Programming Responses for Intimate Partner Violence Lisa Heslop, Tim Kelly, Randal David, Katreena Scott Department of Justice Canada 2016 Information contained in this publication or product may be reproduced, in part or in whole, and by any means, for personal or public non-commercial purposes, without charge or further permission, unless otherwise specified. You are asked to: exercise due diligence in ensuring the accuracy of the materials reproduced; indicate both the complete title of the materials reproduced, as well as the author organization; and indicate that the reproduction is a copy of an official work that is published by the Government of Canada and that the reproduction has not been produced in affiliation with or with the endorsement of the Government of Canada. Commercial reproduction and distribution is prohibited except with written permission from the Department of Justice Canada. For more information, please contact the Department of Justice Canada at: www.justice.gc.ca. © Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada, represented by the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, 2017 ISBN 978-0-660-08236-3 Cat. No. J2-444/2017E-PDF Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank all those who provided information for this report, as well as those who reviewed drafts including provincial and territorial officials responsible for addressing intimate partner violence in their respective jurisdictions. The report was also reviewed by officials at the Department of Justice Canada in the Family, Children and Youth Section and the Research and Statistics Division. 3 Contents Acknowledgements .............................................................................................................................................. 3 INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................................................... 5 CONTEXT .................................................................................................................................................................. 5 OBJECTIVES .......................................................................................................................................................... 7 METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................................................................. 7 FINDINGS: PROGRAMMING RESPONSES FOR PERPETRATORS OF INTIMATE PARTNER VIOLENCE ....................................................................................................................................... 8 ALBERTA ........................................................................................................................................................... 8 BRITISH COLUMBIA ................................................................................................................................. 13 MANITOBA..................................................................................................................................................... 19 NEWFOUNDLAND/LABRADOR .......................................................................................................... 26 NEW BRUNSWICK ...................................................................................................................................... 29 NORTHWEST TERRITORIES ................................................................................................................. 34 NOVA SCOTIA .............................................................................................................................................. 37 NUNAVUT ....................................................................................................................................................... 43 ONTARIO ......................................................................................................................................................... 45 PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND .................................................................................................................... 49 QUÉBEC ........................................................................................................................................................... 51 SASKATCHEWAN ....................................................................................................................................... 54 YUKON ............................................................................................................................................................. 60 DISCUSSION ....................................................................................................................................................... 63 CONCLUSIONS .................................................................................................................................................. 66 APPENDIX A: SERVICES BY PROVINCE ............................................................................................. 66 APPENDIX B: KEY INFORMANTS ........................................................................................................... 74 4 INTRODUCTION The Department Justice Canada has a mandate to ensure a strong justice system response to family violence with appropriate criminal laws and procedures that ensure offender accountability. While there is no specific family violence offence in the Criminal Code, there is a wide range of offences related to the use of physical and sexual violence that are applicable within intimate partner relationships. Such offenses are referred to in this report as intimate partner violence (IPV). Criminal Code sentencing provisions consider IPV as an aggravating factor and have been designed to provide sanctions that are both punitive and rehabilitative. This report was undertaken for the Research and Statistics Division and the Family, Children and Youth Section of the Department of Justice Canada to provide a better understanding of the current landscape of programming aimed at perpetrators of IPV across Canada. The report also augments the now archived 2008 Directory of Canada’s Treatment Programs for Men Who Abuse Their Partners, one of a series of directories prepared under the Family Violence Initiative of the Government of Canada. CONTEXT Justice-linked intervention responses to IPV have been developed and implemented in virtually all regions of Canada. With respect to federal offenders, Correctional Service Canada (CSC) is legally mandated to provide programs and services that address offenders’ criminal behaviour and contribute to their successful transition into the community. For the majority of those convicted of IPV-related offending, services provided by CSC are augmented by community- based treatment. Many of Canada’s provinces and territories have developed IPV action plans, either current or in the recent past, that are relevant to understanding the nature of justice-linked IPV services. IPV action plans both reflect and direct the priorities for justice-linked services. Provincial and territorial action plans were most often developed as a result of strong advocacy by, and in close collaboration with, grassroots and community level organizations. As such, these plans reflect the unique culture, needs, and political landscapes of different regions of Canada. IPV action plans also substantially direct the funding and availability of justice-linked family violence services across the provinces and territories. For example, provincial level decisions around the existence and nature of designated IPV courts (or court processes) substantially influence how men interact with the criminal justice system (CJS) and therefore how they access services mandated by the CJS. In some provinces, the Justice of the Peace (JP) or Judge has the ability to order treatment prior to a conviction for an IPV-related offence, including addictions treatment. In these provinces, community-based services are designated to meet this need. In other cases, police identify high-risk families where no charges have been laid for intervention. In this context, community agencies have services to engage at-risk men in treatment. Other policy-related differences concern the integration (or lack of integration) of child protection, addictions treatment, and broader social services (e.g., housing) into justice-linked intervention responses to IPV. Although, recommendations with respect to therapeutic intervention or programming for offenders are generally a small part of IPV action plans, the overall priorities of 5 the action plan are directly reflected in the justice-linked services provided to address family violence. In this report, we begin our review of services in each province and territory with a brief description of the broader IPV action plans, legislation and/or processes that reflect and direct justice linked intervention services. Links to original documents are provided whenever possible. We recognize that this “top-down” organization can obscure the historic and ongoing influence of grassroots and community organizations on setting and implementing policy. Given the considerable body of implementation literature showing that with greater stakeholder involvement, IPV action plans are more comprehensive, stronger, and more likely to be implemented (Burby 2003; Hawking, Catalano and Arthur 2002), it is critical to remember the bidirectional influence of government