Bill C-54 (Historical)

Protecting Children from Sexual Predators Act

An Act to amend the Criminal Code (sexual offences against children)

This enactment amends the Criminal Code
(a) to increase or impose mandatory minimum penalties for certain sexual offences with respect to children;
(b) to create offences of making sexually explicit material available to a child and of agreeing or arranging to commit a sexual offence against a child;
(c) to ensure consistency among those two new offences and the existing offence of luring a child; and
(d) to expand the list of specified conditions that may be added to prohibition and recognizance orders to include prohibitions concerning contact with a person under the age of 16 and use of the Internet or other digital network, and to expand the list of enumerated offences that may give rise to such orders and prohibitions.

[Lianna McDonald, Executive Director, Canadian Centre for Child Protection]

Mr. Chairman and distinguished members of this committee, I thank you for the opportunity to provide a presentation on Bill C-54 and the larger issue of child sexual abuse and exploitation on the Internet.

I had the privilege to present to this committee a few months ago on Bill C-22, which provided the occasion to share some important background information on our agency and other relevant data surrounding the online sexual exploitation of children. Therefore, my goal today is to provide insight and information specifically to Bill C-54 and to make a few arguments for support of this new legislation.

The Canadian Centre for Child Protection will offer testimony today based on its role in operating Cybertip.ca, Canada's tip line to report the online sexual exploitation of children, as well as its coordinating role with law enforcement and the public and private sectors in combatting online child victimization.

I am joined today by my colleague, Signy Arnason, who is the director of Cybertip.ca. She will speak later to some of the actual reports received by the tip line over the course of the last year.

As stated previously, Cybertip was established in 2002 in partnership with the Government of Canada, various provincial governments, a national law enforcement advisory committee, and a federal task force and steering committee. Like other international hotlines, Cybertip has analysts who review, confirm, and triage reports to the appropriate law enforcement jurisdiction. In particular, the tip line accepts reports related to child abuse material known as child pornography, luring, child sex tourism, children exploited through prostitution, and child trafficking. The tip line is owned and operated by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, a national charity dedicated to the personal safety of all children.

Since launching nationally, the tip line has received nearly 48,000 reports from the public regarding the online sexual exploitation of children, which has resulted in over 70 arrests by law enforcement and numerous children being removed from harmful or abusive environments.

As the front door to the Canadian public, Cybertip receives information regarding various types of concerning behaviours and harmful activities towards children. Often the tip line is the first to become aware of new trends and ways in which adults target or hurt children for sexual purposes. This would include reports dealing with the new offences captured under Bill C-54.

Based on our data, the proposed legislation rightfully acknowledges the role of the Internet in facilitating crimes against children. It is well established that the Internet facilitates the sexual abuse and exploitation of children in a number of ways. Individuals with a sexual interest in children often misuse technology to gain access to them, to normalize their deviant sexual interest, and to fuel sexual fantasies. As a result, reporting to Cybertip and other hotlines continues to grow annually in response to this growing problem.

Beyond reports to Cybertip pertaining to child abuse images, the tip line continues to receive reports that pertain to what is generally defined in the public domain as grooming. This activity often includes adults sending sexually explicit material to one or many targeted children. In the majority of these reports, the children are under the age of 13 and are sent sexually explicit images or videos, usually involving the offender either masturbating, pictures of their genitals, or hard core adult pornography. The grooming process is often used to bring down the child's inhibitions, to attempt to normalize sexual activity, and to engage the child in sexual interactions. In most cases, children do not have the maturity, emotional capacity, and development to manage the short- and long-term implications of such activity.

To date, little has been done to address such activities through the criminal justice process, contrary to the opinion and outrage of most Canadians.

Some of the more concerning reports deal with adults agreeing or making arrangements to commit a sexual offence against one or more children. It is hard to believe that people would offer up their very young children for other individuals to sexually abuse. In one report to Cybertip, a forum moderator was reported as making arrangements to trade his 12-year-old daughter for a second person's four-year-old daughter. The reported information indicated that there was discussion that the second person was going to have sex with the 12-year-old, film it, and impregnate her.

The tip line to date has received a handful of these types of reports. Clearly, they are very much of concern and warrant immediate action. Law enforcement's ability to use the new provisions outlined in Bill C-54 will greatly assist them in their efforts to charge individuals engaging in this type of harmful activity.

Similar to Canada's luring legislation, these two new additions will prove effective, in that law enforcement will be able to take swift action and potentially prevent a child from being victimized. As a result of Canada's existing luring legislation, countless children have been protected in advance of a serious sexual offence occurring; moreover, our agency believes that once the public becomes aware of these new amendments and understands their role in reporting, more children will be saved from abuse.

The public nature of the Internet, combined with the viral nature of child abuse material, offers the opportunity for the public to report and assist in the detection of this type of material and harmful behaviour towards children. While our organization supports the new amendments included in Bill C-54, it should be noted that public education and awareness efforts must also be key components to addressing this problem. Awareness efforts to educate parents and adults surrounding healthy boundaries towards children are essential, as is public education about laws protecting children. The responsibility of adults to take the necessary steps to report and protect them is also imperative.

In concluding, it is critical that governments recognize the particular vulnerability of children, combined with the fact that in today's society children are connected to a technological world that allows unprecedented access to them. This unlevel playing field has given children a new, largely unsupervised playground and has opened to doors for adults to take full advantage of this opportunity. For this reason, the Canadian Centre for Child Protection supports Bill C-54 and urges the government to move swiftly and enact this important legislation to better protect Canada's children.

Thank you.

[Michael Spratt, Director, Criminal Lawyers' Association]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and good afternoon to the honourable members of this committee.

My name is Michael Spratt. I'm a criminal defence lawyer. I practise at the law firm of Webber Schroeder Goldstein Abergel here in Ottawa. I practise exclusively in the area of criminal law. To my left is Mr. Russomanno, who practises at the same law firm, also exclusively in criminal law. We're both members of the Criminal Lawyers' Association. I'm on the board of that organization and Mr. Russomanno is a member.

The Criminal Lawyer's Association was founded in 1971 and is made up of over a thousand criminal lawyers. We're routinely consulted by governments and committees such as this committee on proposed legislation that affects criminal law. The CLA supports legislation that's fair, constitutional, and supported by evidence. The CLA supports protecting vulnerable members of our society—in this case, children.

The CLA remains opposed to the use of the mandatory minimum sentences. They are not fair, and they do not accomplish the objectives that this bill seeks to accomplish. Bill C-54 is another example of the government's love of mandatory minimum sentences. This love persists despite evidence that minimum sentences just don't work. They don't accomplish the objectives that we sometimes believe they might. This bill's short title is “Protecting Children from Sexual Predators”, so I take it that the aim of this bill is to protect children. Unfortunately, the bill as constructed, largely because of the use of mandatory minimum sentences, will fall short of this goal.

There are many problems with mandatory minimum sentences. The first is that minimum sentences remove judicial discretion. This is a departure from one of the historic underpinnings of our justice system—the discretion of a trial judge to impose a just and appropriate sentence. Trial judges are in the best place to craft appropriate sentences. They hear the facts and the circumstances of the offence. They hear details about the offender—his personal circumstances, treatment that the offender sought, and in many cases reports from medical professionals about the risk of reoffence. They also hear from victims through victim impact statements. With this information, they're in the best position to craft a sentence that's fair to the offender and proportional to the offence, to craft a decision that reflects the principles of sentencing.

Mandatory minimum sentences limit this judicial discretion. In fact, they do something even more insidious in transferring that discretion to the police and to the prosecutors—the police who decide what charges to lay, and the prosecutors who decide how to proceed with a charge. Is it a summary offence or is it an offence that will proceed by way of indictment? The crown has discretion to take pleas to lesser included offences that sometimes don't carry mandatory minimum sentences.

The removal of judicial discretion hides the decision-making process. Judges have to deliver reasons, and substantial reasons, for their decisions. Judges are reviewable by appellate courts. The police and the prosecutors are not. Their discretion is not reviewable and is not made public. In short, the removal of discretion will undermine confidence in the judiciary.

Mandatory minimum sentences accomplish two negative things at the same time. They act as an inducement for someone who may not be guilty to plead guilty to avoid a mandatory minimum sentence if the prosecutor offers to bury the charges the person is facing. At the same time, they offer an inducement to take a matter to trial, to use court time to litigate a matter. That often happens. Because the penalty is so severe under the mandatory minimums, there is no risk, no advantage, in taking the matter to trial.

We're all aware that resources are not infinite. What I just mentioned doesn't even take into account the increase in the prison population. Mandatory minimums also disproportionately affect minorities, particularly aboriginal groups. The Supreme Court of Canada in the landmark case of Gladue has recognized that because of their unique background and historic disadvantages, the sentencing of aboriginal people is different. There are different considerations to be taken into account.

Mandatory minimum sentences have the risk of being unconstitutional in that regard, where those considerations the Supreme Court directs cannot be taken into account because there is a mandatory minimum sentence that dictates the result--sometimes an inappropriate result.

Lastly, mandatory minimums do little to advance the principles of sentencing. Mr. Russomanno--if I haven't used all his time by the time I'm done speaking--is going to talk to you about how mandatory minimum sentences don't offer any positive benefits with respect to deterrence, how they don't deter people from committing crimes.

Apart from that, as you've heard already, mandatory minimum sentences can interfere with rehabilitation, which is a paramount principle of our sentencing principles. They essentially abandon rehabilitation or devalue rehabilitation, and put an offender sometimes in a worse position. Mandatory minimums, as Mr. Russomanno will tell you, don't deter.

What mandatory minimum sentences are good at is denouncing conduct, and retribution. Unfortunately, those two principles do not lead to safety. They do not lower the risk of reoffence or offence in the first place, and they often result in the use and overuse of scarce resources and the potential result of unfit sentences.

I'll turn the floor over for whatever time is remaining to Mr. Russomanno.

[Andrew McWhinnie, Andrew McWhinnie Consulting, As an Individual]

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and committee members.

I am Andrew McWhinnie. I hold a master's degree in psychology with an emphasis on the psychology of criminal conduct. About one-third of my private practice is with men who have come into conflict with the law as a result of their sexual behaviour. I also work with men and women who have been sexually victimized. I also consult with correctional agencies nationally and internationally with regard to reintegration strategies for people who have been convicted of sexual assault and other sexual crimes, called circles of support and accountability. I welcome this opportunity to appear before you today.

I wish to address three points. First, as it stands now, while Bill C-54 is a good bill generally, its efforts to institute and modify minimum sentences upwards for sexual offences against children will have the unintended effect of actually decreasing safety for children. At the same time, it will handcuff one of the best-placed safeguards against those unintended consequences, the judiciary. We can and must do better for our children.

The majority, over 80%, of sexual offences against children are perpetrated by a relative or someone known to the child. Further, we need to remember that the majority of those convicted of sexual offences against children will return to the community. Increasing mandatory minimum sentences exposes potential child victims and their families who are the unseen victims of sexual assault to increased harm, because many families, including the children, are dependent on the offenders. The ability to remain in the community, while unpalatable for some, means that the offender will in many cases be able to continue supporting his family while receiving treatment. We cannot and must not ignore or trivialize this fact. These family members are innocent and should not be punished.

The bill proposes a virtual automatic jail sentence of five years for an incest offender, given that most of these incest offences are prosecuted years after the incidents occurred. Incest offenders are the least likely to reoffend, and yet the stiffest penalty proposed under Bill C-54 is reserved for them. This makes no sense and is not what Canadian families want.

For others, an automatic jail term compromises the ability of offenders to access treatment in the community. Receiving treatment in jail will not happen during sentences of 30 and 90 days. Treatment could, however, be started in this time period were the offender left in the community. This is important, given that we know that treated offenders are less likely to reoffend than untreated offenders. This is even more important when you consider that one of the developmental factors that most differentiates child molesters from non-sexual offenders is the history of being sexually victimized in childhood. We should think about that.

Following even a minimum sentence, offenders will be returned to their community--or some other unsuspecting community--and their families as untreated, unemployed, unsupported, and despised. How does this accomplish a major goal of the proposed legislation to prevent the commission of sexual offences against the child?

Left as it is, this bill has the very real risk of doing exactly the opposite. It is true, of course, that not all offenders are members of intact families, not all are employed, not all are in communities where treatment is available, and not all are victims of horrific sexual assaults. True, some families will want them removed from the community. Bill C-54 does not distinguish these differences. Instead, it would handcuff that critically important part of our justice system best placed to assess these variances. Judges will not be able to consider the needs of this complex and diverse group of offenders and craft sentences designed to meet the needs of those people and protect Canadian children.

Other countries, and particularly the United States, have been down this road ahead of us. We need to look carefully at what their experience has been. Some members of the European Union--for example, Latvia, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and Belgium--and some states in the United States are looking at their laws with a view to reducing the time some offenders spend in jail. I will soon be offering testimony to the California Supreme Court, which is interested in exploring options other than incarceration for some of their sexually violent predators who are currently subject to their civil commitment statutes. They have discovered the hard way that increasing the incarceration rate with ever more severe punishment-focused laws is unaffordable, and it is having a serious impact on their fiscal and social economies.

Some like to think that victims want perpetrators to be punished harshly by spending more time in jail, but this is not always the case. Many simply want only three things: for the offences to stop and not to happen to other children, for the offender to obtain the help and support they need not to offend again, and to know why they were chosen by their offender. In other words, they want counselling and support for themselves.

Finally, I want to emphasize that the best practices nationally and internationally recognize that the prevention of crime through treatment, especially of youth at risk, and provision of support for victims, especially those who may go on to become abusers, are practices that make real differences in a society's bid to protect its most vulnerable members.

One such practice that provides those needed supports and encouragements to living safe and accountable lives among adult offenders is circles of support and accountability. Circles of support and accountability are a Canadian innovation, first attempted by members of a Mennonite church in southern Ontario. Circles of support and accountability are groups of between four and seven citizen volunteers who agree to accompany, support, and hold a sexual offender accountable following his release from imprisonment. Volunteers are screened and they receive training for this purpose.

In a national study of the effectiveness of circles, researchers found circles of support and accountability participants had an 83% less likelihood of reoffending, 73% less violent reoffending, and 72% less reoffending of any kind than a matched comparison group who did not participate in circles. Further, in looking at the total number of new charges incurred by the two groups, as opposed to just the numbers of offenders who recidivated, the comparison group garnered 76% more charges than the circles of support and accountability group.

I have submitted a report containing those numbers to the clerk, which will be translated and made available to members of this committee.

Circles of support and accountability are supported in part by the Correctional Service of Canada chaplaincy division and by other faith and non-faith supporters in the community. Currently they work with about 160 offenders, with over 350 volunteers nationwide.

The annual budget for COSA, circles of support and accountability, in Canada is $2.5 million, a fraction of the cost that will be incurred by Bill C-54 and other tough-on-crime measures. Borrowing from the Canadian example, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Latvia, and several U.S. states have developed COSA in their jurisdictions.

While Bill C-54 has the potential for good and the potential to deliver on its promises of protecting children, it also has some serious flaws. These have especially to do with the blanket mandatory sanctions that will not safeguard children. Indeed, these may actually increase the danger towards children.

Other countries are looking at other options instead of increasing incarceration rates. The resources that would be required to implement the mandatory minimums called for in Bill C-54 would be far better diverted to increasing treatment for sexual offenders and equipping alternatives like circles of support and accountability.

Both of these options, circles of support and accoutability and treatment, have proved to be very effective at reducing reoffence rates against children, thereby substantially increasing safety in our society and internationally.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of this committee, for the opportunity to discuss these very important matters with you. I am available for questions, as you see fit.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

I call the meeting to order.

This is meeting 46 of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. For the record, today is Monday, February 7, 2011.

Just as a note, today's meeting is being televised.

You have before you the agenda for today. We're continuing our review of Bill C-54, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (sexual offences against children).

To help us with our review we have with us the following witnesses. First of all, representing the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, we have Lianna McDonald. Welcome back. We also have Signy Arnason. Welcome.

We have BOOST Child Abuse Prevention and Intervention, represented by Karyn Kennedy and Pearl Rimer. Welcome to both of you.

We have the Criminal Lawyers' Association, represented by Michael Spratt and Leonardo Russomanno. Welcome to both of you.

As an individual, we have Andrew McWhinnie.

I think you've been advised as to the process. Each of you has ten minutes to present. Organizations have ten minutes collectively. Then we'll open the floor to questions from our members.

Why don't we start with Mr. McWhinnie. You have ten minutes.

[Carole Morency]

When we look at how our laws compare with those of others, I would suggest that the comparison needs to look at not just what the mandatory minimum is, but at the nature of the offence and what the maximum penalty is that's imposed in the other law as well, because the approach presented in Bill C-54 seeks to bring a consistency across the board for the offences that we have here in Canada.

As you asked, if you look at, for example, the United States, criminal law is a state power. If you look at the state law on child pornography or other forms of child sexual exploitation, you will find a range of penalties, both minimum and maximum, and a difference of approach. I'm not in a position to go through all of that at this time.

But as I mentioned before, at the federal level they have federal criminal laws that address child pornography offences. For example, there is a five-year minimum penalty and a maximum of twenty years for a first offence of distributing child pornography through the mails. It has to be through the mails to apply at the federal level, to catch the interstate commerce threshold. Then, there's a minimum penalty of 15 years and a maximum penalty of 40 years for a repeat offence of possessing or knowingly accessing child pornography that has been mailed, as an example.

But as I mentioned as well, if you look at other countries and their approaches, there is a range. Canada's, with the mandatory minimums proposed in Bill C-54, are as I say consistent with the mandatory minimum penalties that exist right now in the Criminal Code. One of the proposals, to add a five-year minimum penalty for the offences that carry a fourteen-year maximum penalty—for example, incest in section 155—would be comparable to the offence we have now in the Criminal Code in subsection 212(2.1), the aggravated prostitution of a young person using violence.

The approach Bill C-54 takes is to bring all of that together so that you have coherence.

[Carole Morency]

I can indicate to the committee that variations of this may exist in other countries. In the United States, at the federal law level they have an offence of using the mails to provide child pornography—for example, material to a young person. I believe there might be something similar or a variation of it in the United Kingdom's Sexual Offences Act.

But the approach taken here in Bill C-54 is unique in the sense that it reflects the Canadian law, with similar concepts and similar approaches. As the committee heard on Monday from Inspector Naylor, it's an issue that police have long spoken about that they would find very useful as another offence.

So we know it exists; we know that other countries have approached it perhaps somewhat in similar ways, but not exactly like this.

[Carole Morency]

In fact it's even more fundamental. The offence that's proposed in clause 13 of Bill C-54--it may occur through the Internet, but it does not have to. The intention here is to....

First of all, you'll see that the definition of sexually explicit material excludes child pornography. So we're not talking about someone providing child pornography to a young person. What this offence addresses is any person who takes sexually explicit material and provides it to a young person for the specific purpose of facilitating their commission of a sexual offence against that child.

How can that happen? It could happen, as you mentioned, that an offender is on the Internet and sends such an image to a young person. It could easily, and very often, happen in an in-person direct contact situation--the old-fashioned way, right? We know from research, and forensic psychiatrists who've appeared before this committee before have said, that child sex offenders often use these materials to lower the inhibitions of young people, to show them that this conduct occurs, that other kids may be doing it, or in this case other adults are doing it, to normalize it, to make it easier for them to then sexually assault the child.

So the proposed new offence in clause 13 addresses that conduct, whether it happens in person or through the Internet or other means.

[Carole Morency]

My short answer is I would agree with the premise of the question that the hearing aid wouldn't be transmitting, communicating, providing access to the World Wide Web or other.... I suppose there are some medical devices like a heart halter that might be transmitting data to a recipient computer, but it's not providing access to the Internet or other digital networks in the sense that it would provide the offender with the ability to access or communicate with a child or access illicit material such as child pornography. But I certainly appreciate the concerns expressed here. I will undertake to go back and see if I can provide a more fulsome answer that would allay the concerns you had identified.

As to the other part of your question, my understanding from reading a lot of case law is I have not seen a sentencing court express concern on how to identify what they want to prohibit a convicted person from accessing. Typically what they do, the way it's reflected in judgments, is a sentencing report is provided to the court and submissions are made by the crown and the defence to provide or restrict access to whatever devices or under what terms of supervision. The intention with Bill C-54 was to leave that flexibility in the hands of the court to craft an appropriate sentence to address the concerns in that case.

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Thank you very much.

Perhaps I can make a suggestion which relates to the concerns raised by Mr. Lee, which I share. Indeed, after having listened to him, I understand very well, but perhaps if we added “and other electronic tools as described by the judge”, there would be precise instructions to follow. I imagine that when direction is given, it could refer to a certain number of things. It could refer to the Internet, it could refer to access to this or access to that, and so on, but you do not think of heart monitors or that type of instrument.

There is something else I want to ask right now. Several of the minimum sentence increases affect minimum sentences which were created in 2005, particularly as relates to sections 3, 4, 5, 9, 11 and 12 of Bill C-54. They were introduced for the first time in 2005 and came into effect on November 1, 2005.

To your knowledge, has the Department of Justice, or anyone else, ever undertaken a study to determine how the imposition of minimum sentences in 2005 affected outcomes?

[Carole Morency]

The amendment that you see in clause 15 replaces the word that is currently.... For example, currently section 172.1—luring a child—talks about someone who, using “a computer system within the meaning of subsection 342.1(2) communicates with”. This is replacing the language there and in the new offences with “telecommunication”, because this is the language that's also being proposed more broadly in what is currently Bill C-51, which was previously Bill C-46, the Investigative Powers for the 21st Century Act. So it's a consistency to broaden the capture of the types of communications that are at play.

Bill C-54 still uses the terminology “Internet”, as you'll see in the offence. We use language for definition of the Internet here that is consistent with Bill C-30, I believe it is—the Copyright Act, which also has that language.

So the intention here is not.... The bill still does use “Internet”, but the use of “telecommunications” would be consistent here with its use in Bills C-51 and C-52.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

We'll reconvene.

Before we move on with our discussion on Bill C-54, we do have an operating budget request for the study of this bill. It was circulated earlier in our meeting. The total is about $15,000. If you could review that and....

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Minister, I carefully read Bill C-54. Someone from Quebec City might soon come into my riding and say the opposite, but this is a good bill, apart from some provisions which would impose minimum prison sentences for offences which already exist.

Is the purpose of these minimum prison sentences to prevent the courts from imposing conditional sentences, yes or no?

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Minister of Justice]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I am very pleased to appear before the committee as you begin your review of Bill C-54, the Protecting Children from Sexual Predators Act.

Our goal with this bill is twofold. First, it seeks to ensure that all child sexual offences are treated seriously and consistently for sentencing purposes. Second, it proposes reforms that seek to help prevent the commission of sexual offences against children.

This bill's sentencing reforms target mandatory penalties for all sexual offences where the victim is a child. The sexual abuse of any child is a serious offence, and it must be clearly denounced. Our government believes that child sexual offenders must receive sentences that reflect the seriousness of their crimes and the danger they represent to our children.

As members of the committee will know, acts of child sexual abuse can be charged under child-specific offences or under the general sexual offences that apply to both adults and child victims. Though these two groups of offences address similar conduct, they do not impose similar penalties where the victim is a child.

For example, some of the child-specific sexual offences impose mandatory minimums, but none of the general sexual offences impose mandatory penalties. In addition, the variations in sentencing often result in conditional sentences of imprisonment--house arrest, as it's often referred to--for some offences but not for others.

The effect of this varying treatment is that not all child sexual assaults are treated equally seriously by the system. In fact, given that 80% of police-reported incidents of child sexual assault in 2008 were charged under the general sexual assault offence in section 271 of the Criminal Code, this means that the overwhelming majority of child sexual offences do not carry a mandatory minimum penalty. This bill changes that.

There are currently 12 child-specific sexual offences that impose mandatory penalties. Amendments made in 2005 to those offences resulted in mandatory penalties being added to only some of the child-specific sexual offences and to none of the general sexual assault provisions. These changes produced a random and inconsistent approach to mandatory penalties such that they do not all adequately reflect the serious nature of the offences.

In order to fix these inconsistencies and ensure that sexual predators receive sentences that reflect the extreme seriousness of their crimes, this bill proposes to add seven new mandatory penalties to offences that currently do not impose mandatory sentencing. Three of these are child-specific offences: the bestiality provisions, the Internet luring of a child, and the exposure to a child under 16 years of age. The other four are general sexual offences, and the mandatory penalties will apply where the victim is a child under the age of 16, the age of consent.

They are section 155, incest; section 271, sexual assault; section 272, sexual assault with a weapon, threats, or causing bodily harm; and section 273, aggravated sexual assault.

This bill proposes higher mandatory penalties for seven child-specific sexual offences that already carry mandatory penalties. This will ensure that the mandatory penalty is not only commensurate with the offence in question but is also consistent with other mandatory penalty offences.

For example, Bill C-54 would increase the current mandatory penalty for section 151, sexual interference--which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years on indictment--from 45 days mandatory to one year mandatory. In this way, the higher mandatory penalty would be consistent with the new mandatory penalty proposed for section 271, the general sexual assault offence.

Bill C-54 also seeks to prevent the commission of a sexual assault against a child. It does so by proposing the creation of two new offences and by requiring the courts to consider imposing two new specific conditions that would seek to prevent a suspected or convicted child sex offender from engaging in conduct that would facilitate their sexual offending.

The first new offence proposed in this bill would prohibit anyone from providing sexually explicit material to a young person for the purpose of facilitating the commission of a sexual offence against the young person. Child sex offenders often provide such material to their intended victims with a view to lowering their sexual inhibitions; in other words, they do this as part of the grooming process of their victim.

Today, if that material constitutes child pornography, irrespective of the purpose, it is already prohibited. Bill C-54 does not change that. But where the material in question is not child pornography--in other words, where it depicts adults engaged in explicit sexual activity as defined by the new offence--the Criminal Code does not currently catch this unless the material meets the very high threshold definition of obscene material under section 163.

Bill C-54 will change this. It proposes to prohibit providing sexually explicit material to a young person for the purpose of facilitating the commission of a sexual offence against that child. This new offence would carry a penalty similar to that for the existing obscenity and corrupting morals offence in section 163.

Bill C-54 also proposes to prohibit anyone from using telecommunications such as the Internet to make arrangements with another person to commit a sexual offence against a child. In addition, this bill proposes other needed consequential amendments, including, for example, adding the two proposed offences to subsection 7(4.1) of the Criminal Code, which provides Canadian courts with extraterritorial jurisdiction to enable the prosecution of Canadian child sex tourists. Both of the proposed new offences would carry mandatory sentences of imprisonment.

Lastly, our bill proposes to expand the powers of the court to prohibit a convicted child sex offender under section 161 of the Criminal Code and to prohibit a suspected child sex offender under section 810.1 from engaging in conduct that may facilitate their commission of one or more of the enumerated sexual or abduction offences. First, the list of offences would be expanded to include four prostitution offences where the victim is a child; second, the courts would be specifically directed to consider imposing a condition prohibiting the offender from having any unsupervised access to a young person and from having any unsupervised use of the Internet.

The imposition of these conditions would help to prevent the offender from being placed in a situation where he has access and opportunity to sexually assault a child, and from having unfettered use of the Internet and other technologies that are so instrumental in the commission of child pornography and other child-sexually-exploitive offences.

These are the key elements of this bill. As do all law-abiding Canadians, our government knows that the sexual exploitation of children causes irreparable harm to the youngest and most vulnerable members of our society. Our message in Bill C-54 is strong and clear: to those dangerous sexual predators who abuse children, from now on you will go to jail.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Fast]

I call the meeting to order.

This is meeting number 45 of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Today is Wednesday, February 2, 2011.

You have before you the agenda for today. We're continuing our review of Bill C-54, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (sexual offences against children).

To assist us with our review, we have with us again our Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada, the Honourable Rob Nicholson, and accompanying him are senior officials from the Department of Justice. We have with us Carole Morency, acting general counsel, criminal law policy section, and Donald Piragoff, senior assistant deputy minister, policy sector.

Welcome to all three of you.

Joining them will be Matthias Villetorte, counsel, criminal law policy section, once the minister leaves.

A reminder to all members to provide any proposed amendments to the clerk. We're hoping to move to clause-by-clause during the second half of the next meeting, which is Monday. That might carry over into the following day, which would be Wednesday. In any event, if you could get those amendments to us, it would be very helpful to the clerk and the rest of the members.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Okay, thank you.

Inspector Naylor, as you know, this Bill C-54 creates two new offences dealing with the exploitation of children using the Internet. It creates an offence to provide sexually explicit material to a child for the purpose of facilitating the commission of a sexual offence against the child; and it makes it an offence to use telecommunications, including the Internet, to communicate with another person to agree or make arrangements to commit a sexual offence against a child.

First of all, do you think these offences are necessary? Will they help protect children, and can you give us some examples from your experience of how they'll protect children?