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?