Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
As I mentioned to you, I have what might be called, I hope, a friendly precautionary point of order arising from the discussion that took place yesterday, and it was actually during a part of the discussion that I had to be in the House, so before we return to our clause-by-clause review I'd like to reference it.
I believe it arose in part because one of the witnesses innocently, though somewhat maybe incorrectly, contributed to the deliberations leading to an outcome that I think this committee should appreciate in a certain way. I ask the indulgence of all parties because I know that the sequence is out of place with our plan for today, but I'm bringing it up at the outset now so that if there is some merit to what I am saying, members can consult with whomever they wish during the course of the day, during the break, and maybe at the end of our deliberations we can in fact act on it.
The problem, as quickly as I can illustrate this, Mr. Chairman, arose in yesterday's discussion of clause 103 on page 59, wherein the English version says, “sexual exploitation of a person with a disability” and the French says
"personnes en situation d'autorité"
I know this was discussed yesterday, but the problem we have, Mr. Chairman, is that on page 102 of the bill, which is schedule 2—and we have yet to get there, so I'm doing this by way of anticipation, but it connects—the English refers in the same way to the section of the Criminal Code in section 153. But in referring to the same section of the code in French, it says
"personne qui est en situation d’autorité ou de confiance vis-à-vis d’une personne ayant une déficience"
In other words, the French is clearly different in the French text later on in this same bill.
I realize, as it was pointed out yesterday, Mr. Chairman, and I sought to follow it carefully, that these are section headings and that they themselves have limited juridical application by virtue of the Interpretation Act, as my Conservative colleague correctly pointed out yesterday.
We cannot have really two different ways of interpretation in English and French in this manner. Either the English is inaccurate or the French is inaccurate, and either it is wrong in one section or both.
I would like the government to look into this and decide which wording it finds acceptable, so at least we may report a version of the bill without an internal inconsistency in the bill.
Mr. Chairman, this is where I must bring up the issue of what was said yesterday during the discussion by one of the witnesses. My colleague from the NDP, Madam Boivin, stressed that it was important to have the English and the French match. Mr. Jean and others pointed out, correctly again, that we can't change the Criminal Code and that is not the legislation before us.
However, the comments from the witness, and again I know that it was meant and stated in an inadvertent contributory manner, implied that we couldn't in our reference to it change the text used to refer back to the section of the Criminal Code in question, in this case section 153, or, in other words, the impression that members may have had—and it would be the kind of impression one could have—was that these margin notes were phrases fixed in the Criminal Code, and that we were stuck with them as they were, and that was because the Criminal Code was not before us.
Mr. Chairman, herein lies the problem. Subsequent references to section 153 in the Criminal Code itself, in French, all of which use the same English as we have, use a different French than we do, namely the words as I said,
"exploitation d'une personne handicapée à des fins sexuelles"
It is a different French from the one we have. As such, Mr. Chairman, the witness may have been incorrect in implying to the committee that such phrases are set in stone, that they are frozen in the Criminal Code, and that therefore Madam Boivin was incorrect to suggest that we change the French to accommodate the reference in English to section 153.1 of the Criminal Code. Indeed, if Madam Boivin succeeded in changing the reference in French from
"personnes en situation d'autorité" to "exploitation d'une personne handicapée à des fins sexuelles",
the bill would in fact be more consistent with what is now in the Criminal Code already, and such a change would not only be completely permissible but I would say desirable.
Mr. Chairman, let me be frank. I doubt that even if Madam Boivin had put forth her amendment it would have succeeded in the manner in which we are proceeding on the votes, but the government may want to consider this as we near the end of our study.
I looked at this last night. I looked at both the English and the French, and I was asking myself why there is such a large difference between the margin notes for section 153.1 in English and in French. I want to suggest to you, Mr. Chairman, and to the committee that the reason is that in English one casts it in the language of the victim and in French one casts it in the language of the accused. This need not be problematic in and of itself.
While I think generally the Department of Justice might move to reform and consolidate the Criminal Code and remove such seeming discrepancies, we should ask ourselves today whether we can make a decision on how to eliminate this inconsistency with respect to the two English references in our bill and with respect to the two references in French in our bill, and of course between the then discrepancy between the English and the French.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I don't think there needs to be disagreement on this point. When we break later for dinner, for example, I'd be happy to informally discuss this. I know it's difficult to understand all that I’ve now said because it may involve some sort of technical appreciation and referencing and going back and forth.
The only point I would like to make is that it would seem to me that it would make sense to align the two English references to section 153.1, which speaks of “sexual exploitation of person with disability”, with the French use,
"exploitation d'une personne handicapée à des fins sexuelles",
which reflects the language found in at least three different places elsewhere in the Criminal Code. It's not as if it's frozen in the Criminal Code, as we now have read it in section 153.1, and it can't be changed because the other references in the Criminal Code change the language in a way that allows the making of a uniform application of both.
I would say it's within our scope to make this change, and I'd like us to at least have consistency between the two references to the same section in French and in English, and to have the committee be aware that we do have the authority to select this wording, and that when we report it out we could have a consistency between the English and the French, Mr. Chairman.