Evidence of meeting #23 for Public Safety and National Security in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was extremism.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jim Carr
Congratulations. You look like you're getting some sleep. I don't know why that is, but don't worry, you'll have a chance to lose it.
For now and for the next five minutes, you have the floor for questions.
Congratulations on behalf of all of us.
12:45 p.m.
Vancouver Granville, Lib.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. It's a pleasure to be back with everybody.
I want to thank the witnesses for the testimony this morning and my colleagues for allowing me to come back for a little bit today.
I just want to ask Mr. Hashim a few questions. Thank you very much for your testimony, sir.
I just want to clarify, because there has been a lot of conversation about how government-funded groups do research or work in the world of IMVE. I want to confirm that your organizations has been funded by governments of all political stripes—Conservative and Liberal—over the last number of years. Is that correct?
12:45 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
That's correct. We've been in existence since 1996 as a federal Crown corporation.
12:45 p.m.
Vancouver Granville, Lib.
You are non-partisan and you do the work you believe is in the best interests of Canadians in dealing with these issues. Is that correct?
12:45 p.m.
Vancouver Granville, Lib.
A lot of folks have asked questions. There's a lot of whataboutism in these conversations about IMVE and racism, and “fine people on both sides” types of arguments.
What would you say about the ideologically motivated violent extremism or hate that you see from the left? Do you see a lot of that in the 200,000 cases a year that you see?
12:45 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
The number I was quoting was from Statistics Canada, and I'm not sure whether they break it down between left or right. I think the threat for extremism comes from many different places.
However, when we are briefed by the RCMP in terms of some of the focus that they have, right-wing extremism and white supremacist groups definitely are at the top of that list. I'm not too sure about the numbers or proportion around left or right, but in terms of threat assessments, I understand those are the highest.
12:50 p.m.
Vancouver Granville, Lib.
Do you think that the RCMP would have any reason to conflate one side over the other?
12:50 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
I think you would have to ask the RCMP that.
12:50 p.m.
Vancouver Granville, Lib.
Just so I'm clear, from the work that you see, the vast majority that you've described comes from the far right. Is that correct?
12:50 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
From the work that we're seeing, yes.
12:50 p.m.
Vancouver Granville, Lib.
Let's then talk about the victims. You mentioned that the victims are a very important part of this.
Could you reiterate for us who the victims are of this ideologically motivated violent extremism? Could you take a quick second to describe that to us again?
12:50 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
To be honest, I think that a lot of the conversation we're having right now is a bit backwards. We hear a lot from academics. We hear a lot from law enforcement. However, the victims are not at the centre of this conversation.
Twenty years ago, I used to work for Mothers Against Drunk Driving, and I could see how when you centre victims' voices, that integration supports not only the social services sector but the policing environment and the justice system. The level of intelligence that the system gains as a whole by centring the voices of victims is pivotally important.
Who do we see as victims? As I said, in terms of online hate, we've seen women, women of colour and particularly young people, as those who are being targeted the most, but hate is an evolving target. Sometimes you see Muslims. Sometimes you see members of the Jewish community. The highest numbers have typically been Black and indigenous communities, and now you see anti-Asian racism rising in very high levels. I think it evolves over time.
12:50 p.m.
Vancouver Granville, Lib.
With that, then, I think it would be great for all of us, as we try to think about how to improve the situation, to focus on victims.
How do we, as folks in the political conversation, depoliticize this a bit to really focus on and acknowledge that this is a very real problem? What should we be doing, in your view—from the work that you do—to be leaning into trying to address this problem head-on?
Could you, in a nutshell, describe what we could do, where we could invest, what would help to solve this problem once and for all, so that we can get to the type of society that allows everyone to feel as though they can live their best self, their most authentic self, without worrying about these types of challenges?
12:50 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
I think we need to stop saying to some people that we believe you and to others that we don't. I think what we need to do is focus strictly on victims and hear what their perspectives are and to actually believe them. That doesn't come from just saying I believe you or I don't believe you. I think we create a system to support victims.
We've seen really good examples across the world, particularly in Germany, which are now being exported to the OECD. Understandably, their context is significantly different. However, I think there are ways that we can reframe our social services infrastructure to support victims of hate. That could have tangible impacts, not only in determining who a victim is, what a victim feels, what the supports need to be, but in terms of having the system as a whole acknowledge the wrong of what is happening.
I see a number of components to this. Mr. Aziz pointed towards the sensitive and respectful treatment of hate crime victims. There's a real need to be able to understand that. If you want people to go to the police to report it, there needs to be a specialist to address hate crimes. I think that victim support is a key and pivotal portion of that response.
12:50 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jim Carr
Thank you very much.
I would now invite Ms. Larouche to use her two and a half minutes.
Whenever you're ready, please go ahead.
12:50 p.m.
Bloc
Andréanne Larouche Bloc Shefford, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I too congratulate my colleague, who is now the parent of a three-week-old baby. I have a three-month-old. We could talk about that and the exhaustion that comes with a new child. Again, congratulations.
I would like to come back to some of what you said, Mr. Hashim.
You saw a gap between the urban environment and what happens in rural communities. Do you have any more recommendations for us to bridge that gap between cities and more rural areas?
12:50 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
Was that to me or Mr. Aziz?
12:50 p.m.
Bloc
Andréanne Larouche Bloc Shefford, QC
Yes, Mr. Hashim, I'd like to know if you have a recommendation.
Mr. Aziz could answer the question as well.
12:50 p.m.
Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation
I think there's a real divide. To be frank, when we look at police forces who are responding to hate, because police forces in urban areas have more exposure to racialized communities and have more racialized police officers, their ability to understand the impact of what's happening is typically better than it is for those in rural areas.
I can give you the example of a rural police agency where an individual was targeted and was murdered. The police within 24 hours said it wasn't a hate crime. They then went back to say, after listening to the community, that they were going to investigate it as a potential hate crime, but the harm was already done in terms of what the community was told in haste, which was “Look, yes, one person was targeted, and yes, one person was killed, but we don't think it was hateful.” That had real repercussions on that community.
In terms of responses from rural versus urban, I think the urban ones are more developed. Part of the work we're doing with our task force is to create national standards around investigations and help those rural agencies that don't have the resources or hate crimes units. I will give you the example of London, Ontario, where four people were murdered. They today have a one-person hate crime unit. I'm not even sure if that job has been filled yet.
There's a huge divide across Canada in terms of rural and urban responses to hate. I think creating national standards and being able to support the small local police jurisdictions is an important intervention that hopefully our work will contribute towards.
12:55 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jim Carr
Thank you very much.
Mr. MacGregor, we have two and a half minutes before the top of the hour, and that's how much time you have.
You will take us home today. It's all yours.
12:55 p.m.
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
I'm taking us all home. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I will direct my last question to you, Dr. Brisson-Boivin. You talked about how it's really important for websites or apps or social media platforms to have those clear and easy-to-use tools for reporting unacceptable behaviour.
We have also seen examples of where, I remember, during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, there was a lot of misinformation being spread about the nature of the pandemic, its source and whether or not it was even a serious pandemic. Particularly on Facebook, I remember, whenever COVID-19 was mentioned, a little disclaimer was posted at the bottom of each post that would direct people to factual information.
Can you comment a little bit on that specific example? Do we need to have similar ones here, for example, if a post is alluding to white supremacy or is anti-Semitic in nature or something? Do we need to have little educational tools that point people to a verified true source on those things? Could you perhaps expand on that point, please?
12:55 p.m.
Director of Research, MediaSmarts
Thank you very much for the question. I will try to keep my comment brief.
Yes, when we think about technological responses, platforms tend to respond in terms of affordances, which is exactly what you mentioned, design fixes around, for example, this is labelled a piece of misinformation. We could entertain the idea of labelling something hateful or against community standards. I think that's a good starting point. However, we need to ask ourselves this: What then?
What happens when we say to a person that this is a piece of misinformation or hateful content? The user needs to then have other skills and tools to be able to, for example, find the original source of the piece of misinformation to feel confident in being able to verify. Similarly, with online hate, what then? What happens after we have flagged for them that this is a piece of hateful content?
From our perspective, again, those are helpful, but they aren't the end of the story. I think we need other tools and critical thinking skills that will allow people to verify and authenticate information and/or respond to online hate.