Mr. Speaker, if Parliament is seeking to ban something, then it is very important that Parliament clearly know and understand what it is banning. Parliament should be careful to precisely identify the things that it wishes to ban so not to accidentally, through sloppy legislative drafting or through the mal-intent of some and the fear of others, ban things that it does not officially intend to ban.
Whatever may be said about the government's intention in banning something, good intentions are clearly not enough. If it is banning a thing, then it must correctly identify the thing that it wishes to ban, and ban that and that alone.
A legislature might wish, for example, to ban violence, but in the process accidentally also ban legitimate acts of self-defence. A legislature might legitimately wish to ban certain toxic substances, but should still be careful to consider the reasonableness of exceptions, considering all the cases in which those substances are used, such as research or secure technological applications.
If the government said that it was going to take tough measures to combat hard drugs, I would likely support those measures. However, if it miswrote the definition of hard drugs to include all potentially addictive substances, including caffeine or alcohol, then I would vote against those measures. It is not because I do not want to stop the use of hard drugs, but because I would object to the misuse of that term to apply to things which were not in fact hard drugs.
It should be a simple thing to say, in general, that when legislation is debated, the details matter, yet too often the rhetoric we hear from the other side invokes good intentions as the beginning and the end of the argument. When powerful people, in this case parliamentarians, do sloppy or imprecise work, even with good intentions, the results can be disastrous.
The government says that this is a bill to ban conversion therapy, so then what is conversion therapy? As I have said, if we are to ban it, then we must first know what it is and how it will be defined in law. This conversation, in general, has been frustrated by the fact that the government toggles back and forth between two very different definitions. One definition is what conversion therapy has actually meant for as long as the term has been used up until the tabling of the legislation. The other is the definition that has been used in the bill. These are two very different definitions. We are on the verge of banning the wrong thing, based on a bad definition.
Let us first look at the historical or traditional definition of what constitutes conversion therapy. About 100 years ago, the world saw the emergence of pseudoscientific practices which purported to change a person's sexual orientation. These involved the use of a medley of coercion, shaming, violence, physical and psychological abuse, electric shock, ice baths, hyper-sexualized heterosexual experiences, etc.
When this matter was first raised in the House, I spent some time reading, watching and listening to stories of people who had been victims of conversion therapy, and was absolutely horrified by the experiences that some people described. Conversion therapy is wrong and it should be banned, and we should be clear about why.
It is not illegal to have an opinion about when, where or how people should have sex. Indeed, it is quite normal for people to make choices about sexual behaviour and to, in certain cases, choose to limit their own sexual experiences based on whatever factors they think are important or to share their opinions about these matters with those around them. If there was something wrong with giving advice about when to have or not to have sex, we would be driving a whole industry of therapists and relationship advice columnists out of business.
However, conversion therapy is something totally different. We can all agree, I hope, that degrading people, making them feel less valuable or less human because of sexual or romantic feelings or behaviour is never acceptable. A belief in universal immutable human dignity is foundational to our way of life. Nobody's orientation or behaviour justifies subjecting them to violence, bullying or degradation.
If we were actually working to try to get consensus in this place, then that really could be the basis for an agreement. Conversion therapy, as it has been historically defined and understood, is a bad thing, is contrary to human dignity and should be banned. I think we actually all agree on that.
Notably, there has, for a number of years, been a conversion therapy ban in the municipality where I live. The definition of conversion therapy used in Strathcona County's bylaw on the subject is as follows:
“Conversion Therapy” means an attempt to change an individual’s sexual orientation, gender identity, gender preference, or gender expression; an attempt to convert an individual from one orientation, identity, preference, or expression to another. Conversion therapy includes various physical treatments, chemical or hormonal treatments, drug treatments, counselling, or behaviour modification through shaming or emotionally coercive or traumatic stimuli. Conversion therapy does not include clinical assessment and treatment by a medical professional that explores all aspects of an individual’s sexual orientation, gender identity, gender preference, or gender expression, or that explores an age- or developmental-level-appropriate use of gender transition to align an individual’s anatomical features with the individual’s gender identity.
That is a pretty good definition. Any time this sort of thing is put in criminal law, it probably requires an extra level of scrutiny beyond what could happen at the municipal level. However, I would generally credit our municipal leaders in getting it right. They were able to write a definition that identified conversion therapy as pertaining to a quasi-therapeutic context in which a change to sexual orientation or other characteristics is brought about through shaming, emotional coercion or traumatic stimuli.
The work of this one municipal council made up of nine people shows us that it is possible to get the definition right. That is where we should be in terms of definitions when we talk about banning conversion therapy.
However, Bill C-6 uses a false definition of conversion therapy. As amended at committee, with the amendments carrying the support of Liberal and NDP members only, it now defines conversion therapy as:
...a practice, treatment or service designed to change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual, to change a person’s gender identity or gender expression to cisgender or to repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual behaviour or non-cisgender gender expression. For greater certainty, this definition does not include a practice, treatment or service that relates to the exploration and development of an integrated personal identity without favouring any particular sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.
There are three important distinctions between the definition used by my local municipal council, the mayor of which, by the way, is a former Liberal candidate, which is well aligned with the proper and historic definition of conversion therapy, versus the one used by Bill C-6.
First, the definition in Bill C-6 does not refer to any pseudo-therapeutic context. There is no clear definition of what would or would not constitute a practice, treatment or service. As we pointed out at committee, a key principle of law is that the legislature does not speak in vain, so each of these three things would be understood to be different. A service is more than just a treatment and a practice is something other than a treatment or service. A thing could be any of these three things and still be considered conversion therapy according to Bill C-6, although not according to my local municipal bylaw.
Second, there is no reference to coercion, degrading treatment, traumatic stimuli, etc. being part of conversion therapy. Therefore, again, conversion therapy could simply be a word, a statement or a conversation according to Bill C-6, although not according to my municipal bylaw.
Third, and most important, the definition in Bill C-6 includes references to advice or therapy that seeks to modify sexual behaviour as opposed to sexual orientation, and this is a really radical departure. For the first time, it says that advice or statements that do not seek to change orientation or identity but simply advise about sexual behaviour could be considered conversion therapy as well.
Without limiting the definition of conversion therapy to a pseudo-therapeutic context, a simple, informal conversation between two people could be deemed conversion therapy, depending on what it is. For a conversation to cross the line into conversion therapy, according to the definition used in the bill, it would not be necessarily pushing a change in orientation, but simply suggesting some modification of sexual behaviour. This is now being called conversion therapy in this new definition invented by Bill C-6.
Therefore, let me make this concrete. Suppose that a close friend of mine comes to me for advice and confides that he is having some serious challenges in his relationship and those challenges have led him to be unfaithful to his partner. Suppose I encourage my friend to be faithful to his partner and stop cheating or suppose I encourage this friend to break up with his partner and just focus on himself for a while. Now, if, in this hypothetical situation, my friend is straight, then I have broken no law. However, if my friend is gay, then my advice to him has violated the law, because by enjoining him to either reduce his number of sexual partners or to be single for a while, I have engaged in a practice that seeks to reduce non-heterosexual sexual behaviour. The definition of conversion therapy in Bill C-6 is so broad that it would apply precisely to that conversation.
We can hope that I would never be prosecuted for simply giving a gay friend relationship advice, but suppose that similar advice were given by a mentor or a counsellor perhaps to a young person. It is not, I imagine, uncommon for parents or mentors to advise young people in terms of partner reduction, fidelity in relationships, waiting before becoming sexually active, etc. As a young person, I certainly was a recipient of this sort of advice from time to time. However, since any of this advice if given to a gay person would constitute a practice seeking to reduce non-heterosexual sexual behaviour, it could run afoul of criminal law.
To summarize, we have two different operating definitions of conversion therapy: the historic and proper definition, and the false definition in Bill C-6, which extends the term “conversion therapy” to many ordinary conversations, many of which, as the one I described, are not the sort of thing that any reasonable person would want to prevent from occurring.
In light of this simple and very fixable problem, Canadians began to speak out, and my office launched a petition, all with a very simple message: fix the definition. Just fix the definition and then we can all support the bill.
Recently some members of other parties have tried to attack the motivation of those who are concerned about the definition. They have claimed that we are just looking for an excuse to vote against the bill. For those who are levelling this challenge, I would say, “Please, call our bluff.” If they think we are just looking for an excuse to vote against the bill, then why not accept the reasonable amendments we are putting forward and then see what happens?
I am generally loath to give the government political advice, but if the Liberals believe there are members of the House who actually want to oppose a conversion therapy ban, then they should endeavour to address at least the more obvious problems of the definition and thus leave those who allegedly wish to oppose the bill without excuse. Then those who have allegedly been using this excuse simply as an excuse would find themselves in a real bind if the government were to accept some reasonable amendments.
If the Liberals did so, of course, they would find in reality that the bill would pass unanimously. I think at this stage it is obvious that they know this, and that they would rather leave in the definitional problems that we have pointed out, so as to create a political wedge. Sadly, though, it is a political wedge that will potentially cause serious problems for the rights and freedoms of Canadians in terms of the freedom to simply share personal opinions about sex and relationships, even in private.
When this bill came to a vote at second reading, I made the decision to abstain. It was a difficult decision, because I generally do not like to abstain. I worked hard to get here and nobody can vote on behalf of the people of my riding in my stead.
However, there are cases where it is particularly challenging to cast a ballot at the second reading stage of a bill, because while third reading involves a vote on the final text of a bill, second reading is generally thought of as a vote on the principle or objectives of the bill. For those watching these proceedings who may be less familiar with the legislative process, every bill goes through second reading debate and a vote where the general principle of the bill is considered. After that, the bill is refined by committee and then it returns to the House of Commons for a debate and vote at the third and final reading where MPs must consider not only the intention of the bill, but also its substance and text.
Making a judgment at third reading is relatively straightforward, because one is considering the text of the bill in final form. However, making a judgment at second reading about the objective of the bill requires me to evaluate the government’s unspoken intention. Do I agree with what it seems to be trying to do in spite of the technical flaws in a piece of legislation, such that I will support it going forward for further consideration, or do I determine that the flaws in the bill are there by design and demonstrate a policy decision of the government to draft the bill in an overbroad way?
It is sometimes impossible to resolve the question of what the true intent of a bill is without being able to read minds. Ultimately, being unable to resolve this question of the government’s true intention, cognizant of the importance of banning conversion therapy but unconvinced that the flawed definition was simply a drafting error, I decided to abstain from the bill, hoping that I would have an opportunity to vote for it at third reading after committee study.
I had hoped for the best. I had hoped the professions at second reading of a desire to get this right and clear up any ambiguities would turn out to be sincere. When this bill went to committee, it attracted significant public attention and interest, so much so that the committee received close to 300 written briefs from various stakeholders and concerned members of the public. Liberals on the justice committee sadly made a mockery of the committee process by refusing to even allow enough time to read those briefs, refusing to incorporate reasonable concerns and table-dropping amendments to actually make the problems with the definition even worse.
At that stage, where various amendments were considered, Conservative members put forward reasonable amendments that sought to fix the definition. These were opposed by the Liberals and the NDP, who, in the process, also tipped their hand about their true intentions. I noted in particular the comments of the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore in response to one of the reasoned Conservative amendments.
Conservatives proposed an amendment taking language directly from the Department of Justice website, clarifying that the definition of conversion therapy would not apply “to the expression of views on sexual orientation, sexual feelings or gender identity, such as where teachers, school counsellors, pastoral counsellors, faith leaders, doctors, mental health professionals, friends or family members provide support to persons struggling with their sexual orientation, sexual feelings or gender identity”. This amendment would have taken a big step to addressing the problems in the definition, but when this amendment was put forward, the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore said, “I'm concerned that this amendment would defeat the purpose of the bill."
Again, during the final stage of the committee study, when Conservatives proposed an amendment that simply sought to clarify in the definition that conversion therapy would not apply “to the expression of views on sexual orientation, sexual feelings or gender identity,” a Liberal member admitted that the adoption of this amendment would defeat the purpose of the bill.
I thought that the purpose of the bill was to ban conversion therapy, not to restrict the expression of personal views on issues involving sexuality. However, this was a clear admission from the government side that restriction on the expression of views is at least part of the purpose of this bill.
I want to salute the hard work of Conservative members on the justice committee, but also to recognize the member for Rivière-du-Nord, the Bloc member on the committee. I suspect that there are many issues on which he and I will disagree, but I know that he took his role on the committee to study and improve the legislation very seriously.
It was the member for Rivière-du-Nord who noted at the beginning of clause-by-clause consideration that the committee had received hundreds of briefs from members of the public that had only been translated and distributed the day before. He noted that it would have shown a necessary level of respect for the public who had submitted these briefs to delay clause-by-clause for one meeting, allowing members to review the briefs and incorporate insights contained therein. Conservatives supported this Bloc member’s motion to allow time for members to review the briefs that had been submitted. This motion was defeated by the Liberals and the NDP, who insisted on proceeding with clause-by-clause without reviewing the briefs.
Ironically, after this bill was considered that day at the justice committee and referred to the House, the government has not even scheduled the bill for a full day of debate until last week, more than five months after its adoption by committee. Therefore, no time would have been lost at all by delaying the clause-by-clause so as to allow members to consider the input from the public, as suggested by the member for Rivière-du-Nord.
The fact is that government voted against this proposal because it did not want to hear the constructive suggestions put forward by the hundreds of Canadians and Canadian organizations that had taken the time to submit briefs and information to the committee. After defeating this Bloc motion, the government worked with the NDP, table-dropping an amendment that significantly worsened the definition, from the perspective of clarity.
The amendment the Liberals put forward without prior notice added in the idea that conversation therapy includes an effort to reduce non-cisgender gender expression. What would constitute non-cisgender gender expression? Let me quote directly from the committee intervention of the member for Rivière-du-Nord at committee. He said—
