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Mrs. Julie Vignola (Beauport—Limoilou, BQ)

Dec/6/21 12:31:02 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I think that we agree on how important it is to protect the full complement of health care workers, including orderlies and custodians, as my colleague was saying. These people are extremely important. It is unacceptable that these workers are being harassed when all they want is to do their job. However, Bill C-3 has another part to it, namely 10 days of paid sick leave for federally regulated workers. My colleague has not said anything about this, and I would like to know what he thinks.

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Mr. Luc Berthold

Dec/6/21 12:31:46 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I would like to reiterate that, for the benefit of all health care workers, this bill must be passed, yes. The government also wanted to include in this bill 10 days of sick leave for federally regulated workers. During a pandemic like the one we are going through, all workers, not just those under federal jurisdiction, should have access to sick leave and whatever else they need to help them continue working, take care of their families, and, most importantly, take care of themselves.

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Mr. Dane Lloyd (Sturgeon River—Parkland, CPC)

Dec/6/21 12:32:45 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, my grandmother works at the hospital. We have seen the intimidation during these protests. Could the member speak to the importance of ensuring that we stand behind our health care workers during this very difficult time?

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Mr. Luc Berthold

Dec/6/21 12:33:10 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, that is a very important question. They are counting on us to do the right thing, to protect them from the bad attitudes we see in public sometimes. If we are not there for them, how can we count on them to protect us and take care of us? I totally agree with my colleague that we need to do what we can to achieve the goal of protecting them from the bad behaviour that we see are seeing in our society.

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Ms. Elizabeth May (Saanich—Gulf Islands, GP)

Dec/6/21 12:33:55 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask my colleague a larger and broader question. I think we can all agree that we need to ensure that our nurses, our health care professionals and all front-line workers know how grateful we are and how much we support them. Does the member have any reflections on what it says about us as a society that anyone would attack nurses, or try to block them or ill patients in an ambulance from making it to a hospital? What on earth has happened to us? I cannot believe we need a bill like this, even though I recognize we do.

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Mr. Luc Berthold

Dec/6/21 12:34:31 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question. However, I would need more than 30 seconds to try and analyze our current society. I will therefore go back to what I was talking about at the very beginning of my speech, namely, violence against women, which is still happening in our society today. Despite tragedies like the one at the Polytechnique and the fact people are talking more and more about this type of violence in the media, it seems that some still suffer from this hard-to-treat disease. Society needs to address this and find ways to protect victims. Most importantly, we also need to work to prevent this from happening, before women become victims. There are groups that work to prevent violence, and some focus on abusive men. These men have access to certain resources, but they must first recognize that they need them. It all comes back to what I said earlier. Each of us has a duty to go see our neighbours and let them know what resources are currently available. We must no longer turn a blind eye, but rather take action and direct these individuals to the appropriate resources.

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Hon. David Lametti (Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, Lib.)

Dec/6/21 12:36:08 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, this is my first time rising in the House since the election, so it is my turn to thank the voters of LaSalle—Émard—Verdun for placing their trust in me for the third time. I will do my best to represent them as their MP. I would also like to draw everyone's attention to the fact that today is December 6. As a Montrealer, a Canadian and a Quebecker, the memory of what happened in Montreal on December 6 never fails to move me. Fourteen young female engineering students lost their lives. I will do my best to make sure nothing like that ever happens again. I am pleased to speak at the second reading debate on Bill C-3, an act to amend the Criminal Code and the Canada Labour Code, which I introduced alongside the Minister of Labour last week. I will focus my remarks on the Criminal Code amendments contained in the bill. I am proud of Bill C-3, but I will be honest. I am disappointed, as was the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands a moment ago, that we are having to propose criminal law reforms to explicitly protect health care workers and patients against intimidation and obstruction. Since the start of the global pandemic 20 months ago, the health sector in Canada has faced unprecedented challenges. Health professionals have been working relentlessly and under extraordinarily difficult circumstances to save lives. A Statistics Canada survey revealed that seven in 10 health care workers reported worsening mental health due to the pandemic. However, that is only part of the story. On top of the strain on mental health, our health professionals are also facing violence in the workplace. Dr. Katharine Smart, president of the Canadian Medical Association, told Canadians, during a news conference on this bill, that preliminary results from the 2021 National Physician Health Survey suggested that three out of four physicians had experienced intimidation, bullying and harassment in the workplace. She went further to say, “one in three say that this happens regularly. This number jumps to 80% of female physicians.” These numbers are telling me a deeply disturbing story, especially when we look at the impact on people who identify as female in the health profession. Most Canadians have shown tremendous respect for our health care workers and have followed the guidance of public health authorities. Unfortunately, a small number of individuals refuse to believe the authorities or follow evidence-based public health measures. An even smaller group has even uttered threats, including death threats. These people have also committed acts of violence against health workers who were simply doing their jobs by providing essential care to Canadians. Violence against health care workers is a long-standing problem. Ever since the pandemic hit, health care workers have expressed concern about their ability to keep doing their jobs. Some have even been forced to quit. Moreover, people who need health care services have expressed similar concern about their ability to keep accessing health care facilities safely. I cannot stress enough how disappointed I was to learn of this behaviour. There is simply no place in Canada for such conduct, and we will not tolerate it. The ability to express ourselves and to protest what we do not believe is right is a cherished freedom in this country, but Canadians understand the difference between expressing our views and threatening those we disagree with. We have seen the consequences of this abuse. For example, Dr. Gretchen Roedde of Latchford, Ontario has decided to retire early due to online abuse. This small town could lose a doctor because of this kind of behaviour. Shockingly, this abuse and harassment even extends to children. Nolan Blaszczyk, a seven-year-old boy, faced a torrent of verbal abuse when he went with his mother to get his vaccine. Abby Blaszczyk was told that she was murdering her son and she was committing genocide. How is this acceptable? As everyone knows, the Criminal Code includes a broad range of general offences to protect all Canadians. The Criminal Code already prohibits some of the despicable behaviour we have seen over the past year, including assault, criminal harassment, intimidation and threats. Today we see just how urgent it is to go even further. Enhancing these existing measures by explicitly prohibiting this conduct in the health care sector has become necessary and urgent. During the recent election campaign, as COVID‑19-related protests began to intensify around health facilities, the Prime Minister committed to protecting our health care workers and ensuring all Canadians had access to health care without fear of threat or intimidation. The measures introduced in Bill C-3 would fully address these commitments and ensure a broad range of responses to various forms of harmful conduct facing the health sector. The bill would create two new offences specific to the health context. First, a new intimidation offence would be enacted to protect both health workers and health seekers. Intimidation is already criminalized as a general offence, but these amendments would give police and prosecutors additional tools to specifically protect our health care workers and users. Furthermore, they would provide for a higher maximum sentence for intimidation of 10 years. The current intimidation offence carries a maximum sentence of five years. This new offence would extend to health care workers similar protections to those justice system participants, people like judges, jurors, witnesses, as well as journalists who report on organized crime. Intimidation is treated as a more serious offence when committed to impede them in their important functions. That specific intimidation offence was created in response to a series of incidents in which prosecutors, witnesses and others were intimidated by criminal organizations to destabilize the criminal justice system. Similar to what we are doing now, Parliament's response then was to enhance criminal law protections for such intimidation with a distinct offence and an enhanced penalty. It is important to protect those who are working to improve our country, whether through the health care system or legal system. The new intimidation offence would prohibit any act intended to promote fear in health care professionals in order to stop them from performing their professional duties. As noted above, this includes health care professionals working at abortion clinics, other frequent target of threats and intimidation. Anyone who works to assist health professionals in the performance of their duties would also be protected by the intimidation offence. Depending on the circumstances, this could be a professional support worker or clinic staff working alongside a physician or nurse. It takes a community of health workers to deliver health services in our country, so those who assist health care professionals in carrying out their duties are rightly covered by this offence. The proposed offence would also protect anyone seeking or receiving health care services. Any behaviour intended to incite fear in individuals seeking health care services, for the purpose of dissuading those individuals from obtaining services, would be expressly prohibited. Creating this new offence will also allow us to increase the maximum penalty for this behaviour. The new offence will be a hybrid offence and will carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison, on indictment. This is a harsher penalty than the general offence of intimidation, which is five years. Increasing the penalty in this way sends a very clear message that Parliament strongly condemns these forms of behaviour directed at the health sector. There is another point that I want to be very clear about. The proposed intimidation offence can be committed in person or through electronic means, including social media and other online channels. Media outlets across the country are reporting that health care providers are being threatened and intimidated on social media. Medical associations, including the Canadian Medical Association and the Ontario Medical Association, have confirmed that threats and intimidation are occurring not only in person, but also online. The offence of intimidation would apply regardless of the means of communication. In addition to protecting the heroes in the health care sector, the bill also creates a new offence that would prohibit intentionally obstructing or interfering with a person's ability to access a health facility. The offence would protect access to any and every place where health services are provided, including a hospital, a mobile clinic, an abortion clinic, a vaccine clinic, a doctor's office and even doctors' homes if that is where they provide their services. This new offence is hybrid and will carry a maximum penalty of 10 years of imprisonment. I want to be very clear about one thing. Nothing in the proposed legislation would undermine workers' ability to strike or Canadians' ability to peacefully protest. Our government stands by the charter and the freedoms it guarantees, including freedom of speech and the right to strike. That is why this offence would expressly exclude communicative activity that remains peaceful and lawful, such as strike action or peaceful protest, even if it has a minor impact on access. Minor inconvenience for those seeking to get into buildings is a fair price to pay to protect our cherished liberties, but behaviour that is threatening or violent or that creates a major impediment to access is rightly criminalized. This is the current state of our criminal law and the bill would only enhance that. The legislation provides for a definition of “health professional” to clarify the scope of the offences and how they are intended to be applied to police and prosecutors. A health professional would be defined as a person who is entitled, under the laws of a province or territory, to provide a health service, such as doctors or nurses. Given that the provinces and territories are responsible for the health sector and regulation of health professionals and services, the definition is intended to be broad and capable of being applied in accordance with each jurisdiction's health system. I would now like to talk about the sentencing reforms in Bill C‑3. These changes address the concerns that health professionals have had for a while now, and, in fact, parliamentarians from all sides have presented similar reforms in the past through private members' bills. The bill would require that, in cases where there is evidence showing that the offence was committed against a health care provider who was carrying out their duties, sentencing courts treat this evidence as an aggravating factor. Aggravating factors will also apply if the offence involved impeding another person from obtaining health services. Individuals on both sides of our health care system must be protected, meaning health care providers and their patients. Support workers, also referred to as orderlies, are also vulnerable to violence in the workplace. Even though they are not regulated in many regions across the country like health professionals are, they still provide care and essential support to many Canadians. Therefore, the aggravating factors proposed in this bill expressly include personal care services. These sentencing reforms are based on long-standing calls from stakeholders. Indeed, during our news conference following the introduction of the bill, the presidents of the CMA and the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions affirmed the importance of these measures to our health workers. The aggravating factors also implement a recommendation of the 2019 report conducted by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health entitled “Violence Facing Health Care Workers in Canada”. The report requested the Government of Canada amend the Criminal Code to require a court to consider the fact that the victim of an assault is a health care sector worker to be an aggravating circumstance for the purposes of sentencing. The same report documented that health care workers have four times the rate of workplace violence than any other profession, despite most of this violence being unreported due to a culture of acceptance. While the pandemic has created new challenges for health care workers and exacerbated the violence they face, as I mentioned before, those who provide abortion services and the women who access them have also experienced unacceptable threats and violence. It was not so long ago, in the 1990s, that several physicians in Canada were shot because of their work providing abortion services. Abortion clinics have been attacked and blocked. Those seek abortion services have been harassed, threatened and intimidated by individuals opposed to abortion. The safety and security of abortion health care workers and patients continue to be a troubling issue. Our government will protect abortion service providers alongside other health professionals. We support the rights of women to control their bodies and have unimpeded access to abortion services along with other health services. I hope—like all members here today, I am sure—that health care workers will one day be able to do their jobs free from violence and can feel safe and valued when they are caring for us. The pandemic is not over, as we know, and neither is the need to protect our health care workers. These workers play a very important role in the lives of all Canadians. Thanks to them, we have been able to fend off this devastating pandemic and make recovery plans for our society and our country. The proposed reforms will enhance existing measures in the Criminal Code and they have broad support within the medical community. For these reasons, I urge all members to support Bill C‑3, which is urgent, important and necessary.

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Mr. John Barlow (Foothills, CPC)

Dec/6/21 12:52:47 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the fact that the minister was talking about the importance of these protests in that we need to protect the rights of Canadians. I could not agree more. My private member's bill, Bill C-205, went through the parliamentary process in the last Parliament, made it very close to the finish line and was about protecting the rights of farm families and ranch families from protests on farms and on their properties. When we talk about the rights of Canadians, I think that goes both ways. I was honoured to have the support of the Liberal Party at committee as well as having the agriculture minister be in support of that initiative during the election. I am wondering if the justice minister will also support Bill C-205, if I am able to bring it back this Parliament.

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Hon. David Lametti

Dec/6/21 12:53:35 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, it is always wonderful to field a few pucks from the hon. member's part of the House. We were open as a party in the last Parliament, as the government in the last Parliament, to that bill. While I cannot commit as a minister of my cabinet to doing that right now, I can assure the hon. member that we will be open. There is a general protection, as the hon. member knows, against intimidation and violence, which I mentioned in the course of my speech. It carries a five-year penalty. We have taken specific measures in the judicial sphere, we are now proposing to take specific measures in the health care sphere, and I would assure the hon. member that we would be open to considering this measure in other places and spaces.

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Mr. Luc Thériault (Montcalm, BQ)

Dec/6/21 12:54:33 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, the Quebec government did not wait for the Liberal government to pass a law to deal with these types of protests held near institutions. That said, I would be remiss if I did not remind my distinguished colleague of the reason why we find ourselves discussing Bill C-3 about two weeks before Christmas. Earlier, the government referred to the 2019 report from the Standing Committee on Health on violence faced by health care workers. The report, issued two years ago, pointed out that seven out of 10 workers were experiencing deteriorating mental health. The fear and intimidation is only going to worsen their situation if they return to the system. We are clearly in favour of the principle of such a bill. However, why do we find ourselves today with a government that called an election, dragged its feet on recalling Parliament after the election, and consequently delayed other very important bills, in particular the bill in memory of Émilie Sansfaçon, which sought to give people with cancer up to 50 weeks of EI sickness benefits? This also had an impact on the work of the Special Joint Committee on Physician-Assisted Dying. It had one year to submit its report, but it will have barely four months to discuss such a critical issue. Does my colleague not find it hard to be part of a government that puts off critical and important problems like these?

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Hon. David Lametti

Dec/6/21 12:56:15 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for the question. It is always a pleasure to work with him on different projects, including on medical assistance in dying. In a democracy, it is always important to canvass the people directly. That is what we do when we have an election. We have a Westminster parliamentary system, and it has been working well for Canada and the provinces for years. Elections are part of that system. I can assure my colleague that we will work hard on Bill C-3 and on all of our common goals in other areas, such as medical assistance in dying, which we want to improve by taking another look at what we did in 2016 and 2020. I can assure my colleague that we are here to work together.

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Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)

Dec/6/21 12:57:13 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, as the Minister of Justice knows, the NDP is supportive of the principle of protecting health care workers, and the member for Burnaby South, the NDP leader, and the NDP caucus have been the strongest advocates for the 10 days of paid sick leave in Parliament. We fought to have the temporary sick leave program brought in. The government implemented that badly, I think it is fair to say. In this bill, although we support it very much in principle, there are two weaknesses that need to be addressed. First off, in terms of protecting health care workers, there is no amendment that has been accepted by the government that would explicitly protect legal union activities from the risk of prosecution under the new Criminal Code amendments. Then, in terms of paid sick leave, as members know, we actually would have a delay, even if the program in the bill is implemented, that would mean that the first day of paid sick leave would take over a month for a person to access, and it would take 11 months for a worker to access the 10 days of paid sick leave that are so important to protect the worker, the family and also to protect the public. Will the government explicitly say that it will accept those amendments at committee stage?

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Hon. David Lametti

Dec/6/21 12:58:39 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, with respect to the question on sick leave, I will defer to my colleague, the Minister of Labour, who I believe spoke in this place on Friday, to work with members of the opposition, with respect to making sure the bill is in a satisfactory form to achieve the goals we have in common. With respect to the Criminal Code amendments and the right of labour to organize, I would like to assure the hon. member that we actually crafted the bill with the language from the jurisprudence in the cases that explicitly protect a worker's right to picket, go on strike, organize and express their political and social views in that format. Of course, I am open to working, if there is a way to make the language more precise, but we do feel we have taken the actual wording from the cases that enshrine this right.

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Mr. Yasir Naqvi (Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada and Minister of Emergency Preparedness, Lib.)

Dec/6/21 12:59:50 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the Minister of Justice along with the Minister of Labour for bringing forward this very important piece of legislation. I think a lot of us can recount horrible incidences that we saw during the peak period of vaccination, when our hospitals that are so critical for the health and well being of our communities were being picketed by individuals who were just trying to prevent people from getting access to medical care. In my riding of Ottawa Centre, where the Civic Hospital is located, we saw picketing taking place with the sole intention of preventing people from getting important health care. This type of legislation would ensure that members of our community can get health care, whether to get a vaccine or just to visit their loved ones. My precise question to the minister is around protecting abortion services, as well, which I fully support. When I was the attorney general in Ontario, we brought a similar piece of legislation called the Safe Access to Abortion Services Act. I was wondering if the minister could elaborate as to how this particular piece of legislation, if passed, would interact with provincial legislation, such as in Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec, which are the provinces that have similar protections for women to access abortion services.

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Hon. David Lametti

Dec/6/21 1:01:10 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the hon. member for his recent appointment to the position of parliamentary secretary. First off all, to repeat, abortion services are health care services and abortion clinics are health care clinics. Hence, they are protected. With respect to the larger interoperation between the federal use of the criminal law power and provincial use of property and civil rights protections and other heads of provincial power, the answer is that they interoperate very well. Provinces can enact measures to protect spaces. What we would be doing with the criminal law power is protecting the impeding of access, as well as the threat of intimidation. Each has its own standards, both in terms of the mental and actus reus elements of crime, and they fit very well with what provinces have done.

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Ms. Lori Idlout (Nunavut, NDP)

Dec/6/21 1:02:22 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, Qujannamiik, uqaqtittiji. This is a very important discussion, and I would like to ask the Minister of Justice about an issue that is very important to Nunavut. How was Johannes Rivoire allowed to leave Canada? He is now protected in France. I would like to hear from the minister what the government plans to do about this criminal who is hiding in France at the moment.

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Hon. David Lametti

Dec/6/21 1:02:54 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her question. As I have stated a number of times publicly, and has been stated publicly, the specific proceedings against Johannes Rivoire were stayed by the Prosecution Service. I cannot resurrect the stay; however, there is always the possibility that further evidence might be brought forward by other complainants or other witnesses. It would at that point be something that the police, the Prosecution Service and ultimately the Justice Department and the International Assistance Group would have to look at.

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Ms. Louise Chabot (Thérèse-De Blainville, BQ)

Dec/6/21 1:03:43 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I would first like to inform you that I will be sharing my time with my esteemed colleague from Beauport—Limoilou. Furthermore, as today is December 6, the 32nd anniversary of the tragic Polytechnique massacre, in which 14 women were killed just for being women, I would like to offer my support and solidarity and say that we remember. Let us return now to Bill C‑3, which is currently under consideration. This is a two-pronged bill: it amends the Canada Labour Code, and it amends the Criminal Code. These two statutes do not address the same issues. What we do know about this bill is that it stems from a commitment the government made during the last election campaign, the one that should not have happened. During that campaign, the government stated that it wanted to increase the number of sick days for workers who have none and strengthen the Criminal Code with more severe penalties for people who impede the provision of health care or intimidate health care workers. Since we are talking about two jurisdictions here, and since this bill will definitely be worth studying in committee, I am wondering which would be the best committee to study it. The government thought it would be a good idea to significantly strengthen the measures set out in the Criminal Code that penalize people who intimidate or harass patients and health care workers, but is that the right solution to this problem? We will need to examine this bill to be able to answer that question properly. We understand the purpose of the measure, which is to make it clear to health care workers and those who need access to medical care that we will never allow them to be intimidated or afraid to get care. I think everyone understands the message, which may have been necessary. However, as a health care worker myself, even though it has been some time since I worked in the field, what I am wondering is whether our labour laws, our workplace health and safety laws, also protect the workplace from acts of violence, intimidation and harassment. Perhaps that should have been considered. Besides the incidents that we all witnessed in Quebec and the provinces, the major unions have been long calling for stronger measures against violence, intimidation and harassment to be included in our labour laws, because employers also have an obligation to provide a safe workplace. In Quebec, anti-vaxxers have protested in front of primary schools. They have also protested to a lesser extent in front of hospitals and vaccination clinics. The Government of Quebec did not wait for the federal government before it significantly increased fines and public safety measures. That is why we wonder if strengthening the Criminal Code is the right solution. The Canadian Labour Congress made it clear, and we agree, that we must avoid depriving individuals of the fundamental right to associate, to unionize, to strike, to picket and to mobilize. It is a major right guaranteed by the Constitution, and we must ensure that it is included in this bill. As for the Canada Labour Code, the Minister of Labour stated in his speech on Friday that there are gaps in the social safety net. That is not news. Canada's antiquated labour laws are sorely in need of attention. Fifty-eight percent, or 580,000, of Canada's workers do not have paid leave, and it is time to give them 10 days of paid sick leave. We could also amend the Canada Labour Code to increase the minimum wage as the government promised in the last budget. That would send a clear message in the current circumstances that we are protecting workers, who should have good working conditions and good wages. Speaking of gaps in the social safety net, the government has forgotten one important aspect, namely, the employment insurance system. I am thinking specifically of people who are sick. The government is failing thousands of people who have no paid sick leave, no wage loss program and only 15 weeks of sickness benefits. This really is a gap in the social safety net. Why is the government introducing a bill that targets the Canada Labour Code and the Criminal Code, which are two different systems, rather than strengthening labour laws and the EI system to protect people who are sick and have nothing to fall back on when they become seriously ill? Why did the government not ensure that the constitutional right to protest and to freedom of expression were properly protected in the Criminal Code, if that were its intention? It will be important to study those two matters in committee. We support the bill in principle, with a bit of fine-tuning.

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Mr. Gord Johns (Courtenay—Alberni, NDP)

Dec/6/21 1:12:09 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague for talking about the importance of protecting workers. I have asked other parties this same question. Throughout the health crisis, medical health professionals said the top two things that could be done to stop the spread of COVID were for people to get vaccinated and for governments to implement paid sick days. The government chose to drag this legislation out. Here we are 20 months later, and it is finally implementing paid sick days. In the meantime, people have lost their lives. A parallel crisis is happening in our country: the overdose crisis. Medical health professionals are saying that we need to decriminalize the personal possession of illicit drugs and to provide safe spaces, which are the first steps to end the stigma against people who are using illicit drugs. Does my colleague agree that the government has failed to listen to health professionals' guidance on the overdose crisis because of the stigma? Does she also agree that they can end it, and that we need to listen to health professionals when it comes to guidance to respond to emergencies much faster? People are dying as a result of inaction.

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Ms. Louise Chabot

Dec/6/21 1:13:27 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-3

Mr. Speaker, a number of issues could have been raised, but the government determines the legislative agenda, so I will not comment on what could have been done. Many things could have been done, but they are well outside the scope of this bill. Granting sick leave is the bare minimum. Quebec already does it. Other provinces do not. Granting sick leave will send a clear signal, but workers need more protection. Amending the Criminal Code is a start, but this issue is much bigger than that.

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