What is in Bill C-16, Ottawa’s legislation that seeks to toughen gender-based violence laws?

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The federal government is aiming to toughen the Criminal Code with a new justice bill that proposes a wide range of measures, including several aimed at reducing violence against women in Canada.

If passed, the bill would allow longer sentences for some crimes against intimate partners, create new offences related to domestic abuse, and add clearer definitions for offences.

Read the full text of Bill C-16

Advocates for women’s safety have lauded many of those changes after years of calling for action and stricter penalties.

Here are the key points you need to know from the bill:

Classifying femicide as first-degree murder

The bill proposes classifying murders in situations involving sexual violence, control and exploitation as hate crimes, and as first-degree murder – the most serious form of homicide under the Criminal Code.

These murders would be defined as femicide when the victim is a woman.

Currently, homicides are considered first-degree murder if there is planning and deliberation before the killing. Under the proposed changes, femicide and other hate murders would be considered first-degree murders, even if there was no planning and deliberation involved.

The text of the bill says a murder against a woman is femicide when:

• The murder takes place in a pattern of coercive or controlling conduct
• There is sexual violence and/or human trafficking involved
• The murder is hate-motivated

Under the proposed law, if manslaughter is committed under the above circumstances, a court must consider imposing a life sentence, with offenders ineligible for parole for 10 to 25 years.

When the proposal was announced, advocates shared data indicating a woman is killed on average every second day in Canada, often by an intimate partner.

Criminalizing coercive control

The bill proposes adding coercive control to the Criminal Code with a penalty of up to 10 years in prison. This would create a new offence to prohibit engaging in patterns of controlling, coercive behaviour against an intimate partner.

The government says the move is intended to intervene and stop patterns of intimate partner violence before they turn deadly. Research shows coercive control can be an early warning sign of violence, including lethal violence.

Coercive control, according to the bill, is any conduct that would make an intimate partner believe their safety, or the safety of people known to them, is threatened.

Specific examples in the bill include:

• Threatening an intimate partner, or the partner’s children or dependants, people known to them, or their pets, or attempting to control the partner’s caregiving for other people or animals
• Coercing or attempting to coerce the partner into sexual activity
• Threatening to self-harm or die by suicide
• Controlling, attempting to control or monitoring the partner’s movements, actions or social interactions, including digital interactions
• Controlling or attempting to control the partner’s finances or employment, or monitoring their finances
• Attempting to control the partner’s expression of thoughts, opinions, cultural or religious expression, or their access to medication

Tougher laws around ‘revenge porn’ and sexual deepfakes

Under the proposed law, the penalty for distributing non-consensual intimate or sexual images, also known as “revenge porn,” would increase to 10 years, doubling the penalty from the current five years.

The bill also proposes creating a new offence prohibiting the distribution of non-consensual sexual deepfakes, which includes AI-generated or other visual representations of a person which are likely to be mistaken for a real recording of that person.

What other justice measures does Bill C-16 propose?

The bill proposes a wide range of other changes to the Criminal Code, including:

• Mandatory minimums: Mandatory minimum prison sentences previously ruled unconstitutional by the courts would be restored, including an October decision that struck down one-year mandatory jail sentences for possessing or accessing child pornography.
• Justice system delays: People accused of a crime in Canada have the right to have their case heard within a reasonable time period under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In a shift from a decades-old Supreme Court precedent, the new bill tells judges that a court does not need to order a stay of proceedings in a criminal case because of an unreasonable delay, unless there is no other appropriate and just remedy available.
• Victim supports: Victims of crimes including intimate partner violence or human trafficking would have “presumptive access” to testimonial aids, such as having a supportive person or animal present when they testify. Previously victims could request these aids, but it was not a uniform practice across Canada.
• Youth criminal recruitment: Recruiting youth into criminal activity would become a new criminal offence, carrying a five-year sentence. The government says this is meant to tamp down on a growing pattern of criminal organizations recruiting or grooming minors into committing offences.
• Bestiality images: Distributing depictions of bestiality, including deepfake images, carries a five-year sentence, increased from two years. The bill would also specifically prohibit making such images available to children.
• Sextortion and child luring: To protect children and youth online, the new law would include extortion under the child luring offence.

What are supporters and critics saying about the bill?

Advocates who have been calling for action on violence against women welcomed the bill, and say it takes major steps toward acknowledging the deadly and prevalent issue.

Lawyers and civil liberties groups have expressed concerns about some of the proposed changes to stays over unreasonable court delays and mandatory minimum sentences. Some have suggested the changes could lead to new complications and delays in criminal proceedings.

Opposition politicians had a muted response to the bill when it was introduced.

Has Bill C-16 passed in the legislature?

The bill was introduced on Dec. 9 and it’s currently at the second reading stage.

It will need to pass through the House of Commons and go through the committee stage, and pass in the Senate, before becoming law.

With reports from David Ebner and Molly Hayes