Tuesday, September 24, 2024

The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs has the honour to present its

TWENTY-SEVENTH REPORT

Your committee, to which was referred Bill S-250, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (sterilization procedures), has, in obedience to the order of reference of April 20, 2023, examined the said bill and now reports the same with the following amendments:

1.Clause 1, pages 1 to 3:

(a) On page 1, replace lines 11 to 22 with the following:

“268.1 (1) For greater certainty, a sterilization procedure is an act that wounds or maims a person for the purposes of subsection 268(1).

(2) In this section, sterilization procedure means the severing, clipping, tying or cauterizing, in whole or in part, of the Fallopian tubes, ovaries or uterus of a person or any other procedure performed on a person that results in the permanent prevention of reproduction, regardless of whether the procedure is reversible through a subsequent surgical procedure.”;

(b) on page 2, delete lines 1 to 36; and

(c) on page 3, delete lines 1 to 9.

Respectfully submitted,

Observations to the Twenty-Seventh Report of the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs (Bill S-250)

The committee has consistently reported in the past about how the Criminal Code has been amended in a piecemeal manner for many decades and has become cumbersome, sometimes repetitive, inconsistent, and in need of comprehensive reform. (See, for instance, the committee’s 2017 report Delaying Justice is Denying Justice, at pages 41 to 43.) The committee repeats its past recommendation that an independent body should undertake a comprehensive review of the Criminal Code. The revived Law Commission of Canada could undertake such a review, which should include a study of all provisions in the Code that pertain to crimes against vulnerable persons.