Justice Committee on Nov. 6th, 2025

[Brett Broadfoot]

When you first spoke earlier that statement resonated with me because you used the term “judges”...having the opportunity to make that decision on ankle monitors and so on.

Unfortunately, many of our victims don't make it to that point where these offenders are getting to the judges. If it's going to come in, as was just mentioned about making amendments to this bill, where these violent acts are being charged, then the ankle monitor doesn't have to go to a judge. It can be done at the police station with their lawyers in hand. Let's not let them walk out of these situations or put them...and wait until they get on bail. Let's keep them.

We're waiting for a judge to make a decision that, in my family's situation, was scheduled to be over three months later. No, let's bring this back. It should be happening at the very beginning.

When I say ankle monitors and things of that nature, unless you're going to put them in court the next morning, which we know is not going to happen, let's put this into law. You are a violent offender. This is what we do to violent offenders immediately.

That's my statement on that.

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

Thank you so much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

Thank you, Mr. Broadfoot.

We are at time for this panel.

I want to take a brief moment to thank all the witnesses for their courage and their testimony today.

We will suspend very briefly and then resume the debate on the amendment that Mr. Lawton proposed last week.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

Okay. Let's pick up where we left off.

We do not have a ton of time, folks.

As we were debating the subamendment, the floor was Ms. Lattanzio's. I'll give it back to her.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair—

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant South—Six Nations, ON]

I thought the floor was for Andrew Lawton.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Oh yes, he did the subamendment—

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

She was already speaking to it. That's what I have from the clerk.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

That was taken out of order, though. You had recognized me as the speaker, and then she wanted to put an amendment, so you went to her and I didn't intervene.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

Let me just check the notes.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

I was on the speaking list and, then, because there was a motion from Ms. Lattanzio, you chose to recognize that, because at the time we thought we had a consensus.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Am I being recognized to speak, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

I just have Ms. Lattanzio.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

I'd have to go back and look at the architecture of that.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

If you would, you would find that I would have the floor right now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

I will ask the clerk.

[The Clerk of the Committee, Jean-François Lafleur]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

According to what we recall, it was that you proposed a subamendment. It was put on the floor of the committee, and then Mr. Brock moved that we suspend the meeting later—

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant South—Six Nations, ON]

On a point of order, if the chair is prepared to recognize Ms. Lattanzio, she's prepared to put forth an amendment to a subamendment, and that is not allowed procedurally.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

What you need to do is get unanimous consent to amend and replace.

That's how it would work procedurally, but you're accurate on that.

Please proceed, Ms. Lattanzio.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

I pull back the amendment that was done, I believe, in the session of November 6, was it not?

I propose the following amendment to Mr. Brock's motion, at the end. Mr. Brock's motion starts with “That, given”, and goes until the word “House”, and then we would add the following paragraph: “And that the meeting of this Thursday, November 20 be the final meeting with witnesses on Bill C-9. Clause by clause on Bill C-9 will commence on Thursday November 27 and continue for as many meetings as required without interruption by any other subject. The deadline to submit amendments to Bill C-9 will be on Monday November 24 at 4 p.m.”

The amendment was also sent in French to the clerk.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

The clerk has confirmed that you all should have, in your inboxes, in both official languages, the text of the amendment.

Procedurally, we need unanimous consent to withdraw her existing amendment.

[An hon. member]

No.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

I'm not hearing that. That kills it for now, Ms. Lattanzio.

The debate resumes on the subamendment, and it's back to Mr. Lawton.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

When we first discussed Mr. Brock's motion on the need for a strong condemnation by this committee and by the House on child sexual exploitation and abuse materials, it was stemming from the Supreme Court decision that found mandatory minimums for child sexual abuse and exploitation material were cruel and unusual punishment. Since that meeting, I have had an outpouring of messages and emails and phone calls from constituents and people across the country who are very supportive of what we were trying to do with Mr. Brock's motion. This was then amended, and I proposed a subamendment. Central to this is that we believe this is not meant to be a sticky note that can be ignored and disregarded by the government. It is essential that the original intent of our motion, which is now living in my subamendment, that this be reported to the House, that that remains in place.

We had from the Liberal members a proposal that we could achieve this simply by sending a strongly worded letter to the Minister of Justice. I think the Minister of Justice has received many such strongly worded letters from constituents of his and from people across the country. He has chosen to disregard those. I do not believe that is adequate.

The importance of what we're trying to do is to give the House of Commons, all parliamentarians, the opportunity to weigh in on this discussion and to do what is the role and the right of all parliamentarians, which is to take the work of this small group that sits on the justice committee and, if we need to, have this debate in the House of Commons, especially since the government has not been forthright about what its plan is.

I realize that thanks in large part to procedural delays that have led us to only have 10 minutes to consider a subamendment, an amendment and the original motion we are not going to have time to deal with any of this in the meeting here.

I'm very mindful of the concerns raised earlier in this meeting by my colleague, Mr Fortin, about confusion surrounding what happens when a meeting is suspended and all of that. I will be, in a moment, moving to suspend this meeting and reconvene this discussion on Thursday at the next meeting of this committee, and to do so knowing full well that is what we are going to do.

The request I'll make before I move that motion, Mr. Chair, is that all members be given a proper amended notice in both official languages of what precisely will be happening on Thursday. If the goal is to proceed to witness testimony, I expect all members will receive adequate information about that. That is my request, and I think Mr. Fortin's concerns are entirely well founded and were preventable.

I would love to put this to a vote right now, but I do not believe, from what we've heard from my Liberal colleagues, that we will be able to dispatch all three motions right now. At this point, I'm moving to suspend so that we can reconvene and dispatch this properly on Thursday.

(Motion agreed to)