Miller voices support to removing religious exemption for hate speech

Culture Minister Marc Miller expressed support Tuesday for removing a religious exemption on hate speech from the Criminal Code.

Miller told reporters he doesn’t “think people should be using the Bible, the Qur’an or the Torah to escape from committing a hate crime or claim that … what would otherwise be a hate crime is done in the name of a religious text.”

Miller chaired the justice committee until he rejoined cabinet on Monday. He said in French in a followup comment he was offering his own perspective and it remains to be seen what the government and the justice committee will do.

The Bloc Québécois said in a press release Monday the party had the government’s support for an amendment to get rid of the exemption.

The comments follow a report by the National Post saying the Liberals had reached a deal with the Bloc to remove the exemption in exchange for supporting the Liberals’ hate crime bill, C-9.

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During an earlier appearance at committee, in response to a question from a Bloc MP, Justice Minister Sean Fraser said he would be open to making the change to eliminate the exemption.

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“I invite the committee to hear from witnesses on that, and if the majority of members agree to make this change, I see no problem with it,” he said.

Fraser’s office declined to comment on whether the government will support the Bloc amendment in exchange for support on C-9.

“Because the Combatting Hate Act could not be reviewed at committee, no amendments were considered. It would be inappropriate to speculate about changes that Conservatives never allowed the committee to debate,” spokesperson Lola Dandybaeva said.

The House of Commons justice committee started the clause-by-clause process where amendments can be made to the bill, but that work was stalled by a Conservative filibuster. That work resumed on Tuesday.

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In a social media post, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said his party will oppose the amendment, which he called an “assault on freedom of expression and religion.”

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The Criminal Code currently provides an exemption to the wilful promotion of hatred “if, in good faith, the person expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text.”

Richard Moon, a professor emeritus of law at the University of Windsor specializing in freedom of expression and freedom of religion, said he’s not aware of any cases where the exemption was used.

Moon said he wouldn’t be surprised if the defence was used in a legal argument at some point, but he’s not aware of it ever leading to an acquittal.

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“So much in this area is about optics,” he said.

There is a widespread lack of understanding about what hate speech provisions in Canadian law actually do, Moon said.

Moon said not many hate speech prosecutions are brought forward in the first place.

To breach the Criminal Code provisions, speech has to be extreme in character, Moon said, adding that “simply being critical or making use of stereotypes or things like that will not count.”

Hate speech might involve describing the members of a group as subhuman, animalistic or as inherently violent in character, he explained.

Moon said even if religious believers hold views that are discriminatory, they “in almost all cases would not be viewed as sufficiently extreme to count as hate speech.”

“And if it is so extreme, like calling for the death and suggesting that members of various groups are a fundamental danger to our society, then really should it matter if … they think of this as grounded in scripture?”

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