Bill C-75 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Criminal Code, the Youth Criminal Justice Act and other Acts and to make consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Criminal Code to, among other things,
(a) modernize and clarify interim release provisions to simplify the forms of release that may be imposed on an accused, incorporate a principle of restraint and require that particular attention be given to the circumstances of Aboriginal accused and accused from vulnerable populations when making interim release decisions, and provide more onerous interim release requirements for offences involving violence against an intimate partner;
(b) provide for a judicial referral hearing to deal with administration of justice offences involving a failure to comply with conditions of release or failure to appear as required;
(c) abolish peremptory challenges of jurors, modify the process of challenging a juror for cause so that a judge makes the determination of whether a ground of challenge is true, and allow a judge to direct that a juror stand by for reasons of maintaining public confidence in the administration of justice;
(d) increase the maximum term of imprisonment for repeat offences involving intimate partner violence and provide that abuse of an intimate partner is an aggravating factor on sentencing;
(e) restrict the availability of a preliminary inquiry to offences punishable by imprisonment for a term of 14 years or more and strengthen the justice’s powers to limit the issues explored and witnesses to be heard at the inquiry;
(f) hybridize most indictable offences punishable by a maximum penalty of 10 years or less, increase the default maximum penalty to two years less a day of imprisonment for summary conviction offences and extend the limitation period for summary conviction offences to 12 months;
(g) remove the requirement for judicial endorsement for the execution of certain out-of-province warrants and authorizations, expand judicial case management powers, allow receiving routine police evidence in writing, consolidate provisions relating to the powers of the Attorney General and allow increased use of technology to facilitate remote attendance by any person in a proceeding;
(h) re-enact the victim surcharge regime and provide the court with the discretion to waive a victim surcharge if the court is satisfied that the victim surcharge would cause the offender undue hardship or would be disproportionate to the gravity of the offence or the degree of responsibility of the offender; and
(i) remove passages and repeal provisions that have been ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court of Canada, repeal section 159 of the Act and provide that no person shall be convicted of any historical offence of a sexual nature unless the act that constitutes the offence would constitute an offence under the Criminal Code if it were committed on the day on which the charge was laid.
The enactment also amends the Youth Criminal Justice Act in order to reduce delays within the youth criminal justice system and enhance the effectiveness of that system with respect to administration of justice offences. For those purposes, the enactment amends that Act to, among other things,
(a) set out principles intended to encourage the use of extrajudicial measures and judicial reviews as alternatives to the laying of charges for administration of justice offences;
(b) set out requirements for imposing conditions on a young person’s release order or as part of a sentence;
(c) limit the circumstances in which a custodial sentence may be imposed for an administration of justice offence;
(d) remove the requirement for the Attorney General to determine whether to seek an adult sentence in certain circumstances; and
(e) remove the power of a youth justice court to make an order to lift the ban on publication in the case of a young person who receives a youth sentence for a violent offence, as well as the requirement to determine whether to make such an order.
Finally, the enactment amends among other Acts An Act to amend the Criminal Code (exploitation and trafficking in persons) so that certain sections of that Act can come into force on different days and also makes consequential amendments to other Acts.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

This deals with the sections that relate to the threshold for bail conditions and release orders. This amendment would increase that threshold for bail conditions and release order from what the judge or justice considers to be “desirable” to what they consider “necessary”.

Again, this is to bring this section of Bill C-75 more closely aligned with the Supreme Court of Canada's decision in R. v. Antic, in which the Supreme Court has said that they should impose terms of release only “to the extent that they are necessary”.

This will provide a clearer directive, with the principle of imposing the least onerous conditions of bail to achieving the purposes of justice.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Thank you.

This is just the next line down from where my last one was, on the proposed subsection 501(3). This is again looking at increasing the threshold for a bail condition from any amount of risk to public safety to a substantial likelihood of endangering public safety.

Again, this is consistent with a Supreme Court decision. Although it was some time back, we still remember the case of Morales making the Criminal Code compliant with the charter for the accused's right to a reasonable bail. In that decision they said bail is denied “only for those who pose a ‘substantial likelihood’ of committing an offence”.

This brings this section of Bill C-75 into compliance with the Supreme Court of Canada's decision in R. v. Morales.

[Murray Rankin, NDP, Victoria, BC]

There's a line item, and the purpose of NDP-4 is to remove certain parts of Bill C-75, lines 27 to 29 on page 70, which deal with abstaining from going to any specific place or entering any geographic area, and replacing it with:

ing any geographic area, which condition must be:

(i) delimited reasonably, having regard to the circumstances of the accused, including if the accused is an Aboriginal person or belongs to a vulnerable population, and

(ii) reasonably necessary to ensure the safety and security of any person referred to in paragraph (d), except in accordance with any specified conditions;

This amendment, Chair, would ensure that the geographic limitations imposed on an individual, pertaining to an undertaking, are “delimited reasonably” and have ”regard to the circumstances of the the accused,” as I said, for aboriginal persons and vulnerable populations. It would ensure that the limitations are reasonably necessary to ensure the safety of the public, victims or witnesses.

I assume that members will remember the testimony she gave about how, in Montreal, these conditions were used in an absolutely ridiculous fashion. This would be to confine them more carefully. She said that the conditions are subject to considerable abuses and are widely used against marginalized individuals to banish them from inner cities' public spaces, where they have access to essential health and social services like food banks, shelters, and harm reduction services. In her judgment, the language needs to be stronger, to send a clear message to the police that they must restrict it to what is necessary to protect the safety of victims and witnesses.

I think the evidence she gave was overwhelming, to the effect that this has been abused to date. It results in ridiculous circumstances. This language would, I think, effectively correct those deficiencies.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Did I hear you correctly that subsection 498(1.1) is not amended in Bill C-75 at all?

[Shannon Davis-Ermuth]

Thank you.

Subsection 498(1.1) of the Criminal Code, which would be amended by NDP-2, is in fact not amended currently by Bill C-75.

What is contained in subsection 498(1.1) are the grounds for which police can detain the accused. Bill C-75 actually does not amend the grounds of detention of either police or the courts. It maintains the existing case law and structure of the bail regime in Canada.

The principle of restraint does look to the grounds of detention and in fact refers to the grounds of detention, but it doesn't modify them. The effect of NDP-2 would be to depart from the existing bail regime and could have unintended operational impacts on the reasons for which police currently detain the accused.

Remembering that this decision is made hundreds of times daily throughout Canada, it could have very big operational impacts in terms of not allowing police to detain for reasons that it is currently done.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Chair, again this is an amendment dealing with reclassification in Bill C-75. It seeks to maintain the offence of arson by negligence as a solely indictable offence.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Yes. This is another amendment on reclassification. Bill C-75 would make the serious indictable offence of arson for a fraudulent purpose a hybrid offence. It's very difficult to understand why such a serious offence would be treated as a hybrid offence, and this amendment would keep it as solely indictable.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This amendment is in relation to a reclassification under Bill C-75. It would seek to maintain the offence of a threat against internationally protected persons as a solely indictable offence.

[The Chair, Liberal, Anthony Housefather]

Hello, colleagues. Thank you very much for your patience everyone.

We will reconvene at this point. Given the room that we're in, we probably need to put in the earpieces. It's hard to hear in here.

(On clause 162)

We are at clause 162, as we resume our study of Bill C-75, and we're at CPC-101.

Mr. Cooper.

Criminal Code

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise today to speak to Bill C-84. I would first like to mention that I will be sharing my time with the member for Markham—Unionville.

Bill C-84 seems to be another example of the government striking a valiant attempt to make a change, yet it is an incomplete attempt, much like most of the legislation we have seen coming forward from the government. Some of these previous shortcomings include Bill C-45, the cannabis bill, which just came into effect a few days ago. Even though that legislation was debated in the House and passed roughly a year ago, there still remain multiple enforcement agencies, municipalities, regional districts and first nations that agree it simply was not complete or ready. It did not give the provinces or municipalities time to prepare.

After that was Bill C-46, the bill that dealt with impaired driving, which was tied to Bill C-45. We have now heard that because of the way Bill C-46 was drafted, there is no proof that the systems in place and the science and technology around identifying impairment, which was fairly standardized when it came to alcohol, are going to be effective when it comes to drugs. Not only do we have another piece of flawed legislation out there, but we have communities and enforcement agencies trying to scramble to figure out how to deal with that.

The next piece of legislation I am familiar with is Bill C-71, the government's firearms legislation, which, in listening to its rhetoric, is aimed at reducing gun violence, gangs and so on. However, the bill does not mention gangs or gun violence at any point in time. All it talks about is registering firearms and making things worse for law-abiding firearms owners.

The most current is probably Bill C-75, an act to amend the Criminal Code. That is a bill the government introduced to bring modernization to the Criminal Code. That bill has been bantered back and forth many times, but it is now at committee stage. My colleague from St. Albert—Edmonton is currently on the committee studying that bill, and members are looking at stacks and stacks of amendments to another government bill. I experienced the same thing when I sat in on the discussion on Bill C-69, when I happened to be substituting on that committee. I believe there were 600 amendments to that government bill. The bill was 300 pages long, and I believe 300 or 350 of those amendments came from the government side.

I continuously see the government putting forward draft legislation for debate in this House that it has not thought through or consulted on properly, and it just ends up being hashed about at committee. We have seen the Senate return a number of bills to this House with amendments. Worst of all, we see communities, enforcement agencies and the public trying to figure out how they are going to manage or work around this poorly drafted legislation from the government.

Turning back to Bill C-84, an act to amend the Criminal Code with respect to bestiality and animal fighting, I praise the government for bringing forward legislation to deal with this. I agree we need to do what we can, as legislators, to bring in legislation to protect people, protect the innocent and protect animals from the abuses we have seen. Also, to protect them from the ways criminals have been able to skirt the laws through definitions, different interpretations in the courts and so on. On that point, I will give the government credit for at least attempting to do something right.

When I look at this bill, I also see where it comes up short in some cases. I compare it to an insurance policy. I think everyone here has had an insurance policy and has taken a close look at it. Some have possibly made a claim through that insurance policy only to find out that the claim is denied because in the fine print something was excluded.

We may get a chance to amend this bill in committee. Even though it is a short bill and one would not think it needs much amendment, I do not believe it is perfect and I will be talking to committee members about possible amendments going forward.

When I see that the bill includes a phrase that basically bans the fighting or baiting of animals or birds, I question whether that is going to impact our provincial hunting regulations. I have not yet been able to have full discussion with anyone to determine this. In some provinces, it is completely legal and within ethical standards to plant crops to attract wildlife, such as deer and elk, to certain areas for hunting purposes. Those are perfectly accepted standards that continue to this day. In fact, many of those standards actually improve the chances of correct and humane harvest of those animals because they are at a baiting station.

That is why I question the wording in this bill. I will be following through further on this to make sure that this bill, like many other bills the government has put forward, is not flawed after it gets through committee. I want to make sure we are protected in those ways.

Another thing that troubles me with this bill is why it took the government almost a year to introduce its own bill that is identical in most ways to a bill introduced by a member from our side of the House, the member for Calgary Nose Hill. Her bill was introduced in December 2017, and yet the government sat on it and did not move it forward for debate. The government could have had this process done by now and given credit where credit was due, to the person who brought the issue forward.

It seems to be a continuous mantra of the government to not do anything until it is caught not doing anything. We see it when we have witnesses appear at committee to give testimony. We see it in the Auditor General reports. It just seems to be a continuing theme.

In fact, I had the same experience myself. I introduced a private member's bill a couple of years ago to recognize volunteers in search and rescue situations. Just a few weeks later the government announced that it was going to create service medals for search and rescue volunteers. Again, it was not doing anything until it got caught not doing anything.

That is the case here. It is disappointing that the government has to be shown the way forward by members on our side. We see this quite often with the opposition day motions we bring forward. In fact, we had another one just last week. We put forward an opposition day motion that the Liberals could have easily acted on much sooner, but we had to force their hand by forcing the argument and putting it to them to make them step up to the plate. It is just another case of, as I said, not doing anything until they are caught not doing anything. Then they get caught in a bind and have to put out something that is not complete, not well-thought-out and not well-processed.

With that, I am finished my comments. I know I will be receiving questions on this.

Public Safety

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition on Bill C-75, a bill which proposes to lighten the sentences for some very serious crimes like forceable confinement of a minor, forced child marriage, impaired driving and advocating genocide.

The petitioners call upon the Prime Minister to defend the safety and security of all Canadians by withdrawing Bill C-75.

Justice

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is clear that the Liberal government is soft on crime and way too focused on coddling criminals instead of supporting victims and ensuring the safety of Canadians.

In the last month, we have seen the Liberals proactively welcome convicted terrorists back to Canada, transfer Tori Stafford's murderer into a healing lodge where kids are present, punish law-abiding gun owners while making life easier for terrorists, gangsters and criminals and provide generous veteran's benefits to a cop killer who never served a day of his life in the military.

Now it is doubling down with Bill C-75, a deeply-flawed omnibus justice bill that reduces the penalties for serious crimes like human trafficking, utilizing date rape drugs and impaired driving causing bodily harm. This is just further proof that the Liberals are making Canadians less safe and cannot be trusted to look after the interests of victims.

Why are the Liberals always on the wrong side when it comes to criminal justice?

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Mr. Chair, this offence, which Bill C-75 would reclassify, relates to a false return by a public officer. We think this is a serious offence and it should be maintained as an indictable offence.

I'd ask for a recorded vote on this one.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

This is a reclassification amendment. The offence at issue relates to anyone who, with intent to defraud, destroys or mutilates books or documents. Bill C-75 would make that offence a hybrid offence. It's currently an indictable offence. We think it should stay that way.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

CPC-95 deals with an offence in relation to mines. This would maintain that offence as a strictly indictable offence, as opposed to a hybridized offence as proposed by Bill C-75.