Debates of June 7th, 2021

Reference to Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

The question is on the motion. If a member of a recognized party present in the House wishes to request a recorded division or that the motion be adopted on division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I request that the motion be adopted on division.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

Is that agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

I declare the motion carried on division.

(Motion agreed to)

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-6, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (conversion therapy), be read the third time and passed.

Criminal Code

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

I wish to inform the House that because of the deferred recorded divisions, Government Orders will be extended by 16 minutes.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Mr. Speaker, if Parliament is seeking to ban something, then it is very important that Parliament clearly know and understand what it is banning. Parliament should be careful to precisely identify the things that it wishes to ban so not to accidentally, through sloppy legislative drafting or through the mal-intent of some and the fear of others, ban things that it does not officially intend to ban.

Whatever may be said about the government's intention in banning something, good intentions are clearly not enough. If it is banning a thing, then it must correctly identify the thing that it wishes to ban and ban that and that alone.

A legislature might wish, for example, to ban violence, but in the process accidentally also ban legitimate acts of self-defence. A legislature might legitimately wish to ban certain toxic substance, but should still be careful to consider the reasonableness of exceptions, considering all the cases in which those substances are used, such as research or secure technological applications.

If the government said that it was going to take tough measures to combat hard drugs, I would likely support those measures. However, if it miswrote the definition of hard drugs to include all potentially addictive substances, including caffeine or alcohol, then I would vote against those measures. It is not because I do not want to stop the use of hard drugs, but because I would object to the misuse of that term to apply to things which were not in fact hard drugs.

It should be a simple thing to say, in general, that when legislation is debated, the details matter, yet too often the rhetoric we hear from the other side invokes good intentions at the beginning and the end of the argument. When powerful people, in this case parliamentarians, do sloppy or imprecise work, even with good intentions, the results can be disastrous.

The government says that this is a bill to ban conversion therapy, so then what is conversion therapy? As I have said, if we are to ban it, then we must first know what it is and how it will be defined in law. This conversation, in general, has been frustrated by the fact that the government toggles back and forth between two very different definitions. One definition is what conversion therapy has actually meant for as long as the term has been used up until the tabling of the legislation. The other is the definition that has been used in the bill. These are two very different definitions. We are on the verge of banning the wrong thing, based on a bad definition.

Let us first look at the historical or traditional definition of what constitutes conversion therapy. About 100 years ago, the world saw the emergence of pseudoscientific practices which purported to change a person's sexual orientation. These involved the use of a medley of coercion, shaming, violence, physical and psychological abuse, electric shock, ice baths, hyper-sexualized heterosexual experiences, etc.

When this matter was first raised in the House, I spent some time reading, watching and listening to stories of people who had been victims of conversion therapy, and was absolutely horrified by the experiences that some people described. Conversion therapy is wrong and it should be banned, and we should be clear about why.

It is not illegal to have an opinion about when, where or how people should have sex. Indeed, it is quite normal for people to make choices about sexual behaviour and to, in certain cases, choose to limit their own sexual experiences based on whatever factors they think are important or to share their opinions about these matters with those around them. If there was something wrong with giving advice about when to have or not to have sex, we would be driving a whole industry of therapists and relationship advice columnists out of business.

However, conversion therapy is something totally different. We can all agree, I hope, that degrading people, making them feel less valuable or less human because of sexual or romantic feelings or behaviour is never acceptable. A belief in universal immutable human dignity is foundational to our way of life. Nobody's orientation or behaviour justifies subjecting he or she to violence, bullying or degradation.

If we were actually working to try to get consensus in this place, then that really could be the basis for an agreement. Conversion therapy, as it has been historically defined and understood, is a bad thing, is contrary to human dignity and should be banned. I think we actually all agree on that.

Notably, there has, for a number of years, been a conversion therapy ban in the municipality where I live. The definition of conversion therapy used in Strathcona County's bylaw on the subject is as follows:

“Conversion Therapy” means an attempt to change an individual’s sexual orientation, gender identity, gender preference, or gender expression; an attempt to convert an individual from one orientation, identity, preference, or expression to another. Conversion therapy includes various physical treatments, chemical or hormonal treatments, drug treatments, counselling, or behaviour modification through shaming or emotionally coercive or traumatic stimuli. Conversion therapy does not include clinical assessment and treatment by a medical professional that explores all aspects of an individual’s sexual orientation, gender identity, gender preference, or gender expression, or that explores an age- or developmental-level-appropriate use of gender transition to align an individual’s anatomical features with the individual’s gender identity.

That is a pretty good definition. Any time this sort of thing is put in criminal law, it probably requires an extra level of scrutiny beyond what could happen at the municipal level. However, I would generally credit our municipal leaders in getting it right. They were able to write a definition that identified conversion therapy as pertaining to a quasi-therapeutic context in which a change to sexual orientation or other characteristics is brought about through shaming, emotional coercion or traumatic stimuli.

The work of this one municipal council made up of nine people shows us that it is possible to get the definition right. That is where we should be in terms of definitions when we talk about banning conversion therapy.

However, Bill C-6 uses a false definition of conversion therapy. As amended at committee, with the amendments carrying the support of Liberal and NDP members only, it now defines conversion therapy as:

...a practice, treatment or service designed to change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual, to change a person’s gender identity or gender expression to cisgender or to repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual behaviour or non-cisgender gender expression. For greater certainty, this definition does not include a practice, treatment or service that relates to the exploration and development of an integrated personal identity without favouring any particular sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.

There are three important distinctions between the definition used by my local municipal council, the mayor of which, by the way, is a former Liberal candidate, which is well aligned with the proper and historic definition of conversion therapy, versus the one used by Bill C-6.

First, the definition in Bill C-6 does not refer to any pseudo-therapeutic context. There is no clear definition of what would or would not constitute a practice, treatment or service. As we pointed out at committee, a key principle of law is that the legislature does not speak in vain, so each of these three things would be understood to be different. A service is more than just a treatment and a practice is something other than a treatment or service. A thing could be any of these three things and still be considered conversion therapy according to Bill C-6, although not according to my local municipal bylaw.

Second, there is no reference to coercion, degrading treatment, traumatic stimuli, etc. being part of conversion therapy. Therefore, again, conversion therapy could simply be a word, a statement or a conversation according to Bill C-6, although not according to my municipal bylaw.

Third, and most important, the definition in Bill C-6 includes references to advice or therapy that seeks to modify sexual behaviour as opposed to sexual orientation, and this is a really radical departure. For the first time, it says that advice or statements that do not seek to change orientation or identity but simply advise about sexual behaviour could be considered conversion therapy as well.

Without limiting the definition of conversion to a pseudo-therapeutic context, a simple, informal conversation between two people could be deemed conversion therapy depending on what it is. For a conversation to cross the line into conversion therapy, according to the definition used in the bill, it would not be necessarily pushing a change in orientation, but simply to be suggesting some modification of sexual behaviour. This is now being called conversion therapy in this new definition invented by Bill C-6.

Therefore, let me make this concrete. Suppose that a close friend of mine comes to me for advice and confides that he is having some serious challenges in his relationship and those challenges have led him to be unfaithful to his partner. Suppose I encourage my friend to be faithful to his partner and stop cheating or suppose I encourage this friend to breakup with his partner and just focus on himself for a while. Now, if, in this hypothetical situation, my friend is straight, then I have broken no law. However, if my friend is gay, then my advice to him has violated the law, because by enjoining him to either reduce his number of sexual partners or to be single for a while, I have engaged in a practice that seeks to reduce non-heterosexual sexual behaviour. The definition of conversion therapy in Bill C-6 is so broad that it would apply precisely to that conversation.

We can hope that I would never be prosecuted for simply giving a gay friend relationship advice, but suppose that similar advice were given by a mentor or a counsellor perhaps to a young person. It is not, I imagine, uncommon for parents or mentors to advise young people in terms of partner reduction, fidelity in relationships, waiting before becoming sexually active, etc. As a young person, I certainly was a recipient of this sort of advice from time to time. However, since any of this advice if given to a gay person would constitute a practice seeking to reduce non-heterosexual sexual behaviour, it could run afoul of criminal law.

To summarize, we have two different operating definitions of conversion therapy: the historic and proper definition; and the false definition in Bill C-6, which extends the term “conversion therapy” to many ordinary conversations, many of which, as the one I described, are not the sort of thing that any reasonable person would want to prevent from occurring.

In light of this simple and very fixable problem, Canadians began to speak out, and my office launched a petition, all with a very simple message: fix the definition. Just fix the definition and then we can all support the bill.

Recently some members of other parties have tried to attack the motivation of those who are concerned about the definition. They have claimed that we are just looking for an excuse to vote against the bill. For those who are levelling this challenge, I would say, “Please, call our bluff”. If they think we are just looking for an excuse to vote against the bill, then why not accept the reasonable amendments we are putting forward and then see what happens?

I am generally loath to give the government political advice, but if the Liberals believe there are members of the House who actually want to oppose a conversion therapy ban, then they should endeavour to address at least the more obvious problems of the definition and thus leave those who allegedly wish to oppose the bill without excuse. Then those who have allegedly been using this excuse simply as an excuse would find themselves in a real bind if the government were to accept some reasonable amendments.

If the Liberals did so, of course, they would find in reality that the bill would pass unanimously. I think at this stage it is obvious that they know this, and that they would rather leave in the definitional problems that we have pointed out, so as to create a political wedge. Sadly, though, it is a political wedge that will potentially cause serious problems for the rights and freedoms of Canadians in terms of the freedom to simply share personal opinions about sex and relationships, even in private.

When this bill came to a vote at second reading, I made the decision to abstain. It was a difficult decision, because I generally do not like to abstain. I worked hard to get here and nobody can vote on behalf of the people of my riding in my stead.

However, there are cases where it is particularly challenging to cast a ballot at the second reading stage of a bill, because while third reading involves a vote on the final text of a bill, second reading is generally thought of as a vote on the principle or objectives of the bill. For those watching these proceedings who may be less familiar with the legislative process, every bill goes through second reading debate and a vote where the general principle of the bill is considered. After that, the bill is refined by committee and then it returns to the House of Commons for a debate and vote at the third and final reading where MPs must consider not only the intention of the bill, but also its substance and text.

Making a judgment at third reading is relatively straightforward, because one is considering the text of the bill in final form. However, making a judgment at second reading about the objective of the bill requires me to evaluate the government’s unspoken intention. Do I agree with what it seems to be trying to do in spite of the technical flaws in a piece of legislation, such that I will support it going forward for further consideration, or do I determine that the flaws in the bill are there by design and demonstrate a policy decision of the government to draft the bill in an overbroad way?

It is sometimes impossible to resolve the question of what the true intent of a bill is without being able to read minds. Ultimately, being unable to resolve this question of the government’s true intention, cognizant of the importance of banning conversion therapy but unconvinced that the flawed definition was simply a drafting error, I decided to abstain from the bill, hoping that I would have an opportunity to vote for it at third reading after committee study.

I had hoped for the best. I had hoped the professions at second reading of a desire to get this right and clear up any ambiguities would turn out to be sincere. When this bill went to committee, it attracted significant public attention and interest, so much so that the committee received close to 300 written briefs from various stakeholders and concerned members of the public. Liberals on the justice committee sadly made a mockery of the committee process by refusing to even allow enough time to read those briefs, refusing to incorporate reasonable concerns and table-dropping amendments to actually make the problems with the definition even worse.

At that stage, where various amendments were considered, Conservative members put forward reasonable amendments that sought to fix the definition. These were opposed by the Liberals and the NDP, who, in the process, also tipped their hand about their true intentions. I noted in particular the comments of the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore in response to one of the reasoned Conservative amendments.

Conservatives proposed an amendment taking language directly from the Department of Justice website, clarifying that the definition of conversion therapy would not apply “to the expression of views on sexual orientation, sexual feelings or gender identity, such as where teachers, school counsellors, pastoral counsellors, faith leaders, doctors, mental health professionals, friends or family members provide support to persons struggling with their sexual orientation, sexual feelings or gender identity”. This amendment would have taken a big step to addressing the problems in the definition, but when this amendment was put forward, the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore said, “I'm concerned that this amendment would defeat the purpose of the bill."

Again, during the final stage of the committee study, when Conservatives proposed an amendment that simply sought to clarify in the definition that conversion therapy would not apply “to the expression of views on sexual orientation, sexual feelings or gender identity,” a Liberal member admitted that the adoption of this amendment would defeat the purpose of the bill.

I thought that the purpose of the bill was to ban conversion therapy, not to restrict the expression of personal views on issues involving sexuality. However, this was a clear admission from the government side that restriction on the expression of views is at least part of the purpose of this bill.

I want to salute the hard work of Conservative members on the justice committee, but also to recognize the member for Rivière-du-Nord, the Bloc member on the committee. I suspect that there are many issues on which he and I will disagree, but I know that he took his role on the committee to study and improve the legislation very seriously.

It was the member for Rivière-du-Nord who noted at the beginning of clause-by-clause consideration that the committee had received hundreds of briefs from members of the public that had only been translated and distributed the day before. He noted that it would have shown a necessary level of respect for the public who had submitted these briefs to delay clause-by-clause for one meeting, allowing members to review the briefs and incorporate insights contained therein. Conservatives supported this Bloc member’s motion to allow time for members to review the briefs that had been submitted. This motion was defeated by the Liberals and the NDP, who insisted on proceeding with clause-by-clause without reviewing the briefs.

Ironically, after this bill was considered that day at the justice committee and referred to the House, the government has not even scheduled the bill for a full day of debate until last week, more than five months after its adoption by committee. Therefore, no time would have been lost at all by delaying the clause-by-clause so as to allow members to consider the input from the public, as suggested by the member for Rivière-du-Nord.

The fact is that government voted against this proposal because it did not want to hear the constructive suggestions put forward by the hundreds of Canadians and Canadian organizations that had taken the time to submit briefs and information to the committee. After defeating this Bloc motion, the government worked with the NDP, table-dropping an amendment that significantly worsened the definition, from the perspective of clarity.

The amendment the Liberals put forward without prior notice, added in the idea that conversation therapy includes an effort to reduce non-cisgender gender expression. What would constitute non-cisgender gender expression? Let me quote directly from the committee intervention of the member for Rivière-du-Nord at committee. He said—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Just a moment, I have a point of order.

The hon. member for Drummond.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Madam Speaker, I wish to intervene because we often talk about how much we value the work of our interpreters.

If my colleague could speak a little slower, it would give the interpreters a chance to do their job more easily and perhaps a little more accurately. That would make it easier for us to follow our colleague's speech.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

It is very important for us to have interpretation. I must therefore support the request that was just made and ask the hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan to speak more slowly, because it is very important for the interpreters.

I would like to take this opportunity to remind all members who have their speech written up to send a copy to the interpreters. This helps them follow what is said more closely.

The hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, on the same point of order. I appreciate the point. I wonder if you can tell me how much time I have left because that will allow me to calibrate how fast I need to speak, but I do want to share with you it is a good point of advice to share the text with the interpreters and I have done that in this case.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The hon. member has four and a half minutes. The time has stopped for the point of order. I do want to advise the member that I understand it is not just about the interpretation; it is very difficult for even the viewers to listen if the hon. member is talking too quickly. If it could be at a good pace, but not so quick that people cannot follow, that would be important. I am sure that the hon. member wants to make sure that everybody is able to hear and understand what he is saying.

The hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the feedback and will now continue with my speech.

I was quoting from the member for Rivière-du-Nord with respect to the addition of the reference to non-cisgender gender expression. He said:

The Department of Justice website states that “gender expression is the way in which people publicly present their gender. It is the presentation of gender through such aspects as dress, hair [,etc]...” If I go back to the text defining conversion therapy, I understand that the bill would prohibit any practices, treatments or services designed to repress that.

Here is the example that comes to my mind. Let's say that, in the morning before going to school, an eight-year-old boy decides to wear a dress. His mother might say yes, or she might say no. Either way, if we use that definition, it would be a criminal offence for a mother to tell her son that she does not want him to wear a dress and to force him to wear pants. That's the definition we are about to adopt, and I see a problem with it.

The same member said later:

I confess that, as a parent, I have told my daughter that she should not wear so much make-up. From what I understand, by engaging in that practice—and I do feel it can be considered a practice—I would have committed a criminal offence. I'm sure no one wants that.

Despite the serious concerns raised about this further expansion and confusion of this definition, this amendment on gender expression passed the committee by a vote of six to five.

The House has now received back from the committee a bill that is substantially worse than the one it was sent. This is because now it more clearly says any treatment, practice or service, which could be anything at all that involves an effort to reduce non-heterosexual, sexual behaviour or non-cisgender gender expression, so everything from advice about sexual and romantic activities to conversations about dress and make-up, could now very easily constitute a violation of criminal law.

The definition could have easily been fixed, but I think it was for political reasons the government chose not to, because if it fixed the definition then this bill would have had the unanimous support of the House, which would have deprived the government of the opportunity to use this issue to drive a political wedge.

At the end of the day, though, regardless of anyone's evaluation of the government's intention or political strategy here, we are now at third reading and are voting on the final text of the bill. We are not voting on aspirations or intentions, or on a response to conversion therapy as the term was historically defined. We are voting on a piece of legislation that would put many kinds of private conversations, counselling or advice about sex, relationships and anything captured by gender expression under Criminal Code scrutiny. This is fundamentally unacceptable in a free society.

Bill C-6, in its final form, is a bad bill. I will be voting against it and I encourage my colleagues to do likewise. Canadians are rightly disappointed by the politics being played by the Liberals by failing to work constructively with other parties to fix the flaws in the bill. For them, this is now clearly about trying to drive a political contrast rather than trying to get the bill right. The implications of that choice are the freedom of all Canadians to have conversations about sex and relationships being impaired if this bill passes. Such conversations are very different from conversion therapy but they are swept into it by this definition, as written.

We hear repeatedly from government members on effort to set up this false choice in terms of the debate. They try to tell us that we either have to pass this bill in its current form, yes criminalizing conversion therapy but also sweeping up all kinds of other things that have nothing to do with conversion therapy, or we do not pass it and we do not ban conversion therapy.

This is a false choice. This is a false choice of the government's own making. There is an alternative, which is the alternative Conservatives and other members have been calling for from the beginning of this conversation, which is for a clear ban on conversion therapy, a fixed definition and clarity that excludes the private conversations, the conversations that happen where individuals share their opinions about sexual behaviour.

We can have clear exclusions in line with the reasonable amendments proposed at committee and then we can get this done and passed and moving forward quickly. Everybody should want to see that happen, but the government is creating a false choice for political reasons. Let us reject that false choice. Let us fix the definition. I would submit there is still time. There is still time in this Parliament for us to work collaboratively across party lines to fix the definition and pass a clear, comprehensive conversion therapy ban that does not limit the rights and freedoms of people to have conversations about sexual behaviour.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, I think, at least in my opinion, the majority of those who are against a ban on conversion therapy are most likely people who think one's sexual identity is a choice. I am just curious if this member can comment on how he views the situation. Does he believe somebody is born a certain way or does he believe their sexual identity is a choice they make in life?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I am very happy to say that I believe it is not a choice to have that identity. I do not know from personal experience, but this is what people who are friends of mine have told me and I certainly believe the things they share.

I am a bit reluctant to indulge the member for Kingston and the Islands, though, in going down this road of asking members “gotcha” questions about their personal views on these kinds of things. I answered the question. I was willing to answer the question, but I would encourage the member to take a step back from trying to look for those “gotcha” opportunities and instead look at the text of the bill. He has a responsibility not just to be the man who sits in the House and parrots government talking points but to actually look at the legislation that he is going to be voting on and to consider its substance and its impact. I would encourage him to do that. I would encourage him to take on that role and dig into the text of the bill and reflect on whether he would be willing to support some of the reasonable amendments that Conservatives and others have been talking about to fix the definition, work on a consensus and move forward on this.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Madam Speaker, I have a very simple question.

First, it bothers me that we are still debating certain details, when it is all very clear. We have spoken about these things for hours and have demonstrated the merits of the bill. To my mind, members are splitting hairs. Consultations have been held. We have reached this stage, and the majority are in agreement. This is urgent, because people are wondering why this bill has not yet passed.

I would like to know if my colleague has seen the 2018 film Boy Erased, which is about conversion therapy, the subject of the bill. If he has not, does he think he will watch it?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I have not had the opportunity to see the film that the member referred to. I appreciate the recommendation and, based on her recommendation, I will be happy to endeavour to access it and watch it. I gather the implication is that it shares the story of a person who has been through conversion therapy.

I do want to share with the member that, as I said in my speech, when this topic initially came up I made some efforts to look at and read other stories of people who had been victims of conversion therapy. I recall one story of a young woman who was forced to walk around with stones in a backpack. There were other aspects of the story as well that I found particularly affecting, and it formed my conviction that we need to ban conversion therapy. I believe that and I have said it over and over again. That is why I have asked the government to give us a bill that fixes these details so that we can all support it.

The member raised some questions about looking at details. I will say that her Bloc colleague on committee raised some of these questions about details. I quoted extensively from what I thought was the very good work of the Bloc MP. I understand the political impact on the Bloc, perhaps, when the government tries to create this false choice, but let us not accept that false choice. Let us work to fix the bill. Let us work on constructive amendments so that we can ban conversion therapy and address the problems with the definition.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Madam Speaker, my colleague mentioned that, as a result of the discussion around Bill C-6, he was asked about fixing the definition and that there was a web page put up.

Could he comment on what the reaction was from other members of the community across Canada?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is very interesting to have conversations on this issue with people who are maybe from different kinds of political backgrounds. I recall one conversation I had with a constituent who phoned me upon hearing that I had concerns about Bill C-6. Initially she was very worried about that. We had a conversation for close to half an hour. At the end of that she said, “What you're saying is perfectly reasonable. Why doesn't the government just fix the definition?” I said, “I hope they do”.

This did not need to be an issue on which people disagree. It still does not need to be an issue on which people disagree. There are people all over the spectrum politically who have different assumptions, but we can all come together and ban conversion therapy if we fix the definition and address some of these technical details that are important and need to be addressed. At that point, we can all move forward together.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Madam Speaker, I cannot let another speech that grossly misrepresents Bill C-6 go by without commenting.

The speech by the hon. member does so in two ways. First, it equates conversations with practice, treatment or service. There is no reason for such an equation. There is no case in law that he could cite in which a conversation is treated as a practice, treatment or service.

The second way it misrepresents the definition in the bill is that it tries to create a division between someone's sexual orientation or gender identity and the way they live their lives: the way they behave. If the member would like to talk to clinicians, they can talk to him about how repression of sexual orientation and repression of gender identity have been fundamental parts of conversion therapy over time.

This really is a misrepresentation of the bill. I will not speculate on the member's motives.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, although we are clearly not going to agree on this issue, I appreciate the opportunity to work with the member on other issues, including the situation in Tibet.

I would disagree with his interpretation of the legislation. He rightly points out that the legislation refers to a treatment, practice or service. In particular, it is the word “practice”, undefined previously in the Criminal Code, that raises significant questions. As was pointed out at committee by the Bloc member, the principle in law is that the legislature does not speak in vain. When we say a treatment, practice or service, we can imply that a practice is something that is not a treatment or a service, and “practice” is not defined.

To his comments about the distinction between identity and behaviour, I will simply say that there are cases in which a person might be advised, such as when a parent advises a teenager, about aspects of their sexual behaviour not in a way that denies their identity or tries to get them to change their identity, but that says there are certain aspects of the teenager's behaviour they should moderate in some way. I would submit that giving advice to a young person about some aspects of sexual behaviour is very different from telling someone fundamentally that their identity is wrong. These are two very different things, and a distinction has to be made.

[Derek Sloan, Independent, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Madam Speaker, I will ask the member another question regarding the definition. I remember watching some of the committee proceedings and hearing some experts say they were afraid that affirmation-only care for transgender youth would be promoted through this bill. I did some research and I know that transgender identification is rising very quickly. Some countries, such the U.K., are concerned about it. It has been noted in the U.K. that over a seven-year period, there has been a 4,000% increase in this identification. In fact, the U.K.'s minister for women and equalities is calling for a study of the root causes of this surge. She suspects the influence of social media and the teaching of transgender philosophy in the educational system may have something to do with it.

Why does this bill, in the definition, not address this rise? In fact it may create a chilling effect on counselling professionals who are trying to address this issue.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I hesitate to weigh in on some of the details the member has raised because they are ones that I cannot confirm. I am not doubting his sincerity. Some of the numbers and the situations he shared with regard to other countries are genuinely not things I am prepared to comment on, specifically in terms of their substance.

I will say that there is a difference between someone having an opinion that I might disagree with or find reprehensible, and saying that person should be prosecuted criminally for having that opinion. In the way the definition is phrased, with its lack of clarity around what constitutes a practice, the inclusion of any discussion of reducing sexual behaviour, which is a thing that people have conversations about, could become a question of a criminal response. We should ban conversion therapy, properly defined, and we can do that by fixing the definition.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The hon. House Leader of the Official Opposition on a point of order.