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Results: 1 - 15 of 15
View Arnold Viersen Profile
CPC (AB)
View Arnold Viersen Profile
2021-06-18 12:39 [p.8782]
Mr. Speaker, the first petition I have to present today comes from Canadians across the country, who were very concerned about allegations that came out in a New York Times article, entitled “The Children of Pornhub”. One story reported that a 15-year-old girl, who had been missing for over a year, had been found when 58 videos of her rape and sexual assault were discovered on Pornhub.
The petitioners note that Pornhub has no reliable system to verify that the people in the videos are not being trafficked or are minors who are being sexually exploited; that over 100 survivors and 500 NGOs have written a letter calling for a “criminal investigation” into MindGeek; and that the justice committee heard shocking testimony from Pornhub executives.
The petitioners call upon the Government of Canada to investigate and prosecute companies in Canada that host content featuring sex trafficking and child sexual abuse to the fullest extent of the law. They also call for a review of the legislative and regulatory framework to ensure that Canada's laws fully prohibit online, sexually explicit content featuring minors, torture, violence, cruelty and coercion.
Finally, they ask for the introduction of legislation that would require companies to possess reliable systems to verify that people in sexually explicit images are of age and are not being trafficked.
View Jasraj Singh Hallan Profile
CPC (AB)
Mr. Speaker, I want everyone in this House to imagine being a child who is going through something traumatic and just wants to feel loved. Picture this child being approached by an older individual on Instagram who promises gifts and love. Now imagine this child being violated, groomed and sold into human trafficking by that same predator. According to cybertip.ca, they saw an 81% increase from April to June 2020 of reports of youth who had been sexually exploited.
Last week, I introduced Bill C-304 to enforce harsher punishments for child grooming and exploitation. I have two young daughters and I want to see them and the rest of our youth grow up in a safe environment free from child groomers and predators.
I ask everyone in this House to support Bill C-304 so that we can put a stop to this evil.
View Mark Gerretsen Profile
Lib. (ON)
Madam Speaker, it is an honour to rise today to participate in such an important debate and discussion about a bill that would ban conversion therapy and make it a criminal practice.
Despite some of the objections that I have heard in the House today, I do not believe this bill would prevent conversations aimed at exploring a person's sexual identity, including with friends, family members, teachers, social workers, psychologists, religious leaders and so on.
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Mr. Mark Gerretsen: Madam Speaker, I am being heckled from across the way that I am wrong on that, but I genuinely believe that I am not.
The issue of conversion therapy came to light in my community of Kingston not that long ago. It was earlier this year or perhaps late in the fall when it became known that a worship centre in Kingston had been practising conversion therapy for many years. This came to light and was documented through a three-part Global News presentation so that people could really understand and grasp what was happening in our community. It even got some national attention, given the severity of what had taken place. It was a real eye-opener to a lot of people in my community to learn what was going on right inside of it, and many experienced shock as a result of hearing about conversion therapy.
One individual was primarily responsible for being the whistle-blower, so to speak. His name is Ben Rodgers. He came forward after years of going through conversion therapy at the Third Day Worship Centre in Kingston, and he told his story. His desire to come forward was, quite frankly, out of his concern for the way that others may be treated and affected by attending the same worship centre that he did, so I would like to take this opportunity to read Ben's words of what he experienced during his time at the the Third Day Worship Centre in Kingston.
He writes:
My name is Ben Rodgers, and I am a Conversion Therapy Survivor!
When I was 19 years old, I was subjected to a form of change therapy through a church called Third Day Worship Centre in Kingston Ontario. This church wanted to correct me and make me a “good” “true ‘straight’ man” of god. I came out as Gay when I was 18, I was a Cadet, a Football Player, a Singer, Actor, Writer, Artist, Volunteer, I was on my youth worship team and very involved with my church and community. My Mom moved away, back to Kingston, not long after. My brother and his wife and now my Mother who was living in their basement granny suite were all attending this church and all very much against my being gay.
At 19, I was accepted to go to Musical Theatre School. That Summer, I moved in with my Mom...to make some cash and then go off to school. I experienced Kingston’s Gay “Scene”, which was a small bar called Shay Foo Foo’s, and made new friends.
However, soon I started attending Third Day Worship Centre’s Young Adults group. I fell for the entire thing! The rock band style worship team, the dance team, mission trips, evangelism, bible school! I fell for it all!
At first things didn’t seem so bad at first. I felt very accepted and loved. It felt like they truly wanted to help me and...made me feel like they knew god’s path for me and knew how to “fix” me. It was all too good to be true, I fell for it and I wanted to be a part of it. I wanted to sing and praise. I wanted to be part of the worship team. To be a part of the church, or any of its ministries, you had to become a member.
I was still struggling with being gay and a Christian. These new leaders, and my mom and family, they did not agree with my being gay. I didn't know what to do anymore. That is when I began attending mentoring sessions, and private counsel with my new church leaders. I was taught and made to understand that I was trapped by the “enemy” or “the devil” and his demons. I was made to write a Sin List; I was made to confess anything that may hold me from my walk with god.
I entrusted these leaders with the fact that when I was a boy, I was sexually molested by an older cousin. Due to that encounter, or so these religious leaders made me believe, I had let a man take advantage of me and let the enemy attach his demons of lust and homosexuality upon me. They made me feel and believe that it was my fault and that I was rendered with demons. That and a lack of a father figure is why I was acting out and why I was “choosing” to live this “gay lifestyle, which is a clear abomination onto god”.
There was a prayer service of sorts that was performed over me to make me straight. My very own pray away the gay, or at least the demons, as they called them.
I was directed to observe a 3-day dry fast, which is a fast where you have no foods and no liquids. This is actually rather dangerous and should never be done without medical guidance which I was not suggested to seek out. At the end of the fast, I was to attend the Sunday service after which I was to be sitting at the front row where the Pastor, Francis Armstrong, his wife, and the church counselor, were going to at the end of the service, pray over me.
After three days with no food or liquids, now I had their hands on my face, head and shoulders. It felt like these people were yelling and screaming in these tongues, “mystical languages” that they spoke, and pressing their hands down on me. Until the point where I either gave in and let it all happen or gave up and let them win. I remember, I went down to the floor and they continued, casting out the demons and praying for me to be “right”.
After all of this I was offered a space in their bible school, and learned as I went along that you either did as you were told or they wanted nothing to do with you. I was instructed to become celibate, to throw away and completely separate myself from anything, and anyone, that had to do with my old “gay life”. They also had very strict rules on how I was to act, and what I was and was not allowed to do. They controlled who and when and how I could be around others, and particularly how I was not allowed to be alone with other males.
This all went on for over a year, where I had to be this “straight” person and deny who I really was. Lying to myself and others. Losing pieces of myself. Losing my faith in the process.
After I was kicked out of the bible school, and kicked off of ministry duties, I was slowly pushed out of the church. Losing where I was renting, losing everyone I knew. It meant having to try and learn who I was after having to cut off so much of what and who I was and was trying to be.
I was made to feel worthless, unlovable, unworthy and lesser than others simply for being gay. I was taught to hate myself and taught to feel like who I am is unclean, and unnatural. All of these things were lies. Lies that I was taught to believe and endure. All lies that I have had to overcome and am still overcoming. I have had to go through many hells in my life to become strong enough to fight back and to reclaim who I am.
Now we must fight to help those that are still going through these tortures. Those that haven’t found their voices or found the support and help they need.
Our Government needs to step up and protect people like me who were vulnerable and made choices because we were being geared and taught, or too afraid not to. Help stop these organizations and people who speak and do and cause these harms.
My story is just one of many. Our voices need to be heard!
Those are the words of Ben Rodgers, as I indicated at the beginning of my speech. It is my extreme honour to represent him as his member of Parliament and to read his words into the record as we debate the importance this legislation. Ben is a hero. He found his way to realize what had happened to him so he could tell his story, so he could blow the whistle to the media about what was going on at Third Day Worship Centre in Kingston, Ontario. As a result of that, the community became very aware of this and there was a huge outlash and backlash from the community as people demanded change.
We can argue over the nuances of the wording in the legislation. We can find reasons not to support it. I am very pleased and happy and I congratulate the previous Conservative member, when I asked him a question, for saying that the most important thing was banning conversion therapy. I hope that means he will vote in favour of this bill, as a number of Conservative colleagues did at second reading.
He also said that the government brought this bill in, that it was its fault, that it could have made it clearer and that it put the legislation forward in this form. The government also accepted the proposed changes at committee. The Liberal members sitting on the committee worked with the NDP and I presume the Bloc to bring forward some amendments and changes. The government certainly respected the parliamentary process to allow the committee to do its work so it could report back to the House with a more improved bill, and that is what we have.
I genuinely hope my Conservative colleagues who voted for this bill at second reading, who have shown they are willing to take leadership on this issue and who are concerned about specific wording will recognize that we went through the parliamentary process. They obviously have a concern, a concern that is not shared by the majority. Now the bill is back in the House. At the end of the day, what is more important than trying to dissect the exact wording and what it implies is that this legislation get passed, so people like Ben do not continue to be subjected to the abuses, so people like Ben are not told in their place of worship that they are unclean. That is more important than getting hung up on a definition because someone happens to think it might mean something that it does not, which, by the way, the majority of members of the House clearly do not.
I really hope the Conservative members do not use that as a reason not to support this bill. I know there will be dissent among members in the House. There will be a few members, probably the one who heckled me earlier in my speech, and that is fine, but the more members who support this, the better. We will not get unanimous support of the House, which I think is fairly clear, but we certainly can show that members can come out in large numbers to represent almost unanimous consent that this is an important issue for people in our country. This is an important issue for a portion of our population that has struggled so much throughout the years, that has tried so much to get governments of the day to wake up and realize that there is no difference between people just because of the way we happen to be born and who we are.
I encourage all members of the House to vote in favour of the legislation, to get it through the House, as a previous member of the Bloc said, before this session of Parliament is over so we can put it into law, make this is a criminal activity and ensure that voices like Ben Rodgers help protect people into the future.
View Cathay Wagantall Profile
CPC (SK)
View Cathay Wagantall Profile
2021-05-31 17:11 [p.7650]
Madam Speaker, I will begin my contribution to this sober discussion of Bill C-6 and the need to protect Canadians from conversion therapy with experiences in my own life where individuals have been harmed by being directed unknowingly or forced into inappropriate treatments against their will.
My first experience was in the medical field, when I was employed at Souris Valley Mental Health Hospital. From its beginnings in 1921, it was considered on the cutting edge of experimental treatments for people with mental illness. The facility had a reputation of leading the way in therapeutic programming. Early techniques included insulin shock therapy, hydrotherapy, electroshock and lobotomy.
A lobotomy is a form of psychosurgery, a neurosurgical treatment of a mental disorder that involves severing most connections in the brain's prefrontal cortex. It was used for mental disorders, usually defined by a combination of how a person behaves, feels, perceives, and thinks, and occasionally other conditions as a mainstream procedure in some western countries for more than two decades, despite general recognition of frequent and serious side effects. While some people experienced symptomatic improvement with the operation, the improvements were achieved at the cost of creating other impairments. The procedure was controversial from its initial use, in part due to the balance between benefits and risks.
One of the patients in my care was Annie, one of the few remaining lobotomy patients at that time in Canada. Today, lobotomy has become a disparaged procedure, a byword for medical barbarism and an exemplary instance of the medical trampling of patients' rights.
What is remarkable to me is that the originator of the procedure shared the 1949 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for the “discovery of the therapeutic value of lobotomy in certain psychoses”. Clearly, what we know now would have made this award reprehensible.
Another personal experience with a method of conversion therapy was 30 years ago, when a family dear to me was navigating a behavioural problem. At a young age, a child was suffering anger and rebellion issues, and the treatment recommended to the parents was participation in a wilderness camp experience that taught discipline and built peer relationships. The parents’ grief was overwhelming, learning their young teen was coerced into submission with no compassionate support or counselling and had attempted suicide. Upon extraction from that place and hospitalization near home, they later learned that at an innocent age their child had been traumatized by sexual abuse.
In both of these scenarios, what was considered to be cutting-edge, state-of-the-art or appropriate treatment at the time was clearly abusive and wrong.
Today, in this bill and in the scientific and medical realms, conversion therapy is defined and only applied to the LGBTQ2 community. I support a conversion therapy ban, but not this conversion therapy ban, because this bans more than just conversion therapy. Bill C-6 clearly violates the fundamental Charter of Rights and Freedoms for LGBTQ2 and other Canadians.
The definition of conversion therapy conflates orientation with behaviour. The Bill C-6 definition states:
...conversion therapy means a practice, treatment or service designed to change a person’s sexual orientation to heterosexual, to change a person's gender identity or gender expression to cisgender or to repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual behaviour or non-cisgender gender expression. For greater certainty, this definition does not include a practice, treatment or service that relates to the exploration and development of an integrated personal identity without favouring any particular sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.
The definition actually defines conversion therapy to include providing counselling for someone to reduce their unwanted sexual behaviour. This means that if counselling is about reducing porn use or sexual addiction but is not seeking to change someone’s orientation, it would still be a criminal act if it is non-heterosexual behaviour.
There are legitimate reasons why people of any orientation may want to reduce their behaviour. This definition, though, would allow only straight Canadians to get that support but not LGBTQ2 Canadians. This would directly violate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms' equality provisions. It would criminalize any conversation including conversations initiated by LGBTQ2 individuals seeking answers to sexuality questions they wish to explore with family members, friends or faith leaders.
No medical body or professional counselling body in North America uses this definition created by the government for Bill C-6. The Canadian Psychological Association actually defines a psychologist as someone who helps clients change their behaviour, stating, “A psychologist studies how we think, feel and behave from a scientific viewpoint and applies this knowledge to help people understand, explain and change their behaviour.”
In addition to no medical or professional counselling body in North America using this definition, the bill’s definition contradicts itself. The government says that LGBTQ2 Canadians can still explore their sexuality, but exploration cannot happen if they cannot also choose to reduce behaviours that every other Canadian could get help with.
There are many reasons why someone would want to reduce unwanted behaviour without changing their orientation, but the bill would prevent any directional support that would reduce non-heterosexual behaviours. No one suspects that straight persons seeking to reduce sexual behaviour such as pornography use or sex addiction are attempting to change their sexual orientation. LGBTQ2 persons seeking the same kind of professional help could also just be wanting to reduce that behaviour without changing their orientation. Under this bill, however, they would not be able to get help because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. An exploration clause would not protect this treatment.
The language applies to conversations between and with parents, with trusted friends, discussions between individuals and faith leaders, as well as sensitive interactions with guidance counsellors. It also contains no exceptions for the right to conversations between parents and their children. Counsel from these individuals, people who are appropriately looked to for wisdom and support, would effectively be criminalized to the same degree as the damaging and unacceptable practices that all members of the House seek to prohibit. Currently, any course of counselling whereby individuals are seeking to reduce their sexual activities could be considered conversion therapy and therefore subject to legal intervention. This could be corrected.
In Bill C-6, the exploration clause itself directs patients’ counselling outcomes. Even professional counsellors seek not to do that for their patients, so why is the government directing outcomes with this bill? Professional counsellors are like a GPS: They only give directions, but the client decides the destination.
The government’s definition of conversion therapy is not used by governments around the world. No conversion therapy ban in the world bans counselling for unwanted non-heterosexual behaviour. I have reviewed and would be pleased to provide a research document listing 152 definitions of conversion therapy used around the world, including by all the governments that have passed a law or bylaw that are listed on Wikipedia, the United Nations, the United Church of Canada and LGBTQ2 activists like Kris Wells. None of them include sexual behaviour counselling independent of orientation change.
Bill C-6 is much too expansive, based on the fact that Canada's ban actually bans two kinds of counselling: sexual orientation change counselling and reduction of sexual behaviour counselling independent of orientation change. This is why the ban is so dangerous. No medical body or government in the world defines conversion therapy that way.
The UN definition, as follows, would better reflect what the definition of conversion therapy should be in Bill C-6:
“Conversion therapy” is an umbrella term used to describe interventions of a wide-ranging nature, all of which have in common the belief that a person's sexual orientation or gender identity can and should be changed. Such practices aim (or claim to aim) at changing people from gay, lesbian or bisexual to heterosexual and from trans or gender diverse to cisgender.
That is a good definition that this bill should reflect.
As a direct consequence of the flawed definition of conversion therapy, this bill would restrict freedom of choice and expression for LGBTQ2 Canadians. While the bill would allow for measures to change a child’s gender, including surgery and counselling, there is no such liberty afforded for those who wish to transition back to their birth gender. It would restrict intimate conversations intended to limit sexual behaviour, as well as individuals’ attempts to detransition.
This all-encompassing bill would not only criminalize people who listen or speak to those transitioning or having transitioned, but also those who have gone through the process of transitioning, have detransitioned, and are now sharing their stories with others. A simple search of the Internet will expose members to a wide range of thought, opinion, and the personal stories of those who have struggled with gender dysphoria. Not only would these individuals be criminalized by Bill C-6, but they would also be silenced by the implementation of Bill C-10, because of their communications on social media.
Many of those stories include decisions taken at a young age to begin the use of hormone treatment or to surgically alter one's body. For many, these decisions did not satiate feelings of gender dysphoria and, in many cases, worsened feelings of self-image and self-identity.
I will share a handful of these testimonies to have on record today.
In the case of one YouTuber, she, Elle Palmer, started taking testosterone at the age of 16. She had struggled for years with issues of self-hatred and, in her words, began the process of transitioning not in order to look more masculine but in order to hide elements of her body. In her opinion, transitioning was the ultimate form of self-harm. She wanted to change everything about herself and did not see a future in which she could be happy in her own body. At the time, she did not realize that it was possible not to hate her own body.
In another piece of personal testimony, Max explicitly states that gender transition was not the solution to her severe depression. In her words, she feels that she needed a transition in her life, but not from female to male.
Cari's advice to others is that, from her own experience and from her conversations with other detransitioned and reidentified women, “transition is not the only way, or even necessarily the best way, to treat gender dysphoria”. She speaks to her own experience, where she was prescribed hormones after four sessions of therapy. She notes that no attempts were made at these therapy sessions to process personal issues that she raised. She notes that no one in the medical or psychological field ever tried to dissuade her from her gender transition or to offer other options, other than to perhaps wait until age 18. She says, “I detransitioned because I knew I could not continue running from myself...because acknowledging my reality as a woman is vital to my mental health.”
Lee spoke to her experience: “There were all these red flags and I honestly wish that somebody had pointed them out to me and then I might not have transitioned in the first place. If I had realized that somebody with a history of an eating disorder, a history of childhood sexual abuse, a history of neglect and bullying for being a gender non-conforming female, a person with internalized homophobia and misogyny should not have been encouraged to transition.... I wish that somebody had sort of tried to stop me...transition...did not work for me.”
There is another story, which I transcribed from a post on YouTube from July 2019, which has now been made private, so I am going to respect the author's anonymity while sharing her thoughts. She said the following, and I am quoting her.
“I was transgender since I was 15. I’m 21 now.
“I don’t want to be a life-long medical patient. I don’t want to be psychologically dependent on hormones that are made in a lab and injected into me.
“What I want, and what I’ve always wanted, is peace with myself. Not surgically altered self, but my own self. I want to feel an organic love for my body. This body that I was born into, that I was lucky to be born into and inhabit.
“I wanted to find ways of dealing with my gender issues that aren’t medically transitioning, and those ways were not presented to me. Now is my time to make peace with femaleness. With womanhood.
“Even though I’m not good at being a woman, in the sense that I get gender dysphoria, a woman is still what I am. A dysfunctional, wonky, weird, gay, autistic, and completely authentic woman.
“I think I was possessed by some-thing. By an ideology. I can’t understate the role social media has played in all this.
“It’s glaringly obvious to me now that which part of the internet you inhabit for large chunks of time has serious effects on your brain, and your view of the world.
“When it feels right, I’ll tell my parents. And I know they’ll be happy to hear it, because the concerns they had about my 16-year-old self are the ones that I’m just starting to understand as a 21-year-old. I suppose wisdom really does come with age, doesn’t it.
“But, um, yeah, you try telling that to an isolated, self-loathing, gender non-conforming 16-year-old who wants to transition. I mean, you’re going to run into some issues.
“It’s just gender dysphoria that I deal with in my own way now, and I don’t want to go through all the things that I was kind of being, I guess, pressured by these online spaces to go and do.
“I know there are lots of people who are just like me, really, who are going through this same thing, and I have a funny feeling that there will be lots—lots more of us in the next few years as more people who are sort of teenagers, and non-binary and trans at the moment get into their early 20s.
“So, if I can make this resource that maybe people can relate to, because we are, we are, people like us, sort of um, masculine girls and butch lesbians, who were born between sort of the years 1995 and 2000 that have really been the guinea pigs for this.
“For this, whatever this is, going on in the trans community at the moment. We’ve been the guinea pigs and I’m at the other side now, and I really hope that some more people who are struggling with this can get out to the other side. Cuz it’s nice.”
These are not my fabrications. They are the personal, emotional testimonies of those who found that gender transition was not a permanent solution to their gender dysphoria and who found worth in their own process of detransition. These individuals have made their stories of detransitioning, or deciding not to surgically or hormonally transition, public and they stress that they are in no way being disrespectful toward the personal choices of others. This is important. They have friends and, as it stands, Bill C-6 would criminalize people like them. We cannot restrict the free, respectful and exploratory speech of those with valuable lived experience. The overreach of this legislation will harm those who seek to detransition as well as those who, of their own free will, seek support and counselling to change behaviour as LGBTQ2 individuals.
This ban censors conversations. It is not the definition of conversion therapy in Bill C-6 that would censor conversations about sexuality and gender, but the clause on advertising. At the justice committee, the government added the word “promotion” of conversion therapy as a criminal act. This means that free advertising, including verbal advertising, would be banned as criminal as well.
The original wording of the advertising ban states, “Everyone who knowingly advertises an offer to provide conversion therapy is”, and the updated clause states, “Everyone who knowingly promotes or advertises an offer to”. Because the bill defines conversion therapy as merely getting support to reduce behaviour, verbal promotion of a religious event that encourages people to remain celibate, a column that supports detransitioning or any kind of verbal advertising for a counselling session to reduce non-heterosexual behaviour would be made criminal.
Free to Question is an alliance of detransitioners, medical experts, parents, LGBTQ2 people and feminists who want to protect the right of health care professionals to offer ethical and agenda-free psychotherapy services and assessments to gender-dysphoric youth. I think it would be helpful to repeat the list of those participating in this alliance: detransitioners, medical experts, parents, LGBTQ2 people and feminists. They call for an addition to the bill to ensure health care professionals are able to support youth effectively. They wanted this in the bill:
For greater certainty, this definition does not apply to any advice or therapy provided by a social worker, psychologist, psychiatrist, therapist, medical practitioner, nurse practitioner or other health care professional as to the timing or appropriateness of social or medical transition to another gender, including discussion of the risks and benefits and offering alternative or additional diagnoses or courses of treatment.
Every one of us in the House has a responsibility to balance individual rights and freedoms within a diverse society. While the charter protects a pluralistic society, this bill creates a zero-sum game of winners and losers and puts pluralism at risk because the definition of conversion therapy being used causes more harm than good.
Bill C-6, like so many other bills and regulations the Liberal government has brought forward, intentionally seeks to control outcomes based on ideological indoctrination. It goes far beyond the agreed need to ban conversion therapy to controlling thought, speech and behaviour, and stifling democratic freedoms through overreaching legislation.
I support a conversion therapy ban, but not this conversion therapy ban, because this bans more than just conversion therapy. Therefore, I cannot support Bill C-6. Let us do better.
View Jasraj Singh Hallan Profile
CPC (AB)
moved for leave to introduce Bill C-304, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (grooming).
He said: Madam Speaker, it is a great honour to introduce an act to amend the Criminal Code. I would like to thank my colleague, the hon. member for Lakeland, for seconding this proposed legislation and for her great advocacy in protecting children and the vulnerable from predators.
This Conservative bill would make grooming an aggravating factor that the courts would take into account when handing down a sentence for individuals convicted of sexual offences toward young persons. If a court decides not to give effect to the presence of this aggravating factor in any case, it must give a reason for its decision.
For the purpose of the bill, grooming would include communication with victims or conduct in relation to them by a predator such that it makes the victims more susceptible to sexual abuse by the predator.
Grooming is an evil practice that has enabled and continues to enable the victimization of many children. Although the Supreme Court of Canada recognized grooming as an aggravating factor in R. v. Friesen, there are still cases in which the courts have not recognized grooming.
The bill would codify grooming as an aggravating factor, and it is an important step toward tougher punishments for those who choose to use this disgusting practice.
I call on all parliamentarians to work toward tougher punishments for grooming and to increase the protection of children by supporting this bill.
View Pierre Paul-Hus Profile
CPC (QC)
Mr. Speaker, this morning, at the opening of the sitting of the House, I did something important in Parliament. I acted as a legislator, but also as the father of two children.
I introduced Bill C-277, which seeks to combat the sexual exploitation of minors. This bill implements the recommendations set out in the report of the Select Committee on the Sexual Exploitation of Minors, which was unanimously adopted by the Quebec National Assembly.
I hope that my private member's bill will protect our children against sexual exploitation. Now, I also hope that the Liberal government will make this a priority. Our children must not become statistics. The select committee's report must not be forgotten or shelved.
I therefore urge all members, regardless of their political affiliation, to support this bill across party lines and help me give proper effect to its provisions. There is nothing more precious than our children. Let us protect them.
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
CPC (AB)
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
2021-03-23 14:11 [p.5124]
Mr. Speaker, child sexual abuse devastates individuals, families and communities. Survivors deserve accessible, safe and comprehensive physical, mental, emotional and spiritual support. Offenders must face real consequences for the severity of their harm. That is why Conservatives prioritize compassion for victims and take action against dangerous criminals.
Conservatives brought in tougher penalties for child predators and strengthened the national sex offender registry and national DNA data bank. Conservatives fight against human trafficking, online child sexual exploitation and join more than 100 victims who want an investigation into MindGeek for child sexual abuse material.
Little Warriors is a national charity founded by Glori Meldrum for awareness, prevention and treatment of child sexual abuse, and is funded mainly by private donors and grants. The Be Brave Ranch is a one-of-a kind, specialized, trauma-informed, evidenced-based and groundbreaking treatment centre.
I want to recognize the crucial work of the Little Warriors team and the contributions of all the volunteers and donors. Every victim and every child matters.
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
CPC (AB)
View Shannon Stubbs Profile
2021-02-03 14:57 [p.3955]
Mr. Speaker, brave Serena Fleites told MPs she was 13 when explicit videos got on on Pornhub. She pleaded to take them down, but one had 400,000 views before it was pulled. With 3.5 billion site views monthly, Serena could not escape. Desperate, she even tried suicide.
More than 96 million child exploitation pieces are online. The private sector finally acted on MindGeek and got results, but why have the Liberals still done nothing to protect privacy and the ownership of individuals over their own images?
View Justin Trudeau Profile
Lib. (QC)
View Justin Trudeau Profile
2021-02-03 14:58 [p.3955]
Mr. Speaker, we take extremely seriously this situation. That is why we continue to work with members of government and partners to bring in clear rules for Internet service providers and businesses.
We need to make sure that nobody is violating our laws, either in the virtual space or in reality. That is why we are looking forward to bringing forward stronger measures in the coming months.
View Erin O'Toole Profile
CPC (ON)
View Erin O'Toole Profile
2021-02-03 14:58 [p.3955]
Mr. Speaker, the ethics committee heard gut-wrenching testimony this week from survivors of online sexual exploitation that the company MindGeek made money off of. So far, all we have from the government is a promise that it will crack down eventually. Once again, there are no details and there is no real plan. The whole House wants to see this end.
When is the Prime Minister going to give Canadians a clear plan to protect our most vulnerable online?
View Justin Trudeau Profile
Lib. (QC)
View Justin Trudeau Profile
2021-02-03 14:59 [p.3955]
Mr. Speaker, cracking down on illegal online content is something we are taking very, very seriously. Whether it is hate speech, terrorism, child exploitation or any other illegal acts, we will ensure that Canada has the tools to go after companies and individuals for perpetuating these items, these images or this content online.
We are working with partners around the world on the elimination of hate speech and violent extremist content, as well as exploitation of minors and children.
View Larry Maguire Profile
CPC (MB)
View Larry Maguire Profile
2020-10-28 16:09 [p.1364]
Mr. Speaker, I would like to table petition no. 2426.
This petition calls upon the Minister of Justice to amend the definition of section 752 of the Canadian Criminal Code that deals with serious personal injury offence to include wording that identifies sexual interference when considering dangerous offender designations.
View Kate Young Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Kate Young Profile
2020-10-20 10:08 [p.941]
Mr. Speaker, I would like to present a petition to Parliament that speaks to the sexual exploitation of children. The petition draws attention to this growing threat. It says that our children are being exposed to pornography online, their health can be threatened, with some addicted to pornography, some producing and distributing pornography, some performing sexual assaults on other children, some planning suicides online and some planning violent acts to public safety online. The petition says that our parents, caregivers and professionals require increased education, and that the Government of Canada should support the efforts of the federal Canadian charity Internet Sense First and its anti-Internet child exploitation team's goal of the education of Canadians regarding the theory of digital supervision for proactive online child protection.
View Iqra Khalid Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Iqra Khalid Profile
2020-07-22 13:09 [p.2712]
Madam Chair, this pandemic has amplified innovation for commerce, for social justice and for communicating with family and friends through the Internet. We live in a world where the majority of Canadians rely on the Internet for work, social activity and entertainment. Canadians are spending more and more time online than ever. Unfortunately, the virtual space has also seen an amplification of criminal activity. Vulnerable populations are being exploited now more than ever, especially through crimes of human trafficking and child exploitation.
The RCMP's National Child Exploitation Crime Centre has seen an increase in sexual exploitation cases online. Perpetrators are taking advantage of children who may have limited supervision. Child exploitation is on the rise, and human trafficking for sex and labour continues during this pandemic.
Could the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness please update the House on measures that this government is taking to make the virtual world safe for all children and to combat exploitation and human trafficking?
View Bill Blair Profile
Lib. (ON)
View Bill Blair Profile
2020-07-22 13:10 [p.2712]
Madam Chair, I would like to thank the member for her unrelenting advocacy on behalf of the most vulnerable people in our population, including, of course, women and girls.
The issue that she raises of the sexual exploitation of children in particular is the most heinous of crimes. It can leave survivors with long-lasting and lifelong consequences. We know that many people during the pandemic have become increasingly vulnerable, and as the member has indicated, the RCMP is seeing, as we are internationally, an increase in online exploitation during the period of isolation imposed by COVID-19.
I want to assure the members in the House that we are making significant investments in prevention by raising awareness of this serious issue and working to reduce the stigma associated with reporting. At the same, we are providing the necessary resources to police to enhance the capacity of the Internet child exploitation units and inform the work of prosecutors to bring these heinous criminals to justice.
We have also joined with our Five Eyes partners in the adoption of voluntary principles, bringing in international co-operation to deal with child exploitation. We are funding the National Human Trafficking Hotline, currently accessible by phone, text or email 24/7, to connect survivors of human trafficking to the services and programs they need.
There is more that we need to do, and we will be addressing this in the coming weeks through the development of a national strategy to deal with violence against women and girls.
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