Justice Committee on Oct. 9th, 2025

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

Mr. Ripley.

[Owen Ripley]

I am responsible for the criminal law section. As the Prime Minister or as the minister has indicated, there is a lot of work ongoing in the space of criminal law reform right now, including with respect to bail and sentencing. The section has been investing a lot of resources in advancing that work, in addition to Bill C-9, which is before us today.

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

Which has taken more resources?

[Owen Ripley]

The way I would put it, MP Lawton, is that the section is working full out currently to advance the government's criminal law reform efforts, which, again, as the minister has indicated, are going to touch on bail and sentencing, gender-based violence, children's protection, victims' measures and delays, as you have heard the minister set out. He set out a number of issues, and we are working very hard to support the minister and the government more broadly bringing this forward.

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

It's a very simple question, Mr. Ripley.

When did your work on Bill C-9 start, and when did your work on bail start?

[Owen Ripley]

I would characterize it like this: Once the government was elected, we worked with the government and the minister to understand—

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

Which started first?

[Owen Ripley]

The starting point after any election is looking at a government's platform commitments and—

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

Please don't run the clock, Mr. Ripley.

I'm asking you which you started on first. Was it Bill C-9 or working on fixing the broken bail system?

[Owen Ripley]

What I'm trying to communicate to you, and I apologize if I'm not doing it clearly, is that there are platform commitments that touch on both. That work started simultaneously in both cases to understand—

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

Okay. At the same moment, you started both. Did—

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

Time's up.

Ms. Lattanzio, go ahead.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, officials, for being here today and for all the work you've been doing and are going to be doing.

I want to come back to a point that was raised earlier, and it's a point of clarification with regard to attaching the offence of hatred onto a civil offence.

Can you explain to me how that would work? My understanding is that the offence would have to be of a federal nature. I'm not too sure I understand how that would work. Can you clarify that for me?

[Owen Ripley]

The stand-alone hate crime offence would apply to any federal criminal offence. That applies, obviously, to the offences set out in the Criminal Code, but to the extent that Parliament has recognized other federal offences in other pieces of legislation—I believe the Elections Act was cited earlier, and you have the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act—if there is a penalty of a period of imprisonment associated with that, for example, that is inherently a criminal offence.

Therefore, when there is an offence in another statute where the situation is that it could be hate motivated, it would be open for that offence to be charged under the new stand-alone hate offence. There is no situation in which a civil claim or something like that would be in play in this kind of situation. It is really restricted to federal offences in the Criminal Code or other federal statutes that fall under the government's criminal law head of power from a constitutional perspective.

[Patricia Lattanzio, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Thank you.

What are the key criteria or tests that law enforcement or prosecutors would use to determine what is displayed in terms of the symbols that fall within the scope of the proposed hate propaganda bill?

[Owen Ripley]

Thanks very much.

I might turn to my colleague Marianne.

Marianne, I might suggest walking through the various elements of the offence and what would have to be shown in terms of the symbols offence.

[Marianne Breese, Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice]

Thank you, Mr. Ripley. As a caveat, to begin with, I would say that every case would depend on the facts; again, it would be up to police and prosecutors to make this determination. We would expect consideration to be given, for example, if we start with the offence, to whether a symbol is captured by the offence. If we're looking at terrorism symbols, we would ask if it's a symbol that is primarily used by or associated with a listed entity. That suggests that it needs to be publicly available. That list is public, and there has to be a close nexus to that entity.

If that is met, then we would look at whether it is in a public place. Is it displayed in the street, is it in a park, or is it on a website that is publicly available? If those elements are met, then we'd have to look at whether it's being displayed intentionally to promote hatred against an identifiable group. “Identifiable group” is a defined term in law. It means a specific section of society, a population that is distinguished by certain factors, such as race, religion and so forth.

Then we would look at the promotion of hatred. We've been discussing how there's a definition of hatred centred on the concepts of vilification and detestation, and the courts have provided guidance on what that means operationally. Prosecutors would turn to the case law and look at, for example, what the hallmarks of hatred would be. An example would be whether the targeted group is being portrayed as inherently evil or dangerous.

As a next step, you would look at what's happening on the ground, look at the facts. Law enforcement would look, for example, at whether the display is being done on a street. Are there chants associated with it? Are there calls for the elimination of the target group at the same time as the symbol is displayed? Again, this brings us back to the situation that the symbol itself.... There's not a ban on the symbol, and the mere display of the symbol is not criminalized. It has to be situated within the broader elements of the offence.

[The Chair, Liberal, Marc Miller]

Thank you, Ms. Breese.

Mr. Fortin, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Regarding the religious exemption, you told us there's no information about its impact on the number of charges laid or not laid.

What groups did you consult before deciding to exclude it from Bill C‑9?

[Owen Ripley]

Thank you for the question.

Some consultations took place, and commitments were made over the years. This subject was discussed with the provinces and territories during the routine meetings we held with them. In addition, consultations took place in 2020, if I remember correctly. At the time, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice committed to certain things with respect to hate. It was a subject—

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Sorry to interrupt you, Mr. Ripley. I don't want to rush you, but the clock is ticking. Who did you consult in 2020?

[Owen Ripley]

We consulted several groups at the time, including religious groups, community organizations and civil society organizations.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Would you be able to send us the list of organizations that were consulted and tell us when they were consulted?

[Owen Ripley]

Yes.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Ripley.

Regarding the study of Bill C‑9, can you tell us if you remember that being taken into consideration recently? If so, who did you meet with?