44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 13, 2022 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise on behalf of the people of Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo. I am going to speak not from notes but from the heart today. Before I begin, however, I want to note two things. First, I will be splitting my time with the member for Kelowna—Lake Country. This will be likely a brief speech that I am giving, from the heart—
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- Dec/13/22 6:04:39 p.m.
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There is no splitting of time.
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- Dec/13/22 6:04:48 p.m.
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Does the member have unanimous consent?
Some hon. members: Agreed.
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Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise on behalf of the people of Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo.
I want to highlight the exemplary work of someone from my community who recently passed, and that is Melanie Savage. She was a captain in the Blackpool Fire Department. Only 34 years old, she served the community with diligence. I got to know her father through his work in the RCMP when he was a Queen's jubilee medal recipient four or five months ago. I had the privilege of speaking with him today. My condolences go to her family and may eternal light shine upon her.
Similarly, I want to express my condolences to the family of our colleague, the Hon. Jim Carr. May eternal light shine upon him as well.
I had to look up the date. It was about 2015 when my supervisor came to me when I was a prosecutor and said that I had done a lot of work prosecuting what we call child pornography offences, that I was good at it and asked if I would consider doing more. I said no. I went home that night, I talked to my wife about it and I said that somebody had to do this work, so I agreed to do it and said that I would take it on for two years. Six years later, I was more immersed in the work than ever.
Through my work prosecuting child sexual abuse and exploitation material, its production and its dissemination and also the hands-on offences such as sexual assault, sexual interference and Internet luring, I came to understand the importance of victims not only getting justice but moving forward. The reality is that in those six years I looked too many victims in the eye not to know that, if we think that this is something that happens elsewhere, we must think again. As one noted jurist said, Internet luring, for instance, is an insidious crime and it is connected to child sexual abuse and exploitation material.
There is no reason why this bill should not pass and that this bill should not be voted upon tomorrow. This is an important bill; let us make no mistake about it. This bill passed unanimously at second reading. I am confident it will pass unanimously again at third reading.
I drafted this bill based on my experience and I want to thank the member for North Okanagan—Shuswap for sponsoring the bill and using his spot in the order of precedence. I want to thank the member for Kelowna—Lake Country, taking a team British Columbia approach, for bringing this bill here today. I am going to look into the camera first and then I am going to look at my Liberal colleagues. In fact, I am going to look at all my colleagues and say this: There is no reason that this bill should not pass tomorrow.
After my colleague from Kelowna—Lake Country, we as Conservatives will not be putting up any more speakers. There will be roughly 20 minutes of debate left. If debate collapses, we will vote tomorrow. Therefore, I want to be very clear. My exhortation to the people in the House is to let debate collapse. If we believe in this and we say this is important, let us put our money where our mouths are and let debate collapse. I want to be very clear. If debate does not collapse, it is not because of anybody here who wishes for it not to happen because I would love to see a vote occur on this tomorrow.
My heart goes out to victims, to law enforcement and to all those who deal with these difficult, insidious offences. That is all I have to say. My hope is that we are voting on this tomorrow.
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Madam Speaker, may I have unanimous consent to split my time?
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Madam Speaker, I am proud to speak today on this important legislation, Bill C-291, from my Conservative colleagues, the members for North Okanagan—Shuswap and Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, and to help move this piece of legislation along.
Changing the term “child pornography” to “child sexual abuse and exploitation material” is not only more accurate, but the terms “abuse”, “sexual abuse” and “exploitation” also currently exist in the Criminal Code and better align with the facts. As a mother, I have to say that I am not sure what could be more disturbing than child exploitation through sexual abuse material. The victims are children, and the unimaginable robbing of children of their innocence should be reflected in our Criminal Code.
Our 21st century digital age has brought many great things to our lives, but it has allowed the darkest and most pervasive crimes imaginable to be available to anyone. As a result, the ability of predators to monetize their evil behaviour means more children than ever are at a risk of repeat victimization.
It is shocking that in 2021 there was a 14% increase in sexual violations against children. A Statistics Canada 2021 report detailed how child sexual abuse material is a growing problem across Canada. We need to sharpen our laws so they ensure that the prosecution and punishment of offenders reflects the crime. Words do matter, and it is important this bill passes quickly in this place.
I am proud to support this bill, and I call on all members to join the Conservatives in acting to protect innocent victims, the children of today, who are the leaders of tomorrow.
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Madam Speaker, it pleases me to see that the legislation received wide support at its introduction, at second reading and at committee, and now we have the legislation before us today in its first hour of third reading. Based on the comments we have heard consistently over the last while on this legislation, I expect that all members of the House of Commons will be supporting and voting in favour of it, and for good reason.
When the member for Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo was standing up and reflecting on his time as a prosecutor, he said that he was prepared to take on and continue the challenge of going after these offenders. It made me reflect on a discussion I had with a police officer a number of years ago. The police officer said that he and a couple of others were involved in gathering information related to child pornography. What we are now talking about is widening the scope of child pornography to call it “child sexual abuse and exploitation material”.
There was an impact on that particular police officer, and he provided comments on that. He was making reference to Calgary at the time, because I believe that is where some additional attention was given by the government of the day in terms of going after Internet exploitation. It had an impact on individual investigators, and it was difficult for those who had children to go home and see them. One can only imaging having to deal with that on a daily basis.
I can sympathize with individuals who look at the legislation and say it must happen. There is no doubt in my mind that we will see the change. I say that based on discussions I have had with caucus colleagues and after listening to members across the way talk about it.
Replacing the words “child pornography” with “child sexual abuse and exploitation material” broadens the scope and gives a much clearer and better sense of what we are talking about. Child pornography is, in fact, one of the most disgusting and horrific ways one can abuse a child.
When we talk about it, we need to have an understanding of the impact it has. It has a devastating impact on the lives of not only the victim, but the people around the victim, such as their family and friends. Obviously most important is the victim.
As the words say very clearly, we are talking about a child. When we think of the ages of the children being exploited, as has been brought to my attention on a number of occasions, we are talking about children as young as six months old to children up to the age of 18.
Regarding the type of exploitation that takes place, I do not know if trying to describe it in terms of actions is the way to go here, but what I would like to do is emphasize the degree, because often when people think of these materials being circulated, they think of things such as organized crime being behind it. I would like to highlight two things that I find so upsetting in dealing with this issue.
One is the end-user, the individuals who are participating and who ultimately cause any form of a demand for it. They are the consumers of these disgusting materials where children are being exploited. That is what offends me most. The individuals in question might actually surprise some. I was at a discussion where we were talking about child exploitation, and I was surprised to hear that there is a very strong component where we get family members who will exploit their own children.
How does a mother, father or any guardian take a four-year-old and put that four-year-old in an environment where there is some form of exploitation, sexual exploitation in particular? When I posed that question, I was told that there is an issue in many third world countries where the child is the source of income for the family. In my mind in no way does that justify the exploitation of the child, but I learned something from that.
We could then bring it forward to that more organized crime element, where it is well thought through. We could call it Internet luring. There are also individuals who will hang out at terminals where they know young people will go by. They lure young people through all forms of trickery, and before we know it, they are being exploited and being taken advantage of.
Whether it is the individual guardian or parent exploiting their own child or it is organized crime where we get that exploitation taking place, and everything in between, I believe Canadians look at it in the same manner I do and see it for what it is: a horrific crime of child abuse in the worst way.
At the end of the day, we factor in all the things that need to be factored in, and we take a look at the legislation. It is legislation many would argue is fairly straightforward legislation. It is legislation, as I indicated, that I am expecting all members to be voting in favour of when it comes to a vote. It is pretty straightforward in the sense of changing or replacing the word “child pornography” with “child sexual abuse and exploitation material”, which I said at the very beginning widens the scope and provides a better clarification of what civil society, our neighbours and our constituents, would want us to do.
It is indeed a very serious issue, and I believe all members on all sides of the House recognize the sensitivity of it. As I said, I do believe that all members will in fact be voting in favour of it.
An hon. member: Then pass it today.
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- Dec/13/22 6:21:04 p.m.
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Order. I know this is a very sensitive issue, but there is only one person who has the floor, and he is the only person who should be speaking at the moment.
Resuming debate, the hon. member for Surrey—Newton.
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Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to join the third reading debate on Bill C-291, an act to amend the Criminal Code and to make consequential amendments to other acts, regarding child sexual abuse and exploitation material, which was introduced on June 17, 2022, by the member for North Okanagan—Shuswap.
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- Dec/13/22 6:21:46 p.m.
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I am sorry. There is some cross-debate happening. That is not very respectful for the person who has the floor.
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Madam Speaker, before I continue, I also want to express my sincere condolences to the family of our hon. friend Jim Carr, who we lost. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family, friends and constituents.
When we talk about this bill, the protection of children against sexual abuse and exploitation of any kind is an objective that I believe all members support. It is also a priority for the Government of Canada, and this is why we proposed amendments to this private member's bill that would strengthen it and ensure that it does what it was designed to do.
The bill, as it was introduced, proposes to change the term “child pornography” to “child sexual abuse material” at section 163.1 of the Criminal Code, and to make other consequential amendments.
We proposed that the term “child sexual abuse material” in the bill be amended in order to be more descriptive of its definition, which is at section 163.1 of the Criminal Code. The new term, “child sexual abuse and exploitation material”, better describes not only materials that portray the sexual abuse of actual children, but also materials that advocate or counsel—
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Madam Speaker, on a point of order, could you tell us if we will be running out the clock or actually voting on this, perhaps tomorrow?
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- Dec/13/22 6:23:43 p.m.
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That is not really a point of order. The debate goes until 6:33 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this includes materials such as works of fiction that promote the sexual abuse of children, as well as the sexualized portrayal of adults as children. I am pleased that the new term was adopted unanimously by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, as it is an important step towards bringing Canada in line with the general trend away from the term “child pornography”.
The second amendment proposed by the government is an entirely new provision, a one-year coming-into-force provision for the entire bill. I am pleased that this measure, too, was adopted unanimously by the committee.
This proposed amendment came about as a result of studying Bill C-291 after it was introduced. The government noted that the federal regulations made pursuant to An Act respecting the mandatory reporting of Internet child pornography by persons who provide an Internet service would require amending as a result of this bill, as they contain the term “child pornography”.
Those regulations will not be amended as a result of the enactment of Bill C-291 and, therefore, time would be required to get the process under way. I also learned that there are at least 50 pieces of provincial and territorial legislation from across Canada that incorporate or make reference to the term “child pornography” as defined by the Criminal Code, statutes as well as regulations.
Giving the provinces time to adapt their legislation, if they wish, to ensure the coherence of the legislation across Canada, is an important government responsibility. The one-year coming-into-force period would allow time for those amendments to be made in their respective jurisdictions. This delayed coming into force would also allow time for necessary administrative changes to be made at both the federal and provincial levels in places such as courts administrative systems and IT systems.
Finally, the third amendment proposed by the government, which was also unanimously passed in the committee, was the addition of a transitional clause. This new provision would assist participants in the criminal justice system to understand how ongoing proceedings that use the term “child pornography” would be affected on the date of the this bill coming into force.
This new provision clearly states that the changes of terminology would not affect the validity of any ongoing proceedings that have already begun under the old term “child pornography”. Similarly, the validity of any documents related to those proceedings would not be affected by the change in terminology.
In short, this transitional clause tells the criminal justice system participants that this change is a change in the name only. There should be no impacts on ongoing prosecutions as a result.
These three government amendments will, I believe, better achieve the objectives of not only calling these materials what they truly are, but also ensuring that the transition to the new terminology is done in a coherent and non-disruptive way.
I would like to thank the members of the justice committee for voting in favour of the government's amendments and for co-operating in bringing this bill through the House so quickly.
It should not be a surprise to members that the pandemic has contributed to a rise in the sexual offences committed against children, nor should it be a surprise that these offences are primarily committed via telecommunications networks.
In fiscal year 2021-22, the RCMP's National Child Exploitation Crime Centre received 81,799 complaints, reports and requests for assistance relating to online child sexual exploitation. This was a 56% increase compared to the previous fiscal year and an 854% increase compared to 2013-14.
Police-reported crime data from Statistics Canada which includes the first year of the pandemic indicates that incidents of making or distributing child pornography increased by 26% in 2021 compared to 2019. Possession of or accessing child pornography increased by 44% in 2021 compared to 2019 and represents a 146% increase since 2017.
There are many things needed to help combat child sexual exploitation. Clearly, we need to have comprehensive and robust criminal laws against it. We need to have strong and effective law enforcement. We need to continue to advance and support measures that seek to meet the needs of victims and survivors. The government supports the national strategy for the protection of children from sexual exploitation on the Internet, which has four pillars: raising awareness, reducing the stigma associated with reporting, increasing Canada's ability to pursue and prosecute offenders, and working with tech leaders to find new ways to combat the online sexual exploitation of children.
I want to conclude by expressing my thanks to the member for North Okanagan—Shuswap for sponsoring this important bill and for co-operating with all parties to bring it to the House.
I also am thankful for the opportunity to speak.
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Madam Speaker, I want to start by expressing my sincere condolences to the family, friends and colleagues of Jim Carr. He was a devoted parliamentarian who worked tirelessly for his community. He will be missed forever.
I am pleased to join the debate on Bill C-291, an act to amend the Criminal Code and to make consequential amendments to other acts, regarding child sexual abuse and exploitation material, introduced by the member for North Okanagan—Shuswap on June 17.
At the outset, I would like to acknowledge and thank my colleague for introducing this bill, which has a very important objective, to ensure that the terminology used to refer to child pornography means that this harmful material is actually abuse of children.
The Government of Canada is committed to preventing and protecting children from sexual abuse and exploitation of any kind, including in Canada and abroad.
Canada works closely with international partners to combat online child sexual exploitation—
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The time provided for the consideration of Private Members' Business has now expired, and the order is dropped to the bottom of the order of precedence on the Order Paper.
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- Dec/13/22 6:33:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, on Tuesday last week, the Auditor General released an absolutely damning report on the government's COVID-19 programs. This is report 10 from the Auditor General. This report chronicled mismanagement, waste and a lack of focus leading to tens of billions of dollars in government waste.
Let us be very clear: We are not talking about the policy of the COVID support programs. This was a policy that, in principle, all parties supported and it is not the Auditor General's mandate to critique the government's policy, but rather to analyze the effectiveness of implementation. That is whether the actions of government lined up with the stated policy goals.
The Auditor General pointed out that the government made a policy decision not to have an effective pre-disbursement review. It basically relied on an attestation model, an honour system, where people would say they met the criteria and they would get the benefits. Many Canadians were honest and accurate in how they filled those out.
Generally, we say there should be some kind of verification mechanism, either before or afterward. The government said that it needed to get these dollars out the door quickly in terms of these benefits, so it did not do the advance verification, but it said it would do verification after the fact. It would follow up and see if the money went to the right people, and if it did not go to the right people, it would follow up in the appropriate fashion.
The government is now saying it is not going to do those after-the-fact reviews and verifications in every case. For much of the money that the government spent in various COVID-19 support programs, there was no checking before the money went out and no checking after the money was received. This means people could simply attest that they were eligible for benefits. They got cheques as a result and there was no verification.
The Auditor General was able, based on data the government already had available, to assess what indicators there were of whether people who did not meet the requirements of various programs ended up getting money anyway. Here is what she found.
Incredibly, she found that $4.6 billion went to ineligible recipients. That means people who were not eligible for these programs still got money to the tune of $4.6 billion.
Another $27.4 billion went to individuals who, on the face of it, did not meet the program criteria where the Auditor General conservatively says further investigation is required. There were cases, for instance, where individuals did not meet the income requirements, yet still received CERB.
The total of certainly ineligible or almost certainly ineligible, based on the Auditor General's analysis of data in the government's own possession, came to $32 billion. Some $32 billion of COVID-19 benefits went out to individuals who were not eligible for those benefits.
Again, we are not talking about whether offering this support was a good idea. We are talking about whether the government should be held accountable for over $30 billion going to those who did not meet the stated criteria for those programs.
The Auditor General is recommending in this report that the government follow up, get to the bottom of this and track down that money. The government does not agree, does not support it and will not implement this recommendation of the Auditor General. It says, on the final page of the report, that it will not follow up with every one of these cases, as the Auditor General recommends.
The response of the Minister of National Revenue when this issue was raised in the House was to impugn the Auditor General's independence. The Minister of National Revenue got up in this House and said that the Auditor General made the decisions and the recommendations because of pressure from the opposition, which is a totally outrageous attack on a strong, independent public servant by the government simply to cover up its own incompetence.
The government wasted $30 billion. It should be held accountable for that waste and it should not be attacking the Auditor General.
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- Dec/13/22 6:37:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that was an interesting speech, as always, from our colleague.
I would remiss if I did not begin tonight by speaking about the late Jim Carr, a colleague to all of us and a friend to many. He was someone who served with distinction provincially and federally, among so many other different pursuits, and who had a very impressive life. He was a mentor to many MPs who began with him in 2015, and words of advice given by him over the years will not be forgotten, certainly not by myself, not by anyone.
I listened with interest to the hon. member, and we thank the Auditor General for her report, which was tabled last week. The government affirms her independence and integrity, which is true of the minister and true of myself. As I said, this is a very important office, and we affirm all of those important principles. In listening to my hon. colleague though, I wonder if he actually read the report or only those parts he could use to his political advantage.
First of all, the report makes clear that, without the emergency programs put in place, the poverty rate in Canada would have doubled. Particularly important was the CERB, but there was also the wage subsidy. It is also true that we would have seen th massive economic contraction that was impacting the country at the outset of the pandemic simply continue. In 2020, we saw GDP contract by 17%. Again, this is all in the report.
I am sure my friend has the report at hand, if he has not looked at it already, which I suspect he has not, but he can easily bring it up. The report makes clear that, by November 2021, the economy had come back to prepandemic levels. Again, that is because of the emergency programs that were put in place by the the government and supported by all parties in the House.
Interesting also is what was said by the Parliamentary Budget Officer, who recently made it clear that, were it not for the programs, the results for the country would have been “catastrophic”. We would have seen mass bankruptcies, and it would have resulted in significant human costs. Again, I leave that for the consideration of the hon. member.
Underpinning all of the emergency programs, of course, was the attestation-based approach put in place by the government to ensure that funds needed by Canadians, either individuals, families or businesses, were dispensed very quickly, and I am thinking of CERB, the wage subsidy and various other programs. The attestation-based approach made that very possible.
Verification is certainly the objective, but it comes after the fact, which is about the only part of the speech from my hon. colleague across the way that I agree with. Verification was not possible at the beginning. It had to come after the fact because of the unique circumstance, which was a crisis. A crisis necessitates specific approaches tailored to the moment. This is why the government took the approach that it did. The work is ongoing to verify whether or not individuals, businesses and others were actually in need of the various supports that were received.
Yes, there is respectful disagreement on the $27.4 billion between the CRA and the Auditor General, which is, again, a respectful disagreement over calculating the wage subsidy eligibility over GST revenue loss versus general revenue loss. That is a technical matter that will be sorted out.
Over 800,000 notices of redetermination have been given to individuals. Thousands more will be sent. The work of the CRA continues on these matters. It is very serious about ensuring fiscal responsibility and verification.
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- Dec/13/22 6:41:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member is trying to constantly shift this into a debate about whether or not the emergency benefits were a good policy. As he pointed out, all parties supported providing emergency supports during COVID. However, the question is not whether these emergency benefits were required and were valuable. The question is whether the government was right to pay tens of billions of dollars to people who were not eligible for the programs. That is, the House agreed to specific criteria for these programs, and tens of billions of dollars, according to the Auditor General, very likely went to individuals who were not eligible for those programs.
The government said that it had to get the money out quickly at the beginning, fair enough, but the bargain was that there would have to be clear, effective, after-the-fact verification in every case. Either we have to do the verification up front, which is normally what happens, or we have to do some kind of verification after the fact. However, the government has said clearly, in response to the Auditor General's recommendation, that it will not, in fact, do this verification in every case, and the minister attacked the Auditor General on this.
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- Dec/13/22 6:42:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I ask my hon. colleague what the Conservatives would have done had they been in power. What approach would they have taken? The result that we see is that the country was sustained. It was sustained because of these programs. The audit work continues. Verification is being carried out. It is being carried out in multiple ways and in line with international best practices.
The member also neglects to mention that, in November 2020, in fact the Conservatives put forward an effort to delay verification and to delay the way the government would carry out that important work. I am thinking specifically of the wage subsidy here. The Conservatives want it both ways. They want to ensure that verification happens, which it is, but when they had the chance to ensure that it happened as soon as possible on the wage subsidy, they delayed it.
I ask my hon. colleague, why is that?
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