Debates of March 23rd, 2026

Combatting Hate Act

[Scott Anderson, Conservative, Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by saying that I believe in a free, democratic Canada. I believe in a country where people can speak their minds, practise their faith and engage in open debate without fear of punishment from their government. That is why I am deeply concerned about Bill C-9.

I recently held a town hall in my city, with the help of my colleague from Elgin—St. Thomas—London South. Usually, these town halls see maybe 50 or 100 people. That evening, over 600 people from my riding and others showed up. These are not fringe voices. Many were religious thought leaders from established Christian and other denominations, some were officials from other levels of government and all were thoughtful, engaged citizens deeply concerned about what they see as an assault on civil liberties. That level of concern should make all of us pause.

This is not about defending hate. Hate should be condemned. Where it crosses into violence or incitement, we already have those laws, and we need to enforce them instead of making more of them. This bill would expand government power over speech, and whenever government takes more power in this area, we know it is not coming back. Intent matters, and I do not doubt for a second that the framers of this bill had good intentions. The original bill contained provisions that many of us would support, but at committee, the Liberal Party accepted a Bloc amendment to remove the religious exemption. That is a hard no from this side of the House, and I believe from many other Canadians.

The Charter of Rights and Freedoms does not treat religion as an afterthought or something to be bargained away in committee. Freedom of religion is listed among our fundamental freedoms because that freedom to hold beliefs, to express them and to live them out is foundational to human dignity. For decades, Canadian law has reflected this through a religious exemption in hate speech provisions. That exemption ensures Canadians can cite scripture, preach, teach, debate and discuss matters of faith, even when those teachings are controversial, without fear of criminal prosecution. Bill C-9 would remove that protection.

Religious expression is a charter-protected freedom. Let us think about what that means. Expressing a traditional religious teaching, something that has been part of faith for generations, could now be interpreted as criminal, depending on how someone else perceives it. The old adage that the road to hell is paved with good intentions is not just a saying. It is on full display here. The government may mean no harm and the next government may mean no harm, but we do not know the future and what future governments may plan. What we do know is that if Bill C-9 passes, future governments will have the tools they need to legally repress Canadians by simply redefining “hate” to mean whatever they say. That does not mean they necessarily will, but it was not that long ago that the Liberal government accused anti-government protesters of hate and invoked the Emergencies Act. It is not a long walk to imagine future misuse of that term.

This brings us to another major issue: the definition of “hate” in this bill. The bill describes “hate” as detestation or vilification, stronger than dislike or disdain, but what does that actually mean? Who decides what qualifies as detestation? Who determines when strong disagreement becomes criminal speech? It is not voters or Parliament. It is unelected officials, police, prosecutors and courts making subjective judgments about tone, intent and interpretation. That should concern all of us, every single Canadian. Once the state begins policing subjective thresholds in speech, it creates uncertainty, and uncertainty leads to a chilling effect. People begin to self-censor. They avoid difficult conversations, they stay silent rather than risk investigation or complaint, and that silence weakens democracy. If the exemption is removed, many clergy, imams, rabbis, elders and faith leaders will feel compelled to self-censor, not because they promote hatred but because the line between controversial and criminal becomes very blurred.

Think of everyday faith community life: sermons, youth programs, marriage preparation classes, theological debates and small group discussions. In all of these settings, people discuss difficult moral questions. Without the exemption, these conversations could be misinterpreted or taken out of context, leading to complaints or investigation. A law that intimidates people out of participating in their own faith tradition is not protecting freedom but chilling it.

Another troubling aspect of this bill is how it would be enforced. It would rely heavily on a complaint-based system. That means investigations could be triggered not by clear violations, but by complaints, by perception. In today's world, especially online, context is easily lost and disagreement is constant. Do we really want a system where a social media post can lead to police knocking on our door? Do we want a country where people fear that what they said months ago in the heat of an argument could suddenly bring police to their door?

I do not like the “frog in the pot” analogy because it tends to smack of conspiracy theory. This analogy, as we know, says that if we put a frog in a pot of cold water and turn on the heat the frog will not notice the water getting warmer until it is boiling and it is way too late. However, many Canadians feel that negative change is happening gradually, bit by bit. They see rising crime, economic strain and increasing government reach into everyday life. They see their firearms being confiscated and the Emergencies Act misused. They see bank accounts frozen and their jobs disappearing. If they manage to succeed, they are demonized and called greedy. Now they feel that their deepest beliefs may be taken away. Their concern is real and should not be simply dismissed.

Perhaps the most serious issue is the precedent that it sets, that the state can determine which religious beliefs are acceptable and which are criminally suspect. A government should never be in the business of judging which scripture passages are allowed or which doctrines may be taught. I thought western society was over that in the 16th century. Once that door is reopened, it becomes easier for future governments to go further. Today's controversial belief may become tomorrow's punishable offence. It is one thing to uphold the separation of church and state, but it is another to allow the state to define “acceptable church”.

We all want a country that is safe, respectable and just, but safety cannot come at the cost of freedom. The issue is not whether we oppose hate; we all do. Bill C-9 introduces ambiguity where we need clarity. It removes protections where we need safeguards. It shifts power away from Canadians toward institutions that are not directly accountable to them.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, when I look at Bill C-9, I see a holistic bill that is a reflection of a campaign commitment less than a year ago by the Prime Minister and the government of the day. What we are seeing is a genuine, substantial change to ensure there is a proactive approach dealing with hate laws there to protect the victims of hate crimes. It is substantial. The Conservative Party wants to twist it around and talk about one issue, that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms protects freedom of religion.

Does the Conservative Party support other aspects of the legislation or is the member in complete opposition to the legislation, Bill C-9, on combatting hate?

[Scott Anderson, Conservative, Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC]

I think the Conservatives have been very clear about this. We are opposed to the removal of the religious exemption, which was never a campaign promise made by the Liberals at any point. At no point in the campaign were we told they were going to remove religious exemptions from Canadians.

The laws already exist. I cannot think of an offence that this particular bill covers that is not already covered in the Criminal Code.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his speech. We obviously wish him a speedy recovery from his cold.

I would like to hear his thoughts on the situation. My colleague said that it is not up to the state to determine which religion is the right one. However, when people use religion as a pretext to commit violent, serious or deadly crimes, or when they incite hatred by hiding behind that pretext in order to be acquitted or get reduced sentences, is it not the state's responsibility to intervene and change the law so that people can no longer hide behind religious pretexts to incite hatred?

[Scott Anderson, Conservative, Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC]

Mr. Speaker, when somebody uses religion as a pretext to commit a crime, they go to jail. They would go to jail now, before the bill is passed. We do not need the bill to make them go to jail. There is no precedent for doing this at all. I reject the question.

[Andrew Lawton, Conservative, Elgin—St. Thomas—London South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee for his fantastic speech and for hosting an amazing town hall in Vernon, which I had the great privilege of presiding over with him. Over 600 people from B.C.'s beautiful Okanagan came out, because they reject what the Liberals are trying to do with Bill C-9.

The member had, rather infamously now, spoken about how a few Liberals had invited him to cross the floor. I think his stand for free speech disqualifies him from joining their ranks, given the contempt that the Liberals have shown, through Bill C-9 and other bills, towards religious freedom and freedom of expression. The member understands full well that the bill is not the only attempt by the Liberals, and not the first attempt by the Liberals, to erode long-standing protections for religious speech. We have seen this through the online harms bill and through the Online Streaming Act. We have seen it, to some extent, in the Online News Act.

The member has approached this issue rather interestingly. He is not just focused on religious freedom. He has talked about the importance of freedom of expression in general, and I am hoping he can elaborate on that.

[Scott Anderson, Conservative, Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have been called a religious maniac and all the usual terms that come from across the floor many times, despite the fact that I think I have gone to church three or four times in the last 10 years and always on Christmas eve. I am not a religious maniac.

I am very concerned about the curbs on free speech that the bill contains. It is crucial to democracy that we hear all opinions. We cannot form opinions without hearing all of those opinions. Sometimes they are controversial. Sometimes they are not controversial. Personally, I am against all forms of censorship, because I feel that society itself polices this very well. I find free speech to be an absolutely crucial element to democracy. We cannot have democracy unless we have a reasonable amount of free speech.

[Helena Konanz, Conservative, Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to speak to Bill C-9, a piece of legislation that has brought forward huge concerns for Canadians of every religious background across the country.

Canadians I speak with in my community are not asking for more censorship. They are asking for safer streets, stronger communities and a government that focuses on real problems. Instead of focusing on these concerns, the Liberal government has chosen to prioritize Bill C-9, a bill that targets some of the most fundamental charter freedoms we have as Canadians: freedom of speech and the freedom to practise our faith. That choice matters because it tells Canadians what the government values and what it is willing to put aside.

Let us take a step back and clearly understand what this bill would actually do. Under the current Criminal Code, there is a narrow and carefully constructed safeguard. Section 319 allows individuals to express, in good faith, opinions on religious subjects or based on a belief in religious texts. It is for all persons of faith, be they Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist or Sikh. This safeguard is not broad. It is not a loophole and it is not a free pass. It applies only to one specific offence. It does not apply to violence. It does not apply to threats or incitement. These actions are already illegal, and they should be. There is no charter right to hate or to act hatefully.

Even the Supreme Court has recognized that this safeguard is necessary to maintain the constitutionality of Canada's hate speech laws. It exists to ensure that we strike the right balance between protecting people from harm and preserving the freedoms that define us as a democratic society.

Bill C-9 would remove that safeguard. That is where the problem begins, because when that protection is removed, uncertainty is introduced into the law. A situation is created where Canadians could face criminal consequences for expressing sincerely held beliefs grounded in their faith, not because they are promoting violence or because they are attacking an individual, but because those beliefs may be interpreted by the state as crossing a line that this Parliament is choosing to make unclear. That should concern every Canadian, regardless of what they believe or if they do not believe in any religion at all. It is about whether the government should have the authority to decide which beliefs are acceptable and which are not.

We often hear the Liberals point to extreme examples to justify this bill. They talk about hate. They talk about violence. They talk about incitement. However, what they do not say is that all of those things are already illegal. There is no protection in Canadian law for violence. There is no protection for incitement.

Experts who testified before the committee confirmed this. Legal experts, witnesses and practitioners all made it clear that the current law for hate crimes already addresses the scenarios the government keeps raising. When these examples are used to justify this bill, they are not identifying a gap. They are describing conduct that is already criminal. If those laws are not being enforced, then the issue is not the law but enforcement.

However, instead of addressing enforcement, the government is choosing to expand its power over speech. That is a very different conversation, because now we are no longer talking about protecting Canadians from harm. We are talking about regulating what Canadians can say and what they can believe. We are not talking about extremists hiding behind religion to justify harm. This is already illegal, and there are no protections for that under current law.

We are talking about ordinary Canadians: pastors delivering sermons, rabbis teaching scripture, imams guiding their communities, parents teaching their children values rooted in their faith and traditions, and educators discussing religious texts in classrooms. They are the ones who would feel the impact of this change, not the people who seek to sow hate.

I have heard these concerns directly from members of my community. Earlier this year, I met with more than 30 local faith leaders, alongside my colleague from Elgin—St. Thomas—London South. He is a member of the justice committee and has studied this bill extensively. No one in that meeting was seeking to promote hate. They only brought forward concerns that this bill creates uncertainty around what they are allowed to say, teach and share with their own religious communities.

They wanted me to tell this story to all the MPs in Parliament because they are scared that quoting a religious text could be legally misinterpreted. They are worried that the law is moving in a direction so that they can no longer speak freely without fear of consequences. When we hear that directly from people affected, it becomes very clear that this bill is not as straightforward as the Liberal government claims.

That concern has also been echoed by organizations across the country. There are not many pieces of legislation that would unite the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Canadian Muslim Public Affairs Council, the World Sikh Organization of Canada, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the Canadian Labour Congress, the Centre for Free Expression, and Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East. From left and right, these organizations agree that we should not proceed with Bill C-9 in its current form.

In a free society, people should not have to second-guess whether expressing their beliefs would lead to legal consequences. They should not have to weigh their words against the risk of prosecution simply for speaking openly about their faith. This is Canada. Even if prosecutions are rare, the fear alone changes behaviours. It silences people. It discourages open discussion. It weakens the very foundation of a pluralistic society, and that is not something we should take lightly.

Again, we have to ask what problem this bill would solve. It certainly is not addressing a gap in the law. Instead, it is removing a protection. At the same time, the government is choosing not to focus on the issues Canadians are actually worried about.

Across the country, communities are dealing with the consequences of a broken bail system. Police chiefs have raised concerns. Provinces have raised concerns. Municipalities have raised concerns. Canadians have raised concerns. They are seeing repeat offenders released out onto the streets, sometimes within hours, only to reoffend. That is the reality. That is what people are living with. Instead of prioritizing meaningful reform to address this problem, the government is focused on regulating what Canadians can say and what they can believe.

This bill would not make Canadians safer from acts of hate. The bill would shift attention away from the real public safety issues and toward the regulation of speech. Freedom of expression and freedom of religion are not optional in a free society. They are foundational. They protect the ability to disagree. They protect the ability to question. They protect the ability to hold beliefs that may not always be popular. Once the state begins to decide which beliefs are acceptable, those freedoms become conditional. They become dependent on the approval of those in power. That is not what Canadians expect, and that is not the direction we should be heading.

I will leave my Liberal colleagues with this: If the law already makes violence illegal, if the law already prohibits incitement and calls for genocide, and if experts have confirmed there is no gap that requires this change, then why is the government so determined to remove a safeguard that protects peaceful, good-faith religious expression? More importantly, why is the government choosing to focus on regulating belief instead of fixing the real problems that Canadians are facing in their communities every single day?

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Algonquin—Renfrew—Pembroke, ON]

Mr. Speaker, right now, the streets are full of murderers, rapists, thieves, extortionists and gang violence.

How would this bill fight what is currently the scourge on our streets? Could the Liberals have not spent this time on jail, not bail, instead of wasting our time by blocking freedom of speech?

[Helena Konanz, Conservative, Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I think this is the question running through the mind of just about every MP of the House, on both sides of the aisle, I am sure, because this is attacking religion, freedom of speech and democracy. Right now, people in our communities are afraid to walk down the street. They are afraid to go shopping. There are elderly people afraid of break-ins at their home. That is what we should be focusing on.

Why is the government ramming this through? There is no clear explanation.

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant South—Six Nations, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague's speech was excellent. I have been here most of the day, listening to a number of interventions by the Liberals, particularly the member for Winnipeg North. He sounds like a broken record. He has been able to identify one lawyer in Toronto who actually supports the removal of the religious defence. I have listened to the member over a number of days, and that is the only example he can cite.

Given that this was never the intention of the Liberal government when it introduced Bill C-9 in Parliament and that it was clearly done in the middle of a review of Bill C-9, what does the member think about why now the government is unable to articulate the real reason it is supporting the Bloc amendment?

[Helena Konanz, Conservative, Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Again, Mr. Speaker, I think this is a question running through everyone's mind.

I wonder what the members on the other side of the aisle are thinking. They must be getting the phone calls I am getting. They must be getting the emails, the written letters and the calls from their local faith leaders who are completely against this because, as I mentioned earlier, they are afraid of what they might say in their next sermon or what they might write in the next column for the newspaper. Parents are afraid of what they might discuss with their children.

It is baffling why the Liberals would be pushing this through so quickly, and it is actually shameful.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the Holy Bible, the Sri Guru Granth Sahib, the Quran and the Torah are holy scriptures, and there are others. There is the Hindu community, and there are many different places of worship. There is nothing in Bill C-9 that would take away from what is taking place today in these places of faith. Members know that.

Does the member support the motivation of the Conservatives to raise money on this issue? For example, I will quote a Conservative fundraising letter, which says, “[The] goal is to expose people of faith to criminal prosecution.” It also says, “The Liberals are waging a war on religious freedom” and “The Liberals are—”

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Swift Current—Grasslands—Kindersley, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The member has been asking the same question over and over today. If he does not have anything new to add to the debate, maybe he should let somebody else take the floor, because nobody else seems to want to—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

Order. We do have rules about relevance and repetition, but I will let the member complete his question in about three seconds and then allow the member to answer.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I do not appreciate the interruption.

[Helena Konanz, Conservative, Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member across the aisle for the question he has asked many times today.

I would like to ask the member why the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Canadian Muslim Public Affairs Council, the World Sikh Organization of Canada, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the Canadian Labour Congress, the Centre for Free Expression and Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East are against this. Many of the member's constituents are against this, I am sure.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Why don't you come debate it with me in Winnipeg North?

[An hon. member]

I'll take that challenge.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I probably should not have heckled, but I did say, “Why don't you come to Winnipeg North?”

I would like to withdraw that, but I am happy the Conservative critic said he would take me up on it.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, John Nater]

That is not really a point of order. I will let members dictate their agenda in another venue. I thank members for their co-operation.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Mr. Speaker, if the member for Winnipeg North would hush down, I would be more than happy to intercede on the amendments at report stage of Bill C-9.

As I previously stood up during debate on the closure motion on Bill C-9, I want to reiterate that here we have a government that is bringing in a bill and amendments under the guise of hate speech that are actually an attack on our civil liberties and on our charter freedom of religion. We know that the Liberals are now censoring debate by bringing this closure motion. We only get today in the House on Bill C-9 amendments, and then they are forcing us to vote. They are going to force the bill to a final vote on Wednesday.

This is just the modus operandi of the Liberals. When they want to ram something through, when they want to creep into our lives and erode our civil liberties, they bring in closure, they force a vote and they get their way at the end of the day. That is not democracy. That is not parliamentary procedure. It undermines our country and the freedoms we enjoy.

We know that Bill C-9 came in to address the issues of the imam in Montreal, Adil Charkaoui, who said on October 28, 2023, that he denounced all Zionist aggressors, and he called on Allah to kill the enemies of the people of Gaza and spare none of them.

That in itself comes down to anti-Semitism. It was hate. He should have been charged for it, but the RCMP and the investigators decided they were not going to charge him. They did not believe, because there was reasonable doubt, that there was enough evidence to proceed to charge him under sections 318 and 319 of the Criminal Code, which prohibits public incitement to hatred against anyone, and identifiable groups. He used the term “Zionist”, and that is not really religious, but we know he was talking about the Jewish people. It is despicable that he would even suggest that.

Christina Van Geyn wrote an opinion piece in the National Post that states, “One may argue that ‘Zionist’ was just code for ‘Jews.’...But the decision not to charge Charkaoui turned on the basic threshold of incitement to hatred, not on the religious defence.”

The problem the Liberals have in this situation is that it was the prosecutors and the RCMP who decided not to investigate, rather than addressing the real issue of going after it, instead of bringing in Bill C-9, which is just a ruse to undermine our civil liberties, including freedom of religion, freedom of conscience and freedom of expression.

We asked the government to split Bill C-9 into two parts. There are sections in the bill we do want to support, because we all want to stop hate speech. We want to stop the crime that is taking place around this country. Again, though, the Liberals are just ramming this through.

In the dying hours at the justice committee when it was studying Bill C-9 in its original form, the former chair of the committee, who is now the Minister of Canadian Identity and Culture, the member of Parliament for Ville-Marie—Le Sud-Ouest—Île-des-Soeurs, stated from the chair, using his prerogative, “As despicable and as unlawful as the statements made by Mr. Charkaoui are”, and he said that maybe they needed to go into the good-faith argument a bit more. Then he stated, “In Leviticus, Deuteronomy and Romans, there are passages with clear hatred.... Clearly, there are situations in these texts where statements are hateful. They should not be used to invoke...or be a defence.”

That is when, all of a sudden, we got this amendment out of nowhere that would take away from the Criminal Code the religious exemptions to ensure protection for those people who are at the pulpit reading the ancient texts, scripture from the Bible, the Torah and the Quran. Now the Liberals are saying they are hateful and should not be allowed.

The Liberals are trying to make the argument that they are still protected under the charter. However, decisions made by the Supreme Court over the last 30 or 40 years have said clearly that the guardrails we need with respect to protection of the religious freedoms embedded in the Criminal Code under paragraphs 319(3)(b) and 319(3.1)(b) are required.

The sections they want to take away state, and it is the same in both paragraphs, that “No person shall be convicted of an offence under subsection (2.1)”, which is hate crime speech, “if, in good faith, [the person] expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text”.

They would be removing that, and they are trying to say, “Do not worry about it. It is all still going to be protected under the charter.” It would not be. As I said before, this is being led by the person who is now the Minister of Canadian Identity and Culture. He is supposed to be protecting Canadian culture, which includes freedom of religion. He, backed by the Liberal cabinet, the Liberal caucus and the Bloc, is trying to take away the religious freedoms that we have and the exemptions that are granted to protect, particularly, pastors, imams and rabbis who are actually reading and quoting from the Bible, the Koran, the Torah and other religious texts.

There is now a list of almost every religious group and organization in Canada that is opposed to Bill C-9. However, the Liberals say that we should not worry because they are protected under the charter, but they are not.

Again, this a violation of the concept of separation of church and state, which is about keeping government and religion separate from each other. Now the government is trying to step in, and instead of being agnostic as to what faith people want to choose or not choose in Canada, it is now starting to wiggle its way in, inserting the thin edge of the wedge to again divide Canadians on another issue, saying that the church is going to have to take the rules imposed by the government, the state of Canada, on our religious institutions.

Even though we do not have a single law, like other countries have, that says we will separate church and state, there is good reason why we should always keep that separation and the government should not be allowed to dictate what is going to be preached from the pulpit. We do not want to restart what happened under Henry VIII in 1534, when he did not like what the church was saying so he took over the church. He created the Church of England, and today the Crown is still the head of that church.

We also do not want to go down the route of the Soviet Union or the People's Republic of China, where religion is outlawed, but that is exactly what the government is starting to walk towards. Even though it may be saying it is officially agnostic, or, as in the case of the Communist Party of China, saying that it is officially atheist, what the government is really trying to do is pick the winners and losers and is trying quash anyone who does not subscribe to its ideology.

When we were in government, we started the office of religious freedom. Stephen Harper said at that time that “governments that violate religious freedom are also prone to impose themselves in every other sphere of life.”

We talk about how the Liberals continue to weigh in on the issues, and this is not the first time they have started to dictate how the government wants churches and other religious groups, the synagogues the mosques and other temples, to behave. We witnessed this five or six years ago when they brought in the attestation for the Canada summer jobs program. They said that if someone was preaching certain beliefs from the pulpit, like the protection life, they could not do that or they would not be getting any government money. That was challenged and was walked back the following year.

Now the Liberals are trying to actually take away the Criminal Code section that protects what we say from the pulpit and ensures that it cannot be used against us in a court of law. I would just remind the House what the Charter of Rights and Freedoms says. In the very preamble, it says, “Whereas Canada is founded upon principles that recognize the supremacy of God and the rule of law”. In section 2 the charter says, “Everyone has the following fundamental freedoms: (a) freedom of conscience and religion; (b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression”.

This is supported in Supreme Court cases, not the charter, but Criminal Code paragraphs 319(3)(b) and 319(3.1)(b). Both the Supreme Court cases of Big M Drug Mart and of Mouvement laïque québécois v. Saguenay, the city, say that religious neutrality must be maintained and that the government cannot favour or hinder any of that belief.

Everybody should be voting against Bill C-9. Everyone of faith should be very concerned about what the Liberals are trying to do to religious freedom in Canada.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I must say at the beginning that I am very pleased that the Conservative critic is actually going to come to Winnipeg North. I will take him up on that challenge for a public debate. I will look at Sisler High School, or maybe Maples Collegiate. We will see what we can arrange.

Having said that, my question for the member of the opposition is, can he explain to Canadians why the Conservative Party has attempted to raise money using this issue? The Conservatives are literally sending out tens of thousands of emails to get people fearful with the misinformation they are pumping out. I will give an example. They are saying, “They are trying to push laws that could criminalize passages”, and, “The Liberals and Bloc want to prosecute people for quoting scripture.”

Why is the Conservative Party misusing its privileges?

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I am looking forward to the match between the member for Winnipeg North and the shadow minister of justice. My money is on the member for Brantford—Brant South—Six Nations, and I am laying it down. It is going to be no contest. I can see the member for Winnipeg North screaming “uncle” halfway through the first round. I am very much looking forward to it.

The Liberals are using every play in their little dirty book of procedure to try to shut down debate in the House. They are trying to undermine our democratic right to come in here to speak and represent all Canadians, and they are busy trying to attack religious freedom across this country.