Ontario won’t declare intimate partner violence an epidemic following inquest

Ontario is rejecting calls from a coroner’s inquest into the deaths of three women at the hands of their former partner to formally declare intimate partner violence an epidemic.

The jury at a coroner’s inquest into the 2015 deaths of Nathalie Warmerdam, Carol Culleton and Anastasia Kuzyk in Renfrew County made that recommendation one year ago today, along with 85 others aimed at preventing similar tragedies.

Most of the recommendations were directed at the provincial government, and it has now responded to all of them.

The province says that while the government appreciates the intent of the recommendation to declare an epidemic, intimate partner violence is not an infectious or communicable disease.

Ontario is also declining to establish an intimate partner violence commission and create the role of a survivor advocate, as recommended by the inquest jury, because it would duplicate existing systems.

However, the government is working on or has accepted many of the rest of the recommendations, including one to explore ways to allow people to find out if their partner has a history of intimate partner violence, similar to Clare’s Law in the United Kingdom.

This report was first published by The Canadian Press on June 28, 2023.