I'm going to put the timer on, because I know there are a lot of strong advocates at the table.
First of all, welcome. Thank you for being here. As-salaam alaikum. Shalom. It's really, really important.
This is something that I take seriously, Canadians take seriously and my constituents in Parkdale-High Park take very seriously. I know that all of you are here with the best of intentions.
We are seeing an unbelievable amount of hatred, and I'm glad you outlined many aspects of it. Whether it's anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, anti-indigenous sentiment, anti-black sentiment, incel movements, etc., these are a cause for huge concern right here in Canada. We've seen the attacks in Quebec, Pittsburgh and New Zealand.
There was at one point, a tool—and I want to pick up on this, but I'm going to hold you to a bit of a time limit, Mr. Fogel—that was applied in a previous iteration of the Canadian Human Rights Act, section 13. It talked about targeted discrimination based on a prohibited ground towards an identifiable group that was spread by means of a telecommunication. It emphasized that this included the Internet. That provision was removed by the previous government in or around 2012-13.
At the time, it had gone through some challenges. As early as 2006, previous iterations of the groups who are here, including B'nai Brith, the Canadian Jewish Congress, and the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal were defending that very provision. In the Whatcott decision by the Supreme Court of Canada, the analogue to that provision was upheld on the very basis that has been discussed.
I want to know whether your perspective is that was an invalid provision—so perhaps over to CIJA—and if it wasn't invalid, if you can drive at the heart of what you think needs to be added to make it more robust.