To confirm, the federal government does have authority over what we call the “formal capacity”. The legal term is “essential validity” of marriage, which includes setting the minimum age to marry. Provincial and territorial governments have constitutional jurisdiction over the solemnization of marriage: setting the procedures, how licences can be obtained. In the course of the provinces doing that, they prescribe a minimum age to marry.
Under constitutional law, if either level of government purports to legislate in an area that is outside its area of competency, it's ultra vires of that government. To the extent that there is an inconsistency between legislation at the two levels of government, the constitutional doctrine of paramountcy says that the federal law prevails.
In this case, Bill C-22 proposes to set a new limit for age of consent. How would that impact in terms of marriages? As Mr. Moore has said, it does not prevent a young person who meets the conditions prescribed by the provincial law from marrying, provided that the partner is less than five years older in age.
The whole objective of Bill C-22 is to provide a clear definition of when a relationship between an adult and a young person is exploitative. Bill C-22 is saying that we want to address the adult predators. Bill C-22 proposes that the adult predator be defined as a person who is five years or more older.
Bill C-22 says we know that certain relationships exist that are common-law relationships, or they're already married. They're established. They would meet our definition. They would have the exception. It would continue and then the young person would come of age.
Down the road, if Bill C-22 is passed, the message from Parliament is that anything over the age difference is an exploitative relationship; it's a sexual offence.
I don't know if you have specific examples. I don't have any to offer to the committee about how Bill C-22 might impact specific cases.