I move that, in the opinion of this House, the government of Ontario should consult with the public and its partners in the Family Court system to promote and ensure the availability of continuing education seminars for professionals in Ontario’s Family Court system, such as judges, justices of the peace, crown attorneys, custody assessors and social workers, on matters related to intimate partner violence and coercive control in intimate partner and family relationships.

This motion comes with a heavy backstory, and it’s an example of why it is so important we re-evaluate and apply new strategies to eliminate these horrific crimes. It’s about a girl named Keira Kagan—she was four years old, almost five. Keira’s mother, Dr. Jennifer Kagan-Viater, remembers her for her love of animals, sweet-natured soul and courageous smile. We say “remembers” because Keira died suddenly in an apparent murder-suicide at the hands of her father.

On February 9, 2020, Keira and her biological father were found dead at the base of a cliff at Rattlesnake Point Conservation Area in Milton. Jennifer Kagan-Viater and Keira had lived in Burlington, and were living in Thornhill at the time.

In the years leading up to Keira’s death, Dr. Kagan-Viater remembered an escalation in abusive behaviour by her ex-husband. Though she’d left him years earlier, she worried about the safety of her daughter during his unsupervised visits.

She said, “The abuse did not stop with separation, and it only got worse. Keira was used as a tool to get claws into me.”

She said she went to the courts seeking protection for Keira, and expressed concern about Brown’s violent and coercive behaviour, but she said she was met with hurdles.

She went on to say, “When I brought forward the evidence about abuse of Mr. Brown, we had a judge, for example,” say “that domestic violence is not relevant to parenting and, ‘I’m going to ignore it.’”

This motion is aimed at addressing a glaring gap in our family law system to ensure that judges, crown attorneys, justices of the peace, court assessors, social workers and other professionals have the information they need to keep women and children safe.

Jennifer Kagan-Viater, her spouse, Philip Viater, friends and supporters worked hard to spread the message about the need to fill this gap. I am proud to have Jennifer’s support for this motion and her commitment to see this become law in Ontario. This work is in honour of Keira and to ensure that no family has to mourn a lost loved one because of violence and abuse.

Violence against women and children is a blight on our society. All of us in this House know we need to fight it. It takes money for shelters and education. It takes teaching men and boys, women and girls that domestic violence of any kind is wrong. And it takes arming those who make decisions about custody access and child safety with the full information they need to keep everyone safe.

Last Friday was the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, the beginning of the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence, running until December 10, Human Rights Day. The Associate Minister of Women’s Social and Economic Opportunity joined me and MPP Pierre at Halton Women’s Place in our community to see the vital work they do.

This is also Woman Abuse Prevention Month. Yesterday, the Minister of Children, Community and Social Services marked the month, as we all did, by wearing a purple scarf, the symbol of the Ontario Association of Interval and Transition Houses’s Wrapped in Courage campaign. And December 6 is the anniversary of the Montreal massacre. We mark all of these commemorations because we know we need to do so much more.

Forty-four per cent of women in Canada have experienced some form of violence by an intimate partner in their lifetime. Ending the relationship does not end a women’s risk of death; 20% to 22% of intimate partner femicides were perpetrated by estranged spouses within the first 18 months of separation.

In Canada, a woman is murdered every 2.5 days, ranging from 144 to 178 murders each year between 2015 and 2019.

And in 2021, the rate of femicide was trending even higher. Of the women murdered, 50% were killed by intimate partners and 26% by family members.

Women account for 80% of reported incidents of intimate partner violence, which affects all ages, races, ethnicities and socio-economic strata. Women at highest risk are those who are young, immigrants, refugees, Indigenous or living with disabilities.

In my own community, Halton Women’s Place took 2,200 crisis calls in 2021. Over the same year, Halton police responded to 3,500 intimate-partner-violence-related calls, made 890 arrests and laid 2,000 charges.

Data on femicide in Canada show alarming trends among non-urban and Indigenous women. One quarter of all murdered women in Canada are Indigenous.

The Ontario Association of Interval and Transition Houses published a monthly report on femicide. In September 2022, they reported 40 confirmed femicides in Ontario since November 26, 2021.

Furthermore, violent and aggressive behaviour towards female partners is not always weighted heavily enough to change outcomes during decision-making in Family Court, such as in child custody cases.

A report from the Canadian Domestic Homicide Prevention Initiative included statistics on children killed in the context of domestic violence in Canada. There were 74 children killed, representing 9% of all domestic homicide victims identified in the period from 2010 to 2019. There were 54 accused identified in 52 cases of domestic homicide involving children; 82% were male. The majority of children killed were the biological children of the accused at 70%, followed by stepchildren at 24%.

Now, what these stats tell us is that the danger in cases of intimate partner violence does not end with separation or divorce. The most dangerous time for a victim of abuse is when she separates from her partner. According to research from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, when there is history of coercive control, violence and a recent separation, a woman’s risk of domestic homicide goes up 900 times. A study from the US found that 11% of 231 women killed by their intimate partner had been issued a restraining order; about 20% of those who had been issued a restraining order were killed within two days of the order being issued.

Jennifer drew my attention to the case of Jared Osidacz, an eight-year-old boy in Brantford, Ontario, who was killed by his father after a judge granted him unsupervised access.

In courts in Canada and other countries, one of the strategies used by abusers is victimizing themselves or alleging parental alienation. This is a tactic used by abusers whose interest is not in the best interest of the child or the ex-spouse but in controlling them.

We all know that abuse can be more than physical or sexual. Coercive control is part of the definition of family violence contained in both the federal Divorce Act and in the update our government made to the Children’s Law Reform Act in 2020. Both define it in the same way: “‘Family violence’ means any conduct by a family member towards another family member that is violent or threatening, that constitutes a pattern of coercive and controlling behaviour or that causes the other family member to fear for their own safety or for that of another person, and, in the case of a child, includes direct or indirect exposure to such conduct.”

We have the definition in our laws. We just need to ensure that training about domestic violence includes knowledge about coercive control and all aspects of intimate partner violence.

A federal bill, Bill C-223, introduced by Quebec MP Anju Dhillon, calling for training for federally appointed judges, passed the House of Commons with all-party support and is currently before the Senate. It follows on a law originally proposed by former MP Rona Ambrose for mandatory training in sexual assault law for judges. It was eventually passed as a government bill. The new law would add to this. This is what is needed in Ontario too, as Ontario regulates far more of the Family Court system.

The latest continuing education plan for Ontario judges notes that criminal law education conferences have recently covered a range of topics, including sex offences and sexual offenders and the meaning of consent in sexual assault cases. The plan does not appear to specifically reference intimate partner violence or coercive control in a family law context. The most recent Justice of the Peace Education Plan posted on the Ontario Court of Justice website includes two references to domestic violence issues.

We need to go further than this to ensure that decision-makers in the Family Court system learn about intimate partner violence, including emotional violence and coercive control. For too long, women have been silenced from speaking out about domestic violence and the trauma faced while navigating our legal system. That ends today as the Legislature passes Keira’s Law motion.

I would like to thank the Attorney General of Ontario as we take the first step to ensuring we have training about intimate partner violence and coercive control for Ontario judges, justices of the peace, crown attorneys and other professionals in our family courts. We need more tools to ensure all decision-makers know the signs of abuse so we can keep women and children safe.

To all those women who have suffered or are suffering: We hear you and see you. We know this is only the first step, but I’m going to keep working until we’ve found solutions. The best way that we, in the House, can honour Keira’s memory is to keep safe other women and children at risk from intimate partner violence.

I ask members in this House to support my motion. Thank you.

I would like to start my remarks by thanking the member for Oakville North–Burlington for bringing this motion forward. It is a motion that deals with a very serious issue, the issue of domestic violence, and it deserves full support from all of us.

I understand that this motion is inspired by Keira’s Law, a federal bill that passed in the House of Commons on June 1 of this year, with unanimous support of the whole House of Commons. The bill is currently at the second reading stage before the Senate.

The bill requires a justice to consider whether someone charged with intimate partner violence should be required to wear an electronic monitoring device, but more on point with the current motion, the bill also provides for continuing education seminars for judges on matters related to intimate partner violence and coercive control in intimate relationships.

The story behind this legislation is unfortunately one that is too common. Thanks to the determination of Keira’s mom, Jennifer, we now see Parliament taking action, and we need to do the same.

Keira was her four-year-old daughter, and she was found dead with her father on February 9, 2020, at the base of a cliff at Rattlesnake Point conservation area in Milton, Ontario. It is believed that this was a murder-suicide. The father, Robin Brown, had been abusive for years previously. The mother, Jennifer, sought protection for Keira through the courts. She expressed concern with her ex-husband’s violent behaviour. Unfortunately, like it was mentioned before, she was not taken seriously, with the judge saying that the domestic violence and coercive control of Mr. Brown were actually not relevant to Keira’s custody.

When I say this kind of story is too common, I mean that 30 to 40 kids are killed by their own parents every year in Canada. Some of the responsibilities fall with the courts, because they are failing the victims, because judges don’t have the proper training. Without the science of domestic violence, judges are ignoring clues that could help avoid such tragedies. Science cannot be infused, even for judges; it needs to be learned by those who have the power to make a difference.

All judges understand that in any domestic dispute, the interest of the child needs to be the priority. However, the interpretation of what this interest is can be wrong if the judge is thinking that the child must be able to see both parents and that fact supersedes any consideration of domestic violence. Domestic violence is not necessarily visual physically, and that’s why training is important. Training is not only important, it is critical.

I had the opportunity to speak to Jennifer just two days ago. She’s a brave mother who has shown great determination in bringing forward a proposed solution, not for her, because for her it’s too late, but to protect other children and parents from the infinitely tragic situation she has endured and the pain she continues to suffer. There is no more terrible loss than losing a child. We cannot let Jennifer down, no more than we can let down the children and parents who are at risk every day in this province.

The motion is a great first step. When I spoke with Jennifer, she said she’s grateful and she’s encouraged by this, so I’m totally supportive of this effort by the government. But we need to go further. We need to have conversations with the judiciary and the chief justices about the importance of making this a priority.

I spoke to the member for Oakville North–Burlington and to the Attorney General earlier this week, and I want to reiterate my offer to help and to collaborate with the government on moving this forward, to see concrete changes in our legislation.

Again, I want to thank the member for Oakville North–Burlington for bringing this motion before the assembly of Ontario.

I am grateful for the opportunity to rise today to support this important motion put forward by my colleague.

Domestic abuse can take many forms and is almost always related to power and control in the relationship.

Knowledge is power, and by knowing more and educating ourselves on the signs of intimate partner violence and coercive control, we put ourselves and our judicial system in a better position to help protect women and children in abusive relationships.

Gaps in education can have devastating and painful repercussions, as was the case with Keira Kagan, who was killed by her father. Keira’s mother, Jennifer, repeatedly warned judges of the danger Keira’s father posed to them. Keira’s Law, Bill C-233, is currently in the Senate. If there was sufficient training of court officials to identify violent tendencies and the dangers of coercive control, Keira’s case may not have had such a tragic ending. It’s imperative that lawmakers, enforcement officers and judicial powers recognize and know the signs. In order to do this, training is required.

To become an accredited mediator in Ontario, a person would have to do 21 hours of domestic violence training. This is mandatory training, which is required to be updated every year for five years. However, judges do not have to complete this training, and this is where the gap is.

Families put their trust in the court system, hoping that those making the decisions have the knowledge and the understanding it takes to identify violence and abuse in a family situation, because abuse is not always physical and violence doesn’t always present physically. Coercive control can look different in each and every case and can include things like isolating one from friends or family, monitoring communications or tools and depriving one of basic needs. For children, this can look like yelling, rejecting them, brainwashing, thought reform or turning one parent against another. These behaviours can also lead to challenges for children in their adult lives. Victims and survivors of coercive control often struggle with their own mental health, including PTSD, stress, anxiety, eating disorders, substance and alcohol abuse or even repeated cycles of violence and coercion.

The judicial system needs to start recognizing that abuse isn’t just physical; it can be subtle, humiliating, through intimidation, threats, control over finances and liberties. It’s power over the victim. We need to do more and do right by victims and children escaping these situations. Long after the abuse has ceased, the effects on families remain, and the trauma outlives the actual violence and the abuse. We need to make sure that judges, justices of the peace, social workers, mediators and decision-makers are helping to end the cycle of abuse with the appropriate training to handle difficult family cases.

Yesterday, Minister Fullerton spoke about November being Woman Abuse Prevention Month and how the purple scarf is a symbol of the courage it takes for women to leave their abuser.

To protect women and children, all levels of the system need to be trained on intimate partner violence and coercive control. Together, we can make a difference in the lives of victims and in the lives of survivors. Thank you to my colleague from Oakville North–Burlington for bringing intimate partner violence and coercive control to light.