Bill C-20 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Criminal Code (protection of children and other vulnerable persons) and the Canada Evidence Act

Criminal Code

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

moved:

That Bill C-20 be amended by deleting Clause 7.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C-20 and the amendment before us.

I would like to make it very clear that members of the NDP support the measures in the bill that are clearly presented and defined. We believe they will help protect children, a goal that is certainly shared by all of us in the NDP and I think by all members of the House.

We believe we have an obligation to do whatever we can to protect children in our society and to stop the abuse and exploitation of children in every form, whether through child pornography or any other way. That is something that we support very strongly. It is a very important value.

In presenting the amendment today to delete clause 7, we do so because we believe the present wording of clause 7 is very vague. Clause 7 talks about the public good defence. We believe that it may, as a result of being very vague, be very difficult to catch child pornographers, while at the same time there are concerns that we will be endangering the rights of artists from pursuing legitimate artistic expression or researchers and health workers from dealing with the effects of child abuse and sexual trauma.

We believe that the defence of the public good, as has been put forward in the bill, would transfer too much power and discretion to the courts. For example, it may take years of litigation and jurisprudence for the courts to decide exactly how to apply this defence of the public good in relation to child porn laws. I do not think that is something anyone wants to see.

The scope of the public good is ironically both, on the one hand, too broad and, on the other hand, too narrow. In fact, what we need to be doing in the bill is clarifying it to ensure that the most essential point is that the police will be able to make sound decisions in their investigations of a suspected child pornographer to protect children. Second, that artists who are legitimately engaging in artistic expression will not be prosecuted because of that legitimate activity.

We realize that these are difficult issues but surely our role here as parliamentarians in examining the bill is to make sure the clarification on these issues is very clear and that it does not become a subject of ongoing and endless debate in the court system.

In speaking to the amendment today and urging the deletion of clause 7, we believe that clarifying the definition of the public good is something that has not yet been resolved or taken place. It needs to happen here in Parliament.

We do need to be sending a clear message to the courts on how we want the legislation to be implemented and approached. The way it stands now is that I think there is still ambiguity.

We have presented this amendment because we believe the bill is just not good enough. We want to see a good job done on the bill. A tremendous amount of effort went into the bill and its goal is to protect children from sexual exploitation. We want to do it in a way that we are clearly delineating artistic merit. We believe that the provision in the bill as it stands now is simply not adequate to do that.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Bélair)]

There is one motion in amendment standing on the Notice Paper for the report stage of Bill C-20.

Motion No. 1 will be debated and voted upon.

[Richard Marceau, Bloc, Charlesbourg—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thought we were debating Bill C-46, not Bill C-20 on child pornography. Consequently, the pace of this debate is a bit surprising. I also marvel at my previous colleague's definition of brief remarks. If he was being brief, I would not want to hear him give a longer speech.

That said, I rise to speak on Bill C-46 with some disappointment as we had supported this bill at second reading and I had spoken in support of it some time ago.

At the time, I expressed the wish, as I did again in committee, that the government would consider possible amendments, including one on a matter I will address later. Unfortunately, the government has been inflexible, perhaps in the belief that it is the keeper of absolute truth and the ruler by divine right. No matter what the reason, the government's rigidity, inflexibility and closed-mindedness mean that today I invite my Bloc colleagues to vote against Bill C-46, which contains, however, numerous important provisions and clauses that we support.

There is, however, one basic provision in this bill which we in the Bloc Quebecois cannot support and on which we cannot agree with the government. It is the reason we will be voting against Bill C-46.

I felt it was important to make this clear right from the start. Given the inflexibility of the government, I will explain why our position has changed.

Bill C-46, which we have before us today, amends the Criminal Code and creates two new offences: prohibited insider trading and threatening or retaliating against employees for disclosing unlawful conduct. It increases the maximum penalties and codifiesaggravating and non-mitigating sentencing factors for fraud and certainrelated offences and provides for concurrent jurisdiction for theAttorney General of Canada to prosecute those offences.

Bill C-46 also creates a new procedural mechanism by which persons will be required to produce documents, data or information in specific circumstances.

Let us place all of this in context. The recent financial scandals in the United States, the Enron affair for instance, have made us all aware of the fragility of our financial system and, unfortunately, of how dependent we are on it.

Although we may think at first that only major investors are affected by a financial crisis, that is not the case. The biggest players on the stock market, in fact, are the pension funds. If a pension fund suffers major losses, therefore, the little investors are the ones who can end up losing their life's savings and watching their retirement plans go up in smoke. That is what is so worrisome.

As well, according to the financial analysts, there has been a trend recently for retirement trust funds to go more for stocks than for fixed income securities. A financial crisis in Canada would have a direct impact on the retirement income of millions of households. Those households are the ones we, as parliamentarians elected to represent the population, have a duty to protect.

Fortunately—and we do not yet know the reason for it—Canadian stock markets have so far been relatively free of wrongdoing, with the exception of Nortel and CINAR. I raised the latter issue again today in oral question period.

We can feel that something is not clear in this CINAR affair, and the Bloc Quebecois is determined to uncover what may be hidden, particularly what may lie behind the CINAR affair.

It is the opinion of the Bloc Quebecois that, while several of the experts we consulted believe that our securities regulatory systems are much more comprehensive than the ones the U.S. had before the financial crisis I referred to earlier, it is important to send the clear message that financial wrongdoing is a serious crime that will not be tolerated in our society.

This is what prompted my hon. colleague from Joliette and myself, in the fall of 2002—more than one year ago—to call for major amendments to the Criminal Code of Canada to provide the appropriate authorities with better tools to fight financial crimes.

Let us take a brief look at these proposed changes to the Criminal Code I put forward back in the fall of 2002. In our press briefing, we proposed adding a section that would make insider trading a criminal offence, in order to send a clear message to company directors that the use of confidential information obtained in the performance of their duties for the purpose of making profits or avoiding losses would not be tolerated. The fact is that making profits or avoiding losses in this manner impacts negatively on other investors who do not have access to the same privileged information.

This provision would have been added after section 382 of the Criminal Code. It would have created an offence of insider trading, which would have carried a maximum sentence of ten years' imprisonment. As we can see, the government accepted our suggestion and included a new offence of insider trading in the bill.

The Bloc Quebecois also proposed that a new offence be created for securities fraud. This offence was patterned on the measure adopted in the United States. We say so freely and without fear. It would carry a ten-year prison sentence and prohibit fraud when selling or buying securities

We had also proposed two amendments to section 397 of the Criminal Code. This section clearly stipulates that fraud is committed by someone who:

(a) destroys, mutilates, alters, falsifies or makes a false entry in, or

(b) omits a material particular from, or alters a material particular in,a book, paper, writing, valuable security or document.

In our opinion, this provision could have applied to falsified financial statements.

Furthermore, subsection 2 of this section makes it a specific offence if documents are falsified with the intent to defraud the creditors.

Currently, both offences carry a five-year prison term. We felt that this sentence was not dissuasive enough. Consequently, we proposed increasing the maximum term of imprisonment to ten years.

Finally, we proposed adding a third subsection to section 397 of the Criminal Code to specifically target the falsification of financial documents with the intent to defraud shareholders. We believe that shareholders are a more vulnerable category since—unlike the majority of creditors—their investments are not guaranteed. Therefore, we do not see why it is an offence to defraud creditors and not shareholders.

In committee, we suggested very specific amendments incorporating the elements that I just listed. Unfortunately, although as always, the Bloc Quebecois put forward these amendments, changes and proposals in a constructive manner, the government rejected them.

I would like to make a small digression to mention, or rather to deplore, the lack of respect the government has shown lately to the members of this House, particularly to those who sit on the Standing Committee on Justice.

Bill after bill comes before us. It is top speed and full steam ahead on the bill to decriminalize marijuana. The committee is also studying soliciting and prostitution. The government, when it sets the schedule for committees or the House, does not pay any attention to the fact that for many of us it is extremely difficult to be here in the House to debate government bills, and at the same time, to sit on committees. Even though, every Christmas, when asked what I want most, I always say I would like the gift of ubiquity, no one ever gives it to me.

So, while we were debating a government bill here in the House and I was scheduled to speak on behalf of my political party, the Standing Committee on Justice was meeting at the same time, and going about its business, despite the fact that several members of that committee were in the House. I could not defend the amendments I had put forward.

I think that is quite deplorable from a government that, probably sensing the end of its regime approaching, wants to get all its bills passed as quickly as possible, and therefore the work is not done well, because the members who follow the issues—on both sides of the House, in fact, because my Liberal colleagues are in the same situation—cannot contribute as much as they should to improving the legislation before them.

The government shows little consideration for its own legislation, its own bills, as seen in the fact that it does not give the members the time they need to properly examine the bills before them, and this will count against it.

When we are talking about such essential things as Bill C-46, commonly called the Westray bill, which is now before the House, or Bill C-20, the child pornography bill, or Bill C-36 on decriminalizing marijuana, in my opinion it is essential to proceed at a pace that allows the members to be here in the House and in committee at the proper times, but also to digest, assimilate, and understand the many suggestions made by the witnesses who come before us.

In fact, why spend thousands of dollars calling witnesses to appear and why ask them to come before the committee to explain their point of view and suggest amendments and improvements if the members opposite cannot digest the information provided.

All this to say that the constructive, intelligent, consistent and non-partisan amendments I moved in committee should have been moved by a member from the other side of the House. I am not questioning the hon. member's competency. I am in no way accusing him of bad faith. However, the fact remains that the amendments could not be moved, debated and defended by the member who sponsored them.

That concludes this essential digression to explain the current environment in which the members are working. Now I want to get back to Bill C-46 itself.

The Criminal Code would create a new offence prohibiting insider trading, with a maximum ten-year prison sentence.

Although insider trading is currently prohibited under provincial legislation regulating the sale of securities within Canada and under the Canada Business Corporations Act, this new offence under the Criminal Code will apply for cases requiring harsher sentencing.

Since this new offence was directly inspired by the proposal my hon. colleague from Joliette and I made over a year ago, we are pleased to see its inclusion in Bill C-46.

Employees who disclose to or assist law enforcement officers investigating capital markets fraud also need protection against intimidation. These employees often have a key role to play in disclosing scandals in companies, but they may be intimidated or threatened, including through measures against their job or their livelihood.

Creation of a new offence of threat or retaliation relating to employment would encourage people with inside information to co-operate with law enforcement officials and would punish those threatening or making use of reprisals. This offence would be punishable with up to five years' imprisonment. The Bloc Quebecois is in favour of this provision.

To strengthen penalties in cases of fraud on financial markets, and to make sure that the punishment fits the crime, the proposed reforms would increase maximum sentences for existing fraud offences, and would establish aggravating circumstances, which the courts should take into consideration in sentencing.

Maximum prison sentences would rise from 10 to 14 years for the present fraud offences under the Criminal Code, and for those affecting the public market. Maximum sentences for market manipulation offences would increase from 5 to 10 years.

The proposed reforms would also include a list of specific aggravating circumstances allowing the courts to impose stiffer sentences for the most serious offences. Factors such as the extent of the economic impact or any negative impact on investor confidence or market stability could lead to increased sentences. Moreover, a person's reputation and standing in the community or work environment, which have always been considered mitigating factors that can reduce penalties, could not apply in such a case. Those guilty of serious market wrongdoing are often able to get away with their crimes precisely because of these factors.

We feel these are interesting proposals, but we regret that the government did not consider our suggestions with respect to increasing the sentences under section 397 of the Criminal Code.

I will conclude by explaining why we are against Bill C-46: the involvement of federal prosecutors. As members know, financial market regulation comes under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the other provinces, as does the administration of justice. Under Bill C-46, the Attorney General of Canada would have concurrent jurisdiction with the provinces and the territories to prosecute certain criminal fraud cases, including the proposed new offence of illegal insider trading.

Federal involvement in this area would supposedly be limited to cases that threaten the national interest in the integrity of capital markets. According to information released by the federal government, the Government of Canada will collaborate—that is always a key word with the Liberals, but we know what it means—with the provinces to ensure proper and efficient concurrent jurisdiction by establishing prosecution protocols.

We absolutely cannot support these new provisions. They all seem to confirm the federal government's desire to infringe upon yet another area of Quebec and provincial jurisdiction, the securities market.

In committee, I proposed an amendment to the bill that was constructive and would deny federal prosecutors the right to prosecute in these cases. The government rejected it.

Knowing the federal government's penchant for interfering in the regulation of securities markets, we are opposed to Bill C-46, because the Bloc Quebecois would never consent to the federal government's meddling, however minimally, in provincial jurisdictions.

Because of the government's inflexibility and desire to intrude in the jurisdictions of Quebec and the provinces, the Bloc Quebecois is voting against Bill C-46.

[Myron Thompson, Canadian Alliance, Wild Rose, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's speech. I also appreciate his question about the legislation, which has been asked several times: will it achieve its intent? That is a question we have to ask ourselves every time any kind of legislation comes forward. Will it achieve the intent? Like Bill C-46, will it achieve the intent with whistleblowers? Will it achieve the intent with corporate criminals?

Will we clean up our own house when we deal with corrupt activities within our government? We cannot send corporate vice-executives who are guilty of fraud, or whatever the corporate crime might be, to other parts of Europe to be ambassadors. We just cannot continue down that path. That achieves nothing.

Nothing is achieved when Liberals come up with a bill like Bill C-20, but they will not incorporate a clause in it that eliminates all defences that exploit children, like the illegal use of pornography. The minister continually wants to talk about how the doctors have it, psychologists have it and the police have it in their possession, that it is for a good intent, for the public good, and that we need to have that defence in there. That is not what we are talking about. We are talking about defending children.

I realize the justice minister is a lawyer. I sometimes get the impression that the Liberals want to create more court cases to keep all the lawyers busy. I cannot imagine where they are coming from on all this, but it is just one example after another, as the member mentioned in his speech. He brought up several different issues.

Why can we not be specific about what we want to achieve, so there is no question about the intent?

The intent about child pornography was made here last Tuesday when 100% of the members who were present voted for the motion that favoured developing legislation, which would say that there would be no defence for child pornography when it exploited children, for possession, distribution, or anything. I do not have trouble understanding that. I understand that to mean exactly what it says, and that is the kind of legislation for which we are looking.

Would the member comment on why the minister and the government cannot be more specific and put it in words where most people would understand our intentions loud and clear? We will protect our children. We will protect our corporations. We will protect our taxpayers. We will do the right thing by getting it done without all this legislation that never clearly indicates whether the intent will be met.

Child Pornography

[Myron Thompson, Canadian Alliance, Wild Rose, AB]

Mr. Speaker, last week the House totally agreed that all defences for child pornography that exploit children must be eliminated. The pride of the justice minister will not allow him to amend Bill C-20 to incorporate this change.

Why will the minister not swallow his pride, do the democratic thing and ban all defences for child pornography?

[Larry Spencer, Canadian Alliance, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Mr. Speaker, there are plenty of concerns. Bill C-20 fails to legislate stronger sentences for convicted child pornographers. Maximum sentences are rarely used. What is needed is mandatory prison sentencing. The justice minister fails to use even the most basic of deterrents for predatory pornographers. Child pornography is child abuse.

Will the minister act to protect children by committing to some level of mandatory prison sentencing for convicted child pornographers?

[Paul MacKlin, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-20 is clearly meant to deal with the problem of dealing with child pornography within our society and clearly it does so. It has addressed the Sharpe case and has brought forward a defence that is clear and well defined. It was placed before the House yesterday, so hopefully in the final debate the member will bring forward any concerns he has as the bill goes forward.

[Larry Spencer, Canadian Alliance, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-20 fails to alleviate the burden on those who prosecute child pornographers for their perverted crimes against children. Investigators must itemize and document every pornographic image seized, often numbering in the tens of thousands, before being able to prosecute.

Will the justice minister amend the rules of disclosure so that police will not have to examine every single image before prosecuting?

Business of the House

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Minister of State and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, this afternoon we will return to consideration of Bill C-32, the Criminal Code amendments, followed by Bill C-54. If we get through this, we will proceed to consideration of Bills C-19 and C-6, two bills on first nations. If we have time, we will also look at Bill C-51.

If that is a bit too ambitious, the first item for consideration tomorrow will be Bill C-6, the specific claims legislation. After oral question period, we will come back to Bill C-54, which we debated this morning, concerning fiscal arrangements. If there is time, this will be followed by Bill C-46, the market fraud bill, and Bills C-19, on first nations, and S-13, concerning the Statistics Act.

Next week, we will continue to consider bills that have not been completed, beginning on Monday with Bill C-46, on financial institutions. We will add to that list Bill C-23, the sexual offenders legislation.

By mid-week, we hope to be in a position to consider Bill C-52, the radio communications bill, and Bill C-20, the child protection legislation, as mentioned by the Minister of Justice during oral question period.

Justice

[Martin Cauchon, Liberal, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, with regard to the question of the age of consent, the hon. member knows very well that around the table of the federal-provincial meeting there was no consensus.

The government has created a new offence of exploitation that will offer much better protection because the protection will be for all young Canadians between the ages of 14 and 18. If the opposition members wants to offer good protection to young Canadians, they should be supporting the government in the passing of Bill C-20. What they are doing is a disgrace.

Committees of the House

[Andy Scott, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the eighth report of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.

Pursuant to its order of reference of Tuesday, May 13, your committee has considered Bill C-33, an act to implement treaties and administrative arrangements on the international transfers of persons found guilty of criminal offences, and has agreed to report it with one amendment.

I have also the honour to present, in both official languages, the ninth report of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.

Pursuant to its order of reference of Tuesday, April 1, your committee has considered Bill C-20, an act to amend the Criminal Code (protection of children and other vulnerable persons) and the Canada Evidence Act, and has agreed to report it with amendments.

If I may, I would like to thank the members of the committee and the staff. This is our fifth piece of legislation in the last two weeks. It is very important legislation and everyone has done very good work. I must say, as the chair, that I appreciated it.

Child Pornography

[Gerry Ritz, Canadian Alliance, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the minister must have inhaled because he is sure blowing smoke.

The Canadian Police Association, the Toronto Police Service, Project Guardian, the Office for Victims of Crime, the Canadian Resource Centre for Victims of Crime and Beyond Borders have all said that Bill C-20 will be ineffective in stamping out child pornography.

Why will the minister not commit to making the amendments these groups are putting forward and make the commitment today that he will withdraw all of these goofy defences?

[Martin Cauchon, Liberal, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, as we said yesterday and I have said many times, there is no place in Canada for those involved in such an offence, nor anywhere else in the world.

The hon. member knows very well that the legislation we have in place is one of the best in the world. Bill C-20 is before the justice committee at the present time. There are good measures to answer the Sharpe decision in order to increase the protection of our children.

I count on the support of the opposition to ensure that we pass that bill as soon as possible.

[Gerry Ritz, Canadian Alliance, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians continue to speak loud and clear. They want all and any of these so called liberal defences for child pornography eliminated.

Will the justice minister commit today to amending Bill C-20 to reflect the will of the people?

Supply

[Paul Forseth, Canadian Alliance, New Westminster—Coquitlam—Burnaby, BC]

Madam Speaker, I wonder if the member could comment on the recurring theme that we have heard today.

We heard of all the technical merits of getting on with the job and the limits of Bill C-20. There seems to be something deeper here about the ability of the Liberal government to manage social control legislation and the deeper philosophical malaise and almost fear to tread into that kind of moral code.

The Criminal Code itself is a grand piece of work which in essence is moral legislation. We are legislating morality when we apply the Criminal Code. The Liberal ideology seems to fall short when we get into this kind of social policy. It seems to be the fad in the political air that we are going to deal with the democratic deficit but Liberals seem to go all over the map when we try to deal with the ethical deficit. We heard that today in question period for example.

Could the member comment on the deeper philosophical inadequacy of Liberal ideology that is reflected time and again when it comes to this kind of social policy and social standards?