Intimate Partner Violence

Honourable senators, it has been 19 months since I initiated this inquiry for debate. Tonight, I seek to close it, and I thank you for your indulgence. I do this not because I believe everything has been said, but because I am assured by the number of advocates for victims of intimate partner violence present in this chamber who — I know — will continue this discussion here and elsewhere.

In the period from when I first spoke until November 2023, at least 58 women were killed in Ontario under intimate partner violence circumstances. This continues intimate partner violence’s upward trajectory over the past four years — higher than the average pre-pandemic rate.

I would like to extend my thanks and gratitude to those who have contributed remarks to this inquiry. Senators Hartling, Boyer, Seidman, Coyle, Bernard, Pate and Cotter have all offered pertinent and sometimes shocking information to the discussion. I am grateful for the expertise that each of you has brought to this debate.

There have been many developments surrounding intimate partner violence in Canada since I first spoke in October 2022 — not all of which have been positive, but many have been. At the federal level, the Government of Canada released its National Action Plan to End Gender-Based Violence in November 2022. This action plan has been in development since 2017, and, according to Crystal Garrett-Baird, the director general addressing gender-based violence at Women and Gender Equality Canada, the plan:

. . . was informed by over 1,000 recommendations and responds directly to years of calls from survivors, experts and advocates, as well as domestic and international organizations, for Canada to take stronger action to end gender-based violence, including intimate partner violence. . . .

This information was recently shared at our Social Affairs Committee during the study of Bill S-249, which is Senator Manning’s bill to create a national strategy for the prevention of intimate partner violence. As we know, Senator Manning has spent years on this issue, and we all thank him for his dedication.

Furthermore, MP Laurel Collins has a bill currently at the report stage in the House of Commons that seeks to criminalize coercive and controlling conduct of an intimate partner. This bill responds to Recommendation No. 85 of the Renfrew County coroner’s inquest to create a stand-alone offence for this type of behaviour.

Other initiatives have been brought forward by our former colleague Senator Boisvenu, and we passed a bill sponsored here in the Senate by Senator Dalphond which considered an electronic monitoring device be included as a condition of a release order after being charged, along with judicial training on matters related to this topic.

Senators, there is even evidence that our own administration is moving from the shadows on this issue. The drop-down menu when creating a Unit4 staff leave request now contains domestic violence as a reason for said leave. In all of my years involved in various organizations, this is the first time I’ve seen such a thing — we’re trending in the right direction.

Moving to provincial developments, Ontario’s initial and final reports in response to the coroner’s inquest into the triple homicide in Renfrew County — the namesake of this inquiry — have been released. I have a sense of optimism having read the responses, but the province could have — and should have — gone further on many of the recommendations. Those recommendations that I referred to during my first speech were partially accepted by the province. They include the creation of an emergency fund, stable funding going forward, second-stage housing and professional education and training for justice system personnel on intimate partner violence-related issues, including taking into account rural factors.

The only recommendation that was fully agreed to was in relation to cellphone and internet service. Ontario claims to have a plan to implement cellphone service and high-speed internet in rural and remote areas by the end of 2025. This is a win for victims, as the ability to reliably communicate is essential.

Recommendation No. 1 of the coroner’s inquest was to formally declare intimate partner violence an epidemic. In Ontario’s final response to the inquest, they didn’t agree with this recommendation, as the term “epidemic” didn’t align with the technical usage of the word as the spread of communicable infection or disease. The fact that the coroner made this the first recommendation is important, and the fact that Ontario didn’t initially agree with it in their final response is concerning.

Ontario has since given public support for an NDP bill in the legislature seeking to call intimate partner violence an epidemic provincially. Ontario’s apparent about-face is wholly welcome, albeit a delayed opportunity, and we can only hope the government will ensure ongoing support for the passage of this bill.

This follows the calls from nearly 100 municipalities in the province putting forward and passing motions declaring it an epidemic. It is very much our municipalities that have led the way, and I’m proud to say that my hometown of Orillia was one of the latest to do so. But others, such as those as big as Toronto and as small as Perth, have done the same. Our capital city did so in March 2023 on International Women’s Day.

While there is reason for optimism, stories remain that invoke reticence and reflection. On the four-year anniversary of the mass shooting in Nova Scotia, the justice minister of the province said that he doesn’t believe intimate partner violence is an epidemic. To remind colleagues, a good portion of the Mass Casualty Commission’s final report spoke to intimate partner violence and even referred to the Renfrew County inquest. The Mass Casualty Commission report also urged all levels of government to declare intimate partner violence an epidemic.

This resulted in Nova Scotia’s justice minister’s resignation after calls to do so from opposition parties and women’s organizations. This is a reminder that as far as we’ve come on this, some of the thinking can still be antiquated. Another reminder is how this issue remains largely cloaked in the shadows, with so many victims preferring to keep silent.

I’d like to give you an account of a case that I was involved in when I was in the Crown attorney’s office. It is etched in my brain — it was 40 years ago.

A young woman in her mid-thirties was so afraid of her partner that she had a will drafted to ensure that her children would be looked after when he finally got her. She was stabbed repeatedly.

The first responder on the scene was a paramedic. In his evidence in the courtroom, he referred to seeing a man down the hallway in a long coat and red running shoes. Honourable senators, they weren’t red running shoes. It will be forever etched in my brain as someone who merely listened to the evidence as part of the Crown’s team, but it will be etched in that family’s memory forever, and it will be etched in those first responders forever as well. This is a matter we need to take seriously.

It wasn’t long ago, as it was only 1982 — the year of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms — when member of Parliament Margaret Mitchell rose in the House of Commons and informed MPs that 1 in 10 men beat their wives regularly. All of us who are of a certain age will remember the response in the chamber — it was laughter. Colleagues laughed for acknowledging intimate partner violence at that time.

Forty years later, we are finally seeing some lasting change in announcements. This is a far cry from the situation back then, but the fight isn’t over, and as Senator Cotter recently said, we need more men to step up to help tackle the challenge. We owe it to all victims and families struggling with intimate partner violence to continue pushing this issue, but we can’t leave out the most vulnerable — our uniquely affected, our deeply exposed rural residents.

I close by remembering Carol Culleton, Anastasia Kuzyk and Nathalie Warmerdam, the victims of the Renfrew County inquest. Their murders were the basis for this inquiry. Thank you. Meegwetch.