Justice Committee on Dec. 1st, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Thank you very much, Minister.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Minister.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Monsieur Fortin, you're out of time.

We will now go on to Mr. Garrison for six minutes.

Go ahead, sir.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I hope you'll just indulge me for a moment as the NDP spokesperson for sexual orientation and gender identity. I just want to remark that today is World AIDS Day. As a gay man of a certain age, I'm very happy that we have finally gotten to the point where we can talk about the elimination of HIV, which is a scourge of the entire population, no longer just of gay men.

I tabled some Order Paper questions today, and I want to bring them to the attention of the Minister of Diversity and Inclusion. They are about how the government plans to make sure that the new testing methods are available to rural, remote and marginalized communities, because the key to eradicating HIV is for those at risk to know their status.

Now, let me return to the topic at hand today—the bill. I do want to start out by saying that I remain very supportive of the bill as a whole, even though I remain disappointed that this isn't a complete ban on conversion therapy. I want to go back to the Minister of Justice and discuss the exclusion of what people are calling “consenting adults” from this bill.

I know the minister has said he fears a charter challenge, but I want to know whether, quite apart from that, he thinks that we might be able to add adults to this bill in a way that wouldn't endanger the whole bill if there were a charter challenge.

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Garrison. I appreciate your question, and I understand the very sincere place from which it is coming.

We have tried, with respect to adults, to really restrict it to only consenting adults. Duress is a legally known concept, so vulnerable adults will be protected, if you will, by the legislation.

That being said, you're correct to say that I do fear a charter challenge. For an adult capable of consenting and who is not susceptible to duress and is not being subjected to duress, it would be a difficult thing to defend in court.

The best minds in my department tried to wrap their heads around it and couldn't. That was our starting position, I will admit, but if you can find a way, I'd be willing to consider it.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much, Minister.

My problem is with the concept of consenting adults when it comes to conversion therapy because we have some very well-established legal principles that some things that are harmful cannot be consented to. A person cannot consent to being wounded or physically assaulted. A person cannot consent to a fight club, for instance.

In my mind, and I think that of many experts, conversion therapy amounts to an assault. If we leave what are called “consenting adults” out of the bill, I guess I would like to suggest an amendment that we specify very clearly in the bill all the various forms of lack of consent, or how we understand consent, as we have done in other parts of the Criminal Code.

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Once again, thank you. It is something that I think we tried to cover in the bill. If we can do it better, then we'd be willing to work.

Again, the problem is always that when you try to enumerate a list of practices or conversations or whatever one wants to allow or disallow, it can create unintended consequences. The same is true for questions from some of your colleagues around the table.

That's my only caveat, but I'm always willing to work in good faith with a good-faith amendment.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much, Minister.

The bill bans advertising, but it raises a question from some in the community about whether there are other kinds of promotion of conversion therapy that wouldn't strictly qualify as advertising, in particular in that they are unpaid.

Do you believe that unpaid promotion is covered in the bill at present?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

We do believe that it is. It falls under the legal definitions, for both paid and unpaid. Again, I'm happy to look at that, but we were trying to cover it, and we do think we have covered it.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much.

I know I have very little time here, but I want to turn to the Minister of Diversity and Inclusion.

You are currently doing a survey for an action plan. I've had a look at the survey. Unfortunately, the survey doesn't actually ask any questions about actions. It will provide some useful information on the current situation, but it doesn't even ask questions like, “Do you support a ban on conversion therapy?” or “Do you support the government doing any specific things?”

I wonder if the minister has plans to be more specific about which actions might be informed by this survey.

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Waterloo, ON]

I would like to thank the member, through the chair, not only for his comments and his question, but also for his advocacy and the fact that we are now debating this legislation at committee in part because of the foundation that he laid.

When it comes to the conversation around conversion therapy, as has been stated tonight, I would agree that most Canadians agree it does not belong in Canada. That's why it's important that the committee do its important work to make sure that the legislation is correct. I would echo Minister Lametti's comments that if there are things we believe we have covered that have not been covered, this is what we would like brought to our attention. I would think that communities have expressed clearly that that's not out for the conversation. We know it needs to be banned. It does not belong in Canada.

The purpose of the survey is about additional engagements, as to what communities are expecting and how we advance. This is building upon the work we've already done with the round tables we've already held, to make sure our government is responding to communities and proactively ensuring we're building back even better and consciously more inclusively. That's also why Fernand is joining me today. The secretariat is engaging with every single department and agency. Our government—

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Thank you, Minister.

My apologies. We're out of time, Mr. Garrison.

We'll go to our second round of questions now, starting with Madame Findlay for five minutes.

Go ahead.

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Ministers, for being here today.

My first question is for department officials. When this bill was originally introduced, our feedback was to include the language from the department's website in the bill. Today we received a written brief from CIJA, an important Canadian advocacy organization, that favours adoption of the original website language in the bill.

However, at some later, more recent date, the language on the government's website was changed. Can the officials outline why that was done?

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

We still can't hear you, Mr. Daigle.

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

We're quickly changing the device.

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

I hope the technical issue doesn't run into my time, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

I have stopped your time for now.

Mr. Daigle, we still can't hear you, sir. IT will be calling you one more time.

In the meantime, Mr. Brookfield, would you like to add some words there?

[François Daigle, Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Justice]

Can you hear me?

[The Chair, Liberal, Iqra Khalid]

Mr. Daigle, I think your sound is coming back.

[François Daigle]

Yes. Can you hear me now?

Hello. I'm very sorry about that.

As the minister explained before, our view is that what we're criminalizing here is very clear. These are three terms that are used elsewhere in the Criminal Code: “service”, “treatment” and “practice.” We didn't feel there was a need to go much further than that; otherwise we would be excluding things we didn't intend to exclude.

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

Excuse me, Mr. Daigle. That wasn't my question. I'm not sure if you heard my full question with your technical difficulties.

I'm asking why there was a change in the wording on the website. There was a word added that was not there before. That's what I'm trying to understand.

[François Daigle]

When we draft a bill, we look at a number of things. We ended up proposing the bill that the minister has tabled in the House. What was on our website was general information about the intention. Ultimately, we developed a bill that we're comfortable with and prepared to answer questions on. We're also happy to—

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

With respect, I understand that, but you're not answering my question. There was widespread interest in the wording on your website to begin with and widespread support for that, but then it was changed after that. Do you not have an answer for why you changed that?

[François Daigle]

We don't draft laws on the website. We drafted a bill to reflect the information that we obtained in our consultations. We feel that our bill is very clear, and we didn't—

[Kerry-Lynne Findlay, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock, BC]

All right. Thank you. I must move on. I only have so much time.

Under this legislation, how many individuals or organizations does the government expect to prosecute? This is for Minister Lametti. How do you foresee a case being built against those individuals?