Evidence of meeting #13 for Justice and Human Rights in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was c-9.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Marc Miller
Hello, everyone. I call this meeting to order.
Welcome to meeting number 13 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.
Pursuant to the order of reference of October 1, 2025, the committee is meeting to proceed to the clause-by-clause study of Bill C-9, an act to amend the Criminal Code with regard to hate propaganda, hate crime and access to religious or cultural places.
Conservative
Anna Roberts Conservative King—Vaughan, ON
There's no translation. I'm sorry.
I'm on English, but it's coming through in French.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Marc Miller
Okay. Maybe someone can help Anna out.
Okay, it works now.
Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.
I would like to inform the members that the sound tests were done and the results were conclusive.
I would like to ask all in‑person participants to consult the guidelines written on the cards on the table. These measures are in place to prevent audio feedback incidents and acoustic shock and to protect the health and safety of all participants, including the interpreters. You'll also notice a QR code on the cards, which links to a short awareness video.
I have a few notes for the witnesses and members. Please wait until I recognize you by name before speaking. For those participating by video conference, click on the microphone icon to activate your mic, and please mute yourself when you're not speaking. For those on Zoom, at the bottom of your screen, you can select the appropriate channel: floor, English or French. For those in the room, you can use the earpiece and select the desired channel.
I remind you that all comments should be addressed through the chair. I will enforce that a little more rigorously during this clause-by-clause debate.
For members in the room, if you wish to speak, please raise your hand. For members on Zoom, please use the “raise hand” function.
The clerk and I will manage the speaking order to the best of our ability. We appreciate your patience and understanding in this regard.
I'm going to go over this slowly, in detail, because for some, this is their first clause-by-clause consideration of a bill.
Conservative
Liberal
Conservative
Andrew Lawton Conservative Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON
It's just a housekeeping note. I just thought it would be better to dispatch with it before the instructions start. If you'd prefer to continue, that's fine.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Marc Miller
Okay.
I'd like to provide members of the committee with a few comments on how committees proceed with the clause-by-clause consideration of a bill. As the name indicates, this is an examination of all clauses in the order in which they appear in a bill. I'll call each clause successively. Each clause is subject to debate and a vote. If there are amendments to the clause in question, I will recognize the member proposing the amendment, who may explain it. The amendment will then be open for debate. When no further members wish to intervene, the amendment will be voted on. Amendments will be considered in the order in which they appear in the package that each member received from the clerk.
In addition to having to be properly drafted in a legal sense, amendments must also be procedurally admissible. The chair may be called upon to rule the amendments inadmissible if they go against the principle of the bill or go beyond the scope of the bill—both of which were adopted by the House when it agreed to the bill at second reading—or if they offend the financial prerogative of the Crown.
During the debate on an amendment, members are permitted to move subamendments. Only one subamendment may be considered at a time, and that subamendment cannot itself be amended.
Once every clause has been voted on, the committee will vote on the title and the bill itself. An order to reprint the bill may be required if amendments are adopted, so that the House may have a proper copy to use at report stage.
I do thank the members for their attention, and I wish everyone a productive clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-9.
Before I turn to Mr. Lawton, I'll just briefly introduce the folks from the Department of Justice who are here today.
We have Chantele Ramcharan, deputy director general and general counsel, criminal law policy section. We also have Joanna Wells, senior counsel with the criminal law policy section. Also with us is Marianne Breese, counsel from the criminal law policy section as well.
If there are no technical questions, I'll open the floor to remarks before going on to clause-by-clause.
Mr. Lawton.
Conservative
Andrew Lawton Conservative Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON
Thank you very much, Chair.
Thank you for recognizing me before we get into the first clause, because there is a significant issue right now in that this committee was supposed to have had six hours of witness testimony from witnesses who had a range of concerns about a variety of issues, from both the political left and the political right. There have been people raising civil liberties concerns, people raising religious freedom concerns and people raising concerns about how this would affect enforcement of the law.
What was interesting in all of this is that we should have had five full meetings. We had deliberately decided as a committee to extend the length of our meetings to three hours each. The reason for that was so that we could get through all of what we needed to get through to have a proper, fulsome and holistic understanding of this bill before we got to the point we are at now.
I will remind members and all invested in this where we are now. At the previous meeting of this committee, the Liberal members—I'm very grateful—whether by incompetence or cross-partisanship, supported a Conservative motion. Then, Chair, you suspended the meeting to deal with this and then abruptly ended the meeting two hours early.
We were told that we had a very short window of time to produce amendments for this. We had to rush this process, understanding that all amendments had to be written by legislative drafters, who do not work weekends. I'm very grateful that we had a very committed, dedicated set of drafters to help with our amendments. We did as good a job as we could, but the reason we were shortchanged on that crucial time to deal with Bill C-9 when we were supposed to is that Liberal members of Parliament on this committee were filibustering, because they couldn't just accept and support a very basic, very clean motion from Conservatives to condemn heinous sexual abuse of children and call for a reinstatement of mandatory minimum sentences. That was the motion.
This took three meetings. It took almost nine hours of this committee's time, and it showed that the Liberals were so unwilling to make a simple condemnation of lenient sentences and judicial leniency for heinous child abusers that they were prepared to blow up the time that we desperately needed for Bill C-9.
This is important because the motion I'll be introducing shortly realigns and resets this committee's priorities to what members have previously agreed to.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
On a point of order, Mr. Chair, the speaker is on a point of order. He can't introduce a motion.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
You said “point of order” when he told you he was going to recognize you.
Conservative
Andrew Lawton Conservative Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON
It was a point of order at the initial interjection. Now I have the floor.
Liberal
Conservative
Andrew Lawton Conservative Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON
I said “housekeeping”, and I was granted the floor, but I appreciate the effort.
Conservative
Andrew Lawton Conservative Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON
Yes, I will be, but I think it's important to set the stage for why we are moving what we're moving.
The motion that I will be tabling resets the committee priorities. It ensures that we are, first and foremost, giving the study of bail the priority that it deserves. This is also inclusive of our desire to prioritize the study of Bill C-14.
My Liberal colleagues have said that they are very keen to see Bill C-14 passed. I suspect that clause-by-clause on Bill C-9 is going to take a very long period of time, simply because we have been so shortchanged on hearing witness testimony. We don't have the adequate information we need. We will be prioritizing the study of Bill C-14. There is a Bloc Québécois study on judicial appointments that the committee has also agreed to proceed with. I think this is a very important one as well. We believe there needs to be concurrence on this.
I go back to the very beginning of Bill C-9, when we were graced with the presence of the Minister of Justice, Sean Fraser, and department officials. I asked a very simple question, which was, when did work on Bill C-9 by the department begin relative to work on Bill C-14? As in, when did the government decide to begin its work on changing the definition of hate versus cracking down on serious repeat violent offenders? There was no clear answer.
The government chose to put Bill C-9 forward. The government chose to make criminalizing what people say the priority. This is incredibly concerning. The Minister of Justice confirmed in his testimony before this committee that it will affect what people say online. The lower threshold of what constitutes hate means that we will see U.K.-style social media policing in Canada.
I'm also very aware of the fact that, as this committee has undergone its work on Bill C-9—work that was shortchanged by the Liberal members' desire not to take a strong position against sexual deviance and perverts, inexplicably—we heard a line of questioning from our colleague from the Bloc Québécois that seemed to be indicating support for removing the religious defence that is right now in section 319 of the Criminal Code. Also—
Liberal
Liberal
Patricia Lattanzio Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
It's becoming more apparent, Mr. Chair, that the will of the Conservatives is not to move to a clause-by-clause study today on Bill C-9. Interjecting and stating a testimony or a question being brought forward by a member on Bill C-9 could very well be dealt with as we move to the clause-by-clause study. If the objective today is to stall the study of clause-by-clause, I would invite the member to state so.
Conservative
Andrew Lawton Conservative Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON
I said very clearly, Mr. Chair, that the intention is to reset this committee's efforts. I will say candidly that I do not believe we are ready for clause-by-clause. It was an abrupt adjournment to our previous meeting, with an arbitrarily imposed deadline for amendments that forced us into this, when we should have six more hours of testimony. My intention—
Liberal
Conservative
Liberal
Patricia Lattanzio Liberal Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC
Mr. Chair, again, today was scheduled for a clause-by-clause study of Bill C-9. May I remind this committee that two meetings were not dedicated to the study because of the obstruction on the part of Conservatives? It is quite clear that the objective today is not to move to the clause-by-clause study.
I would implore my colleague to make his statements very quickly and to move very swiftly, because we are very anxious to move on with our work on clause-by-clause.
Liberal