuse in the context of their intimate partner relationships in their lifetime. For indigenous women, that number is 61%. For women with disabilities, it is 55%, and for lesbian, bisexual, non-binary and trans women, it is over 67%. These are shocking numbers.

One woman is still killed by an intimate partner every six days in this country, and as femicide in intimate partner relationships is almost always preceded by coercive and controlling behaviour, this bill would save lives.

Some may wonder what caused me to take up this issue in 2020. At the start of the pandemic, I did a call around to police and social services agencies in my riding. I heard universally that one main thing was happening, and that was a spike in domestic violence calls for assistance as a result of the pandemic. In fact, those rates of calls for assistance have not decreased, even as the pandemic measures have eased.

What I heard from police and frontline social services agencies, and in particular from women's shelters and anti-domestic violence agencies, was that this is something we should think of a as shadow pandemic. It was something that was being hidden because women were being isolated at home during the pandemic, and it was even more difficult for them to reach out for assistance.

The second thing I heard, almost universally again, and in particular from both police and social services agencies, was their frustration at lacking the tools to offer help to those trapped in abusive relationships until there is physical violence. Local police recounted leaving many domestic violence calls without being able to help, yet they were certain they would be called back soon, and that the next call would involve physical violence. Shelters reported seeing the same women multiple times, but without the presence of physical violence, there was no ability to seek restraining orders or get removal of the abusive partner from the home.

Making coercive and controlling behaviour a criminal offence is not really about adding a new offence to the Criminal Code. Instead, it would recognize this behaviour is in itself a form of violence. It would move the point at which victims can get help to before physical violence occurs, instead of waiting until there are bruises and broken bones. Bill C-332 is not by itself a solution to the problem of intimate partner violence, but it is rather a tool for addressing abusive relationships before that violence turns physical.

In this debate, we heard a couple of concerns about the impacts of this bill. Certainly, when I began working on this topic, I did often hear that there is no accepted definition for what constitutes coercive and controlling behaviour. This bill would solve that problem by putting in law a very specific description of what this involves.

I have to say, most of those saying that they did not know what coercive and controlling behaviour looks like were men. From women, I almost universally heard about the kinds of coercive and controlling behaviour they, members of their family or their friends had been subjected to. They had no trouble recognizing this behaviour. In fact, I had to admit to myself that the lens of coercive and controlling behaviour helped explain a lot of the family dynamics from my own childhood.

A second concern we heard in this debate referred to the slow start in making effective use of the provisions in other jurisdictions where similar legislation has been adopted. It was adopted in the U.K. in 2015, in Ireland and Wales in 2019, and in New South Wales in Australia in 2022. Hawaii also has a similar provision. Measures to criminalize coercive and controlling behaviour are also moving forward in a number of other U.S. states.

Studies looking at the U.K. show that there was a period of time before there was broad knowledge of the existence of the bill and how to make use of it, and this was not just among those who were victims, but also among police, prosecutors and social services agencies. However, this in itself is no reason for further delay. Similar studies show that the rates of charging and convictions in those other jurisdictions have steadily increased as both the public and enforcement agencies become aware of the possibilities in such a bill. So, we will probably go through the same period of adjustment in this country once we pass the bill, but, for me, that is a strong argument to get started now and not an argument for delay. We should remember that this bill in one form or another has now been before the House for three years.

Members will also have heard some concern that the bill would potentially have a negative impact on marginalized women as it might provide another tool to be used against them by their abusive partners. It has been suggested that the abusive partner might be able to accuse the victim of coercive and controlling behaviour. I have no doubt that this will happen, but I have three, admittedly somewhat impatient, responses to this concern. One is that it is in fact marginalized women, so, racialized women, new Canadians and indigenous women, who are most often the victims of coercive and controlling behaviour and often have the fewest resources to escape those relationships. My second response is to agree that, of course, the whole legal system systematically disadvantages marginalized women, but this is a broader reform we need to tackle in the justice system and not a reason to not proceed with this particular bill. Finally, I would say that I have never heard this concern raised by frontline social service agencies and, in particular, I have never heard this concern from those who serve marginalized women or from marginalized women themselves.

We should also recognize the broad community impacts that this bill will have, the positive impacts. Yes, women are the primary victims of coercive and controlling behaviour, but it is equally damaging in whatever context and whatever the gender of those being abused. Studies have shown that coercive and controlling behaviour is an equally large problem in the queer community. As well, we should also recognize that coercive and controlling behaviour does not just impact the victims but also their children in terms of physical safety and mental health. This is a particularly serious concern when relationships between mothers and their children are weaponized by abusive partners, and it is a particular concern when it comes to questions of child custody when someone is trying to leave such a situation.

At this point, I want to stop and thank all of those who have shared their personal experiences with me and my office. This is not an easy thing to do. We have heard from literally hundreds of women over the past four years, some expressing their thanks for recognizing coercive and controlling behaviour as a form of violence, some just for putting a name to what they were going through and recognizing they were not alone, but all of those women expressing their hope that we would press forward with this bill.

One conversation in particular still stands out for me. It was with a women in my local constituency who holds a highly skilled job and a prominent position in our community. She said she would like to tell her story publicly to show other women that this could happen to anyone, even to those who we would imagine have all the skills, abilities and resources to avoid or escape a coercive and controlling relationship. She wanted to tell that story, because she wants others to understand that it is never the victim's fault no matter how many times the abusive partner tries to make them believe that it is their fault. However, she cannot tell her story publicly yet as her ex-husband is still using child custody as a weapon in trying to reassert control over her.

To conclude, I did not introduce this bill in the beginning thinking it would pass immediately. I introduced it to try and get attention to the crisis that came about in parallel to the pandemic. However, when this report was adopted by the justice committee, I became hopeful that we could get this bill through, and here is where my thanks go to my NDP colleague for Victoria. She and I have been working closely on this and other important issues involving women and the law and, thankfully, the member for Victoria had a much luckier draw in the precedence for PMBs than me. My number would have been virtually last in this Parliament, but she was able to get it before us now, and here we are today.

Let me just say that I hope we advance this bill quickly. It would be a good way of showing Canadians that we, as parliamentarians, can work together effectively to tackle important problems. It would show that we understand that intimate partner violence is indeed an epidemic in our society. It would show that we are going to devote everything we can to fight it, not just with a new law, but also with a necessary—

[Fall Economic Statement Implementation Act, 2023, January 30th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, this is a difficult moment for me, not because I had to find a new seat near the exit, not because it took me two tries to get to Ottawa because of the fog and not because I come from an Irish family of criers, but because it is really a moving moment for me.

I want to thank the member for LaSalle—Émard—Verdun for the friendship we have developed in the House. He has a great record of accomplishment, about which he spoke, but I want to point out something someone asked me on the plane last night, and that was how I could go to work in such a negative place. My response was that, unfortunately, all people see is question period, which is theatre, where people have other agendas they are pursuing, but they do not see the hard work that goes on behind the scenes, the co-operation and the friendships that are built. I really meant that, and the member for LaSalle—Émard—Verdun is a great example of this.

I made a quick list, because I had 15-minutes notice that I had this opportunity, on the number of things he and I worked on together and his willingness to take action to ensure we improved the justice system in Canada, in particular for indigenous people and the work he did on Bill C-5 to reduce mandatory minimums, which fall very hard on the most marginalized in our society.

He mentioned the conversion therapy ban. His work with the leader of the Conservatives and all parties meant we were able to pass that ban unanimously, something which I remain very proud of the House for doing.

He worked on Bill C-40, with which we are not quite finished, on the miscarriages of justice commission. Again, miscarriages of justice fall very hard on the most marginalized, particularly indigenous women. My pledge to him is that I will work as hard as I can to get that done, hopefully by the end of this month. We only have a couple of days, but I think we can get that done.

He also helped shepherd medical assistance in dying legislation through the House when I was initially the NDP critic. This was the most difficult issue in my 13 years here because of the very strong feelings on all sides of the issue. The minister always demonstrated his ability to listen, to be empathetic and to try to find solutions that would keep us all together on this very important issue about reducing suffering at the end of life, not just for the person but for the families of people who need that assistance at the end.

One last one is that I approached the minister about the publication ban on survivors of sexual assault and how many of them felt stifled by the publication ban. He asked what we could do to fix it. Eventually he agreed to add the ability to lift the publication ban in Bill S-12, and it came to the House. This was an example of how, when I approached him with an idea and a problem, he always looked for solutions and a way to bring us all together.

I know he will continue to contribute to Canada once he leaves the House, though I am not sure in exactly what way or if he is sure in exactly what way. He is one of the finest members of Parliament I have ever had the privilege to work with, and I thank him for his contributions here.

[Employment Equity, December 15th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, New Democrats are committed to challenging all forms of discrimination that prevent full participation in our economy. Although updates to the Employment Equity Act are long overdue, they still will not be under the tree this year.

On Monday, the Employment Equity Act review task force released its recommendations to include Black Canadians and 2SLGBTQI+ Canadians in the federal Employment Equity Act as listed groups. The task force notes that, while Canada has shown leadership on other 2SLGBTQI+ issues, we are lagging behind other parts of the world on employment equity. It also notes that transpeople are particularly at risk of employment discrimination and resulting poverty.

The White Paper on the Status of Trans and Gender Diverse People, which has the support of the Canadian Labour Congress, also recommends this addition to the Employment Equity Act. All it would take would be to add eight words to include both of these groups.

After over a year of consultations, the labour minister needs to table legislation to get this done.

[Canada Labour Code, December 14th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, once again, I find it very hard to connect the member's speech to the subject in front of us. I suspect that is because the Conservatives do not really want to take a position on the anti-scab legislation because they are busy posing as friends of labour.

By talking about inflation, is the member actually saying that it is workers' wages that are driving inflation? The Conservatives have been arguing all the time that it is the carbon tax. When we look at what is driving inflation, we find it is the war in Ukraine and the increasing greed of corporate profits in the gas and oil industry.

Is the member, by focusing on inflation, saying it is the workers' fault inflation is happening?

[Canada Labour Code, December 14th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, if we are going to talk about the topic of this bill and use the term “replacement workers”, I would just like to point out that they are temporary foreign workers, however people feel about them. I happen to think that temporary foreign workers are a good addition to our economy. However we feel about them, they are not replacement workers under this legislation. Either the members are confused or they are deliberately—

[Canada Labour Code, December 14th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, I always enjoy working with the member, and her questions are always as they are today: to the point.

One of the concerns I have about the bill is the 18-month delay before its implementation. New Democrats are supporting the bill at second reading so it can go to committee, where there would be a fulsome debate. I too am hoping we can convince the government that the 18-month delay is too long.

[Canada Labour Code, December 14th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, the member has just given a perfect example of what I am talking about: the Conservatives' attempting to make the House dysfunctional. The question he is asking has nothing to do with the topic of the bill before us; it has nothing to do with the work we are trying to do in the House today, so it is a perfect example of the Conservatives' trying to make the House look dysfunctional.

[Canada Labour Code, December 14th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, I do think that all of us come here with the idea that we are going to do what is right for Canadians. It is unfortunate when we head to the ditch of obstructionism. An example is that right now, the justice committee is working on a bill called the miscarriage of justice act, which attempts to deal with the fact that many indigenous and Black Canadians have been wrongfully convicted and have spent long times in jail unnecessarily. Because of the carbon tax, the Conservatives are filibustering the miscarriage of justice act. This just makes no sense to me.

In the four terms I have been here, I have seen some bitter disputes over something that was actually before the House, but it is the first time I have seen disputes flowing into all the committees about something that is absolutely irrelevant to the work those committees are trying to do for Canadians.

[Canada Labour Code, December 14th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, I am particularly pleased and proud to be able to rise in this debate on Bill C-58.

It should go without saying in this country that workers deserve respect, fair wages and safe working conditions. However, success in achieving those things has depended largely on the free collective bargaining process. The success of every business, every enterprise and every government program depends on all the workers involved: Those who clean, those who provide security, those who drive and those who provide child care. None of our economy functions without all of us working together. In fact, I would speculate that if the top CEOs and directors stayed home for a day, their businesses would continue to function, because workers would carry on providing those services to the economy and to the public.

However, we should also recognize today that increasing inequality will eventually undermine social stability in this country. We have had the spectacle of Galen Weston, a CEO, appearing before a House of Commons committee and saying it is “reasonable” that he earns, in one year, 431 times his average worker's salary. I would say to Mr. Weston that it is reasonable only in some other universe than the one the rest of us live in. In fact, it is actually even out of scale for the top 100 CEOs, who only, on average, earn 243 times what their average worker does.

A study by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives demonstrated to us that, in a typical year, and we have a new year coming up, before the end of the second day, the top 100 CEOs will earn more than their average worker in the entire year. By my own calculations, by the end of that year, the CEOs will have earned more than their average worker will earn in a lifetime. Therefore, we have a serious problem with growing inequality in this country, and one of the only ways that we can, on a practical basis, see progress is through free collective bargaining.

We face huge challenges in our society, and I could spend time talking about the challenge of climate change. We face huge challenges, as I said, in inequality. We face all kinds of challenges in our workforce, with labour shortages. How do we address them? We certainly are a wealthy and well-educated country. We have a dedicated workforce, and if we all work together, and everyone pays their fair share, we can meet those challenges. We know what we need to do.

I would cite the NDP dental care plan as an example of how we can meet the challenges we face. This is a health challenge, in particular, for many seniors I hear from in my riding. They worked very hard all their lives but did not necessarily have a job in which their health benefits continued into retirement, if they had them at all. I have had many people approach my office to say that the quality of their life is really impaired by their inability to afford dental care. How is this relevant? If everybody pays their fair share, we can afford dental care for all Canadians.

Some of my Conservative friends have said, “Well, you always support spending. Why is that? You will just support deficits.” I try to correct them by saying that, as a New Democrat, I do not support deficits; I support fair taxation. If we apply the principles of fair taxation, including a wealth tax in this country, we can afford to take care of each other, which is an important principle.

However, where did that principle of taking care of each other come from? It came from trade unions and collective bargaining, where workers joined together and said, “Let us not have some of us succeed at the cost of the rest of us in the workplace.” They negotiated contracts that provided fair benefits, fair wages and better working conditions for everybody in the bargaining unit, and the employers could not just reward those they favoured in the workplace.

I will tell members a door knocking story from an election campaign. I went out one Saturday morning, too early for me and obviously too early for some of my constituents. A gentleman came to the door and said, “Oh, you're the New Democrat. I can't support you.” I said, “Why can't you?” He said, “You're way too close to the unions.” I said, “What day is it?” He said, “What do you mean, what day is it?” I asked again, “What day is it?” He said, “It's Saturday”, and then he looked at me and said, “I see where you're going with this.” I said, “Yes, you're home on the weekend because collective bargaining got people weekends off, which made it a standard in our society.” He said, “Oh, next you're going to talk to me about health care and all kinds of other things unions got.” I said, “That's absolutely what I'm going to talk to you about.” He said, “I still can't vote for you”, and shut the door. I did not succeed in convincing him that day, but even he understood that a lot of the benefits he enjoyed as a non-union worker came from the work of trade unions.

Why am I giving all these examples when we are talking about anti-scab legislation? We know the importance of collective bargaining. We also know, if we stop to think for a minute, that most collective bargaining processes do not lead to strikes or lockouts; the vast majority of them do not. I have seen various statistics. In some sectors, up to 90% of contracts are completed successfully without any work stoppage at all.

What happens when replacement workers get involved? Again, the studies will tell us quite clearly that if replacement workers are hired by an employer, two things happen. One is that the strike, on average, will last six times longer than if replacement workers were not involved. The second thing the use of replacement workers does is to introduce an element of hostility and division in the community, because workers who are on strike see replacement workers as a threat to their livelihood. Quite often, replacement workers are hired through employment agencies or other ways in which they have no idea that they are being sent into such a position of conflict as a replacement worker.

What I think is really good about the legislation is that it would bank this practice. British Columbia and Quebec have already had this kind of legislation for years. Of course, the NDP has been trying to get it introduced at the federal level. We have introduced a bill eight times in the last 15 years. The last time we introduced it, in 2016, both the Liberals and the Conservatives voted against anti-scab legislation.

The Conservative Party leader likes to talk about working people and how he is a friend of working people. I would say that the bill gives him a chance to demonstrate that concretely. His previous record does not show that. His party voted against minimum wages. His party, I guess I would say, has never seen back-to-work legislation it did not like. The record is clear on one side. If the Conservatives want to change that record, the legislation before us gives them an opportunity to demonstrate that they really are friends of workers and friends of progress, in terms of our economy.

Who are the workers most affected by the use of replacement workers? I am going to make a strange argument here, but quite often it is actually the non-union workers, because it is unionized companies and unionized sectors that set the standard that employers have to meet, even if those standards are not legislated. When we talk about the people who work in the lowest-paid, non-union jobs, they would actually be protected by the legislation as well, because it would allow unions to have shorter work stoppages and to negotiate better conditions, which would eventually spread through our economy.

Once again, I am back to the point I want to make. We hear a lot about how society and Parliament in Canada are suddenly dysfunctional. I do not believe that is true. I believe what we have are the choices that we are making. We make choices in the economy. It is not inevitable that we have great inequality. It is not inevitable that we have homelessness in our society. We make policy choices that have real outcomes that disadvantage many Canadians. We can make better choices and we can make different choices.

When we are talking about whether the House of Commons can do that, if the House of Commons appears dysfunctional to people, I believe that it is currently the result of choices being made by one party in the House to make the House of Commons appear dysfunctional and to make sure, as the party's leader declared, that we cannot get anything done anything in the House. He said he is going to grind the House to a halt, and we have seen him trying to do that. What is the impact of that on workers? It means we cannot get to legislation like the bill before us. It means we cannot get to a fair bargaining process for workers in the federal sector across the country. I represent a riding where there are lots of workers in the federally regulated sector. I know that this is important to them because they know it would shorten labour disputes and result in less hostility around the picket lines.

One last thing I want to talk about is that the improvement this legislation would make over what exists in B.C. and Quebec is that it considers the issue of remote work. One of the challenges we have now is that, in many industries, if there is a picket line, there is no need for employers to get someone to actually cross a physical line; they can hire people to work remotely. The federal legislation would actually be an improvement over what exists in British Columbia and Quebec, and I look forward to being able to vote in favour of it.