The Minister of Justice, Simon Jolin-Barrette, partially agrees with the arguments of the Court of Quebec: he proposed Tuesday morning to rename the tribunal specializing in matters of sexual and domestic violence so that it is called rather “division “.
In a series of amendments he tabled in the National Assembly, the minister softened his position. By proposing to rename the tribunal “Specialized division in matters of sexual violence and domestic violence”, it accepts the compromise suggested last week by the former chief justice of the Court of Quebec Elizabeth Corte.
“There is a way to agree on a name,” argued the one who co-chaired the Committee of experts on support for victims of sexual assault and domestic violence. This committee produced the report Rebuild trust, which recommended the establishment of a specialized tribunal.
The mere name of this tribunal upsets the Court of Quebec and the Conseil de la magistrature. They judge that “the specialized qualifier is more suitable for the integrated service center than the report Rebuild trust recommends to implement ”.
The two bodies, as well as associations of defense lawyers, also expressed concern that the bill would undermine the principles of the presumption of innocence and judicial independence. In his amendments, Minister Jolin-Barrette suggests including, in the preamble of the bill, that “respect for the rights of an accused, including the presumption of his innocence, is one of the foundations of the penal and criminal system” .
More responsibilities at the DPCP
The Court of Quebec and the Conseil de la magistrature had also expressed unease over the possibility that the government could determine, by regulation, what types of proceedings are heard by the specialized tribunal.
With his amendments, Minister Jolin-Barrette gets around this pitfall. He proposes to delegate to the Director of Criminal and Penal Prosecutions (DPCP) the decision to submit or not a case to the Specialized Division in matters of sexual violence and conjugal violence. The Minister also wants to grant the DPCP “the role of evaluating whether an alleged criminal offense involves a context of sexual violence or conjugal violence for the purposes of this file being submitted to the Specialized Division”.
The Minister of Justice also proposes that training “on the realities relating to sexual violence and conjugal violence to susceptible persons” be offered to all persons “liable to intervene in the specialized court”. It thus responds to a request expressed by many groups who participated in the hearings on its bill, which until now has been “mainly” on the training of judges, to use the expression of the PQ member Véronique Hivon.
Mr. Jolin-Barrette also tabled an amendment which aims to privilege “accompanying measures and coordination of cases”, as well as “the treatment by the same prosecutor of all stages of a prosecution”.
Asked for a reaction to the changes proposed by the minister, the Court of Quebec and the Judicial Council said on Tuesday that they “do not wish to comment on the proposed amendments [à] this day to Bill 92 ”.