Honourable senators, this item stands adjourned in the name of the Honourable Senator Clement. After my intervention today, I ask for leave that it remain adjourned in her name.

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to Senator Boniface’s wise Inquiry No. 10 on intimate partner violence. I add my voice to those of six honourable colleagues and many of you who might not have spoken to call out intimate partner violence. I hope we can move the needle forward on ending this scourge in our country.

I propose to speak to two dimensions of intimate partner violence: first, its high level in Saskatchewan; and second, men.

To begin, regrettably, Saskatchewan has the highest rates of both family violence and intimate partner violence in our country. In 2022, the rates of intimate partner violence and family violence were double the national average. Not unlike in the rest of the country, the vast majority of victims are women and the vast majority of perpetrators are men. Given the many interesting and intersecting challenges that women face in reporting intimate partner violence, the statistics are likely significantly higher.

Crystal Giesbrecht, Director of Research and Communications at the Provincial Association of Transition Houses and Services of Saskatchewan, or PATHS, commented that these statistics that they were not “. . . surprising but disappointing.”

A number of factors contribute to this: Saskatchewan is unique for both its large proportions of rural and Indigenous communities. On that point, I would like to note and acknowledge Senators Hartling’s and Boniface’s remarks about intimate partner violence in rural areas as well as Senator Boyer’s remarks on the high rates of violence against Indigenous women and girls. Tragically, rural and Indigenous women experience higher rates of violence, more severe physical violence and a higher risk of intimate partner homicide.

These same women face significant and deadly barriers to accessing resources. Services are often too lacking, distant and inaccessible; and anonymity is a concern in small communities, as are limited service availability, geographic barriers, systemic discrimination — you can hear the list.

Despite the important work of advocates in our province, there is a noted lack of safe shelters, transportation and timely service provision.

The risks of failing to prevent and address intimate partner violence cannot be overstated. On this point, let me refer to recent findings out of Saskatchewan. On October 19, 2023, the Saskatchewan Brain Injury Association hosted what was called Purple Thursday, a symposium to bring awareness to interpersonal violence. Participants heard that one in three women will encounter intimate partner violence in their lifetime. We have daughters, sisters, mothers and granddaughters; it’s hard to believe that so many of them will be exposed to this kind of violence. One in eight women will experience a brain injury as a result. Women in Saskatchewan are as likely to suffer a brain injury as a result of intimate partner violence as they are to develop breast cancer. Both are tragic; it would be nice if both could be prevented.

As I mentioned, rural and Indigenous women face an increased risk of intimate partner violence. Between 2015 and 2020, there were 37 intimate partner homicides in Saskatchewan. Of the women, 17 were Indigenous — that’s nearly 40% — and 29 of the 37 were women. A number of these women had contacted police to report violence. Women in Saskatchewan are three times more likely than men to be victims of spousal homicide.

Here is the tragic point: Intimate partner violence is predictable and preventable. Warning signs have been well-documented by advocates. The most dangerous period in an abusive relationship occurs when a victim is planning to leave. More than 12 of the women killed in Saskatchewan during those five years had recently separated from their partners or indicated a desire to leave.

I want to digress and repeat a personal story that is hard for me to tell. I recounted it a few years ago in this chamber and will link it to my second theme later.

When I was a young lawyer many years ago, I represented a woman seeking an uncontested divorce. In those years, you still had to go to court and present your evidence, even in uncontested divorces.

The grounds for the divorce were physical cruelty. The woman testified before the judge that one evening, she was putting her coat on to go out. The husband asked where she was going, and when she replied that she was planning to move out and was going to look for an apartment, he punched her in the face, knocking her off her feet. In summing up, the judge asked me what the evidence of physical cruelty was that would justify the divorce. When I referred to the punch that knocked her to the ground, he replied — I still remember it 45 years later — “That’s not cruelty. She deserved that.”

I found another way to get the woman a divorce, but beyond that, I did nothing — this is sort of my point — in relation to the husband’s violence and nothing in relation to the judge except many years later. Knowing now what the risks were at the time for that woman, I feel that I failed.

I will say more about this incident in a few moments. I want to add my voice to the calls that declare this an epidemic. The federal government has labelled domestic violence an epidemic. Research institutes like RESOLVE, a community-based research network, have been urging provincial governments in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta to declare intimate partner violence an epidemic and to try to mitigate its consequences. The Mass Casualty Commission in Nova Scotia made the same point.

Building on this point, it is important to identify — as so many have — the most effective ways to protect victims of intimate partner violence. I want to endorse what has been said by others on this point, but I want to address another dimension — the only dimension that I think could effectively eradicate this epidemic.

In my view and in the view of many experts, attitudes and behaviours associated with intimate partner violence are deeply embedded in our society. To far too great an extent, there is a toxic culture in our society that makes violence against women seem legitimate or at least tolerable. Unless we address these attitudes, this toxic culture will continue and we will not meaningfully address the epidemic.

As I reflected on these points, I was reminded of something. Until relatively recently — that is up until 1983, to be exact — our laws allowed, even endorsed, serious sexual violence against intimate partners. Until it was amended in 1983, the Criminal Code defined rape in the following way: A male person commits rape when he has sexual intercourse with a female person who is not his wife without consent. This was the law in Canada from 1892 to 1983. This was the law for nearly the first decade that I practised law. It was not just a culture but a legal sanction — almost an invitation — for sexual assault of one’s spouse. It’s not surprising that the culture that tolerates intimate partner violence lives on.

As the Mass Casualty Commission and others have recognized, a critical route to culture change begins with education, and this is my main point. The Mass Casualty Commission made clear that education modules that address these matters from kindergarten to high school and through colleges and universities are critical vehicles in achieving this cultural change. In that regard, I was disappointed to learn that in recently removing third party educators from the sex education programs in Saskatchewan schools where this violence is greatest, education regarding consent and bodily integrity appears also to have been lessened.

The Mass Casualty Commission also recommended enhanced training of police officers and legal professionals in relation to intimate partner violence. I would add that while continuing professional development opportunities are available for judges in relation to intimate partner violence, the judiciary must be full participants in this culture change in their learning and in their decision making.

On this latter point, while somewhat outdated, the story of the judge in that earlier case of the woman seeking a divorce is — at least for me — a cautionary tale, which brings me to my second point: men. I would like to think that all of us in this chamber, including myself and most men, do not engage in violence against women. That is the first commitment we should make to ourselves and our society. However, this is not enough, as my own failure some decades ago makes clear. We must be a more proactive part of the solution.

To that end, I’d like to cite the words of the RESOLVE network:

. . . For far too long, the burden of protecting and supporting women and their children has fallen squarely on the shoulders of shelter workers and women’s advocates, and indeed women themselves. . . .

The Mass Casualty Commission got this message loud and clear. Here is what it says:

We recognize the critical need for more men and boys to become actively engaged in efforts to prevent and intervene in gender-based violence. Furthermore, it adds insult to injury to see that woman, particularly survivors of gender‑based violence, have also been forced to tirelessly lead this change. It is time for more men to be part of the solution. We again call on Ms Bookchin, who explained: “The bulk of the responsibility for this work over decades, maybe hundreds of years, has been on the shoulders of women. We need men to step up . . . .”

How might we do this? First, by supporting the findings and wide range of strategies that are being developed to address this epidemic; second, by calling out behaviours and language that support or sympathize with this toxic culture we are trying to eliminate; third, by safely intervening when incidents arise.

This sounds risky. Not all of us are heroes. However, on all of these points, the Mass Casualty Commission set out in detail best-practice approaches, specifically applicable to men, in addressing incidents of intimate partner violence. Indeed, capturing this commitment in one sentence, one of the recommendations of the commission is this, “Men take up individual and concerted action to contribute to ending this epidemic.”

We all have to play a part in ending intimate partner violence and its life-threatening consequences. I hope our remarks in this chamber are a contribution to renewed action to urgently address this crisis. I thank Senator Boniface for bringing it forward in this way. This includes our collective commitment on all of our parts to be part of the solution. The next victim will be someone’s sister, daughter or mother. Let’s try our best not to let that happen.

Thank you.