Greens introduce amendments to sexual violence policy
A bill requiring universities and colleges to implement sexual assault policies was amended on Thursday night to define the distribution of exploitative images as a form of sexual violence.
In all, five amendments, introduced by the Green party, passed in a rare moment of co-operation between the governing Liberal and the opposition parties.
The Post-Secondary Institutions Sexual Violence Policies Act, introduced by Workforce and Advanced Learning Minister Sonny Gallant, passed Second Reading on Nov. 14. The bill sets out a requirement for post-secondary institutions to respond to and address instances of sexual violence involving students, and mandates student input in the process.
Green Leader Peter BevanBaker introduced the amendments that expanded the definition of sexual violence to include the exploitative electronic distribution of sexually explicit photographs or videos. It also required the policy be culturally sensitive and required post-secondary institutions to accommodate students affected by sexual violence.
Universities and colleges will be required to address prevention and to report instances and complaints of sexual violence on a yearly basis.
Bevan-Baker said the amendments were meant to refine the legislation and were based on similar legislation put in effect in Ontario, Manitoba and B.C.
“Some of the amendments we tabled were to make the legislation more specific,” Bevan-Baker said.
“There was no mention in the legislation specifically of using videos and pictures of people and exploiting them publicly.”
Bevan-Baker said it was important to specify this as an instance of sexual violence. He also said it was important to add clauses to the legislation about prevention and training.
“When something is enshrined in legislation, when a new government comes in, it’s time-proofed, it’s future-proofed,” Bevan-Baker said.
Gallant said the amendments introduced by Bevan-Baker were similar to other regulations that had been planned after the legislation was passed. He said he supported them because they were in the interests of students.
“Basically, this is all about the students. When they stated what we thought were going to be in the regulations down the road, we thought we could work with this,” Gallant said.
The bill will now proceed to third reading.
Thursday was a productive day for the Greens. On Thursday afternoon, an amendment to the Innovation P.E.I. Act, introduced by Green MLA Hannah Bell, was passed. The amendment would include creative and cultural industries under the definition of an “economic sector” and would expand the section of the act on renewable energy to include clean technology. The amendment would require Innovation P.E.I. to provide support to these sectors.