SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 214 - Jun/15/23

Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Jun/15/23 10:18:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that was an interesting contradiction, but there have been a lot of contradictions within the Conservative Party in the last number of hours. I notice that the member says the Conservatives support the bill and want to see the bill get passed, and now what the member does at the very end is read a motion. The motion is an amendment. That continues the tradition of the Conservative Party. Whether it supports a bill or it does not support a bill, its members tend to want to try to prevent legislation from passing. The Minister of Justice just expanded on why there are some issues related to the Senate amendments, and why we cannot support them. I do not quite understand. Is the Conservative Party really wanting to see the legislation pass, or is the idea that it will move an amendment in order to cause additional votes and maybe even put up endless speakers? Is the member going to be the last speaker, or can we get some sense of whether there are going to be another 25, 30 or 40 speakers who want to speak to the legislation?

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Jun/15/23 10:18:04 p.m.
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The amendment is in order.

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Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:19:18 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, this is very important legislation, and it has been dragging on for a long time, so some of my colleagues want to speak to it. This is important legislation, and we have important things to say about it. As for the amendment I just put forward, it says to accept all the amendments put forward by the other place. We think they are important. One of them is actually our own, which the Senate has remade. As for the other amendments, we are saying we agree with them, and we think the legislation would be improved. We are not trying to delay anything; we are just trying to make the legislation better.

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Improved

Ms. Christine Normandin (Saint-Jean, BQ)

Jun/15/23 10:19:59 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. I would like him to answer the same question I asked the Minister of Justice. Do we not run the risk of limiting the number of candidates who could be added to the list of judges and laypersons if we strike “as far as possible” from the sentence about selecting candidates who reflect diversity, especially given that there is a shortage of judges? The minister mentioned that the Canadian Judicial Council seemed convinced it would be able to fulfill an obligation of result in appointing people from diverse backgrounds. Does my colleague share the Minister of Justice's optimism given the current shortage of judges?

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Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:20:46 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, some of the Senate amendments we would be approving speak to exactly that, so we are on record as saying we want to go forward with that. As for there not being enough judges, that is another point I could have raised. I did not, but the shortage of judges is an issue Chief Justice Wagner raised as well in his press conference. There are 80 vacancies right now. At the justice committee, we are studying bail reform, and some of the issues are that the trials are bogged down and bail hearings are not happening the way they should, so it is hitting a crisis point. We need the Minister of Justice and the Prime Minister to fill those vacancies as soon as possible.

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Mr. Richard Cannings (South Okanagan—West Kootenay, NDP)

Jun/15/23 10:21:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is not often I agree with the member for Winnipeg North, but I am confused by the Conservative tactics here. This is a relatively non-controversial bill, something the Canadian Bar Association and the whole legal system has pointed out to us that they would like passed as quickly as possible so judges who do things that are improper would be properly handled and properly sanctioned. However, here we have, with a few days left in this session, the Conservatives stalling again with amendments that they know will not pass and that will delay other bills that are more important and deserve more debate. Here we are, talking endlessly about a bill that we basically all want to see pass.

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Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:23:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, once again we have a colleague saying we are delaying things. We are not. On December 9, we passed this unanimously. It went to the other place, which came up with some amendments, and we think they make a lot of sense. One of the amendments is one of the amendments Conservative members put forward at the justice committee. If it had not been ruled out of scope, and if the Liberal members had voted with us on that, this likely would have received royal assent by now. I am confused as to why the other members think we are delaying things. We are just trying to make the legislation better.

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Mr. Philip Lawrence (Northumberland—Peterborough South, CPC)

Jun/15/23 10:23:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would say respectfully to the government that, if it wanted this law passed, it should not have prorogued or called an unnecessary election. This could have been law years ago. These are substantive amendments to be put in place here, so this is not some tactic. We are talking about the livelihoods and reputation of justices. In my opinion, it is not untoward to have a right of appeal. Requesting leave to the Supreme Court is not real. One will get no shot at it. This will not bog down the court system. There might be a handful of cases that would make it to the Federal Court of Appeal. Does the member agree with my comments?

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Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:24:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would completely agree with that. As the Minister of Justice said, there was an appeal process built within the four walls of this legislation and likely that is the end. However, the experts who came to committee said there must be that one appeal into the court system that everybody recognizes as being fair, judicious and generally accepted by the Canadian public. I do not think it would bog things down at all.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Jun/15/23 10:24:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, when the member first talked about the bill, he spoke about how the legislation is good in that it cuts down on the length and makes it more efficient. He even made reference to how it could ultimately go to the Supreme Court. At the end of his speech, he then came onside, saying that the Conservatives support the amendments. That makes me question if these are Conservative senator amendments or if they are from the senators in general. It seems that they might be Conservative senator amendments the member is proposing. I wonder if he can expand on if he is perhaps being influenced by the Conservative wing of the Senate.

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Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:25:54 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I do not even know where to start with that. Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Jun/15/23 10:25:57 p.m.
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Order. Members who have not been recognized should not be speaking. The hon. member for Langley—Aldergrove.

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Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:26:00 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am not going to speculate on that. This has come back from the Senate with amendments, and we think they are good. One of them is an amendment that the Conservatives put forward initially, and the Senate picked up on that. I do not know why the member would impute bad motives to the senators. They are just trying to do their job to the best of their ability. After a reflection of sober second thought, this is what they think would improve the bill. We agree with them.

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Motives

Mr. Gabriel Ste-Marie (Joliette, BQ)

Jun/15/23 10:26:38 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-9

Madam Speaker, once Bill C‑9 is adopted, should the Minister of Justice finally become involved in the judicial appointment process in order to make it less partisan and more effective?

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Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:26:59 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I completely agree that the appointment of judges and people to the Canadian Judicial Council should be non-partisan. One of the problems we have seen is that it has become too partisan, so I completely support that.

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Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)

Jun/15/23 10:27:21 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, Conservatives said that they wanted to pass the bill. Now they have put in an amendment that provokes hours of additional debate on the bill. How do they reconcile that contradiction of always blocking legislation, even when they say they support it?

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Blocking

Mr. Tako Van Popta

Jun/15/23 10:27:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have been asked this question a few times. We think these amendments make a lot of sense. They improve the legislation. That is exactly the way the process is supposed to work after the other place looks at it, and we think the House should accept those amendments.

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Improve

Ms. Christine Normandin (Saint-Jean, BQ)

Jun/15/23 10:28:12 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-9

Madam Speaker, even though it is late, we are wrapping up our work and we may be a little jagged, it is a pleasure to speak to the return of Bill C‑9 as amended by the Senate. This all feels a bit like groundhog day. I was rereading the notes from my last speech on Bill C‑9 and they begin with a reminder to wish everyone a merry Christmas. In my notes, I was talking about the fact that I had spoken to Bill C‑9 or its equivalent, Bill S‑5, before the 2021 election. All that to say that I have spoken to Bill C‑9 many times now. I feel like I am repeating myself, unfortunately. It may be a feeling shared by my colleagues, either in their own speech or in having to listen to mine for the umpteenth time this evening. This has been mentioned many times: There is a real urgency to look into the misconduct of federally appointed judges, as current events are reminding us. There is the case of Justice Brown, for instance, where there were unending delays in the probe of what seemed to be alleged misconduct. In a context where, unfortunately, there is a shortage of judges, we are reminded that we need to streamline the process for studying misconduct and that we need to do so in two ways. First, Bill C‑9 provides for fewer judges to study a case of misconduct. Second, it provides fewer possibilities for using delaying tactics throughout the process to ensure that the work is done diligently and that the judges are assigned for a shorter period of time. With respect to the amendments proposed by the Senate, only two were retained by the government and the rest were rejected. I will spend a little more time on one of the amendments, which prompted some questions that I have already asked my colleagues. It concerns an amendment to clause 84, which follows up on the clauses that provide for the creation of a list of judges and laypersons who can be involved in the different stages of the process for studying the misconduct. There is a diversity provision for this list. The initial clause read as follows: 84 As far as possible, the Council shall name persons who reflect the diversity of the Canadian population to the roster of judges and to the roster of lay persons. The amendment suggested by the Senate and accepted by the government would delete “as far as possible”. As I mentioned, this points to a shift away from what seemed like an obligation of diligence to an obligation of result. To the extent possible, the aim was to incorporate diversity into the list of judges and laypersons for selection. However, by deleting “as far as possible”, I get a sense that we are creating more of an obligation of result, which raises a number of issues. We are told that there is currently a shortage of judges. We cannot change the current number of judges simply by snapping our fingers. It would be nice if we could because we need them, but we have to work with what we have. If we absolutely had to start reflecting diversity now, with our very small pool of existing judges, we could run into certain problems by selecting judges concentrated in certain geographic areas, where there is better representation. We could end up relying more heavily on specific locations to find judges more representative of diversity. We could also run the risk of sidelining certain other necessary or useful criteria in selecting the judges we want to include on our lists. One example could be knowledge of both official languages. By making diversity an obligation rather than something we are striving for or want, we could be limiting our options at a time when resources are already scarce. When I asked the minister whether it might not create obstacles that are more difficult to overcome if we make it an obligation of result rather than an obligation of diligence, I got the impression that he somewhat agreed that it was perhaps not the best amendment that the Senate could have suggested. He seemed to be saying that we can live with it, it is not so bad, but that, clearly, we could have done without it. When it comes to this aspect of creating an obligation of result when drawing up a list, I think we could have done without this amendment. It creates an obligation that may be difficult to fulfill. I do not necessarily share the Minister of Justice's optimism when he says that the Canadian Judicial Council is of the impression that it will be able to fulfill this obligation. The other amendment that was proposed and welcomed by the government is to add the term “sexual misconduct” to the list of complaints that cannot be systematically dismissed by a screening officer who receives complaints. It therefore says that “A screening officer shall not dismiss a complaint that alleges sexual misconduct [that is the term being added] or sexual harassment or that alleges discrimination on a prohibited ground of discrimination within the meaning of the Canadian Human Rights Act.” In the complaints analysis process, a complaint can be dismissed from the outset if it is frivolous, vexatious or obviously unfounded because the grounds for complaint are not sufficiently substantiated. A complaint cannot be rejected if there is an element of sexual misconduct, sexual harassment or discrimination. This amendment is timely in the context of the #MeToo movement, as we increasingly seek to eliminate everything to do with sexual misconduct. We do not want this to be such a specific criterion that we never reach it. We want to widen the scope. I think it is a good thing to add “sexual misconduct” to the list of criteria for not automatically dismissing a complaint. In that regard, I believe that good work was done. In my opinion and in the Bloc Québécois's opinion, the minister clearly explained the reasons for which he supports these two amendments, although we do not entirely agree with one of them. However, this will not prevent us from voting in favour of the motion, because it will finally make it possible to implement Bill C-9. This is becoming increasingly urgent. We need to get this done as quickly as possible, so we can truly streamline the complaints analysis process. The government rejected the rest of the Senate amendments in order to prevent the complaints analysis process from becoming more cumbersome, given that the original intent of the bill was to streamline it. In our opinion, it was warranted to reject the proposed amendments. I want to come back to the fact that this bill was debated at length on multiple occasions and in various incarnations. The Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights has done a lot of work on this, and it seemed as though we finally had a version that parliamentarians agreed on. Bill C‑9 was unanimously passed at third reading. I think we could have done without the Senate deciding to get involved and adding its two cents. I will not get into the details of Bloc Québécois's position on the very existence of a second chamber. However, I would like to come back to the general purpose of the bill. It is important to remind members of that. The community, all jurists, have been asking for this bill for a long time. What is more, as I mentioned recently, after the news broke about Justice Brown, the Right Hon. Richard Wagner once again emphasized the urgent need to take action and pass Bill C‑9. He also mentioned that it was too bad that the bill was still being examined by the House. This allows me to add this little grain of salt: If not for the snap 2021 election, we would already have a bill in place. I mention the following purely as a hypothesis, since I do not have a crystal ball, but Justice Russell Brown's case might have gone differently had it been handled under the future version of Bill C‑9, which we will likely adopt, instead of under the old complaints process, which is several decades old. This bill, which seeks to shorten the process and therefore lower the cost, is well balanced. It helps speed up the process and make it more efficient, while upholding the rights of any judge who may be the subject of complaints for misconduct of all kinds within or outside their practice. The other thing we really liked about the bill is that it gets us out of a binary repression mode, a binary method for sanctioning complaints. In the first version, either the judge was cleared of the charges and remained in their position, or they were found guilty of the charges and had to be removed. There was no grey area between the two for less serious misconduct, for example. That is something that has been corrected in Bill C‑9. I think it is still worth mentioning a few things that are now possible. I did this last time, and I think it is still relevant to repeat it again today. Clause 102 of the bill states: “If the review panel does not refer the complaint to the Council under section 101, it may dismiss the complaint or take one or more of the following actions if it considers it appropriate to do so in the circumstances”. One of the things the panel can do is “issue a private or public expression of concern” about the judge's alleged conduct. It can “issue a private or public warning”. It can also “issue a private or public reprimand”. Once again, these measures may be more appropriate depending on the type of misconduct that may have occurred, rather than an all-or-nothing approach, in other words removal or no removal. The panel can also “order the judge to apologize, either privately or publicly, by whatever means the panel considers appropriate in the circumstances”. This means the judge can be supported through an apology process that would be tailored to the situation. It can “order the judge to take specific measures, including attending counselling or a continuing education course”. There is a rehabilitation aspect. This is a much more positive approach that shows a desire to retrain judges, if they make honest mistakes, for example. The panel can “take any action that the panel considers to be equivalent to any of the actions referred to in paragraphs (a) to (e)”. This provides the panel with a fair bit of latitude in the actions it can take. Finally, the panel can, “with the consent of the judge, take any other action that the panel considers appropriate in the circumstances”. The fact that the judge's consent is absolutely required for measures beyond the scope of those mentioned is perhaps the aspect of the bill that made us hesitate a little more. Generally speaking, this is a bill that has long been awaited and desired by the judiciary and the bar associations. We are pleased to finally see it come to fruition, to completion. We hope that, despite the little game of ping-pong between the House of Commons and the Senate, no more obstacles will be thrown in the way. I would like to point out that the fact that another amendment has been proposed just this evening worries me a little. I hope that this will not prevent the bill from being passed before the summer, or before what could happen in the fall. Nobody here has a crystal ball. I hope this will not be the umpteenth bill to die on the Order Paper. We could fill a lot of shelves with all the bills that have died on the Order Paper. Unfortunately, we are making a lot of work for shelving manufacturers. In general, we feel that the government's motion assessing the Senate amendments is balanced. It prevents excessive amendments from undermining the bill's original substance and its original objective of streamlining the process and making it much more efficient. We still have some uncertainty about deleting the words “as far as possible” and imposing an obligation of result. However, we can live with that uncertainty. I think that voting in favour of the government's motion is worthwhile, because it will finally allow the bill to be implemented. With that in mind, the Bloc Québécois has no problem in supporting the motion. Most of all, we hope that the next steps will be taken in a timely manner and will finally produce an acceptable bill.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Jun/15/23 10:44:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we have heard some of the stakeholders, particularly from our judicial system, indicating that this legislation is sound and they are recommending that the House of Commons pass it. I recognize that the Bloc has been very supportive of the legislation since before it went to the Senate. I wonder if the member could provide her thoughts on respecting the independence of the courts and the suggestion that they would really like to see this legislation pass.

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Ms. Christine Normandin

Jun/15/23 10:44:53 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-9

Madam Speaker, one of the analyses I did in my first speech on Bill C‑9 was under section 99 of the Constitution, which addresses judges' security of tenure. Different jurists and analysts who worked on the bill mentioned that this principle of immovability was respected. The foundation of the analysis process for misconduct is that it is to be done by peers and a judge must not be removed for minor issues. It was balanced. The fact that the number of courts in the analysis process is being reduced and that only a right of appeal to the Supreme Court is being retained was balanced in context to still allow for the right of defence for judges accused of misconduct. This is a bill that is balanced and respects the constitutional part on security of tenure.

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