Mr. Speaker, private member's bill C-245 covers three extremely important points.
The first has to do with the transmission of child pornography through the Internet or electronic mail. The second has to do with sexual assault on a child, and the third has to do with the confinement of a child by a parent or ward. These are three extremely important points. As the member who introduced the bill said earlier, these are three things that cannot be tolerated in a free and democratic society such as ours.
I am going to examine the bill clause by clause, because there are only three of them. The first clause deals with the definition of publication per se. The issue raised by the first clause of the bill is a very special one. What is the role of the lawmaker with respect to cyberspace? Although clause 1 of the bill looks specifically at the publication of child pornography, it raises the more general issue of governments' responsibility with respect to management of the Internet.
Each of us has his or her own perception of cyberspace. Some people positively worship the Internet. Internet surfers consider this virtual space to be one of the great achievements of the 20th century. Others fear the Internet. This electronic network seems to interfere with the respect of certain principles our community holds dear.
If the Internet is seen as a source of all knowledge, it is also the favourite realm of individuals with a warped view of the world, who spend their time using it to distribute illegal material. Child pornography is a perfect example. The following question therefore arises: What can we as lawmakers do to stop this unhealthy use of the Internet?
Whether to limit the distribution of hate propaganda, discriminatory material or child pornography, various initiatives have already been suggested.
In the United States, the suppression of child pornography focuses on protecting the children that are its subjects. In Canada, while not dealing specifically with publication on the Internet, section 163(1) of the Criminal Code defines child pornography in broader terms. Child pornography is condemned not just because of its direct impact on the young people who are its subjects, but also in order to eliminate its impact on pedophiles and various criminals of this sort who use these media.
Nonetheless, as the Université de Montréal authors of a work entitled Droit du cyberespace pointed out, the regulation of violence on information highways must be consistent with the imperatives of freedom of expression. Concerns about the circulation of violent material arise primarily from the fear that exposure to this kind of material trivializes the real phenomenon of violence or encourages people to resort to violence. To this general concern is naturally added the concern to protect children.
Striking a balance between freedom of expression and a justified control of material harmful to society is not easy. For example, in 1996, there was an American bill, the Decency Act, which was intended to criminalize the distribution of pornographic material, but it was declared unconstitutional.
Considering how difficult it is to establish the identity of a user, the effect of that legislation was to restrict the freedom of expression of the distributors on the one hand, but also the right of adult users to receive information on the other hand.
This clause does not solve all of the problems relating to use of the Internet, and others, but it does engage a debate, which makes us reflect as lawmakers. The Bloc Quebecois is in favour of this more thorough analysis.
Clause 2 addresses sexual assault against children. There is most certainly nothing more abhorrent than sex crimes involving children. Children are the incarnation of everything that is most fragile in our society. When someone decides to sully the innocence of our young people, society as a whole suffers. Children are arguably our most precious resource.
How, then, can such acts not be vigorously denounced? How can we understand someone stooping so low as to commit such monstrous acts? A lawmaker cannot remain indifferent to offences of this nature.
The bill of the hon. member for Oxford is intended to offer some elements of a response to these questions. Clause 2 of the bill provides for special sentencing of those found guilty of sexually assaulting children.
This bill would add to section 271 of the Criminal Code, which pertains to sexual offences, and include in it a special regime for cases when children are the victims. The sentence proposed is harsh: imprisonment for life. This sentence is sought when the crime is particularly heinous, but that is what he are dealing with in cases of sexual assault of children.
Nevertheless, while the bill is severe, the member proposes certain application criteria that would require the courts to evaluate certain characteristics of the victim. Clause 2 thus provides that imprisonment for life would apply when the child involved is under the age of eight years or under the age of fourteen years and in the trust of or dependent on the offender.
Thus the terms provided in section 271(1.1) b) would provide a defence for the accused if it could be proven that the victim aged between 8 and 14 years was not in a in the trust of, under the authority of, or in a relationship of dependency on, the offender.
It should be pointed out that the Criminal Code currently provides a defence that the offender charged under section 271 could use. Section 150(1) of the Criminal Code provides that a person accused under section 271 may use consent as a defence, if the victim is between 12 and 14 and the aggressor is all of the following: aged 12 or older but less than 16; less then two years older than the victim and not someone with whom the victim is in a relationship of dependency.
The problem is that the bill makes no mention of section 150(1). While this silence does not affect the merits of the bill, that is, the application of a more severe sentence in the case of the sexual assault of children, the fact that it does not mention the terms of section 150(1) would have the effect of proposing two different defences for a single offence.
Once again, we agree with the content, with the objective of clause 2, but I believe it lacks some refinement to really achieve the intended objective.
Clause 3 deals with the confinement of a child or ward. It proposes an addition to section 279 of the Criminal Code to introduce more severe sentences when the offence of confinement or imprisonment involves children.
Like sexual assault, this offence is most intolerable, since it takes advantage of children's weakness. Once again, this situation must be denounced and the bill seems to meet that need.
As I have said, this private member's bill addresses three extremely important points, since situations or acts involving children are involved.
However, as always, we in the Bloc Quebecois do not necessarily always have a visceral reaction in such cases. I believe that an analysis that is as cold and objective as possible of these clauses is necessary if we are to attain the objective of amending the Criminal Code in such a way as to truly have the desired impact.
The goal is to protect our young people, the most important thing in our country. I do not believe anyone in this House could be against this bill. I do, however, think that it merits more study in order to improve its clauses and its approaches to the objective sought.