44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 22, 2022 02:00PM
- Jun/22/22 8:51:33 p.m.
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I have to interrupt the hon. minister. We are having a problem with the interpretation.
Is it working now?
I think it is the hon. minister's microphone that is perhaps a bit too high. Maybe she could lower it.
Can we try again?
Hon. Marci Ien: Madam Speaker, is this better?
The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès): It seems to be better.
The hon. minister.
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Madam Speaker, as mentioned, the Supreme Court ruling created a gap, and unfortunately, that gap was quickly filled with misinformation.
I have a personal note. A couple of weeks ago, my daughter, Blaize, came home from school. She is 17 years old. She said, “Mom, how messed up is it that people can just get drunk and then assault other people?” This, of course, was based on information she had seen on social media.
I come from a background of research. In my previous life I was a reporter, so I dug into this a bit. I looked into some of the social media posts, and I looked into what Blaize and other young women across this country were seeing. What I saw were social media posts with thousands of likes and comments misleading young women about what the Supreme Court's decision actually means.
I want to share, if I might, a couple of examples. One caption of a clip said, “POV: You are a teenage girl living in Canada where rape is now legal, if you are intoxicated”. It had 489,000 likes, more than 9,000 comments and almost 6,000 shares. Another post said, “You are a 16-year-old teenager living in Canada, and being too intoxicated is legal for rape and sexual assault”. That had 2.1 million views, and that is why I am here tonight.
While Bill C-28 would address a rare defence, the impact of the gross misinformation on young people, and young women especially, has been absolutely significant. This unintentional misinformation and sometimes intentional alarmist reporting style come with very serious consequences for women right across this country, as they are adding to the stigma that survivors already face when reporting gender-based violence. We know the data already shows us that just 5% of sexual assaults are actually reported to police.
Parliament simply cannot go another day knowing there are young women who believe that, if they are attacked, they will not be protected. It is why, in the little more than five weeks since the Supreme Court's decision, we are making it clear that individuals who consume drugs or alcohol in a criminally negligent manner are held criminally responsible. There will be no loophole.
For those who saw this ruling or the headlines surrounding it and felt that fear, I want them to know that I see them. I understand them, and I understand where that feeling comes from. By closing the gap created by the Supreme Court's rulings, the legislation would strengthen Canada's legal system and better protect some of the most vulnerable members of our society.
Bill C-28 is just one of the many actions we are taking to address gender-based violence and build public confidence in the criminal justice system. We are addressing this from every angle, with changes such as implementing more training for judges, funding campus supports for students and working with provinces and territories on a national action plan to end gender-based violence, which is on track to come out this year.
I know there is still distrust in our justice system, especially for racialized women and girls, indigenous women and members of the LGBTQ2 community, but I hope Bill C-28 will address some of these very real concerns. We cannot lose this hard-won ground. Acting quickly to close the gap created by the Supreme Court's ruling is an important part of this effort. I encourage my hon. colleagues and the other place, as well, to support this bill now before us.
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Madam Speaker, one thing is so key. We know that we need to continually make improvements to the justice system because it continually fails women. While some of the people who are very supportive of this piece of legislation have come out with their support, they have also recommended that far more training occur within the criminal justice system for these types of violence and for criminal acts that happen against women.
The minister mentioned it briefly, but I would ask her talk more about what the government has planned to ensure that our criminal justice system has that specific training to help women who are facing sexual violence.
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Madam Speaker, I want to reiterate what Bill C-28 would do, because that is why we are here tonight. Bill C-28 would amend the Criminal Code so that individuals would be held responsible for violence they commit while in a state of extreme intoxication if they ended up in that state through their own criminal negligence.
That is an important point. In other words, if people voluntarily consume intoxicants, drugs or mix drugs with alcohol knowing that there is a risk of losing control and becoming violent, they may be held criminally responsible. That is the gap that we are closing.
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Madam Speaker, one of the things I am hearing from many organizations is the lack of consultation. The minister indicated that there was lots of consultation, and I know the Minister of Justice said that also, but one of the biggest pieces of feedback I am getting this week is that there has not been enough.
I would ask the minister to comment on that because that is the feedback I am getting from many organizations across Canada.
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Madam Speaker, the hon. member is my critic. I have deep respect for the member and for the way she leads with such empathy.
It is important that we remember why we are here tonight and why we acted so expeditiously in this regard. It is my belief that lives are on the line. When we have the kind of misinformation that was rampant on social media, that creates fear. I saw it in my own daughter, and I know she is not alone. That is something we are addressing. We moved quickly to close the gap.
There was consultation, but it is so important to remember why we are here. Bill C-28 would address a rare defence. The impact of misinformation on young people and young women has been absolutely significant. I have heard first-hand young women who truly thought that if they were attacked, there would be no protection for them, none. We had to act quickly and we did. It has been just over—
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- Jun/22/22 9:00:35 p.m.
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The hon. member for Kitchener Centre.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate that the Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Youth and the governing party have moved quickly.
I wonder if she could offer her insights in response to comments recently reported in the media by Kerri Froc, chair of the National Association of Women and the Law, who shared concerns that Bill C-28, as written, may be too difficult for prosecutors to prove. What are the minister's comments on that?
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Madam Speaker, I am based in research. I have heard it first-hand. I have talked to young women who said if they are attacked, they are not going to be protected, and I had to clear up that misinformation.
We had to act quickly. We know that it has been just over five weeks. We know that well, since the Supreme Court's decision, but we are making it abundantly clear that committing any crime is not okay. I want to repeat that: It is not okay.
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Madam Speaker, I listened carefully to the speech given by my colleague, the Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Youth.
She told us that lives are at stake. I completely agree with her, and the Bloc Québécois is definitely in favour of Bill C‑28. If lives are at stake, then my question is obvious: Why did they wait so long to introduce legislation?
In R. v. Brown, which went to the Supreme Court, there was already a decision at the trial level. The government could have been proactive and provided a framework for such situations. I will quote the Supreme Court, as follows:
Parliament had before it a record that highlighted the strong correlation between alcohol and drug use and violent offences, in particular against women, and brought to the fore of Parliament’s attention the equality, dignity, and security rights of all victims of intoxicated violence.
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Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his support, and I will say with deep respect that five weeks is not slow.
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Madam Speaker, to begin, I would like to ask for unanimous consent to split my time with the member for Fundy Royal.
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- Jun/22/22 9:03:25 p.m.
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Does the hon. member have unanimous consent?
Some hon. members: Agreed.
The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès): The hon. member may proceed.
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Madam Speaker, I am sure everybody in the lobby is surprised that I actually did that at the right time.
Tonight is one of our last evenings sitting in the House of Commons before we adjourn for the summer and return to our ridings. The speech that I am going to give tonight is truly based in what I am seeing all around us. It has become a culture of violence.
Tonight, we are speaking on Bill C-28. Although I support it in principle, we do have a lot further to go. Tonight, we have the opportunity to begin this discussion, which I hope becomes a much larger national discussion. We need to continue this conversation, especially with women's organizations, which have come out and cannot support this legislation.
A good ally of mine and friend, Megan Walker, discussed this legislation with me yesterday. She cannot support it and shared her concerns about the ability of the Crown to prove it. She feels that this legislation is tokenism
Women's organizations are stepping forward and asking us to halt this legislation, while other organizations are in full support of the legislation. To me, this is a clear yellow light that we have to be cautious and that we need to re-address this: that what we are doing today is just not enough. This needs to continue.
My last six months in my role as the shadow minister for women and gender equality and youth have given me the honour to work with people, especially in the committee on the status of women.
I can share with members that it seems like we are in a real mess, and I can tell us that we need change.
Let us start with this piece of legislation. I want to address it by sharing the letter that was received by the National Association of Women and the Law. It reads, and I quote:
Feminist organizations in Canada have long been concerned about the connection between men’s use of intoxicants, and violence against women. Study after study has shown that there is a direct link between so-called ‘drunkenness’ and sexual violence. There are studies that report an average of 50% of sexual assault perpetrators consumed alcohol at the time of the assault, with other studies showing a variance of between 30 and 75%.
Looking back to the 1994 Daviault decision, in which the Supreme Court ordered a new trial based on the accused’s extreme intoxication at the time of the incident, the ‘gap’ in the law quickly becomes apparent. Mr. Daviault had voluntarily consumed an excessive quantity of alcohol before forcing intercourse on the complainant, an elderly woman with a disability. In response, feminist groups like National Association of Women and the Law (NAWL) pressed the government to restrict the defence of extreme intoxication. The federal government enacted section 33.1 of the Criminal Code, closing the gap by preventing those who voluntarily consume intoxicants and then commit acts of violence from using the defence of extreme intoxication for general intent offences.
In May 2022, the Supreme Court of Canada’s unanimous decision in Brown struck down the law set out in s. 33.1, declaring it unconstitutional and stating that voluntarily taking intoxicating substances cannot replace the criminal intent required for a conviction. This decision re-opens the ‘gap’ left by the 1994 Daviault decision, once again leaving women vulnerable to crimes of violence when the accused can demonstrate that his intoxication put him into a state of automatism. Despite the assurances of some defence lawyers and their allies that reliance on extreme intoxication will be rare, research analyzing the extreme intoxication defence indicates that it will be raised with some regularity. Indeed, research shows that it will be used overwhelmingly by men, and that the majority of victims will be women.
I know that I shared a very lengthy part of that letter, but to me, this is what we are talking about. Yes, this legislation came out very quickly. That means we need to get it passed to stop the gap today, but that does not mean that the gap has fully been filled. That is why I am urging the government to say, yes, we have got Bill C-28 done but we need to do more. I am urging the government to get on the road and let us start doing those consultations. Let us start talking more.
I want to go back to stuff that we have also been hearing about Hockey Canada. We just heard that Hockey Canada receives one to two formal complaints annually and that there are investigations.
I want to talk about all of this, because one thing that I can indicate is that sexual violence and violence against children should never happen. We are seeing it more and more. In the past number of weeks, as I have been dealing with my role as the shadow minister for women and gender equality, and in chairing the committee on the status of women, we are talking about violence and more violence. Our one study on intimate partner violence was talking about domestic violence. Following that, we talked about Kyra's Law, named for a young girl, a young child, who was murdered by her father, basically to get back at the mother.
I am looking at what is happening with Hockey Canada. We talked about a young girl who was allegedly raped by eight hockey players, and there is no responsibility. Then we can talk about what we are talking about here today, Bill C-28. To me, it is really clear. We are talking about things that are a social issue. It is a sexual assault issue.
When I look back at that link between what I am talking about with Hockey Canada and the eight players, and what we are seeing here, the bottom line is that it should never be happening in the first place. In Hockey Canada, we are hearing about a civil law suit that went through. Hockey Canada actually paid out, rather than having this go through the criminal court system. Unfortunately, I understand why someone would choose a civil suit over our justice system right now. We know it is not perfect. With the help of Bill C-233 and other bills that have been put forward in the past, we need to ensure that there is proper training for judges, but it is not just judges. It is everybody involved.
When I look at this, I look at who is responsible. Ultimately, the perpetrator has to be responsible. Although this legislation closes that gap in which we are talking about the state of automatism, we also have to look at what is next.
Just weeks ago, we passed that important piece of legislation, Bill C-233 with unanimous support. It was an all-party effort. I believe it started a conversation, and I believe what we are doing here tonight is also starting that conversation. Just as the minister stated, I had the same conversation with my 18-year-old son. He called me the very next morning and asked me about it when I was in Ottawa. I said, “Son, I'm working on this.” We recognize that it does not mean that someone has to be drunk and this could happen, but there needs to be extreme intoxication. For a young woman, anything is a barrier, including the fact that somebody may use this defence. Everything like that is a barrier.
People are coming out and saying that this law is just window dressing and is not really tackling the real issues. I think what we have to tackle is the culture of sexual violence, because we seem to be ignoring it. I was thinking about it a lot over the past few days. Working on the Hockey Canada case has really brought things to light. These are our kids we are talking about. These are the kids that our kids go to public school with. These are the children, whether they are the perpetrators or the victims. These are just kids. Sometimes we get lost on our way and we confuse what is right and wrong. Is extreme intoxication good enough, or is because someone is an athlete or a politician good enough?
We know, from the recent Supreme Court ruling on May 13, that women's organizations have spoken up. Because of that, we know this needs to be addressed. The government has addressed it through this legislation as Bill C-28. I thank the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada. We pushed on this and we asked for this to be done, so I thank him for doing so.
We need more transparency for victims, and we need to remember that victims have rights, too. This is the problem. We talk so much about the rights of our perpetrators, but our victims need to have rights too. This is what we are losing a lot of the time in these conversations, whether I am talking about Hockey Canada or extreme intoxication. No is no, and there must be consent.
Finally, I want to end this with a quote. I go back to the National Association of Women and the Law:
While they may not be successful in making out the defence – pleading the defence, in itself, will result in increased timelines and lengthy court processes for victims. Ultimately, C-28 is a missed opportunity to close the door on the use of the extreme intoxication defence where alcohol alone is used.
I am coming back and I am saying that this summer I will be working on this. I will be working on providing any information that I can to both the Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Youth and the Minister of Justice, because we can do better, and we need to make sure that we listen to everybody. We need to be listening to the victims, and we need to be working to end sexual violence.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for her very thoughtful speech, as well as her support of this bill.
I want to quote from LEAF:
LEAF supports this thoughtful, nuanced, and constitutional legislation to address the narrow gap resulting from the SCC decisions.
“If adopted by Parliament, we will be looking to the courts to apply this legislation in a similarly thoughtful way,” says Pam Hrick, Executive Director & General Counsel at LEAF.
I am wondering if my friend opposite could comment on this. Based on her concerns about the bill, could the member see how it is so important for us to pass this bill today and have it as law before we rise?
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Madam Speaker, we need to pass it because, as the Minister for Gender Equality indicated, we do not want victims. We do not want another person to fall victim to this. I look at it as one is too many. We know that this defence being used once is one time too many, especially if somebody has been the victim of a sexual assault and somebody is getting off using this defence. We need to continue this conversation. Although this bill solves part of the problem, there needs to be a much bigger conversation.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague and I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge her. She is the chair of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. I wish her a very good summer. She was also with me at the meeting of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage on the horrible case of assault against a young woman; it is truly awful. She spoke about it at the end.
It was a difficult session. We conducted a study on domestic violence at the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. It was a very tough session. We heard some poignant testimonies.
How does Bill C‑28 fit into this context? She opened the door in her response to the previous question: in a continuum of measures that may be taken to address violence against people. She says that this bill may not go far enough. How does she see it? What would she have wanted to see to make this bill truly fit into the context where we address this violence against women?
I would like to hear her thoughts.
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Madam Speaker, I have really enjoyed my time working with the member for Shefford.
When we are looking at this bill, Bill C-28, we know that domestic violence increases with the intake of alcohol. We know that over the past two years, when we have seen stress and mental health also have many challenges, we have seen an increase in domestic violence, as well. With respect to Bill C-28, because I am a person who will always advocate for victims, I look at this as a very victim-centred bill. That is what we need to look at. It seems to be more perpetrator-centred, but that is the thing. We need to continue to fight for those victims and we understand that—
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- Jun/22/22 9:16:42 p.m.
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We have time for a brief question. The hon. member for Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke.
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Madam Speaker, I know the member shares the same concern we have as New Democrats: This is only one part of attacking violence against women. Does she share with me the concern that the justice committee has twice recommended to the House that the government act to make coercive and controlling behaviour an offence in the Criminal Code? We know that coercive and controlling behaviour contributes directly to violence. Does she share my concern about the sloth with which the government is approaching that recommendation?
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