Mr. Chair, this amendment is technical in nature. It would alter the definition of “sexual offence against a child” in clause 21 to (a) clarify that a designated offence as defined in subsection 490.011(1) of the Criminal Code applies where it is committed against a person under 18 years of age and the offender is required to comply with the Sex Offender Information Registration Act; and (b) it would specify that it applies to an offence that is committed in a foreign jurisdiction against a person who is under 18 years of age where the offender has been served with a notice to comply with the Sex Offender Information Registration Act.
The current definition refers to subsection 490.011(1) of the Criminal Code, which includes non-sexual offences under paragraphs 490.011(1)(b) and (f). The proposed amendment clarifies that the definition applies to offenders who are required to comply with the Sex Offender Information Registration Act, which excludes offenders convicted of a non-sexual offence where it had not been established beyond a reasonable doubt that the offender had intended to commit a designated sexual offence.
The proposed amendment would therefore ensure that there is no incorrect interpretation that non-sexual offenders would be among those subject to the proposed new provisions in the Sex Offender Information Registration Act for child sex offenders, such as, for example, reporting obligations regarding travel and information sharing with the Canada Border Services Agency. Also, the current definition does not specifically address sexual offences that are committed outside of Canada against a person under the age of 18 years where that person subsequently returned to Canada and is on the national sex offender registry.
The proposed amendment includes foreign sex offence convictions in the definition, which would ensure that these child sex offenders would be subject to reporting obligations regarding travel and information sharing with the Canada Border Services Agency in accordance with the proposed new Sex Offender Information Registration Act provisions in Bill C-26 for child sex offenders. Similar amendments are also being proposed to clause 29 of the bill in the definition used for “sexual offence against a child” with regard to the proposed new high risk child sex offender database that's contained in this bill.
For those reasons, we're proposing the amendment and will support it.