Thank you so much.

As you have just heard, the situation for women and girls in Canada is dire. Women and girls have been erased by government policies. Terms like “gender-based violence”, “intimate partner violence” and “domestic violence” fail to differentiate between victim and offender. According to the UN, male violence against women and girls is the most pervasive human rights abuse in the world, yet the language used by many governments, including Canada's, fails to name it as male violence against women and girls.

Tiffany Gates was found dead in her boyfriend's apartment on September 7, 2023. She was a victim of femicide-suicide. Their names and the nature of their relationship only became public after friends and family posted on social media. Police have not released information, citing privacy rules. Tiffany's mother, Linda Davidson, has continued to tell police that without releasing information, it is unclear to the public who killed whom.

On July 16, as you just heard, 17-year-old Breanna Broadfoot was stabbed multiple times by a man she was trying to end a relationship with. She died two days later. The man who killed her had been charged on March 15, 2024, with offences consistent with torture, including assault with choking and suffocation or strangulation activity. She was hospitalized after the assault. He was released with an undertaking not to contact her, a promise to appear and an order to stay at least 50 metres away from her workplace, home and school. He was prohibited from possessing firearms, crossbows and any restricted ammunition, devices or weapons. He breached his conditions and was due back in court on July 31. He was killed by police on the 16th.

On June 22, 2024, 62-year-old Cheryl Sheldon was killed by a man she was trying to leave. He has since been charged with second-degree murder. Cheryl reached out for help from at least three London agencies. The first two referred her on. The third offered her a bed for the night. Cheryl never arrived. She was killed in the hours after she contacted agencies for help.

In 2019, 136 women were killed. In 2020, 160 women were killed. In 2021, 173 women and girls were killed. In 2022, 184 women and girls were killed. In 2023, 187 women and girls were victims of femicide. The total number of femicides in Canada between 2019 and 2023 is 840. That's 840 dead women.

The year-after-year increase is significant, yet here we are, and the government hasn't called it a crisis or an epidemic. The government, in fact, hasn't addressed it at all.

Current government strategies to end femicide, whatever they are, are not working. If they were, we would see a decrease in femicide rates. I'm hard pressed to know what those strategies are, or even if there are strategies. Male violence against women and femicide are preventable, and immediate action has to be taken to end this crisis now.

I offer the following recommendations.

Legislate and define the term “femicide” in the current Criminal Code. The term generally refers to “the killing of females by males because they are female.”

Canada signed a global treaty in 2018 committing to investigate and eliminate femicide. Canada has not followed through. Why not?

On September 15, 2022, the London Police Service Board, of which I am vice-chair, invited the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister, the former minister of justice and the Minister of Women and Gender Equality to attend a meeting to discuss the urgent need for a Criminal Code definition of femicide. It's been two years, and there's still been no meeting.

Humanize the names of women and girls. They are victims of femicide.

Acknowledge that every 48 hours, a woman or girl is killed. Follow Ontario municipalities, including London, by declaring femicide an epidemic.

Name victims and offenders publicly. Femicide is not a private issue.

Restraining orders, undertakings and peace bonds offer women and girls a false sense of security and place them at an increased risk of femicide.

Per the examples above, they aren't worth the paper they're written on. The judicial system continues to fail women and girls and needs to be updated.

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