Health Committee on Feb. 7th, 2017

[The Chair, Liberal, Bill Casey]

Okay, the time is up.

Go ahead, Mr. Davies.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Thank you for being here, Mr. Viersen. Congratulations on your work bringing this important issue forward. I'm going to start with a bit of the legal context that's currently the case in Canada.

Though access to sexually explicit material in Canada is legal, as you know, the content is regulated under the Criminal Code. Under section 163 of the Criminal Code, it is currently an offence to make, print, publish, distribute, or circulate “any obscene written matter, picture, model, phonograph record or other thing whatever”. It is also an offence to possess such material for the purpose of publication, distribution, and circulation. A so-called “obscene” publication is one that has “the undue exploitation of sex, or of sex and any one or more of the following subjects, namely, crime, horror, cruelty and violence” as a dominant characteristic.

In your view, is the current Criminal Code legislation deficient?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I'm not totally up to speed on what the Criminal Code has to say on this. I approached this entirely from a health perspective. Therefore, I do not have any recommendations about whether the Criminal Code is sufficient or not. I know that there have been several court rulings that have clarified some of these things, so I think I'll let the lawyers continue to hash that out in court. We could put forward law right here in this place as well, but I focused entirely on a health perspective. As I stated earlier, this is a pervasive issue throughout all of society and we are not going to be able to legislate and incarcerate our way out of this.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

I'll ask you one more question on law before we turn to the health and research issues. You're quite right, the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled on these sections of the code in a leading case called R. v. Butler. Writing for the majority, Justice Sopinka divided pornography into three categories: explicit sex with violence, explicit sex without violence but which subjects people to treatment that is degrading or dehumanizing, and explicit sex without violence that is neither degrading nor dehumanizing.

In talking about these categories, he wrote:

In making this determination with respect to the three categories of pornography...the portrayal of sex coupled with violence will almost always constitute the undue exploitation of sex—

—and therefore be illegal. He continued:

Explicit sex which is degrading or dehumanizing may be undue if the risk of harm is substantial. Finally, explicit sex that is not violent and neither degrading nor dehumanizing is generally tolerated in our society and will not qualify as the undue exploitation of sex unless it employs children in its production.

Justice Sopinka and the Supreme Court of Canada have declared that any pornography that has violence in it is already illegal. Sex, or what is commonly referred to as erotica, that is simply the portrayal of sex without any violence or degradation or dehumanization is legal. It's that middle category that I think your motion or bill speaks to, which is sex that is not violent but is degrading or dehumanizing and may be undue if the risk of harm is substantial.

Mr. Viersen, would it be fair to say that what you'd like this committee to focus on is research to help inform a court of the law in the future to determine if the portrayal of sex as degrading or dehumanizing creates a risk of harm?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I'm not exactly sure how to answer that question. I'm not sure if we're trying to tell a court something with this. Again, I've gone with the health model, but that would possibly come into your report. I know that the latest research.... In a report that came out in 2016, Stanley, Barter, et al., studied seven different countries, 22 different studies. It was a meta-analysis, and it was the first study of its kind to prove causation between viewing sexual violence online and perpetrating it in some fashion. That may come into your report as well.

What I would point to is the top 50 viewed videos in the world. That's a bit of the trouble with trying to manage all of this. It's in the world because it's on the Internet. You're not going to shut down the Internet tomorrow. The top 50 viewed videos have both violence and sexually degrading material in them. This is having an impact on our society.

What I would like the committee to do is to find out what that impact is and how we can address it in the Canadian context.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Before I get your views on directing the committee in terms of the evidence we should look at.... In 2013, the U.K. Children's Commissioner asked academics from Middlesex University to review all the available evidence about the effect of pornography on adolescence, so they did a meta-sample as well. They excluded articles that had a very high or particular ideological angle and articles that had methodological problems. They ranked the quality and relevance of papers and gave them a strength rating of high, medium, or low. They reviewed 40,000 papers, but only 276 met their criteria.

In your view, should this committee be cautious about the independence and objectivity of available research? How should evidence be weighted in our study?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I would start with hearing from some of the leading researchers in this area, such as Dr. Mary Anne Layden and Dr. Gail Dines. That would be a good place to start. I think they are very neutral in their position on a lot of this stuff. In particular, they come from significantly different ideological bends than I do, so it has been a really interesting road to travel with them, for sure.

That was probably the most unique part of all this. I would say, use your own judgment on that. We passed this unanimously through the House, with support from every party, so I think that, going forward, we should be able to continue to work together on this.

Thank you.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bill Casey]

Ms. Sidhu, go ahead.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Viersen, for coming today.

I just want to ask you, did you consider provincial and territorial jurisdiction? Can you explain what engagement you had with the provinces and territories on your present action plans in this regard?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I haven't put forward any recommendations or action plans at this point. In writing my motion, I said to respect provincial and territorial jurisdiction. I realize that in Canada, when it comes to health, that is a significant hurdle. We fund it federally, but it's provincial responsibility to lay out health. I guess at some point it's going to be.... You're right. Some of your recommendations are going to be recommendations for provinces, but we'll have no recourse in actually getting them implemented. It will be up to the provinces as to whether they want to or not.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

I know this is an important issue, but why do you view the health committee as the best way to study this? There was a relatively tight deadline formulated this year, considering all the other committee business in this committee, such as pharmacare. We all heard that 20% of people cannot take their medication because they cannot afford the prescription. Organ and tissue donation matters, as well as indigenous health. These are very important. This issue is also very important, but why do you think this is the most important issue at this time?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I put this motion on notice on March 8, 2015, International Women's Day, and I anticipated that it would have been passed significantly earlier, which would have given it about a year to be studied, so there's that aspect of it as well.

The other thing I would point out is that this issue affects every Canadian, so I think it's imperative that we do study it. I put a date on it so it would get studied. The date has crept up on us for sure, but I'm pleased to be here and pleased to see that you're taking it on.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Other countries like China have very robust control on Internet access. I think we all know about this. Do you think we should pursue something like that? Could you elaborate on that.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Should we pursue China's Internet...? No, I don't think we should.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

I just want your ideas. What do you want the federal government to do?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I've put this in the health region specifically so that you can hear from health professionals on this, hear the latest academic research, and ask their opinions on what we should be doing. A legislative approach or a regulatory approach will be part of it, but I don't see that as playing a major role in shifting societal ideas and shifting the culture on this. That's probably going to be the biggest impact we can have.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

I heard you say that parents have some duties too, but the researchers we have heard so far have suggested that such material can have a negative impact on the ideas about sexual consent. Given that you have asked this committee to study this issue, what role do you see our government having with regard to teaching the giving of consent?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I think it's going to take a multi-faceted approach. I think there are two aspects of consent on this issue. Number one, the violence perpetrated within the videos totally destroys the concept of consent within relationships. Number two is the other aspect of consent. When I purchase a pack of cigarettes, I am informed as to the health effects of those cigarettes, that I may develop cancer or mouth diseases. They have the most awful pictures on the packages of cigarettes.

With this, there's not necessarily any informed consent. Nobody is saying if you consume this product these are the outcomes that could happen later on in life. That would be a big aspect of the consent as well that I see. I know that many of our young people, if you ask them, “Do you want to get married? Do you want to have a meaningful relationship later on in life?”, that's important to all of them. Yet nobody's saying that if you engage in these behaviours you limit your ability to be able to participate in those kinds of relationships in the future. There's that aspect of informed consent that I think is really important, and I task the committee with that as well.

I'm one guy, and a whole host of people out there have some good recommendations. I hope we get to hear from them at this committee.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bill Casey]

Thank you very much.

Dr. Carrie, this is the first of the five-minute rounds.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank Arnold for being here, but also for bringing up this issue. I remember that when you first approached me about the issue, I had an opportunity to talk to faith leaders in Oshawa. I asked them, “What is one of the biggest things you're facing?” They said sex addiction. I didn't realize this had become such an issue in all of our communities.

I was wondering what motivated you to take on this issue. What drew you to it?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

I was elected in 2015, same as the rest of you, but for the first time for me, and I had thought about a lot of things. I had asked a million questions to the neighbouring MP as to what it all entailed, but one of the things I was not anticipating was private member's business and getting chosen early on the private members' list. That was a bit of a curve ball for me.

We get a lot of mail, so I went through all the mail, talked to everybody I could talk to in my riding, and I had a list of about 30 or 40 things that I could do my private member's business on. Then somebody suggested I look at the pornography issue. I got six letters from my riding on that, and somebody also mentioned the Rehtaeh Parsons case. I don't know if you remember that or not, but that was a case from the east coast where a 17-year-old girl was raped at a party and then the pictures of it were posted on Facebook. I don't remember where I was or what was going on at the time, but that story stuck with me.

It was in the news quite a bit and that story stuck with me, and I always wondered what made those young men think it was appropriate to post the pictures, as if this were a brag story, on Facebook. That was baffling to me, so I started to do some research on that case. I spoke to Rehtaeh's mother and worked with her. She now has an organization, the Rehtaeh Parsons Society. Rehtaeh subsequently committed suicide, so in her memory her mom has started this foundation.

I worked with her and a number of other organizations from around the country to come up with the motion. It wasn't something that I came here wanting to take on, this fight, but it was something that struck me, I guess, and intrigued me. I thought that, if we can do some good around here, this is something to do good with.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

I think we can do some good. I think one of the challenges with the committee is that we're trying to figure out what role the federal government and Health Canada can play. You and my colleagues have brought up the challenge with provincial and territorial jurisdiction in our country. The delivery of health care is provincial. Education is provincial.

I know in the past we've done research, we've looked at standards, and we've looked at what is being done internationally. Do you think we should be focusing on that type of thing? How much of the provincial role do you want to see investigated at this stage? Is that something we should leave to the provincial guys themselves?

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

If we could, I would approach other jurisdictions and see what they're doing as well. I know that other jurisdictions don't necessarily have the split, with health and education at another jurisdictional level, so they may be able to tell you how they've dealt with some of these issues. As well, it would be good to put it in the record. I think that's going to be as important as anything, how other jurisdictions are dealing with this. Also what recommendations the academic community has is going to be very important as well.