Justice committee  In our opinion, it is important that the sentence reflect not only the consequences of these actions on the victims and on the women's lives, but also their objective seriousness. Stalking is one of the tactics, one of the manifestations of coercive control. So, we simply find it logical that the maximum sentence should be at least ten years, and not five years as currently provided for in Bill C‑332.

Justice committee  I'd like to take the liberty of adding something. In Scotland, survivors were invited to participate in the consultation on the wording of the law, and pets were among the examples that were subsequently added.

Justice committee  Thank you for the question. I actually had the opportunity to go to London and Edinburgh to meet partners in jurisdictions where coercive control had been criminalized. There are many lessons to be learned. Canada's fortunate to be able to propose such measures after those countries did, because it can learn from their experience.

Justice committee  Thank you very much for the question. Indeed, that's one of the amendments we'd like to see in Bill C-332. In particular, we want the two-year time limit set out in the bill to be removed. We're not even proposing that the period be increased, because in reality, there's no time limit on domestic violence following a separation.

Justice committee  The societal implications are that criminalization would demonstrate that this socially unacceptable behaviour needs to be taken seriously. Although physical violence and femicides are universally condemned, all too often, non-physical intimate partner violence continues to be normalized and trivialized.