Too Little Known About Child Brides in Canada

Alberta leads Canada in child marriage rate

Emma Graney
Calgary SUN 

Researcher Alissa Koski, an assistant professor at McGill University, said Alberta leads the country in the rate of child marriages at five for every 10,000 girls.

Alberta leads the country in the rate of child marriages, according to new research, issuing 791 licences to teenagers ages 16 to 18 between 2000 and 2018.

Breaking it down by sex, that’s five in every 10,000 girls, compared with one per 10,000 boys. Across Canada, at least 3,382 children were married over the same period.

Those numbers surprised Culture, Multiculturalism and Status of Women Minister Leela Aheer. Payman Parseyan, Aheer’s press secretary, told Postmedia in an email the minister will continue to monitor the issue.

He said anyone with concerns about the welfare of young people in Alberta — including forced marriages or inappropriate relationships — should contact law enforcement.

HOME VS. ABROAD: A CHILD MARRIAGE DISCREPANCY

The research into Canadian child marriage was led by Alissa Koski, an assistant professor at McGill University who examines women’s health and well-being in low-income countries.

After studying child marriage in sub-Saharan Africa and the United States, her attention turned to Canada when in 2017 the federal government announced a policy to help fund global efforts to end child marriage abroad.

“There was no reflection of the fact that our domestic laws actually permit child marriage, so that sparked my curiosity,” Koski said Wednesday.

“I was interested in that discrepancy between what we’re advocating abroad and what we’re actually doing at home.”

Koski called that “a curious blind spot.”

There are numerous blind spots when it comes to child sexual abuse. Not all child marriages are child abuse but enough of them are that it should be investigated. How many girls disappear from school during summer, or March break, and never come back because they were married off to an older man in their country of origin? We have no idea! But we should!

“I haven’t come across any provincial or national discussion on the issue, which is surprising given the emphasis on child marriage as part of our foreign policy. I don’t think it’s anything we’re talking about, and I think we should be,” she said.

“We have all kinds of protections in place (for children) before the age of 18. We assume that these kids are not capable of renting an apartment independently, buying a pack of cigarettes, that they just don’t have the maturity to make those decisions. And yet we’re assuming they do when it comes to marriage.”

GIRLS PAY THE PRICE

Koski’s research in Canada was more about numbers than diving into who is getting married before age 18. But, she said, those children are typically in hard-to-reach populations.

In other parts of the world, religious and cultural norms play a part in child marriage, but it’s usually girls who end up at the altar before they’re 18.

Negative outcomes for child brides include mental health and substance abuse issues, problems with obstetrics and access to birth control, and higher incidences of domestic violence. 

Not to mention a cessation of their education in most cases.

Koski thinks it’s telling that the vast majority of child marriages in Canada — 85 per cent in every province and territory — are also girls.

“I think we need to ask ourselves whether a law that permits child marriage is in line with our commitment to gender equality,” she said.

As for the Alberta government, Parseyan stressed marriage licences are not issued to children under 16. In the case of 16-year-olds or 17-year-olds, they’re only issued with parental consent.

“Any licences received that do not follow those rules are also a clear violation of the federal Marriage Act and subject to prosecution,” he said.

And so what do we do with adult men who have married little girls in foreign countries and brought them to Canada? Or those who married the child so they would qualify to come to Canada? Do we know how many of these there are? 

Have we struck down the marriage of a single child bride? I don't think so, because it is not politically correct to attack traditions of foreign-born Canadians regardless of how barbaric they might be.