Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Well, here we are today with the government censoring debate on a censorship bill, an incredible compounded attack on our freedoms as Canadians. What's at stake here is section 2(b) of the charter, freedom of expression, so really, what we're debating is 2(b) or not 2(b): that is the question. Will Canadians continue to have their section 2(b) rights to express themselves uninhibited by government bureaucracy?
Before us is a bill that would allow government bureaucrats to rig technological algorithms in order to favour certain kinds of pro-government content online while discouraging content that government does not want us to see, in some cases taking that content off the Internet altogether. Now, they tell us that this new power, which we have done just fine without for the last 20 years since the Internet blossomed and online communications and the existence of social media occurred, is necessary to protect Canadian content. But they can't tell us exactly what Canadian content is.
Apparently, for example, when the CBC plagiarizes a CNN story out of Washington and runs a full story, without even mentioning Canada, about what's happening in the United States, that would be considered Canadian content. My local community association in Canada puts out a newsletter informing a Canadian audience about what's happening in a Canadian community, produced by a Canadian author, and that would not be considered Canadian content. It therefore would be knocked down on the algorithmic food chain and pushed out of sight and out of mind. We don't—