Thank you, Mr. Chair and honourable members. The Canadian Bar Association is pleased to have this opportunity to speak to you today in support of Bill C-22.
The letter we have provided to you analyzing the bill has been prepared by our criminal justice section, which has among its membership both crown and defence counsel, as well as by the sexual orientation and gender identity conference.
The mandate of the Canadian Bar Association is to improve the law and the administration of justice, and we have analyzed the bill within that optic.
I'm going to ask Ms. Gallagher to speak about the Criminal Code aspects of the bill, and then Mr. Kindred will address some things that we think would improve the bill even more.