Megan Walker, a long-time advocate for women facing violence, says proposal to add femicide to the Criminal Code is a big step forward and communicates that Canada won't 'tolerate men killing women any longer.'Geoff Robins/The Globe and Mail
The federal government’s plan to name femicide in the Criminal Code and introduce measures to reduce violence against women is being lauded by advocates who have long worked for stricter penalties for these crimes, and for official recognition of their prevalence.
The proposals are contained in Bill C-16, tabled on Tuesday, which would make a wide range of changes to the Criminal Code. Among them would be the introduction of several scenarios that would meet the definition of femicide, including murder of an intimate partner while motivated by hate based on sex and gender. The bill would classify femicide as first-degree murder, even if the killing is not planned and deliberate.
A second proposed change is the inclusion of coercive control in the Criminal Code, with a penalty of up to 10 years in prison. In the text of the bill, the crime covers many scenarios, from a person threatening violence against an intimate partner to attempting to control a partner through financial or other means.
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“This is to me the best outcome,” said Megan Walker, a long-time advocate for women facing violence. “These are really serious steps.”
The federal government’s moves follow years of calls for change from advocacy groups and in numerous official reports. For example, adding femicide and coercive control to the Criminal Code was recommended three years ago by a jury in the high-profile Renfrew County inquest into a 2015 triple-femicide in the Ottawa Valley.
A fundamental issue cited by advocates is a brutal fact: The statistically most dangerous place for a woman in Canada is her own home. Statistics Canada last week in an analysis of homicide trends said 81 women were killed by a spouse or an intimate partner in 2024, up more than 50 per cent from 53 women in 2023.
The proposed additions of femicide and coercive control to the Criminal Code are part of the federal Liberals’ second major crime bill this fall. The plans, including categorizing femicide as first-degree murder, were detailed in the Liberal platform during the election campaign last spring.
Ms. Walker ran the London Abused Women’s Centre in Ontario for nearly a quarter-century, until 2021, and has seen the painful reverberations of violence against women up close. Naming femicide is a big step forward, she said, and communicates a clear message: “We will not tolerate men killing women any longer.”
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The Canadian Civil Liberties Association expressed some concern with the changes. It opposes Bill C-16, which features an array of measures beyond violence against women. The association said violence against women is a serious problem but questioned the broad approach to classify femicide as first-degree murder, for which the punishment is life imprisonment with no chance of parole for 25 years.
Myrna Dawson, a professor with the University of Guelph and executive director of the Canadian Femicide Observatory for Justice and Accountability, said her group has for upward of a decade called on Ottawa to specifically name the crime: “Just at least acknowledge that this is something that is happening.”
She said the proposal puts Canada ahead of peer countries such as the United States, Australia and Britain, and follows a legal path blazed by countries such as Costa Rica and, most recently, Italy.
An expansive definition of femicide in the tabled legislation is also important, Prof. Dawson said. It is not limited to the context of intimate partners.
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The impact of the changes in law, if passed by Parliament, will depend on implementation in provinces and territories across Canada, Prof. Dawson added. Ottawa is in charge of the Criminal Code. The provinces run the justice systems in their jurisdictions.
One factor is drumming up greater public awareness “about what femicide is and what it means,” she said. That will include work across the legal system: “a big package around training, not just of lawyers and judges but of police, especially when you’re talking about coercive control.”
On coercive control, Tuesday’s bill resuscitates a measure that was recently on the verge of becoming law. Before prorogation in January, Parliament had been close to passing a private member’s bill to include it in the Criminal Code.
Coercive control has been described as a silent violence, one that often involves a wielding of psychological abuse that has been linked to femicides. The federal government, in a news release Tuesday, said: “Abuse often escalates through patterns of control long before physical violence occurs.” England and Wales have taken action on this front.
Adam Weisberg, president of the Criminal Lawyers’ Association of Ontario, said the definition is complicated and doesn’t include an objective test. Given this, he said there could be litigation if it becomes law.
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Some advocates have cautioned against looking to the courts for solutions to intimate-partner violence, given distrust in the justice system felt by many victims, especially those who are Indigenous or racialized. Statscan in 2019 estimated 80 per cent of women experiencing spousal violence did not report it to police.
These are legitimate concerns, said Carmen Gill, a professor at the University of New Brunswick who has long studied coercive control, but she also believes they can be mitigated with careful implementation. She was pleased to see the issue revived in the new bill.
“It’s clearly sending a message that violence against women is serious and it is punishable,” she said.
Change has already in part taken hold in the justice system. Prof. Gill has worked with police chiefs across the country to familiarize them with the nuances of coercive control. The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police this summer published a national framework for police intervention in intimate partner coercive control.
“At different levels, they are already moving forward,” Prof. Gill said.