THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Thursday, May 21, 2026
The Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights met with videoconference this day at 8 a.m. [ET] to study Bill C-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (hate propaganda, hate crime and access to religious or cultural places).
Senator Paulette Senior (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Good morning, everyone. I begin this meeting by acknowledging that the land on which we gather is on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Anishinaabe Algonquin Nation.
My name is Paulette Senior, a senator from Ontario and chair of this committee. I now invite senators to introduce themselves starting with our deputy chair.
Senator Bernard: Good morning. I am Wanda Thomas Bernard, senator from Nova Scotia, Mi’kmaq territory.
Senator McPhedran: Good morning. Marilou McPhedran, independent senator for Manitoba, Treaty 1 and the homeland of the Red River Métis.
Senator Arnot: Good morning. My name is David Arnot. I am a senator from Saskatchewan.
Senator Ince: Good morning. Tony Ince from Nova Scotia.
[Translation]
Senator Arnold: Good morning. Dawn Arnold from New Brunswick.
[English]
Senator K. Wells: Kristopher Wells, Treaty 6 territory, Alberta.
Senator Pate: Good morning and welcome. Kim Pate. I live here in the unceded, unsurrendered, unreturned territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe.
Senator Ataullahjan: Good morning and welcome. Salma Ataullahjan from Ontario.
The Chair: Welcome, senators, and welcome to all of those who are joining and following our deliberations.
Today, our committee is continuing its study of Bill C-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (hate propaganda, hate crime and access to religious or cultural places).
Before we welcome our witnesses, I would like to provide a content warning for this meeting. The sensitive topics covered today may be triggering for people in the room with us as well as for those watching and listening to the broadcast. Mental health support for all Canadians is available by phone and text at 988. Senators and parliamentary employees are also reminded that the Senate’s Employee and Family Assistance Program is available to them and that a counsellor from this program is available in room C-126 for the duration of this meeting and for one hour afterwards.
For our first panel, we have the pleasure of welcoming the Honourable Sean Fraser, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada and Minister responsible for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. He is joined by officials from the Department of Justice. We have Owen Ripley, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Policy Sector; Joanna Wells, Senior Counsel and Team Lead, Criminal Law Policy Section; and Marianne Breese, Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section.
Welcome to all of you and welcome, minister. I now invite you, Minister Fraser, to make your opening statement.
Hon. Sean Fraser, P.C., M.P., Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada and Minister responsible for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency: Thank you, chair. How much time do I have for the opening statement?
The Chair: You know, I was being a bit cheeky by leaving it open, because I don’t want to limit you to five minutes, but I wouldn’t like you to take up the whole hour either.
Mr. Fraser: That’s fine. Thank you. I will do my very best to stick to about that time so we can save time for questions.
The Chair: Thank you.
Mr. Fraser: We have had the opportunity previously. I will do my best to be brief.
[Translation]
Before I begin, I would like to thank you for being here.
[English]
I know these are not normal sitting hours. It’s not a normal sitting week, and the fact that you have shown up outside of the normal sitting schedule for these extended hearings is something I am grateful for. I think it demonstrates a commitment to advancing important work to combat hate across Canada and I wanted to say thank you.
I wanted to thank you as well for the recommendations that were tabled, I believe a month ago today, from this committee that have a lot of crossover with the measures we are debating through this committee process, insofar as we can deal with the criminal law reforms that are designed to combat hate. I hope you will see some of the recommendations reflected in the content of this bill.
[Translation]
Before I get to the heart of the matter, it is essential to understand the public safety strategy and appreciate the significance of this bill.
The first pillar of the strategy is to overhaul the Criminal Code with the aim of strengthening criminal courts across the country.
[English]
In addition to some of the very specific changes to the Criminal Code, it is important — and I know those on the Legal Committee will be tired of hearing me say this — that we don’t simply reform the code and think the job is done. In addition to the criminal law reforms included in this and other bills dealing with bail and sentencing reform and gender-based violence as well as the combatting hate act, we need to ensure that we put supports on the front line to ensure that we have law enforcement who are properly trained, community organizations that have the capacity to support victims of crime, and that we also take a long view to make systemic investments upstream in affordable housing, mental health and addictions, and education and training to ensure that, over the long term, we are seeking not only to punish wrongdoing but to prevent it in the first place.
This particular bill fits into that context as part of that first pillar, strengthening the criminal laws that are on the books to combat a very troubling rise in hate crimes we have seen in recent years in Canada. You do not have to read the newspapers for too many days in a row to see that there is a very real challenge when it comes to anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, anti‑Black racism, anti-Asian hate, the list goes on. The thousands of people who have reported hate crimes represent only a fraction of the instances of hate that take place in our communities, and the prevalence of these challenging behaviours that have crossed a criminal threshold, in my opinion, in many instances demand that we take the issues very seriously.
In the interest of time, I will get to the substance of the bill. You will know well that the bill contains at its core four new criminal offences — the intimidation and obstruction offences that were initially motivated by seeking to ensure people could practise their religion freely, by giving certain protections through the criminal law to religious institutions, very quickly evolved into a more complex understanding that hate is not limited to the doorsteps of our religious institutions. Certainly, we should be able to pray freely at mosques, synagogues, churches and temples in this country, but we also should recognize that the protections should extend equally to buildings or spaces used by any identifiable group. If hate takes place at a community centre, for example, that is something that we desire to extend protections to.
In addition to the intimidation and the obstruction offences, which were core campaign commitments, we have also decided to move forward with the stand-alone crime of hate. This is particularly important to me as part of this bill after my engagement with different communities of interest. The point was driven home for me through those conversations that when a crime is committed, it is always morally culpable, but when it is motivated by hatred towards the victim’s identity, it is not just the victim individually who suffers but the harm reverberates through the entirety of a particular community. When we can see that there is a higher degree of moral culpability when a crime is not only committed but instead targets a victim because of who they are, it demands additional changes.
We have decided to move forward with the stand-alone crime of hate to ensure that if you assault a person because of the colour of their skin, that you will face additional charges for the crime of hate. If you harass a person at a university campus or a grocery store in a criminal manner, we want to recognize that targeting on the basis of the identity of the victim should carry a heavier weight in criminal law.
And, of course, where the crime of the wilful promotion of hatred has been committed, we are adding an additional offence where the crime is committed in the context of using a hate symbol. This is to demonstrate that sometimes a tool used to commit a crime can make it a more serious offence. We recognize in the Criminal Code that there is a different context when you commit assault, for example, versus assault with a weapon. When you are committing the crime of the wilful promotion of hate, but choose to do so through the use of a hate symbol in addition to the underlying behaviour, that is something that we have determined should carry an additional criminal offence in the manner that we have moved forward with.
Through the parliamentary process, we have heard there were certain elements we didn’t quite get right when we had our first draft of this bill and have reflected those changes and amendments we have accepted from the House of Commons committee process. This includes being more specific in defining hatred under Canada’s criminal law, and, in fact, it reflects very closely the advice of this committee and the report that I mentioned that was tabled a month ago.
We have also heard from communities that the additional layer of protection to have the consent of a provincial attorney general should be maintained in the Criminal Code and we have accepted that amendment.
We have also listened to the Hindu community, who asked us not to include language around the swastika, which, of course, carries a very different meaning in their community than the hakenkreuz, as it is referred to in the legislation, does for so many others.
There was a lengthy debate on how we ought to define the religious exemption to hate crimes. Instead, we wish to recognize not that it should operate as a defence to what would otherwise be a hate crime but instead should be better captured in the definition of a hate crime to ensure we are dealing with a definition that recognizes the ordinary practice of faith is not a hate crime to begin with under any circumstances.
My hope is that we can pass this bill expeditiously. To the extent that we can go into the summer with the additional protections that this bill provides to communities of faith, but also, more broadly, communities that have a shared identity more broadly, I know we could see the protections afforded to those individuals who make up the community more quickly.
[Translation]
Thank you very much. I greatly appreciate the efforts you’re making to improve the quality of this bill, and I look forward to hearing your questions. Thank you, everyone.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you very much, minister. We will now proceed to questions from senators. Senators, you have five minutes, which also includes the answer. We will begin with our deputy chair, Senator Bernard.
Senator Bernard: Thank you, Minister Fraser, for being with us today. Yesterday, we heard a clear divide: Police want a strict hate crime code and a fixed list of symbols, but human rights advocates warn this forces traumatized communities to constantly relitigate new hate icons. How does the government intend to reconcile rigid policing boundaries with a social trauma-informed framework? Specifically, can you tell us what safeguards exist to ensure this legislation is not selectively enforced against the very racialized members of protest groups it aims to protect?
Mr. Fraser: Thank you, senator, for the question. One learning for me over the course of my past more than a year now in this job was how much we depend on the judgment of law enforcement in individual sets of circumstances. With every criminal law that is on the books, there will be some judgment that is applied at a local level. When we have advances in the criminal law, it is important we equip law enforcement with the training they need, of course, working with local jurisdictions, provincially and municipally as that may be the case, and that work will have to continue after whatever version of reforms is implemented through this bill.
In addition, though, we want it to have some objectivity to prevent the potential weaponization, as you discussed, to the potential symbols that could be used. We also wanted to make clear it is a high threshold before you are in the territory of committing a hate crime with the specific definition around hate with the extreme vilification and detestation, but also maintaining the threshold question of the commission of the crime of the wilful promotion of hate before you engage in an assessment as to whether the display of a symbol, for example, would, in fact, be a crime.
We could have decided to move forward with a version of the bill that simply criminalized the display of a symbol. There would be obvious constitutional concerns, and we wanted to scope out protests and have included specific language in the bill to that effect. We want to manage a process going forward that will make clear to some degree that there is an objective process behind which symbols are put on. I feel a bit uncomfortable, personally, having an individual minister simply determine new symbols that could be banned. You could imagine how that could be abused, but through a combination of maintaining a threshold for the definition of hate the crime of the wilful promotion of hatred before you engage in analysis as to whether the hate symbols piece would be engaged, I have some comfort that this will not be applied in a way that is abusive of local law enforcement authority, with the obvious caveat that we will need to work with police of local jurisdiction as well as provinces and municipalities to ensure proper levels of training are put in place as the laws evolve.
Senator Bernard: I’m glad you mentioned training. Education and training were certainly one of the themes that came up from many witnesses yesterday as well. Many witnesses talked about education being key to implementation. Can you tell us, Minister Fraser, how the legislation safeguards the use of these symbols in educational, journalistic, academic or artistic contexts?
Mr. Fraser: Yes, there are two elements. First, there is an explicit carve-out for academic, journalistic and the general sense of free expression. You can imagine an educator who wants to teach the history of the Second World War may engage the use of the symbols that were used by the Nazis during that time. We are not suggesting it’s a crime to teach kids about that history, but if you seek to promote hate against an identifiable group through the use of those symbols, that’s a very different thing. We will specifically carve out in this bill the use of these symbols for the purposes of the nature that you mentioned.
Separate and apart from that — and this will happen outside of the bill because, obviously, the bill is about reforming the Criminal Code — there should be efforts taken by different levels of government to not only to protect free expression and the letter of the law but to actually fund training programs to ensure that law enforcement has the benefit of the learnings of different levels of government when it comes to recognizing when hate exists and to ensure that officers understand that hate does have that higher threshold of extreme detestation and vilification. In addition to having that carve-out that you discussed, there will need to be, on the back end in perpetuity, investments made by different levels of government in training so those on the ground applying the law know the law and how it ought to be applied in a given set of circumstances.
The Chair: Thank you, minister.
Senator Ataullahjan: Good morning, minister. Bill C-16 in the Forty-second Parliament expanded protected grounds in the Canadian Human Rights Act and Criminal Code with respect to gender identity and gender expression while maintaining the existing balance between equality protections and Charter freedoms, including freedom of religion and expression. Bill C-9 now expands criminal hate speech enforcement and amends section 319 of the Criminal Code by repealing the statutory defence for good faith expressions of religious opinions or beliefs based on a religious text.
Why is the government expanding statutory protections for some groups while removing a long-standing safeguard relied upon by faith communities, particularly when the Criminal Code already contains extensive provisions addressing threats, violence, harassment and hate-motivated conduct?
Mr. Fraser: Thank you, senator. One thing that I wish to clarify is that, in my view, the protections that are being extended to different groups apply equally or perhaps specifically to freedom of religion.
The motivation for this bill, from the moment we campaigned on elements of it during the recent federal election, was to offer enhanced protection to religious communities.
It became sickening to me that we saw continued harassment of individuals who were seeking to attend their mosque or their synagogue or church or temple and were being harassed, intimidated or obstructed, and we want to ensure that the people have the protection to practise their faith freely.
Those benefits will accrue through the intimidation and obstruction defence, as well as the stand-alone crime of hate, which is extremely important to recognize. However, you raised an important question. We didn’t start with the decision to repeal the religious defence. That emerged through the parliamentary process, and obviously that defence was put in place at a time that pre-existed the Charter and the freedom of conscience and freedom of religion protections therein. I have faith that those protections will continue, but more specifically, one of the things when I sat down to think about this issue, is that I’m not convinced that the religious defence, as it existed, properly captured the free religion the way that I envision it should exist.
The way it exists today before this bill is advanced would suggest that the practice of your faith could be a hate crime, but if you in good faith are expressing it, that operates a defence to what otherwise is classified as a hate crime. We should recognize through the definition of hate that the ordinary practice of faith is not a hate crime to begin with. If we are able to ensure that communities can attend their place of worship, can preach, can read and educate the public or their faith membership on the lessons from their holy books, then that would be a more appropriate way to deal with this unique challenge. That emerged through conversations with different political parties during the House of Commons proceedings.
My own view is that we cannot allow people to believe let alone change the law in a manner that would suggest, that they can’t freely practise their faith. Canada is a country built on multiculturalism and diversity, including religious diversity, and it is a huge part of the strength of the social fabric of Canada.
So, in my view, the shift of the protections of the religious defence, instead, to a clarifying provision that clearly demonstrates that the good-faith practice of your religion is not a hate crime to begin with, rather than it operating as a defence to what would otherwise be a hate crime, is a more accurate reflection of what the law ought to be in Canada.
Senator Ataullahjan: Minister, Bill C-9 risks criminalizing mainstream religious and political symbols based on vague resemblance. If extremist groups misuse the shahada or other common symbols, how are the police supposed to distinguish lawful expression from banned imagery? And why does the bill target potentially confusing symbols while ignoring universally recognized hate symbols? How exactly does section 2.2 protect communities rather than create confusion and selective enforcement?
Mr. Fraser: A lot to get into in such a short period of time. My own view — and I’ve said this at the parliamentary committee before the House of Commons — I don’t think you can promote hate in good faith. If we can clarify that the practice of religion in its ordinary way does not constitute a crime, we must. I believe the bill, with the “for greater certainty” clause, gets there. The heightened definition of “hatred” and the additional protection that we put back into the bill with the consent of the Attorney General before a charge can go forward all offer additional protections.
No one from any political party I spoke to wants to make it a crime to practise your faith in an ordinary way. We want to ensure, if you are, in good faith, reading your holy books, attending a service or educating the public, that that’s not what we’re getting at. But when you actually seek to promote hatred or violence against an identifiable group of people, that is a different category of behaviour altogether.
The Chair: Thank you, minister.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you, minister and officials, for being with us today. I appreciate in your opening comments, minister, that you referenced some of the confusion around symbols. I’m going to ask a very specific question here about the use of the wording in the bill as it stands with “wilfully promotes hatred . . . by displaying,” and, in very practical terms, that would seem to indicate that simply holding or displaying something will, in and of itself, wilfully promote hatred. It could be interpreted that way.
I am asking whether it would be better to change one word in that phrase to “wilfully promotes hatred while displaying,” so that it is not just the display in and of itself. This is a point, as Senator Bernard noted when she spoke with you, that has been made by a number of different organizations and religious groups. If you could, please just address that specific wording question.
Mr. Fraser: Thank you, sincerely. That’s a point that’s well taken. From your question, I think we are all aligned in the outcome that we’re hoping to achieve.
We are not seeking to criminalize the display of a given symbol that may find itself on the list but, instead, are seeking to recognize that when you commit the crime of wilful promotion hatred in its current form, and you do so by using a hate symbol, that can deliver a greater social harm to the group that you may be targeting through that underlying crime of wilfully promoting hate.
As you can imagine, there may be symbols people will use for other purposes. Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard has enumerated several examples.
To me, I would want to ensure that we have language used in the provision that will be interpreted with certainty. I would hate to, through a good-faith amendment, accidentally water down or lower the threshold, so I would want to ensure that we have the opportunity for our officials to give an assessment as to the likely legal interpretation of the language that we have chosen.
The drafting that we’ve put together intended to deliver an offence that would still require you to meet the very high threshold of wilful promotion of hatred through the use of a hate symbol, not saying the use of a hate symbol in all circumstances will constitute that crime with a very high threshold.
I don’t want to eat up the clock. So if there are officials sticking around beyond my time on the committee, it may be appropriate to get their assessment of the potential interpretation of the language that you’ve chosen, senator.
Senator McPhedran: Minister, we know that the Charter is all about the balancing of rights. Here we have political speech, hate speech and freedom of expression balanced with protections of people’s rights not to be subjected to hate and hateful speech.
I will pick up on a point that was raised with you by my colleague Elizabeth May in the other place, and others, but I think Ms. May spoke to this with a lot of articulation, and that is the whole idea of a building and the protection of people. Obviously, this is something that is highly relevant to faith groups in our country, but the lack of clarity in this definition seems to really, de facto, open up the way to have bubble zones, the kind of thing that we see at the municipal level. Could you address that, please, the broad language, and is this not likely to lead to interpretations that will really limit political speech in this country?
Mr. Fraser: Thank you. I don’t expect that will be the automatic result of the decision to move forward because we have specifically carved out free expression and sharing information, in addition to the academic and journalistic exceptions. Going to a protest and sharing information can be a very healthy part of life in a democracy. It can be uncomfortable, but there is no right to comfort that is protected by the Charter. There are reasonable limits we can place on the rights enumerated in the Charter if there is some pressing social obligation we are seeking to achieve.
We are not talking about people who wish to go protest. In fact, we don’t have the jurisdiction to establish bubble-zone legislation. That would be a municipal regulatory authority, in all likelihood. But we do have behaviour that crosses a line into criminality, and if you are seeking to criminally intimidate or physically obstruct a person from entering their place of worship, that is a fundamentally different thing than showing up outside a particular building and saying, “I disagree with X,” or, “I believe that you should know Y.” And making sure that we are only capturing that behaviour that crosses the criminal threshold rather than criminalizing protest is an essential part of this bill by —
The Chair: Thank you, minister.
Mr. Fraser: Thank you, chair.
Senator Arnot: Good morning, minister. You mentioned the linkage between the anti-Semitism report and the goals in Bill C-9. I’m wondering if you support the creation, which was a key recommendation, of dedicated hate crime units in provincial and municipal police forces throughout Canada.
Mr. Fraser: At the risk of stepping on other’s toes here, because it is not my jurisdiction, the answer is a clear yes.
When we’ve seen, across jurisdictions, not only in the areas of hate crimes but across different policy areas — sexual crimes, for example, and organized crime is another — where you have a localized force that develops deep expertise and understanding of a given set of issues, we end up seeing a more nuanced understanding of how the law is interpreted, and that deeper expertise, in my view, results in better social outcomes. You can appreciate someone who has never been through a training exercise being asked to interpret a change in criminal laws. It is challenging under the best of circumstances. On the contrary example, you have not just an individual who has gone through a seminar but a person whose expertise is developed through working in a particular policy space and enforcing the law on the ground over a period of years. That person will become better at the job they are being asked to do.
To the extent that local jurisdictions — provincial or municipal — adopt specialized units across policy areas, including hate-crime units, my experience in the conversations that I have shared is that the individuals who form part of those units become more expert and do a better job.
Senator Arnot: We heard from various witnesses about the need to collect enhanced and disaggregated data. I’m wondering, sir, if you would support a three-year statutory review covering the charges, the outcomes, the demographic impacts, Attorney General consent decisions and Charter litigation.
Mr. Fraser: Generally speaking, reviews are a helpful tool when you have a legal change to understand the impact they’ve had. I have not done the policy work to understand why a three‑year policy review would be superior to a two-year or a five‑year, for example. As a general rule, they could be useful tools that force a government or a system to assess the results of changes they made. From my perspective, that’s something that I would leave to the Senate based on the testimony that this committee has heard through witnesses.
Before we entertain amendments that could potentially delay the implementation of the legislation is backed by committee testimony, I would hope that we understand that it is based on facts and evidence, and not just a general sense of what should happen. But to the extent the Senate committee concludes that a review is a useful tool, that’s not something I find problematic.
Senator Arnot: Thank you.
Senator K. Wells: Hello, minister. One common critique we’ve heard about this bill, including testimony yesterday, is that the law already accounts for hate-related offences, including at sentencing, but Bill C-9 creates a new stand-alone hate crime offence, which means police and prosecutors can charge someone with a hate-motivated crime from the very outset. Can you explain why having a stand-alone hate crime offence, not just at sentencing, as an add-on aggravating factor, why this matters for communities that are now under attack in Canada?
Mr. Fraser: Thank you. This is extremely important and it is important in a few ways. The first conversation I had with anyone in Canada that sold me on the importance of hate was Irwin Cotler, my predecessor in this job, who has remained an active advocate for human rights. And when I say we need to recognize that a crime of hate affects not only the individual victim but reverberates through an entire community — I told Irwin I was going to plagiarize him — that came directly from him based on a lifetime of considering issues such as this.
When you look at the newspaper and see a young man in my community who was shot on a construction site with a nail gun who happened to be the only Black worker on the job, I thought to myself, “This is not a common assault and it should be treated differently.”
When we see that there are members of the Jewish community not only being harassed outside synagogue, but being assaulted in a grocery story in the Ottawa region, I think to myself, “This is not just the individual who is being impacted but an entire community who sees that they are not safe when they experience life in Canada.”
So from my perspective, we need to recognize that, through a separate criminal charge, there is a different moral culpability for assaulting someone versus assaulting someone because of the colour of their skin, the person they love or the god that they pray to.
We have an opportunity here to send a very strong message across Canada that hate has no quarter in this country, and we will pursue not only the underlying charge that justifies crime, but, separately and independently, the crime of hate, recognizing the harm you’ve done not only to the individual, but to creating an unwelcoming set of circumstances for entire groups of people based on their identity.
Senator K. Wells: Thank you for that. Next, we recognize that hate symbols have been banned around the world for a very specific reason. Not only do they spread fear, but they also function as rallying calls. They signal to perpetrators that fear and intimidation are welcome. They are a call to join a particular cause or movement. Can you explain, for the record, why criminalizing the public display of symbols associated with terrorist organizations is a necessary tool to stop spreading that fear and the signalling of support for hate?
Mr. Fraser: Certainly. I will walk through my thinking of getting here. My first reaction when I heard about the potential to do a symbols ban was to say, “Okay, we have to be careful here because free expression is important. People should be allowed to make a point in public that is a non-violent attempt to convey meaning. That has been the law in Canada for many years.” So it was important to me that we establish a threshold question that made very clear this is not about free expression. And we’ve tied it to the threshold question of the wilful promotion of hatred, which is already a crime in Canada.
My own view is that we have different examples in the Criminal Code when you recognize the tool that you use or the method by which you commit a crime can make it worse. Think of assault versus assault with a weapon. We recognize that the harm when you use a particular weapon is greater. When you have a crime of hate, the wilful promotion of hate versus the wilful promotion of hate through a hate symbol, we know both are bad, but you use a hate symbol, perhaps to bring people together to join the cause more effectively, but also the use of that symbol can deliver a greater degree of pain to a community for whom that symbol means something very different for other members of society.
When you choose not to address this gap in the law, you are allowing the status quo to potentially proliferate and fester, and you send a signal that we’re going to tolerate the use of these kinds of hate or terror symbols in society based on the effectiveness through which they are used to help others promote hate. The increased social harm when you have a hate symbol layered on top of the underlying crime of the wilful promotion of hate, similar to the stand-alone hate crime, we believe that it deserves recognition as an individual offence in the Criminal Code, recognizing the different impact it can have over and above the promotion of hatred.
The Chair: Thank you.
Senator Ince: Thank you to the officials. Thank you, minister, for being here. Minister, throughout emails and everything else, stakeholders have shared concerns that the hate symbols in Bill C-9 do not comprehensively include hate symbols that continue to threaten vulnerable communities. What are the benefits and the drawbacks of the inclusion of a larger list in this bill?
Mr. Fraser: Thank you very much, senator. This is an important conversation and one, if I can be completely candid and open with you, that I think is likely to evolve somewhat over time.
One of the things that I felt strongly about was I want to protect against the potential harm that some future ministers might be able to pick a group they don’t like and add them to a list. You can imagine there will be a pro-development individual who wants to do harm to an environmental organization. There may be a person of a particular political philosophy who wishes to target opponents who support a different political philosophy, and those are dangerous conversations.
What I wanted to do, to prevent whoever may succeed me in this job from abusing the authorities that they could have under this law, was to have some objective reference to an already‑established list. When I looked across government at what we actually have on the shelf, the list of terror organizations seemed like a decent starting point. There are groups that I’ve been thinking about that fall outside of that list — think of the KKK, for example — that I struggle with, because they are as tasteless and dangerous a group, in my view, that exists when it comes to promoting hate, but I also want to make sure there is some objective mechanism through which new organizations or new symbols can be added not just to the individual preference of the minister of the day.
With respect, from point of view, if this is an area of further work that parliamentary committees in the House or the Senate wish to take on, or if we need to revise the process through which groups are added to the terror list, that’s something I am open to, but I also don’t want perfection to be the enemy of progress, knowing that creating a new system in the course of this particular study could significantly delay the protections for all groups we are seeking to protect.
From my point of view, I don’t want to have the minister on their personal whim be responsible for identifying groups, but instead I really want to have some objective basis upon which a group’s symbol would be added to this list.
Senator Ince: Thank you.
Senator Pate: Thank you, minister, for joining us, and thank you to the officials.
I spent yesterday in Collins Bay Institution, where I met primarily with men who are Black. Last week, I was in prisons in Alberta, where I met primarily with folks who are Indigenous. It is very clear there are issues that need to be dealt with in this country that you have identified.
This is now the third bill — or there are more than three — where there are already existing provisions in the Criminal Code instead of addressing the issues that you, minister, have very astutely pointed out that we need to be taking other concrete steps on to address inequality in this country. What measures are going to be taken to address those issues?
Even as you spoke and gave the example of assault with a weapon being worse than assault without a weapon, I immediately went to some of the Indigenous women I met with last week who are in jail for assault with a weapon because that was the option other than being choked or kicked by the male hands that were abusing them. Grabbing a plate, grabbing a knife — his own knife or his own gun — sometimes is the option.
It strikes me that we are not getting to the nuances and the importance of really addressing the equality issues at the root of this bill and so many others. When will we take those concrete steps to address those issues?
Mr. Fraser: There are a few different elements to your question. I don’t want to evade any of them, so to the extent we need to come back, let me know.
First, in the circumstances you’ve described, I would hope that prosecutors, courts and law enforcement would take somewhat of a nuanced understanding when a person is actually defending themselves, for example. There are, obviously, many cases where the outcome isn’t exactly one that we would believe is just in the circumstances, and we need to build trust in the system through training and expertise developed over many years that will have more and more cases deliver a just result rather than imprisoning a person who may have been defending themselves, as in the examples you gave, with a plate or whatever weapon happened to be accessible in an emergency situation.
I have challenges with the point that there are other provisions in the code that could do this, one, because it may allow us to have the social permission to accept the status quo, and I don’t think the laws we have on the books today are sufficient to offer the protections that we, in fact, do need.
The other piece that you’ve mentioned is going to require work on the back end when it comes to implementation, and this is a part where I want to make sure I’m understanding your question. When you say, “When are we doing those other things,” are you talking about training, for example, or what is it that you are pointing to?
Senator Pate: Sure. When we’ve been speaking about other bills, you talked about the importance of ensuring that people have equal access to supports and to justice, and, yes, training is a part of that, but when we continue to put in place add-ons to laws and provisions that really allow those who have the least opportunity to have their issues explained or who may be already criminalized — the people I’m talking about in the cases where they have criminal law heaped on top of them — they are often already within a vulnerable group that is more likely to be criminalized.
Part of the role of government, I would suggest, is to educate the public when we are going through a mechanism and throwing criminal law at it when, in fact, we should be taking much broader steps to provide public education and provide opportunities for people to have access to the kinds of supports they need to not go down the rabbit holes of misinformation and disinformation.
Mr. Fraser: It’s not as though I can point to a magic date on the calendar and say, “This is the date that these things are happening,” because they have to happen on an ongoing basis and need to grow incrementally over time.
I think, for example, the ratcheting up of the impact of race and culture assessments pioneered by the African-Nova Scotian community in my home province is a good example, and we are starting to do more. We seen Nova Scotia and Ontario both embrace these tools.
We also need to make sure that we’re placing investments in the social infrastructure that cause fewer of these problems to arise in the first place. Now, some of that will be very specific around the justice system. Some of it will be on social support around additional support for affordable housing. Some of it will be recreational infrastructure with recent announcements in national sport organizations that will have a longer-term impact.
It is not as though we can say, “Wait two or three months; there is this big package coming.” Every day we need to be introducing the kinds of supports that are both very closely connected to the justice system through training for officers and tools for courts at the same time that we make those generational, upstream investments that will improve the connection to violent crime over time.
The Chair: Thank you, minister. Before we go to second round, I have a question I would like to put to you as well.
I also want to remind my colleagues that the officials will be here on Monday, so if we don’t get to you on second round, you will have another chance to ask your questions.
Minister, this is in relation to the defence of good faith religious belief, and the clarification clauses added by the House committee are included only in Bill C-9 itself rather than being added to the code. What are the advantages and disadvantages of this particular approach?
Mr. Fraser: I don’t think it has a significant legal impact in terms of where the actual interpreting clause exists. It would be unique in the code to have a “for greater certainty” type of clause. Having a clear and concise description of what the offences are and when the elements of a crime can be made out is a useful approach in the code.
This is something that was determined, again, not through the government’s policy choice at the outset of the bill being drafted but by what was then a minority Parliament’s standing committee on the House side.
I don’t want to question the judgment of the committee to have chosen the manner through which they’ve chosen it, but what was important to me — and to committee members — was that we made it clear that regardless of where the definitional “for greater certainty” clause exists, going to practise your faith, reading your scripture and teaching the lessons of your religion are not intended to be a crime in Canada in no way, shape or form.
It really is about promoting hate against an identifiable group. Whether that’s in Bill C-9 or in the code directly is a less important factor to me, though I would probably have a slight preference to keep the code trim and concise. But from a legal point of view, I do not believe there would be a significant difference.
The Chair: Thank you very much.
My second question is with regard to your opening statement. You mentioned that you would like to see this bill go forward expeditiously. I believe that’s the word you used, and in light of the work that we’re doing — even on our off week — we’re working towards doing that.
Is there an openness to looking at amendments from committee members? We’ve been hearing a lot from various communities in terms of their concerns, whether it is a word change from “by” to “while” or other such changes that are meaningful to specific communities.
Is there an openness to look at that, despite the expeditious intention?
Mr. Fraser: It will depend on the specific amendment, as is always the case. I don’t want to be in a position where I tell another body of Parliament what they should or should not do. The Senate maintains an arm’s-length relationship with government, I think, for good reason.
That said, I don’t want to compromise this bill falling into the fall of next year. I am very grateful, legitimately, that you are taking time during a non-sitting week and having extended hours to get this bill properly considered and hopefully passed before we hit the summer. It demonstrates to me that the Senate wants to play a role in moving this work forward on pace.
If there are important features that need to be corrected because there is a bad social outcome that will result from the bill, then, by all means, do your work.
If, however, it is a semantic change, for the sake of accommodating witness testimony when, in fact, there is a different interpretation that the officials may give on the example that was raised with us earlier, you have to use your best judgment. To the extent that we can go into the summer with new protections in place for Canadians who have been facing unduly high levels of hate, we owe it to them to move as quickly as we can, but I do want the Senate and members of this committee to be satisfied that we are adopting good laws and not just adopting laws quickly.
The Chair: Thank you, minister.
Senator Bernard: Minister Fraser, I want to pick up on a question and response from Senator Ince about symbols. Yesterday, witnesses — and also community advocates who have been in touch with us during the study — highlighted that hate is adaptive, meaning a static list of banned symbols in Bill C-9 will inevitably become outdated. To solve this, the committee heard testimony yesterday recommending the creation of an ongoing, independent advisory committee composed of civil rights experts and targeted community members to periodically review and recommend updates to the prohibited symbols list. Instead of requiring future time-consuming legislative overhauls every time a new symbol emerges, would the government support establishing such an advisory body within the framework of this legislation or by enabling regulations?
Mr. Fraser: Thank you. This conversation perhaps demands more than two minutes, and perhaps we should make time. Speaking for myself, because there is not a government policy on this particular question that you’ve just put to me now, some mechanism like that may prove useful and should be the source of further work to identify how we should establish such a committee. You are absolutely right that a static list is not the way to go. There is a need for an evergreen list. There is some element of that evergreen nature with the list that we’ve chosen, but it is listed to terror organizations and not other organizations that promote hatred that are causing problems that this bill seeks to address.
An appropriate next step would be to do a little bit of work to understand how we create that body. What voices need to be on it? What is the process? We’re late in the process to create a new mechanism in this bill to accomplish that outcome. There could be a parliamentary study on either the House or Senate side that followed this bill and made recommendations on how we can better adapt a process to identify new symbols that will emerge and, frankly, to clarify the application of certain symbols with counterfeits, for example, or those who seek to mimic a terror symbol. There are other issues. I think about the conversations I’ve had with members of the Black community about the use of a noose. It is not as though they all look the same, and police are looking for certainty in terms of a symbol.
There are unanswered questions that I even have and I wouldn’t mind some support through the policy development process. I do think it will probably be difficult to get it right, as this bill is now at the final stages of consideration, but I would personally value some exercise on the back end of this bill’s adoption that would include either or both of the House or Senate committees to understand what that process should look like.
The Chair: Thank you, minister.
Mr. Fraser: Thank you, chair.
Senator Ataullahjan: Minister, I’ve had many conversations with people from the Muslim community who are really worried. They say the language is really vague. They worry about practising their religion. The consultation is done. How do we reassure people who are worried? The call that stands out the most was a woman who called and said she left her country because she felt she couldn’t practise her religion, and she said now she feels she may have to leave Canada. How do we reassure these people who are calling us?
Mr. Fraser: Maybe the first piece is to recognize that this bill is designed to promote religious freedom, among other things in Canada. The intimidation and obstruction offences, when we first conceived of them, were designed around the idea that we needed to specifically protect the ability of people to attend services at their religious institutions. It was expanded somewhat beyond religious institutions, but that was the motivation for this bill before the bill existed when we campaigned on it.
We want to ensure — and people can use my many public statements in this regard — that in Canada, you will have a higher degree of freedom to pray to the god of your choice, to practise your faith freely and openly in Canada, and that we value that as a strength.
The next thing to do is to get the wording right. When we heard concern around the proposed removal of the religious exemption to hate crimes, we immediately recognized the need to make an adjustment through this “for greater certainty” clause that makes very clear that the ordinary practice of your faith will not constitute the wilful promotion of hatred in Canada. I know with a high degree of confidence and certainty that the language we’ve chosen will not result in the criminalization of people reading their scripture.
However, I want to recognize that the feeling you’ve identified is very real, and we need to do what we can, through public communications, to give confidence to people, not only that they continue to have the ability to practise their faith freely, but that we want you in Canada to continue to have that ability.
We believe Canada is stronger for a diversity of religious perspectives, and we want to ensure that the protections included in this bill around the stand-alone crime of hate, intimidation and obstruction actually serve to increase religious freedom. This is not some attempt to limit the ability of people to practise their faith. To the contrary, it is designed to protect their ability to do so in a free and democratic Canada.
The Chair: I have time for one more second round question. Next on the list is Senator Wells. I would then invite Senator Ince and Senator McPhedran to pose their questions and see where we can go with that.
Senator K. Wells: Minister, I want to return to the symbols again, a topic that has come up frequently. There has been concern raised about the language that says “nearly resembles” in the symbols provision in that it might be vague and could capture symbols unintentionally. My reading of the legislation is that the intent is clearly to catch people who modify banned symbols slightly to try to evade the purposes of the law.
For the record, could you be explicit and talk about whether the provision is designed to catch people tweaking, for example, the hakenkreuz or a Nazi symbol to try to get around the ban and is not designed to criminalize legitimate symbols of protest, like the Palestinian flag or perhaps the Hindu swastika or other symbols that really have no association with terror or terrorist groups.
Mr. Fraser: Thank you. You have perfectly described the intent here. This is not about using a range of different symbols that are tied to an activist campaign for one group or another, or people who are seeking to make a point in public about their religion or a cause they support. We wanted to make this clear and tighten up the language around the “nearly resembles” on the House side. You identified the social harm directly. You have to be precise in the Criminal Code if you are dealing with the consequences a person may face for being convicted criminally in their life. We want to prevent someone from taking a hate symbol — the Nazi hakenkreuz, the SS bolts, the terror symbols that we have used otherwise — and making a counterfeit version of it through a simple tweak just for the purpose of avoiding criminal liability.
It’s important to us that you use the symbol that will be interpreted by the audience as the hate symbol and that the mental element is still made out that you intended to promote hate against the identifiable group. If you are using a different symbol for a different purpose or sometimes the same symbol for a different purpose, that is not the wilful promotion of hatred. However, if you are seeking to take a Nazi symbol and add a brushstroke somewhere on the flag that that person can’t see from a distance, your intent has not necessarily changed, and we wanted to capture that kind of behaviour where someone modifies a hate symbol without modifying the meaning of the hate symbol.
The Chair: Thank you, minister. I will invite Senator Ince and Senator McPhedran to pose their questions respectively, and we will see if we can get very short responses from the minister.
Senator Ince: Thank you. Yesterday in committee, minister, it was highlighted that the success of Bill C-9 will depend heavily on how it is implemented in practice, including training and resources provided by law enforcement.
What are your thoughts on this idea, and what other implementations do you believe will ensure the success of this bill?
Senator McPhedran: I have a similar question but with a different focus. Minister, I want to understand better how you see this bill actually affecting the training that needs to be given to police and other forces in this country to implement the bill in a way that does not obstruct freedom of expression?
Mr. Fraser: The success of this bill is not going to be borne out by a certain number of arrests being made. It’s going to be borne out through the reduction of hate crimes in Canada over a period of time. This bill is going to be one tool that we help get there. Senator Ince, you said the witnesses said implementation success will depend on the training and resources put in on the back end. The same can be said for virtually every law we adopt as a Parliament. We need to ensure we have good rules and the rules are enforced by people who know what they are doing.
In respect of Senator McPhedran’s question, the bill itself will affect what training needs to be implemented around what is a hate crime? What is the changing definition of hate? What are intimidation and obstruction?
The training resources itself will need to flow separately. This bill only modifies the language of the Code. It doesn’t create new programming; that would require a separate bill with financial resources to back it. That will have to be part of a broader, ongoing conversation. I expect my time has expired.
The Chair: It has, indeed. Thank you so much, minister, for being with us today. Your assistance with our study of this bill is truly appreciated. We look forward to continuing the conversation next week with the officials. Thank you, everyone.
For our second panel, our witnesses have been asked to make an opening statement of five minutes each. This will be followed by questions from the senators.
With us by video conference, please welcome Victoria Pruden, President of the Métis National Council. With us in person, we welcome Anishinabek Nation Council Grand Chief Linda Debassige. And joining us online, we welcome Abram Benedict, Ontario Regional Chief for the Chiefs of Ontario.
I now invite Ms. Pruden to make her presentation.
Victoria Pruden, President, Métis National Council: Good morning, everyone. Good morning to my esteemed colleagues. Chiefs, good morning to you as well. I want to thank the committee for the invitation to appear today and to acknowledge that you are meeting on the traditional, unceded territory of the Anishinaabe Algonquin people.
I’m calling in from Regina, Saskatchewan, my long-time home in Treaty 4 territory and part of the homeland of the Métis Michif people here in Saskatchewan.
My name is Victoria Pruden, and I am the President of the Métis National Council. I refer to myself as Otipemisiwak iskwêw, a Métis woman.
I am a seventh generation Métis woman with deep ancestral roots in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta. I’m a former member of the Métis Nation Saskatchewan and currently a member of the Métis Nation British Columbia. My ancestors were involved in every significant Métis resistance from Seven Oaks to Fish Creek to the Batoche resistance, which we assisted to plan and to execute to the detriment of many generations of our family post resistance.
And the reason I share this is that for the Métis nation and for our people, the tie between culture, identity, land and governance are inseparable. That is one of the perspectives that I bring to my comments in this discussion today.
I’m speaking on behalf of the Métis National Council today. We’ve represented Métis Nation interests nationally and internationally for over 43 years.
And I’m getting a citizen perspective today, primarily from the Otipemisiwak Métis Government with the Métis Nation of Alberta, the Métis Nation of Ontario and, most recently, our MOU partners, north of 60, our relations with the Northwest Territory Métis Nation, all of whom represent section 35 rights holder Métis citizens.
Today I’m speaking on Bill C-9. We have a real and growing concern about the potential impacts of Bill C-9, which we support absolutely in general. We’re all seeing an increase in hate-motivated incidents in this country, reflecting a broader commitment needed to strengthening protections for communities targeted by hate, including our own.
We support the overall objective of the legislation and we see alignment in strengthening tools to address hate-motivated conduct, recognizing that harm targets both individuals and communities and it advances a preventative approach to community safety.
But the effectiveness of Bill C-9 will depend not only on its intent, but how it is structured and applied in practice. Today, I’m going to highlight four key issues on behalf of our Métis governments and citizens: gaps and protections for Métis cultural sites; interaction with Métis jurisdiction and self-government; risk of unintended criminalization; and UNDRIP and UNDA alignment.
Our key issues include that without clear safeguards, there can still be inconsistent or overly broad application. We’re recommending safeguards that explicitly recognize section 35 protected activity so there is no ambiguity about lawful cultural practices.
Second, we’re suggesting a reconsideration of Indigenous legal orders and community context so that decisions are informed by the appropriate framework.
Third, it is about supporting consistent, prosecutorial approaches, so reducing that variability across various jurisdictions. We’re recommending these to ensure that the law targets harmful conduct, not legitimate cultural activity. So we’re not asking for exemptions; we’re asking for clarity and safeguards just to ensure that the law is applied fairly, consistently and with full recognition of Indigenous rights for all Indigenous Peoples.
Let me speak a bit about gaps for the protection of Métis cultural sites. One of the central features of Bill C-9 is the creation of offences related to interference with access to certain places, including buildings used for religious or cultural purposes and cemeteries. This reflects an important recognition that harm is directed not only at individuals, but at the places where communities gather, practise culture and express identity. The current drafting focuses on buildings and physical structures.
For us in the Métis nation, culture is not defined to built Western environments; often it is land-based and includes harvesting areas or gathering places, burial sites and culturally significant landscapes. There are instances where harm has been directed at Métis identity in ways that are not necessarily tied to a defined place or building. For example, in Alberta, a Métis flag and pole in a certain municipality were forcefully taken down. While this falls under vandalism and was clearly hate-motivated conduct, it does not involve a place as defined in the bill.
Land-based spaces are central to Métis identity, continuity and governance, and without explicit recognition, there is a risk of unequal protection. This highlights a gap where Métis identity and cultural spaces may not be captured under the current provisions.
Our recommendation is expanding the definition of protected places to include land-based cultural and heritage sites and enabling and partnering with respective Métis governments across the homeland and north of 60 to identify those sites.
The Chair: President Pruden, would you mind wrapping up your statement?
Ms. Pruden: I have provided a full brief in writing. I’m just going to reiterate, again, gaps in protection for Métis cultural sites, interaction with Métis jurisdiction and self-government, the risk of unintended criminalization, and UNDRIP and UNDA alignment. I have provided a full written briefing on our recommendations for all.
The Chair: Thank you.
Linda Debassige, Grand Council Chief, Anishinabek Nation: Meegwetch. Thank you, Senator Senior.
[Indigenous language spoken.]
The Anishinabek Nation advocates and supports 39 First Nations across Ontario. This means that I was elected by our First Nation chiefs to stand before the government on various issues, including this important topic.
In October 2025, Anishinabek Nation provided a written submission to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. This submission reflects the voices, concerns, and lived realities of Survivors, warriors, and intergenerational Survivors within our territory.
Our territory had five Indian residential schools; however, many of our communities had children who left their homes and attended residential schools great distances away, even beyond the five I just shared.
I know I don’t need to tell this committee and senators in this room about the horrors that went on in these institutions. No schools should ever have burial grounds, and the fact that these did is sufficient to demonstrate that they were unique in their brutal genocidal attempts to assimilate our people at all costs.
Comparatively, the boarding schools of the European settler elite, which existed around the same time, did not have cemeteries. Should a death occur, the children were always sent home for a proper burial, providing families closure and a space to grieve. Our people did not receive the same opportunity.
The reality we face today is that, despite the tremendous progress and protections which will undoubtedly occur with this bill, it fails to address the experiences of First Nations. Once again, this signifies to me and my people that we are not a priority for Canada. This is an occasion where substantial protections can be put in place to protect First Nations Peoples, our shared history with Canada, and importantly, Survivors.
This bill provides a reasonable vessel for these amendments to occur. Our recommended amendments logically fit within a bill which specifically speaks to hate-related crimes. Should these amendments not take place, I question when we will ever have this opportunity again. When will it stop — that it remains okay in our Canadian society that hatred and bigotry continue for our First Nations Peoples?
Changes which strengthen the Criminal Code do not occur every day. The opportunity is before you right now to table the recommended amendments which have been submitted by Anishinabek Nation, as well as by Chiefs of Ontario.
Our recommendations that I put before you have two components. The first recommended amendment is a stand-alone criminal offence recognizing Indian residential school denialism as a distinct harm. This, in our view, addresses the increases in First Nation hatred resulting from condoning, denying and downplaying the existence of the Indian residential school system’s impacts and its very existence.
I come here with respect and reverence for the police, for the legal system, and with a deep understanding of what it feels like to have the ability to voice your concerns stripped away from you. I also know we must view the Criminal Code from a very technical lens and ensure that we are not infringing on other rights Canadians hold.
However, I remind this committee that our First Nations People have inherent rights that predate Confederation.
I ask you to view our recommended additions in the same lens as the wilful promotion of anti-Semitism for Holocaust denialism. Our goal is not to persecute ignorance or limit free speech. Instead, we want to protect our vulnerable people from the racism, hatred and bigotry that result from the claims that our people are simply draining taxpayers’ wallets by addressing Indian residential schools issues, that these schools were good for our people, and that no children actually died or are buried at these sites.
We want to work with you and our Survivors to define denialism in a way which is not sweeping silence over conversation and intelligent debate but instead provides an amount of consequence for those profiting from websites and tabloids, which support the existence of the schools, condone and deny the existence of unmarked burials and deaths at schools, or deny the legacies these institutions have caused.
Our second recommended amendment is the expansion of the definition of religious or cultural spaces within this bill to ensure it aligns with our understanding of these spaces. As the bill reads, it defines religious or cultural places as discrete physical structures. Its language extends protection only to “buildings, structures, or cemeteries.” It does not include Indigenous sacred landscapes, burial mounds, open-air ceremonial grounds or culturally significant wilderness areas. Our places for prayer and cultural ceremonies can be defined not necessarily by walls or crosses but instead by markings left by our ancestors, stories passed down or sites where our children were forced to endure the horrors of Indian residential schools.
Although we are speaking about amending the Criminal Code, this goes far beyond a legal issue. This is a human issue and the reality is that Canada created these schools. The hatred and desecration related to these sites also require Canada’s intervention.
We recommend that Canada enact a stand-alone offence recognizing Indian residential school denialism as a distinct harm, expand the protections within the Criminal Code to protect First Nation residential school Survivors and their families through the criminalization of Indian residential school denialism, mirroring the 319(2.1) wilful promotion of anti‑Semitism protections allotted to Holocaust survivors and those impacted by the genocide.
We recommend that Canada should enact a new offence explicitly protecting First Nations sacred sites, ensuring that sacred spaces, sites of cultural significance, culturally modified landforms and locations and First Nation burial grounds are clearly identified as locations subject to protections under the Criminal Code and at the bare minimum should the recommended amendments not take root, a thorough analysis of the impacts of Indian residential school denialism and the resulting anti-First Nation rhetoric is necessary. We currently have no statistics or studies on a national level which investigate the pervasive nature of this issue, nor do we truly understand the long-term harm of not addressing this denialism.
I thank the committee for the invitation here today. Meegwetch and thank you for your time.
The Chair: Thank you, Grand Chief. We now go to Regional Chief Benedict.
Abram Benedict, Ontario Regional Chief, Chiefs of Ontario: Good morning.
[Indigenous language spoken]
Thank you for the opportunity this morning. I would like to acknowledge committee members for sitting in a week that the House is not sitting. I commend you for your commitment to ensuring that the important work you are doing continues to advance.
Honourable senators, Madam Chair, thank you again for the privilege of being here this morning with my esteemed colleague Grand Council Chief Debassige. Let me begin by saying, and I don’t want this to be lost, that there is nothing in Bill C-9 that we oppose. In fact, this bill creates protections for places of worship, cultural institutions and vulnerable communities that are targeted by hate that is sadly needed in the time in which we live, and they make Canada a more inclusive place.
Our concern is not with what is in the bill; our concern is with what is not in this bill.
Honourable senators, this bill is a careful, thoughtful piece of legislation. It protects buildings used for religious worship, educational institutions and daycare centres. It protects residences for seniors, some cemeteries. It protects spaces where identifiable groups gather for many purposes, whether it be social, cultural or sport.
It criminalizes the display of symbols of terrorism, of terrorist entities. It criminalizes the Nazi swastika, and these are all good efforts that we need to protect our citizens in this country.
It is a long, careful list built to protect Canadians from hatred. However, First Nations are not named. Our unmarked graves are not named. Our sacred sites are not named. The denial of the residential school system, a denial that re-traumatizes Survivors every single day in this country, is not named.
I know this was not deliberate. This is a good bill, but this was an oversight, and I am here today because oversights in legislation can be corrected. This committee is precisely where that correction can happen.
To be direct, honourable senators, your responsibility here and procedural oversight is a prime opportunity. When Bill C-9 was studied in the House Standing Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights, there was an opportunity to bring forward amendments about residential school denialism and the protection of our burial sites and sacred places. There was and continues to remain cross-party openness to this conversation. But politics is politics and no amendments were tabled. The bill is now in its third reading without them, so we find ourselves here talking about what parts of this bill are missing. That is not a failure of process. It has set the stage for a second chance.
The Senate exists for moments exactly like this, where the House has done good work, but the work is incomplete, and the chamber of sober second thought can finish what has been started. Cross-party support continues to exist for addressing residential school denialism in this country. The Murray report, which I will return to in a moment, sadly, for many reasons, known and unknown, has been on the minister’s desk for over a year, and Survivors have asked for action. First Nation leadership across the country has asked why Parliament hasn’t acted on what this important report has recommended. This bill is a vehicle, and it sits in front of us today.
We are bringing forward three proposed amendments for the committee’s consideration. I will summarize them at a high level. We have made a technical submission as well.
First, add unmarked graves and burial sites associated with Indian residential schools to the protected sites listed in proposed section 423.3, alongside cemeteries. We have done some legal research. The definition of cemetery in Canadian law is not the same in every jurisdiction. Including burial sites of the children who never came home from residential school is needed. This ambiguity must be closed and the Murray report calls for it directly.
Second, add Indigenous religious and cultural sites to the protected places listed alongside buildings used for religious worship. Our ceremonies do not always take place inside a building. Our ceremonies take place at sacred sites like powwow grounds. They are landscapes. They are waterways. They are the places where our ancestors rest, where knowledge is passed on, where language survives. If this bill protects churches, mosques, synagogues and temples, as it should, then it must also protect the places where we do ceremony.
Third, amend the Criminal Code to make it an offence to wilfully promote hatred against Indigenous peoples who condone, deny, downplay or justify the Indian residential school system, or by misrepresenting facts relating to it. The language is taken directly from the final report of the Independent Special Interlocutor, Kimberly Murray. It mirrors, in structure and in spirit, the Holocaust denialism provision that Parliament added to subsection 319(2.1) of the Criminal Code in 2022.
Honourable senators, I want to be respectful but firm on this point. Parliament has done this once already. In 2022, this Parliament determined that the wilful promotion of hatred by condoning, denying, or downplaying the Holocaust was conduct serious enough to warrant criminal sanctions. That provision was studied, debated and passed. It has withstood scrutiny.
The legal architecture exists, the constitutional analysis has been done and the drafting template is sitting in the Criminal Code itself.
We are not asking this committee to invent something new. We are asking this committee to apply a principle Parliament has already accepted to a group of survivors Parliament has already, by motion of the House of Commons, recognized as the victims of genocide.
The Chair: Regional Chief, would you mind summarizing now?
Mr. Benedict: I can absolutely. In closing, I want to say that the opportunity exists now for us to make those changes. The precedent has been set. It is fundamentally important to the fabric of Canada to ensure that these protections are put in place for First Nations as we advance in the world in which we live and push for stricter enforcement in the Criminal Code, and sadly, this is one of them. The Criminal Code has many elements that impact our people in negative ways. But this is an area and work that I think this committee can do. We are asking for those recommendations to be implemented. Nia:wen, meegwetch for the opportunity.
The Chair: Thank you so much for all your presentations. We will now proceed to questions from senators. Senators, you have four minutes for your question, and that includes the answer. We will begin with our deputy chair of this committee, Senator Bernard.
Senator Bernard: Thank you to all three of our witnesses for being here today and for the testimony you’ve provided to us. The theme that I’m seeing clearly is that there is a gap, and you have proposed amendments to fill that gap. Have you actually submitted to the committee in writing those proposed amendments? Yes? All three have. We will certainly take those into consideration.
I would like to ask, though, as this bill was being developed, were there consultations with your communities?
Ms. Pruden: Thank you, senator. No, there was not a consultation opportunity for us, for our Métis government.
Senator Bernard: If each of you could respond to that, I would appreciate it. Thank you.
Ms. Debassige: Our First Nations within the Anishinabek Nation were also not consulted.
We pay attention to what is happening in Parliament, recognizing there are always missed opportunities to support First Nations people. So I can confirm that there was zero consultation whatsoever.
Mr. Benedict: Thank you for the question. For our Ontario region, there was not. That’s clearly one of the areas that was gapped. The Assembly of First Nations has also publicly expressed concern with the lack of consultation around this legislation as well.
Senator Bernard: Thank you.
Senator Ataullahjan: Thank you to all three witnesses. My question is similar to that of Senator Bernard. My understanding is that there was zero consultation with the Indigenous, First Nations and Métis. Why do you think the government chose not to consult you? And I understand that we are worried about the gaps in this legislation and how it is structured. We heard that. The big concern is how it will be implemented and who will implement it. Because the language is so vague, the interpretation can be so different from person to person. To all three of you, why do you feel you were ignored and not included in the discussions?
Ms. Pruden: I will keep my remarks brief. Just a little over a month ago, I mentioned this lack of consultation when we had our federal-provincial-territorial meeting about missing and murdered Indigenous women and Two-Spirited peoples. My comment at that time was I couldn’t understand why we weren’t included in the consultations for Bill C-9 when we’ve been enduring hate crimes in this country for generations.
Certainly, I think there are many very important intersections — those who have been named by me and my colleagues today, as well as there may be hate crimes intersecting very much with violence perpetrated against our members in the Métis Nation and against Indigenous people and beyond. So we’re hoping that this oversight can certainly be addressed in multiple ways.
Ms. Debassige: Meegwetch. Thank you for the question. I believe, historically, the Canadian government has and continues at times to treat First Nations people as third-class citizens of this country. That’s reflected in the reports. The Ontario Regional Chief mentioned the Murray report, which was passed on. Number 15 of the 31 obligations references what our testimony was here today.
Canada has consistently tabled such reports that they’ve actually commissioned — the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls and, essentially, Truth and Reconciliation as well. UNDRIP is also questionable. I believe, had the Canadian government respected their own principles of UNDRIP, we would have been consulted properly. Our nations would have been consulted properly. I believe it is all rooted in perception, and that lends itself to your question around the implementation and the vagueness.
To me, it is the perception of government that they didn’t need to consult with us, but they ought to have. The implementation of the bill, as it exists today, raises a lot of questions and concerns, because, again, the enforcement is with police services at the start. Once the charge is laid, arrest is made, so on and so forth, it then enters into the justice system. At that point in time, the justice system is responsible for the continuation of that implementation and holding those accountable.
One may argue that there are already sections of the Criminal Code that reflect this. However, in our view, through our nations’ view, there is a fear of actually laying the charge because of the prosecution. I work with the police a lot, our own First Nations police services quite a bit. The challenge is when the Crown attorneys decide not to proceed with it, the police then are more reluctant to lay the charge. That creates a problem with the system.
Today, before you is an opportunity, as the courageous senators you are, to make these recommended revisions to the bill before you today. Thank you.
Senator Arnot: Thank you. It is nice to see Chief Debassige and Chief Benedict. I had recent discussions with you, and I was very informed by your discussions and your points. I just want to set context. I would like to know, from a Métis perspective from President Pruden and from a First Nations perspective from the two Chiefs, what would meaningful consultation look like after passage of the bill? What safeguards are needed so that anti-hate criminal law doesn’t worsen over-policing of Indigenous Peoples in Canada?
Finally, would you support a three-year statutory review covering the charges, the outcomes, the demographic impacts — including impacts on Métis peoples and communities, First Nations people and communities — the Attorney General consent decisions and Charter litigation so it is built into this legislation? It would be, in effect, mandatory to consult with you to gather that information. I would like the two Chiefs and the president to answer that question, if possible. Thank you.
Ms. Pruden: I will respond briefly on our behalf. Each one of the Métis governments we work with and those who are not our current partners all have systems and processes for engaging in fulsome consultation with their communities, which range greatly in terms of geography and community size, including urban, rural and remote. So there are already infrastructure methods and methodologies in place for consultation, which we can certainly assist with.
Just going out on a limb with respect to your suggestion about a three-year opportunity to fulsomely consult, I believe — in the moment, I’m going to say that we would be in favour. Of course, I have to take that back to our governments. We have a number of consulting structures that we can employ with elected leaderships and technicians to help move that process forward. But for us, consultation is absolutely necessary. We’ve had a number of instances, including, of course — all of us have probably seen in the news the tragic case of the two Métis hunters, Maurice and his nephew, who were murdered in Alberta while hunting on traditional lands, and numerous other instances of visible anti-Indigenous deadly discrimination that resulted in violence and death. I am very interested in what you are proposing, and I would like to take that back to our elected leadership and technicians. Thank you. [Indigenous language spoken].
Ms. Debassige: Thank you for the question.
With respect to the question around the three-year statutory review, I listed off a bunch of reports and reviews that have historically taken place by the government that they don’t have to act on. Based on the practice and based on the history, while a review on paper looks really good and looks like a real opportunity, in order for it to be successful from a First Nations’ lens, there would have to be a more detailed requirement and an implementation factor with it that would prevent it from being shelved and collecting dust and referenced over time only to be a feel-good story for 15 minutes.
With respect to the generality of your question, it is not unwelcome, but right now we have an opportunity to enact change. There is no other bill in the works where we could include this. There is nothing else that starts to implement the final report of the special interlocutor. With respect to anti‑hate worsening for First Nations people, it again goes to perception, right?
Police have the discretion to lay or not lay charges. Crown prosecutors have the discretion to continue on with a court case or not take it and dismiss it. There is a broader conversation about the institutional biases accepting the continued hate and discrimination towards First Nations people generally, and this would be no exception to that.
Meaningful consultation after the passage of the bill would, obviously, have to be structured in a way that allows for appropriate, proper and respectful consultation with First Nations people with, perhaps, the creation of regulatory areas that are informed by that consultation process.
At the end of the day, what we’ve experienced as First Nations people is that even at times, despite consultation, they do whatever they want anyway, and I think that’s the reality of governments.
One thing that governments forget is that they have a fiduciary duty towards First Nations people. Our First Nations people have inherent rights, and they continue to sideline those each and every single time.
Thank you for the question.
Senator Arnot: Thank you.
Mr. Benedict: Meaningful consultation becomes quite difficult after the fact. There was no consultation ahead of this. It doesn’t mean that we can’t start a process once the bill becomes law, what meaningful means.
A three-year review is something that we would be open to, but I would say that, with respect to the review and consultation, there is the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, or UNDRIP. There is an action plan, and there is bringing Canadian legislation into uniformity.
The question around this legislation would really be was that measured against UNDRIP? Is this something that will impact First Nations, or is this something that can embrace First Nations jurisdiction as well as protect First Nations with the development of this law? As we’ve seen, there is no mention. I think this was not considered against that, and so that is a bit of an oversight in the development of this.
First Nations are not against this. We are willing partners and are prepared to continue to work with government, but we need the same protections that Bill C-9 is outlining.
The Chair: Thank you very much.
Senator McPhedran: I want to raise with you a point that has been made outside this committee but by an Indigenous senator about a concern around extending this legislation to affect those who have actually experienced residential school.
The concern that she raised that I want to share here today is that one of the most common responses to trauma for human beings is, actually, denial. Sometimes that’s a stage. Sometimes that is something that stays with someone for their life.
The concern that I am sharing here is that — and let me frame it more as a question because you have greater expertise than I do — is there potential for someone who has experienced residential school and who is in a state of denial to be captured inappropriately and unfairly by this bill if we were to explicitly include denialism of the residential school experience?
That question is to all, please.
Mr. Benedict: I can start. Thank you for the question.
Part of the legislative process is balancing all possibilities. If we step back for a second, Bill C-9 provides combatting hate crime amendments to the Criminal Code. The reality is that, in the time that we live in, hatred is something that we have to live with, and our legislation, sadly, has to be reflective of that.
Bill C-9 creates protective spaces and makes certain actions an offence — symbols and expanding hatred. It is quite sad that we have to have that in legislation now in the society in which we are in.
To put forth those protections is the right thing to do, but if we look at it from a First Nations context and a Survivors’ context, sadly, those actions that have happened as part of the history of the country in which we live are having those same negative connotations done to them as well. People are saying, “This was not as atrocious as you think it is. There are no children buried on those grounds.”
The House of Commons passed a motion making this a genocide. Those protections that are under Bill C-9 for things that are so fundamentally wrong need to be afforded to First Nations at the same time. That is the core principle of our presentation, that this is an opportunity to do that.
I wish I didn’t have to actually ask for this to be done, but the reality of the world that we live in is that those protections are needed.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
Ms. Pruden: Thank you so much for your question. This is a very interesting question that came from one of your colleagues.
From a Métis perspective, certainly, my friends, community members and relations who attended residential school, including the Île-à-la-Crosse Residential School in Saskatchewan, I haven’t had the anecdotal experience of denialism within our communities for a while. However, I have certainly heard many messages over the years, including that Métis or Apeetogosan or Michif people did not attend residential schools, which is not factual. We experience that kind of denialism — that our families, our relatives, our ancestors, grandmothers, grandfathers and great-grandparents didn’t attend residential schools. That’s simply not a fact. That’s the kind of Metis-specific denialism that I hear more often.
I am intrigued by your question, but I would have to give that further consideration or discussion.
Any denialism of residential school experience or attendance is completely disrespectful and dehumanizing, including statements that include that Métis, Michif and Apeetogosan people did not attend residential school when they are, in fact, Survivors of the same types of atrocities as our other Indigenous brothers and sisters in this country.
Thank you.
Ms. Debassige: Thank you for the question.
I’ve had the honour of working with and being around Survivors my entire life. Over time, starting with the apology for Indian residential schools by former Prime Minister Harper, our Survivors began to open up. I have been around family members who have shared with me, when I was a young girl, “Residential schools were the best thing to happen to us; we are going to be successful members of society,” only to find out as they processed their trauma that they resented it. They started healing. They realized how wrong that was. They started to open up about what they saw, and as little children, put blockers around them.
You spoke about trauma and how trauma behaves. Members of my own family saw some of the greatest atrocities and saw little children die.
When we talk about essentially the positive experiences of schools that some people have shared, I have also seen the same people change as they went through their own processes. But still today, some will say it was a positive experience because of what they learned and that they then went outward into Canada to work. The reality is that some of those who attended these schools have positive memories. This is factual. However, it is important to note that simply because there were positive experiences, it does not negate the fact that the schools were created to wipe out a culture, a religion and a way of being deemed to be inferior. These are undeniable facts.
The issue is not each residential school but instead is the system that created and ran Indian residential schools, a system that was a hunting ground for pedophiles, a breeding ground for disease and a facilitator for neglect and mistreatment. This fight is not to silence Survivors with happy memories. It is to provide consequences for those who take these case-specific experiences of Survivors and use them to generalize all First Nations people’s experiences as positive and all residential schools as positive and happy places.
Importantly, it is those who use these Survivors’ positive memories as a means of disproving and discounting the negative experiences of many others with lived experience and inciting hatred towards those who experienced the horrors of abuse.
The fight is not to silence Survivors with positive experiences. It is to provide consequences for those who take these case‑specific situations and use them to generalize and justify all schools.
I think the reality is, even in the context of Bill C-9, had this legislation even been in place post-1850, Canada would be subjected to the enforcement of this particular law — potential law — and consequences thereto. It is really about how we, together, help protect these most vulnerable people. Thank you.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
The Chair: The final question goes to Senator Wells.
Senator K. Wells: Thank you all for being here with us today.
A common theme that we are hearing from different witnesses is this concept of a high threshold that currently exists in the law to determine when speech or an expression turns into a hate crime or becomes hate speech. When it comes to us understanding Indigenous communities and Métis people in Canada and their history on this land, I think we would all probably agree that we have a lot of work left to do on educating Canadians on Canada’s shameful past and how we have treated our First Peoples in Canada — issues like residential schools that have been raised, the Sixties Scoop and what the Indian Act continues to mean to First Nations today.
On the question of residential school denialism, we would appreciate if you could help us as a committee consider the difference between someone speaking without fully understanding Canada’s history with residential schools and someone who is wilfully promoting residential school denialism. I open that to the panel if you have thoughts about that threshold of wilfully promoting hate under the Criminal Code is an extremely high bar and, as you have mentioned, we have seen very few successful prosecutions.
Ms. Pruden: Honourable senator, I just want to make a suggestion to you, kind sir. When you began your introduction saying Indigenous Peoples and Métis peoples, I just need to remind you that Métis peoples, including myself, are Indigenous Peoples in this country. As my Elder Maria Campbell would say, “We were not hatched on a rock.” Indigenous Peoples include Métis, First Nations and Inuit peoples in this country. I will defer to the Chiefs to address your specific question first. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Benedict: I can start a bit and then I will defer to Grand Council Chief Debassige.
It is really, I suppose, a question between being naive and having clear, deliberate purpose of what your message is. Being naive, does that reach the threshold of needing protections under the Criminal Code? I think that really is fundamentally the question here. It is not designed to be punitive; at the same time, free speech, as well, I think, can be delivered in the context, without action, is quite obvious. But action and intent are really where we see these things do meet the threshold of needing protection.
That is really fundamentally the question. That balance is not only for the legislators, like yourselves, but also for the systems that adjudicate those systems.
Part of the work that we do and continue to do, like the Murray report, like the inquiries that have been made is about educating all those people who don’t understand what that means, right? It is coming back to my comments earlier. It is very unfortunate that the world we live in now, that we have to have more — there is just so much anger and hatred in the world we live in. We push so hard as political leaders supporting our nations, to inform all Canadians, all people of our history and how it has come about in a respectful, peaceful way.
But we know that, in a very short period of time as a society, the notches have gone up quite high. Social media has made it quite different. This is a super big question of fundamentally where that balance is. We know there are bad actors that have pure, deliberate intentions that are not good. This is why we need those same protections for our people that are being sought here in this bill.
Ms. Debassige: Thank you for the question. I think we can once again take the example of Holocaust denialism to define residential school denialism somewhat — the act of condoning, downplaying, minimizing or misrepresenting known and widely documented historical truths. This includes profiting from these acts, to imply that the schools were well intentioned or, even worse, were beneficial to First Nations people. The key issue is when these actions result in hatred directed at First Nations people and creates an environment where our people are framed as liars simply exploiting an experience for the sake of accessing funds and sympathy. Downplaying or misrepresenting the truths of schools’ harms breeds a space for the justification of colonization. This is violence against our people.
Additionally, we see the rise in harms associated with people profiting from denialism, specifically the creation and administration of websites devoted to disproving survivors and reinterpreting historical documents and disseminating false facts. These sites requesting funds and donations from citizens, undoubtedly profiting from acts which incite anti-First Nations racism and hatred cannot be allowed.
You talk about the concept of the high threshold. Again, I believe that’s also rooted in the perception. The reality is that our First Nations exist in a society where our First Nations continue to experience hatred and bigotry, ultimately, at times leading to the deaths of our people. I look to our fallen sisters, our missing and murdered Indigenous women — that is rooted in hatred. Who does that to a person?
I even look at how this law could potentially apply to members of provincial parliaments. There is a particular person in the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia who basically is saying remarks out of hatred for First Nations people. A councillor in Sarnia, Ontario is promoting wilful hatred toward First Nations people. Even in our own House of Commons, there are comments that can be viewed by our First Nations people as inciting hatred towards us.
In this more recent context of First Nations’ land rights, what people don’t realize is that our nations have inherent rights that have existed pre-Confederation. And our nations have always been the subject of continued attempts of genocide and assimilation. That is well documented, even in government commission reports.
Again, before all of us is an opportunity. The Ontario Regional Chief, myself, our Métis National Council President are here, even though we weren’t even consulted properly. It means we are paying attention to our people. We’re working to help protect and to continue to protect them. And at the very least, this government ought to do the same.
The Chair: Thank you. I’ll give the last but very short word to Ms. Pruden.
Ms. Pruden: Thank you so much, colleagues. I just want to say in closing that I certainly support all of the comments of my esteemed colleagues, both chiefs today.
We need to pay attention to all forms of residential school denialism, including what I mentioned earlier, the attendance of my relations and our community members at residential schools.
Recently, I saw in the public sphere in the media denialism after Métis attendance at residential schools and I thought very poignantly of my late auntie Angie Mercredi Crerar of Fort Resolution, Northwest Territories, who attended residential school alongside my mother-in-law, the late Ms. Marie Therese Williah Arden. We attended residential schools, and denialism or sweeping statements about Métis First Nation or Inuit attendance at those schools is wrong.
I know that we’ve got some subtleties that need to be worked out in terms of enforcement, and I thank you so much, dear senators, and both my esteemed colleagues, for the opportunity to talk about this important issue and the importance of the inclusion of Indigenous experiences of hatred in Bill C-9. Thank you so much.
[Indigenous language spoken.]
The Chair: Thank you all for your testimonies today. I would like to sincerely thank you for being with us and for sharing your thoughts on this bill. Your assistance with our study of this bill is greatly appreciated.
Welcome to our next panel of witnesses. With us in person from the Black Opportunity Fund is Craig Wellington, Chief Executive Officer; and from the Black-Manitobans Chamber of Commerce we have Deborah-Zita Somakoko, President and Founder.
Mr. Wellington, we will begin with you.
Craig Wellington, Chief Executive Officer, Black Opportunity Fund: Honourable senators, thank you for the opportunity to address you today. My name is Craig Wellington, and I am the CEO of Black Opportunity Fund. We are a national charitable organization dedicated to dismantling the impacts of anti-Black racism and fostering socio-economic empowerment of Black communities in Canada.
We applaud and rise in support of Bill C-9. We commend Parliament’s recognition that certain symbols carry such concentrated hate that their public display constitutes not speech but threat; but this bill, as drafted, is incomplete. We are here to urge one essential amendment, the inclusion of the noose among Canada’s designated hate symbols, acknowledging its historical and widespread current use as a symbol of racial terror in Canada. Our recommendation is supported by over 420 leaders of Black organizations representing every province in the country that are calling on Parliament to include this amendment in Bill C-9.
According to RCMP reports, Black Canadians are consistently the leading target of hate crimes in our country, consistently over time, more than any other group; yet the bill, as currently drafted, does not acknowledge this reality in any way. We are asking the Senate to address this problematic gap to ensure that all Canadians, including Black Canadians, are protected from hate crimes.
We are not asking this committee to silence difficult ideas. We are not asking you to shield Canadians from discomfort or important debate; however, there is a line between discourse that provokes thought and symbols that provoke terror. The noose is not a position in a debate. It is not an argument. It is a promise of violence. It is a threat. It is a tool that is being used to commit violence and acts of racial terror.
Some may ask: Is the noose truly a hate symbol for us in Canada? Is this not an American concern imported from their history? We have our own history with the noose in this country. The noose found victims here in Nova Scotia, British Columbia, Quebec, Ontario and beyond.
However, the history of the past alone may not compel you until you understand, as well, what is happening in the present. Over the past decade, the noose has repeatedly reappeared as a tool of hate and racial intimidation here. During the height of the pandemic, nooses were found hanging at multiple Toronto construction sites, including transit projects, hospitals and commercial buildings over the course of years. In Nova Scotia, recent reports of nooses have surfaced targeting Black families and communities.
In an Alberta hospital, a Black surgical assistant was confronted by a noose hung on the door outside the operating room, specifically put there by a White surgeon to intimidate him. There are many other examples in recent years. These are deliberate acts of hate and racial terror. They are precise in their targeting, deliberate in their effect; they are not ambiguous. The noose requires no word. It makes no explicit threat that might trigger existing criminal provisions. It simply appears on a student’s locker, on a car mirror or hanging from the tree across from the home of a Black family. It says, “We don’t want you here.” It says, “Remember what was done in the past; we can do it again.” This is an explicit promise of violence.
Some will say the noose has other meanings used in context unrelated to race, in discussions of suicide, in historical displays or theatrical productions, and this is true and why we trust in the wisdom of our courts and the principle of context.
The Criminal Code already recognizes that symbols derive meaning from circumstance. A noose displayed in a museum exhibit is not the same as a noose hung on a Black family’s fence or placed in a Black child’s backpack. The courts can make this distinction. We are not asking for a blanket prohibition. We are asking when the noose is deployed as an instrument of racial terror, when its context makes this unmistakable, the law recognizes it for what it is.
We also support the creation of an independent mechanism to review and determine if other symbols in the future should be listed as symbols of hate. There must be a high threshold independent of the whims of future governments. In summary, we urge this committee to amend the bill and designate the noose as a hate symbol because of its historical and, importantly, current use against Black Canadians and others.
The defence of free expression and the prohibition of symbols of hate and terror are, in fact, the same fight — the fight for a Canada where no one is silenced by fear and threats, the fight for a Canada where the noose, at last, is recognized as a threat of racial violence, not history but a wound that remains open until we choose to close it. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you. Ms. Somakoko, you have the floor.
Deborah-Zita Somakoko, President and Founder, Black-Manitobans Chamber of Commerce: Thank you, chair, honourable senators, and I thank God for the opportunity to speak before you today.
My name is Dr. Deborah-Zita Somakoko, Founder and President of the Black-Manitobans Chamber of Commerce, Canada’s first bilingual Black chamber of commerce and the first Black woman in Canadian history to found a chamber of commerce.
I am appearing on behalf of the Black-Manitobans Chamber of Commerce, but also on behalf of millions of Black Canadians, further to our written brief submitted to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights regarding Bill C-9 and Canada’s urgent need to explicitly recognize and confront anti-Black hate within federal legislation.
Today, we come before this committee with a clear message: Black communities in Canada are not asking for special treatment. We are asking for recognition of specific historic, measurable and enduring forms of harm, anti-Black hate, and for legislation that reflects that reality.
The Senate has a unique responsibility, not only to review legislation, but to ensure that it reflects the lived realities of all Canadians, including those whose experiences have historically been minimized or overlooked.
Honourable senators, there remains a persistent assumption that existing constitutional and human rights protections are already sufficient because they apply broadly to all Canadians, but generalized protections do not automatically produce equal protections in practice. It is not reflected in the case of Black Canadians.
Anti-Black hate is not random, it is not isolated, it is not incidental. It is historically rooted, structurally embedded, ideological, measurable and reproduced across generations.
Across societies and continents, we continue to see the same patterns repeated. Black communities are simultaneously copied, feared, mocked, criminalized, fetishized, segregated, underpaid, over-policed, erased and exploited. These are not isolated incidents. They reflect a global hierarchy that has historically positioned Blackness as inferior.
This is not about hierarchy among communities. It is about recognizing that equal protection under law sometimes requires explicit recognition of distinct and measurable forms of harm. Anti-Black racism in Canada is not only social, it is economic. It is reflected in unequal access to capital, procurement barriers, exclusion from leadership, credibility bias and under-representation in systems that continue to make it harder for Black entrepreneurs and professionals to scale, compete and succeed.
Economic inclusion is not charity. It is economic development, workforce development, innovation policy and nation building.
At the same time, anti-Black racism is sustained not only to institutions, but also to narratives. The repeated vilification of Blackness in media and public discourse continues to associate Black people with danger, criminality and dysfunction, while minimizing Black excellence, leadership, humanity and complexity. Media does not simply reflect society. It helps shape it.
Black people became the construct and justification used to build empires on stolen land and stolen labour, the imposed bottom caste upon which systems of power and wealth are built. Once societies organized themselves around the idea that Blackness means less than, entire social structures learned to define themselves in opposition to it. That is why anti-Black hate persists.
It persists even in places that have very few Black people. Canada is not outside this reality. Our own government acknowledges that anti-Black racism is entrenched within Canadian institutions. We see this in rising hate crimes, overrepresentation of Black individuals within the justice system, documented racial profiling in policing, economic exclusions, and systemic barriers across employment, housing, health care and education. These are not simply personal experiences or isolated interactions.
The Chair: Ms. Somakoko, would you mind summarizing, please?
Ms. Somakoko: Yes. They are identifiable, measurable and documented realities, and measurable harms require explicit protection under law.
Recent reporting in Canada has highlighted the growing presence of organized White supremacist extremist networks promoting racial conflict — a so-called race war. This demonstrates that anti-Black hate is not only systemic; it is organizing, adapting and becoming increasingly normalized.
Canada cannot claim to confront hate while refusing to explicitly name one of its oldest and most persistent forms. Anti‑Black hate must be explicitly recognized, clearly measured and directly addressed within Bill C-9, because legislative silence in the face of documented anti-Black harm is not neutrality. It is unequal protection under law. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you both for your statements. We will now proceed to questions from senators. Senators, you have five minutes, including the responses. I will begin with our deputy chair, Senator Bernard.
Senator Bernard: Thank you both for being here and for helping to inform this committee about the reality of anti-Black racism.
Your testimony has reminded me of one of the things that I did in my previous life before coming here. I led a research project called “The Racism, Violence and Health Project.” It was the first project funded in Canada by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research looking specifically at racism targeting Black people. And, as the leader of that project, I received so much hate that I created a hate file.
I’m reminded of that today in a very visceral way, and in thinking about your suggestion, your recommendation for an amendment to include the noose — and we’ve heard this from a number of people. One of the questions that’s come up is: Should the noose be added as a specific additional symbol?
I wonder, Mr. Wellington, if you could clarify for us what you’re suggesting. Some before us have said we shouldn’t have a list at all. If you could comment on that, and then if you’re saying we should have a list, tell us where you think the positionality of that noose should be. Should other symbols be included as well? Some people have talked about the Confederate flag as another example of anti-Black racism and anti-Black hate.
Mr. Wellington: Thank you for that question, senator. Our position is Bill C-9 already — so the precedent has been set — it already has identified specific symbols, which it suggests reach the level that there is no ambiguity — these are acknowledged symbols of hate — to protect and acknowledge harms and hate attacks for specific groups.
What we are suggesting is it is extremely problematic that a bill which has the intent of protecting vulnerable communities from hate attacks does not specifically acknowledge the manifestations — any manifestations of hate against the one group, Black people, which, according to the RCMP, are the leading target of hate crimes in Canada consistently over time. RCMP reports consistently show this. It is strange, to say the least, that there is not this acknowledgment of that group.
Also, the noose is different. The noose is not just a symbol. It is the actual tool that was used to murder Black, and Indigenous people, by the way, in this continent, in this country, in acts of racial terror and in acts of mob violence. That is still an unambiguous symbol and representation of that terror when it continues. That is historical context, but it continues, as I have mentioned, to appear today in the last 10 years. We have an incident in an Ontario school where a 13-year-old Black girl, on the first day of school, has a picture of a noose placed in her backpack. That is day one. On day two, there are threats, death threats followed by rape threats and finally by assault.
We have multiple construction sites where the noose is left to intimidate Black construction workers. It appears in Nova Scotia. We see it in Alberta.
In Alberta, outside the operating room, the College of Physicians & Surgeons of Alberta called it a deadly threat. It is a death threat because of the nature of the noose.
Ms. Somakoko: When Bill C-9 was proposed, consultations happened with different communities. Our communities were not consulted. We get a list of all these symbols of hatred, like Craig Wellington shared with us, but we don’t just want a list of symbols listed in that bill. We want explicit legislation that protects us because we don’t have one.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you both for the additional effort of coming to be with us in person. We really appreciate it.
This has been very powerful testimony that you’ve each shared with us, and I think it is fair to say that you’ve given us some specific examples that we probably haven’t heard of — or many of us have not heard of — which may also speak to the amount of attention that’s paid specifically to anti-Black racism in our country.
You heard the minister this morning as our first witness, and with this bill, I think we were hearing some attempts at reassuring us that the bill has enough flexibility that it will be able to be interpreted in a way that will protect groups that are not as obviously identifiable. I’m hearing from both of you that that’s not good enough and that there need to be very specific amendments to this bill.
I heard you clearly about the noose. I wonder if there are any other parts of the bill where you feel there needs to be a more specific amendment added?
Ms. Somakoko: The protection of Black Canadians is generalized, and when it is brought up that an explicit legislation should be included in our federal and provincial legislation, we often hear, “Well, we have the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which includes everybody.”
If that were so, why, then, do we have in Canada certain groups that have different, separate acts to protect them? I will tell you why: Because these groups have demonstrated that their fears or harms are explicit, measurable and identifiable. Therefore, within the Canadian Criminal Code, if a crime — although generalized — becomes specifically targeted, there is room for an explicit protection for that group.
This is not new to Canada. We have certain minorities and identifiable groups that have been identified as targeted, and the law protects them. Yet the oldest hatred of people on earth doesn’t have that provision of protection. That needs to change, especially in the time that we live in.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
Mr. Wellington: Again, as we’ve spoken to, and as you mentioned, senator, a lot of the stuff we have said is a surprise to many people, and this is what we find in Canada.
The history of anti-Black racism and the history of slavery in Canada are so often denied that they are erased. The number of times I’ve been in groups with highly educated people or members of government who are making speeches and talking about how Canada did not have racism because there is this narrative that Canada is this bastion of freedom at the end of the Underground Railroad and where, in the 1800s, enslaved Black people in the U.S. escaped to Canada for freedom.
But we don’t talk about the fact that in the 1700s, enslaved Black people in Canada escaped to the U.S. for freedom. We don’t talk about that. We don’t talk about the Ku Klux Klan, or KKK and their significant presence here.
I’ve done presentations where I show the 1930 Toronto Daily Star front page with a picture describing the 75 hooded KKK Klansmen in downtown Oakville burning crosses because a Black Canadian veteran announced his engagement to his White fiancée. The mayor of Oakville, Ontario, said that the KKK aligns with the values of Canada and the people. This is part of our history, but nobody knows this.
I flag that RCMP report, which is easily and readily available — it documents that over time — and recently, just last year, their report showing that over the last 10 years, Black people are the leading target of hate crimes. Most people don’t know that.
How is it possible that we have a bill that is targeting hate crimes when the group that the RCMP states and documents — and this is evidence-based — is the leading target is not there?
It is that kind of cultural erasure and amnesia that leads to this because it is a systemic erasure, as Deborah-Zita Somakoko mentions.
Senator Ataullahjan: Thank you for your passionate testimony.
I don’t know if you heard my question to the minister when I asked him about the bill targeting potentially confusing symbols while ignoring universally recognized hate symbols like the noose.
Why do you think the government did that?
Second, just listening to your testimony takes me back to when we were in Alberta, and we were speaking to a group of young, Black Muslim women who wore the hijab, and I can tell you that by the end of their testimony, there was not a dry eye in the room. We were so emotional, and it still makes me emotional because if you are Muslim, and you are a Black woman, your life is hell, and those were the words that were being used.
How do you think this bill is going to impact them? A lot of people of faith are worrying about the effects of this bill. How do you think this is going to impact their lives?
Mr. Wellington: Thank you for that question. I heard the conversation with the minister. The intent of the bill has been misrepresented to be, in some cases, targeting religious freedom when, as the minister said, the intent is the opposite. This bill is about having a consistent definition of hate crimes to provide clarity for law enforcement, for the courts and for people.
You mentioned the concept of intersectionality, where some people, because of dual identities — Black, Muslim, women — face multiple levels of discrimination because of multiple identities. Black, trans and gay people face multiple layers. So in terms of the Black community, yes, the Black community significantly faces harms and hate attacks, but if you see the targeting of trans people, of gay people, Black trans people are significantly targeted. We see in Alberta Black Muslim women who were having their hijabs taken off and significant attacks, so absolutely.
This bill is important and critical. We are addressing that there are significant gaps that we are asking to be filled, and it is important to have that broader conversation about setting up a mechanism that is independent and free from political influence that can be used then to look at how other symbols can be added over time without political influence. We’ve made a recommendation about that as well.
Ms. Somakoko: Thank you for your question. The reason Black hate continues to be dismissed and overlooked is not random. It is intentional because Black people, Blackness, does not exist, period; we are invisible, and the system is built to dismiss that. Identifying that in the bill will mean acknowledgment, and they do not want to acknowledge that this exists.
I will tell you about what is happening in Manitoba. My son, a 15-year-old boy, was targeted in school because he is Black, an athlete, and his teammate put a noose in his backpack. He dismissed it. He thought it was a joke. He thought he was a rookie among the team. They invited him after a game, the only Black kid on the team. He thought they were his friends and it was just a joke. They beat him up. Thank God he knew how to defend himself. You know what they were doing? They videotaped it.
He showed me that video, and I know my son got out of there just by God’s protection. They slammed him on the concrete and stamped on him. For some reason, he mustered his strength to take one of them when the entire group was on top of him. One of his friends somehow came to that place. That is how he got out of there.
My second son was taken at gunpoint. When his girlfriend finally was able to drive the car, they called the police. They did not come. They showed up at 2 a.m. at my house; they called my son out and put him in the back of the car like he was not the victim to ask him what happened. When I asked the police why they were doing this, they were smug. They smiled. I told them, “You are supposed to protect him.” You know what they told me? “We are not here to protect you.” I got that on video. I sent it to the police commission. Nothing. Not even a response happened. You know why? He is not protected. His race is not protected. He is not a human being. That’s what we have become.
Every other race measures against us. They don’t want to be us. This did not happen centuries ago. In December 2025, in Manitoba, an immigrant family had just moved to Brandon. That boy went to school; he was a great athlete. They felt threatened by how good he is; they beat him to a pulp, and you know what they did again? They showed themselves as KKK. It is documented. This is our reality.
When we have all of these other groups protected, we are not. We are not asking for special treatment. When will it be enough? With 12.5 million killed, documented, in history, and nobody talks about it; it is not genocide. But 6 million is more than 12.5 million, right? This is the reality, if you care to know. We sent you the report. Even the RCMP report. No, we are made to be inferior, to believe to be inferior. It is ideological, structural, and it goes from generation to generation. That is the reality and why we need protection.
The Chair: We have 10, 12 minutes. We have four more questions. Thank you, Ms. Somakoko, for sharing the pain of your family that is really steeped in anti-Black racism. Do we need a minute to collect ourselves? Are we okay to proceed as a committee?
Senator McPhedran: I do note that we have counselling support here.
The Chair: At the beginning of our day, I shared that we do have counselling support, so if you would like to avail yourself of that, it is available. It is your choice.
Ms. Somakoko: Thank you.
The Chair: It is not just for you as witnesses, but for others in the room as well. And there is a number that folks who are not in the room can call, which is 988. Folks can text that number if they are looking for support, to receive that as well.
Senator Bernard: Madam Chair, if I could beg the indulgence of my colleagues, I have a question that could help us wrap this up nicely and tie back to the bill. Is that okay, colleagues?
Senator McPhedran: Please.
Senator Bernard: Given the pain, trauma and violence of anti-Black racism, given the history of anti-Black racism in Canada and the invisibility, that historical inferiority, I would like to ask, for the record, what confidence do you have in the systems that will be left to interpret this bill in legislation? What confidence do you have that it will be fair and just for Black Canadians?
Mr. Wellington: That’s an excellent question. Bill C-9 doesn’t exist in a vacuum by itself. We also have parallel legislation, the Black Justice Strategy, which my organization is doing a lot of advocacy with; we are engaging. We have a national justice working group that works across the country to improve justice outcomes for Black people. That was heavily consulted. We are working with this group.
That has a number of recommendations. Some of them are in parallel with Bill C-9 and other legislation. That was a very extractive process from the community, telling the same stories over and over again that continue to be ignored. So that is one thing that, as we provided our input to the Justice Minister, we have put faith in this by doing this again.
Right now we have the Black Justice Strategy, which is a 10‑year strategy. The government committed to funding it only 2 years of the 10-year strategy. Because of that, it means provincial and municipal governments are not signing up because they don’t want to sign up for something on which the government then drops the bag on.
In Bill C-9, there is a specific recommendation. We were talking about moving the Attorney General’s consultation with regard to hate crimes and leaving it to police on the ground completely. That has changed. I think there needs to be some more tightening up on that. That’s an important change.
One of the things I flagged is assuming police, who may carry their own bias, who do not have adequate training, will be on the ground making recommendations in consultation after that provision was made.
One of the things I flagged, for example, is that I had my car tires slashed by police in a routine traffic stop in Toronto. I’ve had police threaten me for breaking into my own home. This is part of the story. This is not something that for Black people are unique situations. This is just part of our reality. Anti-Black hate goes significantly under-reported because of the lack of faith in the justice system.
We always proceed in faith, but, as Sister Deborah-Zita mentioned, if we do not specifically acknowledge anti-Black hate in this bill and it is left generically with the assumption that it is included, guaranteed it will not be. We will be disappointed unless it is specifically mentioned.
As mentioned, there is a precedent already where we are saying these symbols are important enough to acknowledge, but the message that is being sent is the manifestations of anti-Black hate, the group the most targeted for hate crimes, are not important because they are not important. That is the message that Bill C-9, as it is written, currently sends.
We are asking the Senate to address that. Ensure that we acknowledge anti-Black racism; add the noose as a symbol. Again, we are recommending an independent body to assess — and there are other precedents of similar bodies — future symbols of hate that would be insulated from political interference in the process. Thank you.
Senator Bernard: Thank you.
Ms. Somakoko: Thank you. At some point, I no longer want to use the word “resilient” to define Black people, but let’s just use it for the sake of today.
We are here today. You are hearing this, all of you, about this reality that you may not have known, or you may have known but dismissed it. Now, today, you have two faces; his experience, my experience, his experience, her experience, her experience. If they were to talk, it will be the same.
Mr. Wellington: The same experience.
Ms. Somakoko: I was in Geneva at the United Nations; all Black people, thousands in one room. I was shocked that this reality is in South America? In Australia, too? Same thing. Same pattern.
So this is the beginning. This conversation has never happened. This bill is an opportunity for us to do it right. If the minister’s intent and motives are right and true, that this bill is actually to prevent and bring justice to hate crimes — and now that he omitted the other group, it is now back on the panel? Well, we are hopeful. Just by being here today and sharing in this room for the very first time, that is progress for us. And we hope because that’s what keeps us going.
I talked to the mayor when Winnipeg was listed as the most racist city in Canada. They consulted with everybody but us, again. And when I spoke about it, I came to my house to find a Black cat hanging on my door. Thank God I was not with my younger kids then. Imagine what that could have been for little kids — at the time, they were 9, 7 and 5. Imagine if they were with me when I came home.
How dare you speak about this? That was the message. But we are here now. This bill gives us the opportunity to right the wrong, and I hope that you do that. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you both. I would say that this has been the most impactful panel that we’ve had, and we truly, deeply thank you for your presentation, your testimony and your sharing of experiences. It will certainly be important as we consider our review of this bill. Thank you both.
Senators, for our third and final panel of the day, our witnesses have been asked to make an opening statement of five minutes each. This will be followed by questions from the senators.
Thank you to our witnesses for your patience. With us in person, please welcome Ryan Weston, Lead Animator, Public Witness for Social and Ecological Justice, Anglican Church of Canada. Welcome. Joining us online, we welcome Reverend Cheri DiNovo, former member of the provincial parliament and clergy. Also appearing by video conference, we have Kevin Robertson, Bishop, Diocese of Toronto, Anglican Church of Canada. Finally, we also welcome Reverend Andrea Anderson from the African United Baptist Association.
I invite Mr. Weston to make his presentation, followed by Reverend DiNovo, Bishop Robertson and concluding with Reverend Anderson.
Over to you, Mr. Weston.
Ryan Weston, Lead Animator, Public Witness for Social and Ecological Justice, Anglican Church of Canada: Thank you, chair. Good morning, senators. Thank you for welcoming me today. My name is Ryan Weston, and it is my pleasure to represent the Anglican Church of Canada today as the Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights studies the implications of Bill C-9.
The Anglican Church of Canada serves Canadians from coast to coast to coast through Christian worship and community service and is comprised of approximately 1,700 individual parishes, organized into 30 dioceses serving Indigenous, urban, suburban and rural communities.
Canada has seen a significant increase in hate-motivated violence, harassment and discrimination affecting communities across this country. Anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, anti-Black racism and the incitement of hatred towards any identifiable group or person are unacceptable and require a broad range of interventions from governments, faith groups and civil society organizations to address, challenge and dismantle these systems. The Anglican Church of Canada is committed to doing our part to address these issues within our own communities, and to working with others who share this goal.
Our primary concern with Bill C-9, currently under study by this committee, is the proposed removal of the “good faith” religious defence exemption from the Criminal Code as was amended in the House of Commons. Repealing paragraph 319(3)(b) of the code will add new uncertainty about the legal implications of faith education, practise and discussion. Open and thoughtful discourse is not only central to the various spiritual and religious communities in Canada, it is also an opportunity to challenge ideas and interpretations that might be offensive and even hateful.
We stand with many others who have continued to express their concern about this provision of the bill, including Jewish organizations, Muslim leaders, other Christian churches and various civil society advocacy groups. The Anglican Church of Canada respectfully requests that this committee recommend the removal of this provision and the maintenance of the current “good faith” exemption defence. These exemptions play a beneficial role in safeguarding religious expression without compromising the critical work of acting against violence, discrimination and hate.
We have been heartened by the willingness in the House of Commons to amend other aspects of this bill based on input and feedback from civil society, and we hope that the Senate will act similarly regarding this issue.
We recognize that the Anglican Church of Canada and other faith communities have a role to play in combatting hate, and particularly hate that uses religious texts and traditions in support of violence, harassment or discrimination. We continue to undertake this work in our own congregations, with our ecumenical colleagues in other Christian traditions, and with our interfaith partners, and we remain committed to working with government and other stakeholders towards programs and legislation that seek to uphold our shared concern to effectively combat hate and to protect the freedom of religion both.
Thank you for this time this morning and for your consideration.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Weston.
Reverend Cheri DiNovo, Former Member of the Provincial Parliament and Clergy, as an individual: Thank you. First of all, I have been ordained for 30 years in the United Church of Canada. I was also in the Government of Ontario, in opposition, for almost 12 years. In various roles — I was at the very first pride in 1971. I performed the first legalized same sex marriage in Canada in 2001. Regarding legislative experience, I introduced the first trans rights bill that became law in 2012 — that was the first major trans rights bill — then the first banning conversion therapy bill in 2015, and the Trans Day of Remembrance bill in 2017 that requires all legislators to stand for a moment of silence.
I am mainly concerned, of course, with the hatred against all queer people but particularly trans, non-binary and genderqueer people right now that is proliferating both in law in Alberta, where they deny health care to children who are non-binary and trans, and, of course, across the country, across the world and certainly south of the border. So I’d like to bring that to people’s attention.
I wrote two books, first Qu(e)erying Evangelism, published out of UCLA and that won the Lambda Literary Award for Spirituality and Religion in Washington, D.C.; and a second book The Queer Evangelist a few years ago.
I want to bring two items to this Senate committee’s attention and they are based on experience. The first was a Sunday school picnic that I presided over years ago in High Park — lots of little kids and their families, all genders, mainly heterosexual, certainly all ethnicities. Because of our stance as a community of faith for freedom of choice for women, people who were anti‑abortion came and demonstrated with pictures of aborted fetuses at a Sunday school picnic. This was in a park. I can’t imagine a more hateful thing to do with children present.
We could have called the police; we did not take that option. It was on a church building. Instead, what I did was spoke about how every child should be a wanted child and tried to be as child friendly in talking about a woman’s right to choose as I could possibly be.
The second instance was a huge demonstration at Queen’s Park with hundreds of people, organized by a conservative Christian minister, but all faiths were present. There were definitely hateful signs against trans people and against homosexuals. This was in response to an update to sex education programs in our schools in Ontario brought in by the Liberal government specifically saying that gay is okay. That was a response to that.
Our response to that — I was in the legislature at the time — was to put on my collar, walk outside with my executive assistant, hold a pride flag and a banner with all of the laws that we’d managed to pass, and to then engage with people one‑on‑one who were in that crowd; and, again, doing it for the protection of our children and their children, who might be trans, non-binary, or lesbian, gay or bisexual, for their very safety.
So if there is a message here, it is that legislation is a blunt tool, and the only way to change hearts, minds and souls is through education and cultural shifts.
We’ve heard from First Nations today and also from the BIPOC community as to how the noose should be a symbol of hate. Agreed. Sacred lands and the invasion of those of First Nations should also be seen as hateful in certain instances.
I would argue, if we want to continue, that desecration of a pride flag, pulling pride flags down or symbols of gay liberation, attacks on anything that represents, for example, trans people, that should also be symbols of hate. But we could go on, right?
The two problems with Bill C-9, as constituted, are, one, it is not broad enough. We will never be able to list the symbols of hate because they are ever-morphing. By the way, most of the hate is online and seemingly out of the purview. I am one of those fearless people on X. I do not read the comments; I have 92,000 followers. Reading the comments is bad for your mental health. But I am not alone there; there are many others who support human rights in all its forms in that media.
There is no way of controlling that. In a sense, it is not broad enough.
The other sense is that it’s too broad. It gives too much power to police. It is not fair to them to, on the fly, make decisions about what is hateful and what is not hateful in a demonstration outside a church, in a park or anywhere.
The Chair: Reverend DiNovo, sorry to interrupt. If you could just summarize, please?
Reverend DiNovo: If we want to really do something substantive in this country, let’s look at the use of the “notwithstanding” clause. I know it’s a constitutional can of worms, but every province right now can get out of any human rights as long as that exists.
Thank you for addressing this as a government, but way more work needs to be done. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you.
Kevin Robertson, Bishop, Diocese of Toronto, Anglican Church of Canada: Good morning, senators:
I am a bishop of the Anglican Church of Canada, serving within the Diocese of Toronto, Canada’s largest and most populous diocese in our country.
After serving in parish ministry for almost 20 years, I was elected a bishop in 2016. Over the past decade, I have had oversight of some 85 Anglican parishes, schools and community ministries across our diocese.
I want to recognize the historic privilege that the Anglican Church has held in this country. In 1797, when the very first church was built in the village of York — now the City of Toronto — it was a Church of England church.
For more than 200 years, that historic privilege has been used to help in lots of wonderful ways; social reform, care and welfare of the most vulnerable, but our church has also been an agent of harm, complicit in the wrongs done to Indigenous people, including our role in the terrible legacy of residential schools.
So I hope we have learned some lessons along the way and are committed to a renewed responsibility to create and maintain a safe space for every person, every faith tradition, every marginalized community.
That is why I’m grateful to be invited to be with you for a few minutes today to talk about Bill C-9, combatting hate and ensuring access to religions and cultural places.
I am appearing before you today from a unique position; I am, of course, a faith leader within my own denomination, and I am also an openly gay, married man and the first and, so far, only gay and partnered bishop in the Anglican Church of Canada. I live with my husband, our two teenage children and our goldendoodle in the east end of Toronto.
As a faith leader and gay man, I have seen firsthand the ways in which homophobia and transphobia have left people unsafe within religious communities and society more broadly. I witnessed the ways in which religion has been used to justify the persecution of queer people, but also the ways in which more progressive religious communities have been harangued for supporting our community.
The language we use and the symbols we display matter. Sometimes they are used explicitly within religious communities as a way of saying who belongs and who does not belong, but more often there is a less visible and unconscious bias that upholds systems and structures that are life-giving for some people, but not for others.
I therefore want to support the broad goals of Bill C-9 and its efforts to combat hate, to protect vulnerable communities, especially the 2SLGBTQIA+ community, and also religious minorities. I support the language that seeks to criminalize intimidation by those who aim to provoke fear. Our Christian scriptures teach that perfect love casts out fear.
Perhaps not surprisingly, what compels me is the teaching and example of Jesus. I’m after all an Anglican bishop. I think the space that we see in the scriptures that he created was a space of holy belonging for those who had not belonged before. In baptism, which is the principal right of Christian initiation, one of the promises that is made is that we will strive for justice and peace among all people and respect the dignity of every human being.
Those are more than words on a page; they represent a sacred promise to see every human being as a holy and precious gift from the Creator; inclusion is a gospel imperative.
Yes, every faith tradition must have freedom to hold and teach what they believe to be true; that is fundamental, I think, in protecting the freedom of religion and freedom of expression. But the fundamental protection of others, and especially the most vulnerable, protecting dignity and worth, must never be asked to yield to these things.
There is a balance to be found between the basic freedom of religion expression, on the one hand, and the protection of vulnerable communities on the other.
I do believe the way forward is what we’re about today; strengthening anti-hate and anti-violence legislation, supporting stronger protections for marginalized people and resisting discrimination and dehumanization at every turn.
I commend the honourable members of this chamber for their commitment to this important work, and I am delighted you have invited others along to be part of this journey. Thank you for inviting me to be part of this conversation today.
The Chair: Thank you very much.
Reverend Andrea Anderson, African United Baptist Association: Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today and for allowing the voices of historic Black faith communities to be a part of this important national conversation.
I serve as the moderator of the African United Baptist Association, representing one of the oldest historic Black Baptist faith traditions in Canada. I also serve as a senior pastor of East Preston United Baptist Church in the historic Black community of East Preston, Nova Scotia.
I fully support efforts to combat hatred, anti-Semitism, violence and the dehumanization of any individual and/or community.
As a Black church leader whose community lived through racism, segregation, exclusion and systemic discrimination, I understand deeply the damage that hateful speech can cause. Historic Black churches in Canada have long stood against hatred and injustice while affirming the dignity and humanity of all people.
My concern is not about protecting hate speech. My concern is about preserving a careful and important balance in criminal law, a balance between protecting vulnerable communities from genuine hatred, while also protecting the constitutional freedom of faith communities to teach and interpret their sacred text in good faith.
My concern regarding the repeal of Bill C-9 relates to three areas; protecting genuine religious freedom; maintaining clear, legal safeguards for good faith religious expression; and preserving the distinction between peaceful religious teaching and genuine hate propaganda.
Section 319(3)(b) of the Criminal Code currently recognizes that distinction. The current offence applies specifically to religious expression and good faith. From my perspective, the provision is not a license for hatred; rather, it provides reassurance that peaceful, religious teaching and interpretation of sacred texts will not automatically be interpreted as promoting hatred simply because others strongly disagree with those beliefs.
For historic Black faith communities, this issue carries particular significance. Historically, African Black churches were formed within communities that experience exclusion and unequal treatment under Canadian institutions. For generations, the Black church became one of the few spaces where African Nova Scotia communities preserved dignity and proclaimed hope through scripture.
For our communities, freedom to preach and interpret sacred text was not merely an abstract legal right. It was essential to survival and our identity, and perseverance and resistance against oppression. Sacred scripture was not a tool for hatred for the Black church. Scripture was one of the very things our community used to affirm our dignity, preserve our identity and reclaim our humanity and confront injustice in the face of racism and discrimination.
As historic Black faith communities, we understand deeply both the dangers of hatred and the importance of protecting the freedom to teach sacred convictions in good faith. My concern is not that ordinary preaching will suddenly become criminalized if the provision is repealed. Rather, my concern is that the uncertainty and chilling effect that may follow when explicit protections are removed from the Criminal Code. Even where convictions are unlikely, fear of complaints, investigations, reputational harm or costly legal challenges can still discourage open religious expression. That concern may carry even greater weight for smaller and historically marginalized faith communities that do not possess significant legal or financial resources to navigate lengthy constitutional litigation.
I recognize that Charter protections for freedom of religion would remain in place even if this provision is repealed. However, section 319(3)(b) provides explicit statutory recognition that good-faith religious interpretation deserves protection within Canadian law. Removing this provision may unintentionally shift greater legal uncertainty onto faith communities and require smaller churches to rely more heavily upon expensive Charter litigation to defend freedoms that were previously acknowledged directly within the Criminal Code.
At the same time, I want to be absolutely clear that no faith community should ever use religion to justify violence, harassment, intimidation or dehumanization of any group of people. Canada does not need to choose between protecting vulnerable communities and protecting religious freedoms. We can and must continue to do both.
My respectful concern is that removing this explicit protection may unintentionally blur the important distinction between genuine hate propaganda and lawful religious expression communicated peacefully and respectfully in good faith. The peaceful and respectful expression of sincerely held religious beliefs should not automatically be interpreted as promoting hatred simply because others strongly disagree with those beliefs.
As a representative of the historic African-Canadian faith tradition shaped by both faith and struggle, I respectfully ask this committee to proceed carefully and thoughtfully. Our churches know first-hand the harmful effects of hatred and discrimination. We also know the essential role religious freedom has played in preserving dignity, hope, perseverance and justice in marginalized communities throughout Canadian history. Thank you for your time and consideration.
The Chair: Thank you all for your presentations today. We will now proceed to questions from senators.
Senators, you have four minutes for your question, and that includes the answer. I begin with Senator Bernard, our deputy chair.
Senator Bernard: Thank you to all of our witnesses for appearing before us today. We appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedules to do so.
Earlier this morning, we met with the Minister of Justice, and one of the things that he said, in response to a question — or it may have been in his opening remarks, but I quoted this, and I would like to hear your thoughts on this. He said, “The ordinary practice of faith is not a hate crime.” He assured this committee that it was certainly not the intention of the bill to see it as such. I would like to hear your thoughts with regard to Minister Fraser’s statement that I have just shared. Maybe we will start with you, Mr. Weston, since you are in the room.
Mr. Weston: Thank you, senator, for the question. Yes, I would agree with the minister that the ordinary practice of faith is not a hate crime, but I’m not sure that this bill represents that perspective.
I think, as Reverend Anderson said in her statement, the bill leads to extra confusion and greater uncertainty for people, even the senator saying what does “the ordinary practice of faith” mean, particularly for marginalized groups and smaller communities? It is really open to interpretation in the legislation.
I agree with the sentiment, but I’m not sure I agree that this bill, as proposed, addresses that. It leaves it open. It complicates it even more, I think, than what is there now.
Senator Bernard: Thank you.
Reverend Anderson: Yes, I hear what the minister says. One of the issues for me is clear legal safeguards. By not having this section in the Criminal Code, what becomes confusing is there are no legal safeguards. When things are not clear, guess what it does? It creates fear.
For me, that’s what I look at. When I think about that fear that it creates, I believe clergy will begin to fear, “Am I safe to preach my full text?” There is a fear of, what if I am scrutinized? What if I am investigated? What if I receive complaints? How will that impact the teaching and interpretation and preaching of sacred texts?
I hear what he is saying, but for me, it comes back to really being able to have clear legal safeguards.
Bishop Robertson: I agree with my friend and colleague Ryan about this. The devil is in the details. That expression, “the ordinary practice of faith,” really needs some clarity.
I would hope that “the ordinary practice of faith” is not a free pass for people of faith, publicly in particular, from the pulpit or from the street corner, to say whatever they wish to say. That really gets us into a difficult place. I am a strong advocate for freedom of religion and freedom of expression, but I think that cannot go unchecked.
If we were going to really follow this thread that “the ordinary practice of faith is not a hate crime,” we would really need to drill down and talk in specifics about what is permissible and what is not.
Reverend DiNovo: Two things. Freedom of speech and the defence of it mean to defend those we don’t agree with. Certainly, what are we talking about? We are talking about here — Paul talks about the defence of slavery in the Bible. Sodom and Gomorrah, Leviticus, Romans — these are called, in the queer community at times, “texts of terror.” I don’t think they are. I think they are queer-positive texts. I am willing to defend that theologically. We don’t need the state involved in that discussion. We don’t need police involved in that discussion. I think we’re fine.
I think we all agree here on the panel, in other words, senator, that the devil is in the details here. I might disagree with Reverend Anderson, and she might disagree with me, but I don’t think that this has to be mediated by the heavy hand of the law here.
What we have already is good. It just needs to be enforced, right? And not by police. But tested, if you will, and not written into law.
The Chair: Thank you.
Senator Ataullahjan: I have a short question, so we can get answers from most of the witnesses. Most faith communities are really worried about the removal of section 319(3)(b) from the Criminal Code, the good-faith religious defence. They are concerned about the interpretation and implementation of this legislation. How can the government reassure people of different faiths that they will address their concerns?
Mr. Weston: The way we could be reassured is by removing this section, by keeping the legislation intact, the Criminal Code as it is. I think it has been functioning okay, and it allows some room for addressing issues of hate speech, but I think it has a bit more clarity for us, for religious communities. That would be my answer: Leave it alone.
Reverend DiNovo: Yes, I would tend to agree and with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association as well, that we have protections. We need to use them more. We need to really look into how provinces can get away without observing them.
Again, these are questions of dialogue. We may not all agree in all of our faith communities with what scripture means, but that is not a legislative matter. This is a theological matter. This is a situation where free speech plays, and it is good to have some disagreement, as long as it doesn’t result in violence, transphobia and homophobia. Wonderful.
Reverend Anderson: Yes, I agree. The fact that cases are rare for people being charged and investigated tells me that the current section of the Criminal Code is actually working.
Bishop Robertson: I would agree with what has been said here today. I think the removal of that is the easiest and best way forward.
I would add to what Reverend DiNovo said, that continuing to create space for theological diversity and theological disagreement in faith communities is essential, and I don’t know if the government has a particular role to play in that. Certainly, faith communities do, and our increasing work around ecumenical relationships and deepening those and, more importantly, deepening interfaith relationships is essential.
Here in the city of Toronto, coming alongside the Jewish community recently, in particular, around the acts of violence against synagogues and schools, we absolutely must be doing that. Again, I don’t know if the government has a particular legislative role to play in any of that — I’m not sure that it does — but the onus is certainly on us to be stepping up.
Senator K. Wells: This morning the minister also reminded us that the good faith clause that we’ve been talking about was pre-Charter. This morning he also said that you cannot promote hate in good faith.
We saw that in the House of Commons. Bill C-9, as amended, included “for greater certainty” clauses, the need for attorney general consent and a higher codified definition of hate, which all offer additional important protections for faith communities.
I will start my questioning with Reverend DiNovo. Do you believe that Bill C-9 already has the right protections for religious minorities in its current form so that good faith religious acts are not considered expressions of hate?
Reverend DiNovo: I would say yes. I was pleased to hear you mention the Attorney General here, because, again, this cannot be something that we leave to police to do on the fly. I don’t think it is fair to them. These are questions to be decided, obviously, on a case-by-case basis, often.
Again, to assuage the fears of Reverend Anderson and others, I gave two instances of situations where this bill would not have helped, basically, and where the answer is education. The answer is theological discussion. The answer is cultural. The answer is not — I hope — always in the courts and, certainly, not in heavy-handed legislation, and I think that’s where our panel is trying to put our point forward.
Senator K. Wells: Great. Maybe I will move to Bishop Robertson. Given those extra safeguards that are now in place in Bill C-9, would any of those assuage concerns that your faith community may have?
Bishop Robertson: I think so. The bill, as it is — and I will just bracket the controversial piece for a moment. In my opening statement, I was talking about finding the balance between freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom of religion and also being really aware of and responsive to what I see as a rising tide of hate speech.
I really appreciated what the bill says about symbolism; although I would echo what Reverend DiNovo said, that the list is not exhaustive, and it is ever-expanding. That would need a close eye. If this goes forward, somebody would need to be adding to that list.
I really want us to find a place where there is a clear and sensible balance between those two things: freedom of expression and responding in as unified a way as possible and in a very intentional way against some of the really ugly stuff that is happening against faith communities and against the queer community as well.
Reverend Anderson: In response to that, I would say that we live in a pluralistic society, and people and faith communities will not always agree on every moral or theological issue. Disagreement is not necessarily hatred.
I agree with my panellists here that there is a space and place for further discussion and communication and talking, but I do believe that because we live in a pluralistic society, just because people disagree on something, it cannot be perceived as being hatred.
Senator K. Wells: Thank you.
Mr. Weston: I would echo what my colleagues have said, but the rest of the legislation has a lot of safeguards in it. I think that it is good. I do think that it will be, at the very least, a big communication challenge if this provision stays in to remove the section of the Criminal Code.
Because we are hearing from congregations who are not paying attention to what the government is doing generally but are concerned about the implications of this particular piece of the bill. If it stays in, I think there will be a lot of work to be done about what the implications are. How are those safeguards maintained and understood? How are they going to be enforced?
Reverend DiNovo had a lot of excellent points about putting the onus onto police officers to do this kind of in-the-field interpretation of what is happening in a religious setting. I think that’s a lot, and, as she said in her opening statement, legislation is the blunt tool. What we need is a comprehensive, programmatic approach that allows us to do much more than just criminalize certain behaviour.
Senator Ince: Thank you to all the witnesses. This question is open to everyone.
We have heard, seen and read several submissions warning of the potential chilling effect on lawful expression. From your perspective, how real is that risk for congregations, clergy and faith-based educators?
Reverend Anderson: For the historical Black community and the churches, it will have a chilling effect to the extent that we are no strangers to systemic racism in Canadian institutions. If this matter becomes a complaint or an investigation, our dealings in the Canadian institutions have not been favourable in our history.
For our churches, we look at the fact that we are smaller churches. We have limited resources, and if we look at how we will be able to manœuvre through our institutions and lengthy litigation, it will have a chilling effect on our Black churches.
Bishop Robertson: Senator, thank you for the question. I think the phrase the “potential chilling effect on lawful expression” is really important there. My view on that is that if it is a lawful expression, then it is a lawful expression, as long as that is adjudicated in the right way.
My concern is, actually, about marginalized communities. Reverend Anderson, I know you are speaking to the historical Black community. If I might speak on behalf of the LGBTQ community, the risk of continued violence against the queer community — that’s in language and also in deed — is such that we need to be deliberating about what is a lawful expression and what is not. If something is unlawful, we have vulnerable and marginalized communities who are suffering, have suffered and will continue to suffer because of that. Clarity around what is a lawful expression, and what is not, will be really important.
Reverend DiNovo: Yes, and I think that clarity will be very difficult to come at legislatively, quite frankly. It comes down to whether people are frightened to say something on their interpretation of biblical literature. It may be something that I disagree with; they probably disagree with me; whatever. We don’t want the state and the police involved in that. There are better venues to discuss those things.
In that sense, yes, possibly chilling, but to Bishop Robertson’s point, it’s so important to always keep in mind the vulnerable and the marginalized. This is profoundly Christian, if I can speak from a Christian context. And I’m not just talking about Christians here; I’m talking about all faiths.
Certainly, I work in multi-faith situations, as do many of us, where we come together. We can all agree that, for example, hatred of queers, racism, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia are contrary to what our scripture tells us and to what God tells us. Yes. Why do we need it if it’s not going to work necessarily the way we intend it to work? Yes. It is problematic. I would say to the senator that it is problematic.
Mr. Weston: Thank you. I would say the chilling effect is almost starting. People are concerned about it. Whether that’s founded or not, that’s their reality on the ground. We’ve had people coming to us asking what it means for our own work and our own interpretation. As some of my colleagues said, it becomes a real question of interpretation then. The government is not in a position to interpret scripture in a particular way, I think. Even among Christians, for the example of who is here today on the panel, we don’t agree. We’re not of one mind on this. So we need room for that.
My other concern is that it could also lead to an isolating of folks who might have more extreme — well, let’s say they have a range of opinions on it. They might only talk to each other. If those ideas aren’t out in the open, people can isolate themselves, and those things can ferment in those smaller pockets unless we’re bringing it into the light together and having an opportunity to challenge those sentiments within our own traditions.
The Chair: Thank you.
Senator Arnold: Thank you all for being here today. It is such an interesting discussion. I thank you all for your leadership around interfaith relationships, in particular, and reaching out to others in your community. Positive dialogue, even when there isn’t agreement, is always a good thing.
But my question is for you, Mr. Weston. I am sorry to be so super concrete here, but I would like a tangible example of a situation which you are worried about.
Mr. Weston: I am not personally worried about something that I will say or do. I hope that most folks would not be offended by my theological interpretation. But I do think there are people who have a range of understanding of their scripture, whether it is Christian scripture or other traditions, with whom I may disagree. I may be the target of what they’re saying. There are folks who are concerned about their abilities to express those views.
Our position in this case is that we need to be able to express those views, that there is value in hearing from each other and having those conversations but being able to openly communicate that. People are worried they will not be able to share their interpretation of the Bible, for example. As many of us know, the Bible says a whole range of things and has been interpreted in a whole range of ways. There are all kinds of things that people could pull out and highlight in there, and their understanding of what is in this legislation leads them to say, “Maybe I can’t say that anymore,” or, “How do I go about teaching this thing that is important to my understanding of my faith tradition?” If they can’t do that, then the question comes in about freedom of religion or freedom of expression.
Again, I don’t have a specific concern of my own, about my own ability to do my work, but people have well-founded concerns about their abilities to express and share and teach their understanding of their traditions, should this legislation come into effect as it is.
The Chair: Thank you very much.
Senator Bernard: I have a question for Bishop Robertson.
Bishop Robertson, you talked about dehumanization and the need to protect both religious freedom and the dignity and worth of vulnerable communities. From your perspective as a faith leader, could you tell us where you see the line between the legitimate expression of religious belief and the expression that contributes to that dehumanization or the harm that can be caused? How do you see Bill C-9 helping with that line, without chilling the good faith religious expression that we’ve just been talking about?
Bishop Robertson: Thank you, Senator Bernard. That’s a great question. I would start by saying that when I was talking about dehumanization, I really wanted to claim that as a Christian leader, and I quoted the baptismal covenant, which is something uniquely Christian, of course, and the Christian rite of initiation, which specifically talks about seeking justice and peace and, most notably, respecting the dignity of every human being.
The word “dehumanizing” is the other side of that. I am grateful for my colleagues today who have been talking about the different ways that we read and interpret the scriptures. The way I read and interpret the scriptures is that we are wonderfully and lovingly made in the image of God and that fundamental worth, value and dignity are found in every human being, regardless of gender, gender expression, gender identity, theological position and all of that.
My view about that, senator, is that fundamental human worth and dignity form the basic starting point. When I was talking about things that are dehumanizing, it would be things that erode that. When there are words used or actions taken that are violent or aggressive, things that chip away at the basic fundamental human worth of every being — that’s what they are.
Now, we might have different understandings of what those things are that lead to a dehumanizing, but that’s the context in which I used that word. Here we are, made in the loving image of God, and here are the things that chip away at that and erode that in ways that are very damaging to both individuals and vulnerable communities as well.
The Chair: Thank you, and thank you all for your very helpful presentations.
Reverend Anderson: Madam Chair, may I please add one final comment?
The Chair: You have 30 seconds.
Reverend Anderson: Thank you. I want to respond to the chilling effect.
And I think it’s also important to note that we think about that, and to address my other colleague. We can look to the situation with Päivi Räsänen, who, when we think about the chilling effect, who has gone through many legal investigations and still ongoing. I think that if we’re honest today, those are some of the chilling effects that are of concern for some of our Christian faith churches.
I think it’s important to establish that. Also to clarify, if a religion says something is sin, that is a belief, that is not hatred. And with my colleagues, once again, we need to find a way outside of this to talk about those things. I do believe that section 319(3.1)(b) needs to maintain status quo and order so we have a current defence, and also that we have a clear, legal standard for safeguards. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you, Reverend Anderson, for your contribution. Thank you all for your testimonies. We appreciate what you are contributing as we continue to study this bill.
And thank you to all of the witnesses yesterday and today. We’ve certainly had a bit of a marathon, so I want to thank the committee as we chartered our way through this. We will resume our meetings next week.
(The committee adjourned.)