Mr. Speaker, I rise today to present a number of petitions from hundreds of Canadians across Canada, including my own constituents.
In the first petition, the petitioners are concerned about the accessibility and impact of violent and degrading sexually explicit material online and the impacts on public health, especially on the well-being of women and girls. The petitioners recognize that we cannot say that we believe in preventing sexual violence toward women while allowing pornography companies to freely expose our children to violent sexually explicit imagery day after day, which is a form of child abuse.
They note that the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child requires Canada to develop the means to protect children from forms of media that are injurious to their well-being. As such, the petitioners are calling on the House of Commons to require meaningful age verification on all adult websites.