Thank you, Madam Chair.
Mr. Marceau, Ms. Lyons, Mr. Robertson and Ms. Kirzner‑Roberts, thank you for being here with us today. I think this is an important study, as Ms. Lyons noted at the outset. It is among the most important topics that our committee will be studying this year, and we have to approach it seriously.
I listened carefully to my colleagues and to the witnesses, and I too am very concerned by what Mr. Adil Charkaoui said last fall. I also have trouble explaining the decision by Quebec's director of criminal and penal prosecutions not to go after Mr. Charkaoui. I am not questioning his decision and I'm sure he had good reasons for making it, as he does with all of his decisions. I do have questions though about our role as federal legislators. Isn't there something wrong here? Isn't there something we could do?
That is why my party introduced a bill recently that seeks to abolish the religious exceptions in the Criminal Code.
Under section 319 currently, it is prohibited to wilfully promote hatred, to publicly incite hatred or wilfully promote antisemitism. I will not read out the entire section, but it also stipulates defences, including if a person accused of such offences has in good faith expressed an opinion on a religious topic or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text, or attempted to establish an argument.
In our opinion, the Criminal Code should not include that kind of exception. We believe that the Criminal Code should apply to all citizens equally and that the rules for living in harmony right across Canada should be the same for everyone, regardless of religion or beliefs, and if a religion should happen to allow or advocate hatred or violence, that religion has no place in Quebec or Canada, in our humble opinion.
Ms. Lyons, do you think this kind of religious exception should be eliminated, which allows people to do something that would otherwise be considered a crime, simply by virtue of belief in a religious text?