It’s Time to Turn the Tide Together: 3rd Anniversary of Mass Casualty Commission Report

By Luke's Place | March 30, 2026

On March 30, 2023, the Nova Scotia Mass Casualty Commission released its landmark final report, Turning the Tide Together, offering a wide-ranging and deeply grounded blueprint for how Canada could better prevent and respond to violence in all its forms, especially gender-based, intimate partner, and family violence.

The Commission’s report laid out what so many advocates, survivors, and community leaders have been saying for years: safety is not just about policing. It’s about:

addressing the root causes of violence
transforming how institutions and systems respond to risk and harm
investing in prevention and supports
recognizing that gender-based violence is a public health and human rights issue

With 130 recommendations, the report does more than just identify a problem, it offers tangible responses to violence and shifts the focus to the importance of prevention.

As we mark this anniversary, we honour the memory of the 22 people killed in Nova Scotia in April 2020, and all who have faced gender-based violence before and since. But honoring memory isn’t enough. Honour must be shown through action. One way to act is calling for the implementation and completion of the 130 recommendations. Many of the recommendations listed in the report overlap with recommendations called for by other inquests, reports, survivors, and feminist/anti-violence organizations.

Some of the recommendations in the report that Luke’s Place has called for in response to this and other acts of violence include:

review of mandatory charging
greater focus on addressing and preventing the root causes of violence in communities, including gender-based violence, intimate partner violence, and family violence
enhanced education on intimate partner violence, and gender-based violence

We must continue to make progress and implement changes so we can all live free of violence.

Read More: