Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner has announced that her party will introduce new legislation aimed at protecting Canadians from online harms when Parliament resumes.
The proposed legislation is being positioned as a direct response to the federal government’s approach, which Rempel Garner argued has failed to adequately address the problem. While the Bill C-63 was at its second reading in June, it has faced criticism for its vagueness and for potentially infringing on free speech rights.
Rempel Garner highlighted the need for more decisive action, citing cases of Canadians facing serious online harassment with little recourse. “Imagine opening your email or direct messages to find explicit threats about how someone is going to kill or rape you,” she said, drawing attention to the pervasive issue of online abuse. She emphasized that current measures are insufficient, and police often lack the necessary tools to address the severity of these crimes.
This problem, she noted, affects people across the country, including high-profile figures like journalist Mercedes Stephenson, who recently experienced a resurgence of online harassment despite previous police intervention. “If the system struggles to protect people in positions of power and authority, what hope do other Canadians have?” Rempel Garner asked.
Garner was critical of the government’s past efforts to combat online harm, particularly Bill C-36, introduced by former Justice Minister David Lametti in 2021. That bill faced widespread opposition for what critics viewed as a potential threat to free speech and civil liberties, and it ultimately failed. The current Bill C-63, introduced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s new Justice Minister Arif Virani earlier this year, has also faced similar backlash.
“The Liberals have presented Canadians with a false dichotomy: that they should have to water down their civil liberties to be protected online,” Rempel Garner said. She argued that the Conservative approach would strike a better balance between protecting Canadians from criminal harassment while safeguarding their right to free expression.
Three Key Focus Areas of the New Legislation
The proposed Conservative legislation will focus on three critical areas: enhancing protections against criminal harassment, implementing specific safeguards for minors, and modernizing laws surrounding the non-consensual distribution of intimate images, particularly those generated using artificial intelligence (AI).
1. Criminal Harassment Online
The first area of focus is modernizing Canada’s criminal harassment laws to reflect the realities of online abuse. Rempel Garner stressed that this update would not infringe on the right to free speech, such as disagreements over political issues. Instead, it would target repeated harassment that causes individuals to fear for their safety or well-being.
“Our new legislation will be based on the existing definition of criminal harassment, which already has clear legal precedent,” she explained. By defining the crime clearly, law enforcement and judicial officials would have the tools they need to intervene effectively, without creating what she described as the “expensive kangaroo courts” proposed in Bill C-63.
Additionally, the new law would allow victims to seek immediate judicial action, such as obtaining no-contact orders against their harassers. Social media platforms would also be required to disclose the identity of abusers in certain situations, providing victims with another avenue to end the harassment swiftly.
2. Protecting Minors
The second area of focus is protecting minors from online harm. Rempel Garner noted that children are particularly vulnerable to online abuse, and the Conservative legislation would include provisions to help parents safeguard their children’s online activity. The bill would require online platforms to implement privacy-preserving age verification methods and provide parents with tools to manage their children’s access to potentially harmful content.
Unlike the Liberal bill, which Rempel Garner criticized for pushing regulatory decisions into the future, the Conservative legislation would directly legislate these protections, ensuring that online platforms have a clear duty of care to minors. Failure to comply with these rules would result in significant penalties for the platforms.
3. Non-Consensual Distribution of Intimate Images
The third focus of the Conservative legislation addresses the non-consensual distribution of intimate images, particularly those created using AI, such as deepfake images. Rempel Garner described this as a “glaring loophole” in Canadian law that has been exploited by perpetrators of online abuse.
The new legislation would criminalize the creation and distribution of realistic AI-generated intimate images without consent, while still preserving fair use protections in Canadian law. It would also impose harsher penalties for those found guilty of distributing such images, particularly when they depict sexual assaults.
While the Liberal government’s Bill C-63 aimed to tackle online harm, it has been met with opposition for what critics describe as its overreach into free speech and privacy. The bill proposes a regulatory framework that would grant significant powers to government agencies to monitor and address harmful content online.
Rempel Garner’s proposed legislation seeks to address these same issues while avoiding what she sees as the pitfalls of government overreach. By focusing on clear, enforceable laws rather than broad regulatory powers, the Conservatives hope to create a more effective legal framework for combating online harassment and abuse.
As Parliament prepares to resume, the Conservative party’s new legislation is likely to reignite debates over how best to address online harm in Canada. With the Bill C-63 still in its early stages, Garner’s announcement signals a clear intention from the opposition to take a more direct, civil liberties-focused approach to protecting Canadians online.