Justice committee  Thank you, Mr. Garrison. That leads me to two complementary subjects, access to long-term care, and recognition for elderly members of minority groups. As you know, seniors are not a homogeneous group. There are huge differences based on gender, age and ethnocultural communitie

Justice committee  Elder abuse includes psychological, material, financial, physical and sexual aspects, as well as infringement of rights. It can take many different forms. What stands out most in the major prevalence studies is always psychological abuse, which is very often accompanied by finan

Justice committee  Thank you for your question, Mr. Garrison. I would say that the whole question of private versus public long-term care homes has been problematic for several years now. I'll be very careful in my answer, having encountered serious abuse incidents in public care homes as well. I

Justice committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Fortin. My first point reported on current knowledge about abuse, its prevalence and its dynamics. My second point was about the legal scope of the abuse concept, including current limitations on Criminal Code enforcement. I specifically addressed pract

Justice committee  For legal aid specifically for seniors, there is a legal aid centre for elders at McGill University, headed by a lawyer, Ms. Ann Soden. Other than that, what Quebec mainly has are user fee services, which are not always specialized in aid for seniorsx. The Advocacy Centre for th

Justice committee  I believe that there are still several problems. When we work with seniors who have been abused and talk to them about seeking assistance or reporting an incident, we find that most of them don't know where to go, either because such services don't exist or because they're not w

Justice committee  The fact that people are talking about it more would indicate that people are more aware of elder abuse. However, I can't tell you whether there are more incidents at home or in residential facilities. What I can say is that over the past year, the pandemic has revealed all kind

Justice committee  It took time to come up with a definition of elder abuse, and it came in 2002 as part of the World Health Organization's work in Canada, in the Toronto Declaration on the Global Prevention of Elder Abuse. The declaration defines elder abuse as "a single or repeated act, or lack

Justice committee  Certainly. Elder bullying was never recognized until a few years ago. It involves a power relationship, and we now acknowledge that it's a relationship that can exist between people who know one another, but seniors can also be bullied by others, including other seniors.

Justice committee  I was still quite concerned even when the amendments that resulted in section 718.2 of the Criminal Code were made because that section constitutes a reminder to judges, rather than an obligation, to consider age, victimization and its consequences. I don't think it goes far enou

Justice committee  Thank you for your question, Ms. Brière. In my view, the act of reporting incidents to the police is the key to the criminal justice system. What we've seen over the years, until five or six years ago, is that police officers were not well trained in recognizing elder abuse. I w

Justice committee  Good afternoon, members of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Thank you for inviting me to take part in your work on a topic that has been very important to me for nearly 35 years. I share your concerns and your wish to take a more effective approach to addressi