Thanks for that question.

In my view, it strikes the right balance. Of course, you raise very serious concerns about the tenet of our justice system, which is innocent until proven guilty. My role is also to keep in mind how that shows up for people in the justice system, particularly the criminal justice system. It is our view that this strikes the right balance. They are targeted in the sense that it is focused on a certain category of repeat violent offenders.

As you know, in the Criminal Code, there are already reverse onus provisions where we say that, in certain circumstances, a judge may determine that, for certain factors, this person is unsafe to be released. We believe that just needs to be strengthened. There are categories, particularly with intimate partner violence, which happens to be a very dangerous time for the victim of the violence. We know with a lot of women’s organizations we work with that that’s a time when there is a heightened risk that the woman will be seriously harmed because of the nature of the escalation of the criminal proceedings. I believe there are specific circumstances where detention is appropriate over release. Those are circumstances where we think this bill strikes the right balance, which is the use of weapons and intimate partner violence, those things that we know cause harm to communities.

I represent a community in east Vancouver, and I hear from vulnerable women in particular who are victims of repeat violent offenders when they are out on bail. That is something that, I think, certainly the people who were involved in the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women have approached me and talked about as an honest discussion. It is my view that there are times in the criminal justice system where it tips over to protecting the community, and this reverse onus is capturing that.

An interesting thing happened during COVID in terms of the different independent actors in our justice system working together better in terms of understanding how to keep the justice system operating under the constraints that we were under at that time. Those tables are still around now. To your point, it’s important that we understand better outcomes, measures and data when it comes to our justice system. I remember when I took on this role and learned about how hard it is to collect data and how there are so many independent actors that it makes it not only important to understand how the justice system is acting on people and how it shows up for people but also complicated to think about how we collect that data and how we measure it. A lot of important work needs to be done to continue the connection that we have had since COVID and across provinces to think about that.

At the end of the day, everybody just wants better outcomes for their communities and for individuals not to be in a situation where there are repeat violent offenders. That’s an ill in society which I think everybody can agree we want to work to prevent. It’s good that there is a review in this process and that we will be looking at that.

I mentioned the repeat violent offender initiative in B.C. I just met with the whole team, the Crown counsel that’s working on this. They are starting to hear that some accused want to be referred to the Repeat Violent Offending Intervention Initiative, despite what you would term as stigma related to that kind of label, because they feel that they would then get both the attention and the resources they need potentially to change their life.

We will find out a lot of interesting things through all the work we are doing. I hope that will make the justice system better. Obviously, this process needs a review. We need to understand together what we’re measuring and what success looks like.

This leads me to my next question. Much of your practice before you went into politics was working with Indigenous peoples specifically around issues of reconciliation and compensation. Are you worried at all about the implications of what this might mean for Indigenous people when they are already grotesquely overrepresented in our jail system?

Thanks for asking that.

I want to make something clear about this question. In B.C.’s approach, we have an Indigenous justice strategy that we have been implementing for a couple of years. We acknowledge and recognize the harms in our justice system to Indigenous people. There are two tracks to it. One is about lessening these harms and making sure that we can address the over-incarceration of Indigenous people. We have Indigenous justice centres that we are standing up across the province. These are centres where Indigenous people who are encountering the justice system can receive culturally appropriate, Indigenous-led legal services, include Gladue Report-writing and all the things we need to be better at when it comes to Indigenous people facing the criminal justice system. The second track of that is helping to understand how we implement Indigenous legal orders.

We are also working on an anti-racism strategy that would affect all government services. It’s something that I’m keenly aware of, and, as you mentioned, part of my practice before coming here was with that. B.C. is making a very strong commitment to making sure our justice system is not working against Indigenous people, as it has been in the past.

Minister, it’s quite easy to predict that there’s going to be increased pressures with more bail hearings occurring, judicial resources like Crown prosecutors and legal aid being impacted and an increased need for capacity in pretrial detention. Are you and your ministry prepared to address those issues in a timely way? What kind of cost do you expect to be paying in order to facilitate this new act?

Secondly, what was the impetus for your Safer Communities Action Plan? It’s a policy approach. What are the expectations and outcomes? Do you believe it’s a model for the rest of Canada? Do you know of other jurisdictions following that kind of active intervention model?

Thanks for both questions. I’ll address the first one.

We are always thinking about investments. Of course, I have to work with the Solicitor General when it comes to the other half of that, and I’m focused on what we do in the Attorney General’s office.

We have invested in increased Crown counsel. We have done the biggest hire of Crown counsel in, I think, decades here in B.C. because we want to make sure the resources are there on the front end when it comes to addressing the challenges that we were talking about. The investments that we made were specifically in the repeat event offenders initiative. That’s focused particularly on this group of people. I’m always working with my colleague the Solicitor General when it comes to what resources are needed on his side of the justice system. We are prepared to work with the federal government to raise that investment.

I think you raise a very important point about legal aid. We’re grateful that the federal government has given an increase in legal aid over the past couple years, but we think we need to work together with the federal government to get further increases for criminal legal aid to make sure people have that ability to get representation if they can’t afford it.

On your second question related to the Safer Communities Action Plan, I’m not aware of other provinces that are taking this approach. We think it’s the right approach. We’ve consulted experts who have told us that crime is complicated. Impacts on communities and how it shows up in communities are real, and communities across Canada are facing that. Our approach is about addressing all the challenges that lead to a decreased sense of safety for communities, whether that’s the mental health and addictions investments we’re making or changing our justice system in many ways. We’re investing in the Repeat Violent Offending Intervention Initiative, which is about understanding the individual that’s committing the violence and thinking about what the system needs to do to respond. We’re also investing in many resources that communities have been asking for, such as situation tables. We’re working on many things. I think we’re always led by what we hear the needs are from our communities. However, I do think it’s a comprehensive approach that every ministry needs to focus on to deliver safer communities.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Minister Sharma, for joining us and for your lifetime of work in this area.

One of the things we’ve heard from other witnesses, which certainly has been acknowledged, I think, by the government, is that Parliament did not rely on empirical evidence when it first introduced the reverse onus provisions in the 1970s. Since then, we’ve seen, as you’ve acknowledged, the exponential increase in the number of people held on bail or remanded in custody in this country, particularly those who are part of marginalized groups.

We’ve also heard from witnesses about the concerns this will have on Indigenous women particularly. I know you’ve invested a fair bit of money in the Indigenous women’s justice strategy in B.C. How do you square this with the reality that, increasingly, we’re seeing countercharging of Indigenous women? When they even pick up a hairbrush or a kitchen utensil to try to ward off violence, they may end up countercharged and sometimes multiply countercharged. How do you see this not being applied against those very women?

Thanks for the very important question.

It’s something we have to be keenly aware of, and I think we’re making the right investments in B.C. to make sure there are checks and balances when it comes to that process. As I mentioned before, we’re very committed to our Indigenous Justice Strategy. We’re working with Indigenous people to understand what’s showing up for them in terms of the racism and the colonization of the system that they have faced and then undoing that harm. It’s part of the work you mentioned with the Indigenous women’s justice strategy that we’re working on, and it’s really led by Indigenous women. We as a government know that sometimes fixing those issues is stepping back, understanding what’s happening and addressing the challenges when we hear what they are from Indigenous women. You raise a very important point. It’s something I’m concerned about, and we’re working on investing to make sure that doesn’t happen when it comes to the bigger system.

I also want to add that the reason I strongly believe these amendments are appropriate is that in my community, I have people who have participated in the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls inquiry. They were part of that. When you’re talking about a specific category of repeat violent offenders that have caused harm or intimate partner violence, there is a need for protection so they can do no further harm to particularly the most vulnerable people in our communities.

I think it’s all about striking a balance and being aware of the challenges that the justice system needs to address, like the ones you’ve raised.

If the evidence comes in and shows that, in fact, what we saw since the 1970s continues to see this issue exacerbated, would you lead the way to having provinces change this? Would you approach the federal government to rescind this policy?

Yes. If we are seeing that things are more harmful than good for communities, then I would say it would be my job to advocate for the changes needed to fix that.

In B.C., I think we’re putting the right systems in place to be able to ensure that that doesn’t happen because we are investing in resources to address repeat violent offenders. As well, we are investing in resources to make sure the supports are there and to understand when, particularly, as you mentioned, Indigenous women are facing the problematic sides of the justice system. We will see that. I am confident that we’re making the right investments to be able to see how this goes. I believe that it strikes the right balance.

Thank you, minister. We’ll be watching.

Good morning, Madam Minister. I just want to thank you for running for office. Doing that is a source of great inspiration to many, as you know. I would just like to say that out loud.

I’d like to stay on the topic of over-representation of Indigenous, Black and other racialized people in our justice system. We heard from witnesses yesterday who said that the system is currently in crisis and that the over-representation is evidence-based and proven. It seems that Bill C-48 will do the opposite of what it purports to do, right? It will make certain communities more unsafe. I would like to stay on that topic.

My other question for you is this: Clearly, B.C. has shown leadership — clearly. However, what does that mean in other provinces that haven’t made statements around investments they are willing or able to make? What will that mean for people who live in different parts of this country? I’m concerned about that. I would appreciate it if you could respond to that.

Thanks for raising both of those very important issues, and thank you for the appreciation of me running at the beginning.

I am very proud to lead the anti-racism work in government in my ministry. That work is comprehensive and involves identifying where systemic racism sits and removing it. We’ve done some really groundbreaking stuff here when it comes to that work. We’re collecting race-based data. Racialized communities have been asking for that for a long time. We have a demographic survey that I think is just recently out of the field where we asked British Columbians to give us, in a private and protected way, race-based data. The second part of that is I will be passing legislation that goes to government’s action once we see what that data is showing. The goal is that once it’s clear how different systems and services, including the justice system, impact different people, we can address it through better policy and better interventions. That’s important work.

I am keenly aware that part of our approach to our work here today, and just comprehensively approaching safer communities, is acknowledging the disproportional impacts of the justice system on Indigenous and racialized people and how negative those impacts have been up to today. It’s something that I think is part of the work we all need to do. Yes, I think that’s really important.

On the second question, I’m always happy to talk with colleagues across the country about the work and the approach that we’re taking in B.C. I hear from different Attorneys General about the work that they are doing when it comes to this. I am hopeful that, through our collaboration that was seen on this bill — actually, I think it is pretty rare to have everybody agree across the country on specific amendments — we can continue the conversation about how we are jointly rising to the challenges that our communities are seeing when it comes to repeat violence and offending. We are always happy to share the work that we are doing and hopefully seek more federal support on some of the initiatives that we have going on in B.C.

Thank you for that.

Hopeful is one thing, but there are people who are really in great need. Does your Safer Communities Action Plan speak specifically to investments around poverty, housing and mental health services?

Yes. We have a Minister of Housing in B.C., and we have a poverty reduction plan under the Minister of Social Development and Poverty Reduction. All of that is highly connected. We hear most often that housing is one of the bigger challenges that we face in terms of people having secure lives. One of our top priorities in B.C., to be honest, is investing in understanding how we can face that challenge of housing.

We are also experiencing a tragic opioid crisis in B.C. Too many lives have been lost to that. We are thinking about it in a comprehensive way, which means getting the services up in communities that for too long have been underfunded, namely, mental health and addiction services and mental health, and addictions for young people, so people in schools that are facing that first adverse childhood experience that might set them off to having mental health challenges, so these are being invested in across the province.

We have really thought about all these challenges, the complicated root causes of them and also the work that we need to do to undo the harms of the justice system on these groups of people.

Thank you, Minister Sharma, for joining us today on this important topic.

In a recent statement regarding the progress of Bill C-48, you expressed your intention to advocate for further changes concerning bail reform. Could you please tell us what changes you want to see implemented at the federal level?

We have been advocating to get these specific changes that you have before me. At this point, I don’t have any further advocacy. I think there is an important conversation, apart from the reforms that you see before you today, about more cooperation between the federal and provincial government for supports, whether it’s increased funding for legal aid or increased funding for our repeat offenders initiative that I think is working or has a lot of potential to work. Right now, I am not advocating for any further changes besides the one before you on bail reform.

Okay.

In a letter, the 13 premiers of Canada’s provinces and territories expressed their desire for the federal government to conduct a comprehensive review of the bail system. Obviously, Bill C-48 is very limited and quite targeted. It doesn’t really go to the extent that the premiers were asking for. On that point, what do you think the federal government should do? Are you in agreement with your premier that this is something you want to continue to see?

Thanks for that.

There are obviously other connectors or issues to this that I have been talking about a bit. This is a targeted piece that’s before you, but we have to work together for better data, for example, which is one of the first questions that I had. We also have to work together for better investments in different levels of the justice system. When it comes to how communities are experiencing or facing challenges, I think the federal government does have a role to play. Although what you have before you are very targeted reforms that we’ve been advocating for, there’s obviously a bigger conversation in all of our FTPs about the different aspects of investments and approaches that are needed to work together to fix it. I think we’ve talked about some of that today.

Years ago, when I used to be the Saskatchewan’s Justice Minister’s Chief of Staff, I recall that our FTP meetings used to be in the fall. I don’t know if that is still of the case or whether COVID interrupted that. When is your next FTP meeting, and is this an issue on the agenda?