It’s an honour for me to bring this private member’s matter, Bill 138, the Change of Name Amendment Act, along with my colleague, the member from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock.

Speaker, name changes are relatively common in Ontario and often indicate a positive transition in life. It could be a new beginning for an adopted child, or a person, perhaps, who wants to capture a part of their family lineage—regardless, there are a number of reasons that provide an honourable and positive reason for changing your name.

But sadly, there are many bad actors who use the application to hide their identity for the wrong reasons—creating a new world for themselves, unknown to their victims and their community. These convicted offenders could take advantage of this opportunity of a legal name change to distance themselves from crime so very heinous, providing them with a new life, a fresh start—something their victims will never have.

The right to change one’s name shouldn’t be abused. As a community of people who sit within this House, I believe we have a moral obligation to put the rights of those victims first.

Let me give you a bit of background on this bill. In 1988, when Christopher was just 11 years old, he was kidnapped at knifepoint at a Brampton mall, and, after hours of abuse, the abuser killed Christopher and left his body in a field. It was determined through the investigation that the person responsible for the attack, Fredericks, was a repeat sexual offender. From the ashes of that horrific experience, Christopher’s parents rallied to create Christopher’s Law, also known as the Ontario Sex Offender Registry, which came into effect in 2001. This bill is very simple: to ban convicted sex offenders that fall into this registry from having the privilege of making application for a legal name change. They should not get a new chance at life, because that’s something their victims will never have. We have to do everything in our power to protect the lives of our most vulnerable in society: our children, their family members and the supports that keep them whole.

Sexual offences are among the most heinous and degrading forms of violence against children. They have a devastating impact on survivors, who are literally broken, and they live with this trauma for the rest of their lives.

In my past life, I worked on matters under the child protection act and it was very rewarding work. Many files were a happy ending for the children that Ontario supported—placement in a safe and nurturing family environment—and I’m always reflective of this work as positive not only for the children but also as a community. I’m not blind, though, to the trauma some of those children face. As a mother it especially hits home for me. We have to work to protect Ontario’s children.

Speaker, let me be very clear: We currently have very strong laws. Ontarians seeking a legal name change must undergo a criminal record check, and under most circumstances, those who change their names must register these details with the Ontario Gazette, where name changes are published. Yet truthfully, Speaker, most Ontarians do not read the Gazette, let alone know of its existence. While safeguards do exist, they still do not prevent sex offenders from making applications.

It’s also crucial to keep in mind that recidivism amongst offenders remains an ongoing concern. Given the heinous nature of sexual offences, recidivism cannot be ignored, and the highest likelihood of reoffenders is observed amongst those who victimize young boys, with a 15-year recidivism rate of 35%. That means one in three are going to recommit.

Recently, an investigation by a joint task force of police services across Ontario known as Project Limestone has led to the arrest of 10 people for child exploitation. One of the people taken into custody was a repeat offender; one who was out on bail at the time of their arrest. And I also think of Donald Shumey, the 76-year-old man who returned to Canada after spending 20 years in prison after 88 different sexual offence counts. He changed his name as well: David Donald Stryker.

And, like most of us, we think of Karla Homolka, who is now living under the name of Leanne Teale in Quebec. We all remember her, and I will choose not to mention her former husband’s name, because, quite simply, their crimes were so reprehensible that I do not wish to bring his name into the record. My understanding is that Ms. Homolka—or, should I say, Ms. Teale—was at one point volunteering at a school.

This legislation aims to deny these offenders the legal right to change their name. There are no acceptable excuses for those who commit such acts, and our laws and our punishments must be consistently firm in addressing these cases. This legislation has been adopted in other jurisdictions, and these are positive steps that Ontario needs to make.

The right to change one’s name must not be abused. Closing this loophole will strengthen our government’s zero tolerance against sexual offenders on our most vulnerable, and strengthen our position with survivors and their families, putting them first and not the thousands of offenders who have committed the most reprehensible crimes against our most precious citizens.

This bill, if passed, will stop the Karla Homolkas of the world from becoming Leanne Teales. These heinous criminals are the people that this legislation aims to stop. I hope you will support Bill 138, the Change of Name Amendment Act, for the sake of our communities, our children and our children’s children. Thank you.

It’s always an honour to be able to stand in the House, today to discuss Bill 138, An Act to amend the Change of Name Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act, sponsored by the member from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock and the member from Thornhill.

Just to put it in context, I’d like to read the explanatory note: “The bill amends the Change of Name Act to provide that certain offenders are ineligible to apply to change their name. The offenders who are ineligible are those who are required to comply with Christopher’s Law (Sex Offender Registry), 2000.” The member from Thornhill did a good job of explaining what Christopher’s Law’s role is to register sex offenders.

As a parent, I think I speak on behalf of everyone in this province that I can’t imagine what it’s like for a parent to experience their child being abused, or for the child. And as a party, we, as every other Ontarian, want to make sure that children are protected and that people who have harmed them in any way—that we do our best to make sure that it doesn’t happen again. That is incumbent on us.

We think this bill is supportable. We support it. We support it to actually go to committee and actually make sure that it’s done correctly, that we actually make this bill as good as it can be and that it actually passes. This is an issue, I think, on which we can all agree, but we have to make sure that someone doesn’t get caught up in this who we’re not trying to get caught up. That’s why it should go to committee. The member for Thornhill, I agree: We do have strong legislation in this province, strong legislation that can always be made better. With this bill, I think it is a step forward as long as we make sure that it’s as good as it can be.

I don’t think we need to prolong this debate. We are all on the same page in this one. You have our support. There’s nothing that should be stopping this bill from going to committee and becoming law. I’d like to thank the members for putting it forward. I’d like to thank you, Speaker, for allowing me the time. Those are my remarks.

It’s my pleasure tonight to rise in support of Bill 138, and I want to congratulate my colleagues the MPP from Haliburton–Kawartha Lakes–Brock and the MPP from Thornhill for bringing this important private member’s bill forward. It’s also my pleasure as the parliamentary assistant to the Ministry of the Attorney General to speak to this matter.

This is a government that is committed to putting the safety and well-being of our citizens and our communities first and foremost. Earlier in this session, we spoke to the need to address bail reform to make sure that a small percentage of our most violent re-offenders are kept off the streets pending trial. This debate tonight is a little bit different, because what we’re discussing is not pre-sentencing issues; what we’re talking about is post-conviction issues. That type of sentencing and carrying through on those types of sentences to make sure that we safeguard our community and specifically those that are most vulnerable in youth and women is a critical, critical issue for us.

We look at the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and it states in section 1 that the charter “guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.” We in Canada are somewhat unique in this. We do not prioritize rights. We don’t stack rights. They live in a continuum, in the balance that we try to strike in making sure that we have a respect for the rights of the individual, and we understand how those rights turn into obligations when we live in a community. So with a right comes an obligation. For example, in our freedom of speech: That freedom of speech is balanced by our obligation to prevent hate crimes, to not speak prejudicially about others and to make sure that the conversations we’re having are productive and discursive.

That same balancing act, Madam Speaker, exists in our Criminal Code as well. While we want to make sure that the rights of the individual charged are respected—that they get a free and impartial trial, that they have the right to a lawyer—that is balanced with the need for us to protect our citizenry and to make sure that, when we’re sentencing, we’re looking at the determinants of a sentence, from rehabilitation to retribution to deterrence. All of these foundational aspects of the sentencing process are grounded in the idea that, if you break the law, you will pay the price, and there’s a balancing to make sure that our citizens and our most vulnerable are protected from criminal conduct or the acts of others that transgress the Criminal Code.

The situation that we’re talking about tonight is really about protecting our most vulnerable. We’re looking at a convict who has been convicted of crimes, of sexual crimes against youth, against women and against other men, to make sure that they must serve the penalty that’s been meted out to them, but also that we balance that so in their post-sentencing world they will be monitored and so that we can most protect those in our society that need that protection.

Christopher’s Law, enacted in 2011, is a strong example of that. An 11-year-old boy was murdered by a convicted sex offender who had a past record and took the life of an 11-year-old, so we created a registry so that we would have a continuous record of those who had committed these most heinous crimes. What we’re doing tonight is trying to close a loophole that would allow a convicted sex offender to walk around Christopher’s Law and to subvert the protections that the government of Canada has put in place to protect the most vulnerable from a sex offender.

We have heard from the earlier speakers tonight of the prevalence of recidivism in this type of offence: as high as 35%, or one in three. If we allow name changes to take place—and we have seen that happen. We have seen it in the example of Karla Homolka. We have seen it in the case of David Donald Shumey from Saskatchewan and also in the case of Adam Budgell, who was convicted on three separate occasions of domestic abuse and rape of his former partners. One of those partners is Jenny Smith from Welland, Ontario. After the conviction of her assailant, she said, “I could sleep at night knowing that once he was released, all any person—a woman, a family member, a friend ... could” do was to “google ‘Adam Budgell’ and he could not escape what he had done.” But Adam did; he changed his name. By changing his name, he sidestepped the important tracking that could be done through Christopher’s Law to prevent, and protect our citizens.

Madam Speaker, this motion, this private members’ bill, will plug that loophole, will make sure that the intent of Christopher’s Law is abided by and will balance the rights of the individual against the collective rights of our citizenry and our communities. On this topic and in this situation, there can be no mistake that the protection and the favour must fall on the side of our citizens and our communities. For that, I will be supporting this very important private members’ bill. Again, I thank the members for their hard work on this.

And I will be sharing my time with MPP Leardi.