Bill C-51 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Department of Justice Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act

This enactment amends the Criminal Code to amend, remove or repeal passages and provisions that have been ruled unconstitutional or that raise risks with regard to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, as well as passages and provisions that are obsolete, redundant or that no longer have a place in criminal law. It also modifies certain provisions of the Code relating to sexual assault in order to clarify their application and to provide a procedure applicable to the admissibility and use of a complainant’s record when in the possession of the accused.
This enactment also amends the Department of Justice Act to require that the Minister of Justice cause to be tabled, for every government Bill introduced in either House of Parliament, a statement of the Bill’s potential effects on the rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Finally, it makes consequential amendments to the Criminal Records Act.

Bill C-49—Time Allocation Motion

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Durham, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we are very proud of the hon. minister's service in Parliament and his service in space, but it is time for him to come back down to Earth. He was deriding the opposition for not bringing substantive debate to this place. The government, in almost two years, has passed only 19 bills. That is it. It has had over 30 time allocation motions limiting debate on a very small record.

In the last few weeks, the Liberals are limiting time on a substantive bill, but they put forward motions on Paris and had a speech by the Minister of Foreign Affairs that really did not amount to anything. They also have Bill C-51 and Bill C-39, which are not substantive legislation either.

I agree with the minister that there are some serious issues addressed in the bill. He is limiting debate on the serious issues affecting Canadians, affecting rail safety, and affecting our transportation system, while having nothing before Parliament to justify limiting debate in the House. I would like to ask the member why they have only passed a small number of bills, and then when bills have an important element, like this one, they are not allowing debate in the chamber.

Business of the House

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Waterloo, ON]

Mr. Speaker, tomorrow the House will debate Bill C-49, on transportation modernization, at second reading.

On Monday we will debate our changes to the Standing Orders. Following that debate, we will resume second reading debate on Bill C-51.

Tuesday the House will debate Bill S-3, on Indian registration, at report stage and third reading.

Following that debate, we hope to make progress on the following bills: Bill S-2, the bill respecting motor vehicle recalls, at second reading; Bill C-17, respecting the environmental assessment process in Yukon, at second reading; Bill C-25, on encouraging gender parity on the boards of federally regulated organizations; Bill C-36, the bill to give Statistics Canada greater independence; Bill C-48, the bill to impose a moratorium on oil tankers off the B.C. coast; and Bill C-34, the bill to reinstate sensible conditions for public service employment.

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister of Small Business and Tourism]

Mr. Speaker, this afternoon we will resume second reading debate on Bill C-51, to remove the outdated provisions from the law books.

Tomorrow the House will be—

Public Safety

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the only action we have seen from these Liberals on Bill C-51 is when they supported the Conservative bill in the last Parliament. It is not very reassuring when they decide to table legislation in the dying days of a sitting of Parliament. It gets worse. We are also looking at warrantless access to the private information of Canadian Internet users, something the Supreme Court has judged is unconstitutional. When we see the minister's office saying that it is “developing proposals for what legislation could look like”, that is concerning.

Could the minister assure the House that we are not going to be giving police and spy agencies the powers to take Canadians' private Internet information?

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Thank you very much. I'll be sharing my time with Ms. Ludwig.

Thank you, all of you, for the incredible work you're doing. Know that one reason we're doing this study is that we know that many of the women you're working with have been made invisible. Our purpose is to make sure that they become visible and that we are able to find solutions. We know that there is an intersection between violence and economic security and that it becomes a cycle in terms of child care, discrimination, and the judicial system.

One thing that our government announced a few months ago was an additional $90 million in infrastructure funding for building and refurbishing transitional shelters for domestic violence survivors. Just this week we signed a multilateral framework with the provinces on child care, with $7.5 billion to be provided over the next 11 years.

In fact, in addition to Bill C-51 that was just tabled by the government, this committee is going to reduce barriers to the judicial process for women who have faced violence, including by redefining consent. Also, just this week Minister Monsef announced $18 million for a call for proposals—the largest ever call for proposals—for locally based organizations that are finding solutions.

I would like each of you to comment on how that will make an impact and if there are priority areas that we should also be focusing on.

Criminal Code

[Jody Wilson-Raybould, Liberal, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-51, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Department of Justice Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to table at this time, in both official languages, a charter statement related to the bill just tabled, an act to amend the Criminal Code and the Department of Justice Act and to make consequential amendments to another act.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Minister, thanks for being here.

I want to quote what the Prime Minister said when we were debating Bill C-51:

An oversight body looks on a continual basis at what is taking place inside an intelligence service and has the mandate to evaluate and guide current actions in “real time.” That is crucial and must be amended, if we are giving CSIS the new powers proposed in Bill C-51.

That's not necessarily what this committee is doing, but I want to go back to Mr. Clement's point about the information that's available, because, Minister Goodale, you quoted Craig Forcese. Professors Atkey, Forcese, and Roach said in The Globe and Mail that they were very concerned about the Prime Minister's ability to redact reports, but also about how much information is shared.

You and Mr. Clement had an exchange over law enforcement investigations, but there is also defence intelligence and special operational information which, as defined by the law, is very broad and leads to a web of instances whereby you basically find yourself in a situation where anything that can even be inferred from the information being given to the committee could be considered off limits to the committee.

Without that information, how can the committee be expected to do its job? That's the first part of the question. Second, if we have a concrete amendment for you to allow that information to be shared, would you accept that?

[Bernice Murray, As an Individual]

I want to say a couple of things.

In terms of the security review, the government is presenting security as a question of balance between rights and security. I just want to make the point that, in terms of a starting point, you will not deal with people's security if you don't guarantee their rights. It's not a question of balance. It's a question of defending the rights of all of us. Also, it's more than just civil rights. It's a question of economic, political, and social rights. I think it's extremely important to start from that point of view. These rights are things that belong to people because, by their being, the fact is that they collectively belong to us and so on. That's the starting point for any kind of consideration.

I have a concern that the green paper and various other documents being used in the consultations divert the whole discussion of security rights into a discussion of violent extremism, and then all the measures become acceptable because that's to combat these things, rather than dealing with the very important question. I think that even this question of the consultations particularly.... I'm not sure that you're wrapping up on December 1 but some of them are. In terms of the fact that you're trying to have a discussion on security and rights in this country on the basis of two months or whatever, and one session in Toronto, it's not going to be that kind of comprehensiveness that's required.

Specifically, I'm here to raise the question of the Anti-terrorism Act, 2015, which everybody refers to as Bill C-51. While I'm saying that these consultations are not serious in the sense of “extensive”, I would say that the discussion and public consultation that took place on Bill C-51—no thanks to the government of the day—was extremely broad and extremely deep. Somebody else has already mentioned it, but there were actions all across the country. There were broad discussions. There were town halls. There were days of action. There were 311,000 signatures on a petition to repeal the bill.

I think it should be brought before you that the question of this bill has been discussed, and the Canadian people have given their verdict on it. That verdict is that they want it repealed.

On the whole question of the Harper government, one of the issues.... I ran as a candidate in the election and did door-to-door work right from January 2015 on. One of the very big concerns of people across the area of the city I was doing work in was Bill C-51, and it was that it should be repealed. There is definitely no mandate that can be alluded to by any party to say that the bill was something they should hold on to. I don't think it's reformable and so on.

I also want to point out that what is now the governing party pointed out that they would repeal the problematic aspects of the bill. I would just like to point out that they're all problematic. The bill itself should be repealed.