Proceedings in the
Douglas Fir Room

The House in Committee, Section A.

The committee met at 2:26 p.m.

[Susie Chant in the chair.]

Committee of the Whole

Bill 13 — Safe Access to Places
of Public Worship Act

The Chair: I call Committee of the Whole on Bill 13, Safe Access to Places of Public Worship Act, to order.

On clause 1.

The Chair: First of all, Minister, did you want to make any opening remarks?

Hon. Niki Sharma: Sure. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to make sure I introduced the team that’s going to be joining me virtually to help me through this, and that’s Isobel McIntyre and Gabe Hill who are here. I just want to thank all the team for the work that they did on putting this legislation together.

The Chair: Member, did you want to make any remarks?

Steve Kooner: Yes, sure. Once again, I want to thank the Attorney General’s department staff that’s here that has prepared to provide help, assist the Attorney General in providing answers to the opposition’s questions. I know it takes some time to prepare, and so I thank the Attorney General’s department for that. I look forward to asking some very important questions about this legislation.

With the spirit of the precedent for clause 1 on bills that we canvass here in committee stage, I will be asking some general questions first. General questions will go to the intent of the bill and other general points.

The first point I have is: what was the extent of consultation in regards to this particular bill?

Hon. Niki Sharma: There was quite a bit of consultation done on this. I guess it would start from…. On a personal note, a few years ago, when I started hearing from faith leaders about different concerns about incidents that were happening in places of worship, we stepped in with some security funding and had been in regular contact with them.

[2:30 p.m.]

I think there were some pretty high-profile incidents that the member probably knows about that happened at mandirs, gurdwaras, synagogues and mosques.

In terms of specific organizations that were consulted, the B.C. chiefs of police, B.C. Assessment, the Union of B.C. Municipalities, courts, FNLC, the modern treaty Nations and the rights holders were also consulted.

We also did very many round tables with many faith leaders. They were from different backgrounds, whether it was Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh, Jewish, Catholic, also different branches of the Christian faith. There were other churches that were involved. We made a point of connecting with multi-faith organizations to talk to them about the bill and the contents of it and what we were hoping to achieve and then receive their feedback.

Steve Kooner: What was the substance of those consultations? What was discussed?

Hon. Niki Sharma: The content of the discussions was, I think…. At the outset, it was about incidents that were happening on various places of worship. Then as we got into a more detailed policy solution that ended up being this bill, we had deeper discussions with faith leaders and the various other entities about what we were planning on doing with respect to this piece of legislation, the contents of it and what we thought would be a good legislated solution to the challenges they were facing and then got their feedback on that.

Steve Kooner: What were the challenges that these faith groups were facing?

Hon. Niki Sharma: They were very disturbing, the different things that I heard that were happening on places of worship.

I heard from a Muslim organization that was talking about mosques in the Interior where groups that were promoting hate were showing up to mosques at the time of worship.

We heard from synagogues about the threats and the safety concerns that were occurring and the need for particular legislative protections. Some of them, I think, have been widely reported, some of those incidents.

We heard from gurdwaras about really disruptive protests and behaviour that were happening around gurdwaras. When people were entering, they were having difficulties. We heard from others similar things.

We also heard from churches that there were times where…. There was sometimes a very reoccurring type of disruptive protest or behaviour that was happening in and around their churches.

Just really disturbing things, and at some points, leading to altercations. Because of that kind of widespread impacts that different places of worship had happening, we developed these policy responses.

Steve Kooner: Was a copy of the draft of this legislation provided to the faith groups and advocacy groups that were consulted?

[2:35 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: The draft was provided — of course, when we share draft legislation, we require, as is the normal course of things, confidentiality protections in place when we provide that draft, when it hasn’t been tabled in the Legislature — to most of the organizations that I mentioned off the top.

With the faith leaders, we brought them into pretty detailed discussion about the contents of what the policy asks for, but we didn’t provide the draft legislation to them. Essentially, the content of it was revealed through a slide show.

Steve Kooner: There were numerous groups that were consulted, according to the Attorney General. There were faith groups. There were the B.C. chiefs of police. There were different municipalities. One name I never heard was civil liberty groups. Were there any civil liberty groups consulted in regards to this legislation?

Hon. Niki Sharma: No civil liberties groups were directly consulted with a draft of this legislation, although I have a whole team of lawyers that are very equipped with understanding the different rights of people and individuals and how the law works.

Steve Kooner: The Attorney General just mentioned there’s a whole group, a team, of lawyers that assist the Attorney General in advising about rights. Could the Attorney General talk more about that and specifics? What type of rights were canvassed and discussed, and how much of that emphasis was on the Charter of Rights and Freedoms?

Hon. Niki Sharma: As we mentioned, I think under the debate that we had about the safe schools act, similar principles are involved every time you create this type of legislation. This one, in particular, I think is a bit different, because you could say that there are, in a sense, different Charter rights that are at play — the freedom to express your religion, along with the freedom of expression.

These are the types of principles that, every time we design this type of legislation, we need to weigh. When we go through the legislation, I’m happy to talk through the different components of it about where we landed on those decisions.

Steve Kooner: Out of the groups that were consulted…. What was the reaction to this detailed legislation that was being proposed from all these groups? Was it all positive in nature, or were there any negative remarks as well?

[2:40 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: The consultations that we had…. I said that initially, when we talked about it, it was the groups identifying an issue to us. So when we talked in more detail about the policy solutions we were coming up with, it was by and large very positive.

At the announcement, I think you saw that. We had leaders from multiple faiths across the province that were standing with us because they were appreciative of the work and where we landed.

During the discussions, I think they each raised what was happening within their place of worship and how we need to take care to balance Charter rights so that freedom of expression is balanced appropriately with the right to practise one’s religion and that we would find that balance by making sure that the appropriate behaviours are stopped in an area to provide access and that we were content neutral in the kinds of things that we talked about on the safe schools act about making sure we were striking that balance.

The Chair: If I can just remind the committee that when the minister or the member is speaking, if everybody else would mind not speaking at that time. It would be appreciated. Thank you so very much.

Steve Kooner: We’ve heard the nature of the remarks from these advocacy groups, these groups that were consulted. But the question was: were all the remarks positive, or were there some negative as well? I didn’t hear any sort of words in regards to some of the consultation being negative.

Can the Attorney General confirm whether the Attorney General heard any negative remarks about this proposed legislation?

Hon. Niki Sharma: No, the consultations were not…. The comments were more constructive about us finding the right balance. Nobody has said to me that they’re in opposition to the legislation or steps we’re taking to protect places of worship.

Steve Kooner: Did the Attorney General’s department compare this proposed legislation with any other jurisdictions, whether other jurisdictions have similar legislation?

Hon. Niki Sharma: Of course, every time we step into an area of policy or legislative development, we do a scan of any existing legislation or models that we can follow. That’s a normal course of things, and we can learn from what different jurisdictions have done and where we think we should step in.

I would say the most pressing precedent that we used, and you can see that in the wording in the legislation, was our safe schools act and the history that we talked about with that and with the Access to Abortions Act that was actually considered by a court here in B.C. Those are the kind of strongest legal precedents and, I guess, precedents for this type of legislation that we developed.

The other really important one, I think, was Bill C-9, which was the federal legislation that was working to amend the Criminal Code with respect to criminal sanctions related to access to a variety of things. We were looking at that legislation as kind of working in concert with some of the changes that we would make.

[2:45 p.m.]

I guess that was based on the fact that what we saw with the safe schools act was that by just putting in this type of bubble zone — I think with places of worship, you can think of it as a sanctuary zone or an access zone — the deterrence level was pretty high. So if you just put this in place, it prevents a lot of the behaviour from happening and creates a safe access zone for people to do what we think they should have a right to do.

So those were, I think, some of the key precedents that we relied on that led to this legislation.

Steve Kooner: The Attorney General just mentioned the Criminal Code of Canada. There are provisions in the Criminal Code of Canada that talk about harassment, talk about intimidation, talk about criminal impeding, obstruction to access.

Is there a reason, when we have the Criminal Code, which provides for some of the fundamental items that this legislation is designed to capture…? Was there a reason why this legislation was brought forward regardless of the Criminal Code of Canada existing? The Criminal Code of Canada exists, and law enforcement actually has access to it to enforce that. Perhaps the Attorney General can provide a comment on that.

Hon. Niki Sharma: Similar to the safe schools Act that we talked about yesterday, there are a few things going on between the difference between the civil and criminal processes. Obviously, the criminal standard is different. The types of behaviours in Bill C-9 that are attached to criminal sanctions potentially are different. The standards are different.

This is a civil remedy that we know has a deterrence factor. So we’re actually using it as a tool to prevent harm and to make sure that worshippers know that they have safe access to their place of worship. And that’s a standard that we’re setting across the province through legislation like this, which is a powerful thing just in and of itself.

I will also note that the B.C. chiefs of police, the organization that I mentioned that we consulted off the top…. Their response was favourable to this type of tool. Having a geographical zone was something that they mentioned was really important with the safe schools act. That you had a geographical zone that was circled around, where some behaviours were not allowed in, was a useful tool in their enforcement. So they were favourable to something like this.

[2:50 p.m.]

Steve Kooner: Okay, in regards to this actual clause, the first definition is “access zone.”

Can the Attorney General explain why this definition was included?

Hon. Niki Sharma: This is an important definition to make sure that it’s clear that the term “access zone” has the meaning that’s established under this act. You can see the reference to section 3. This is the setting of the geographical zone, which is actually pretty key to the functioning of the act.

Steve Kooner: The next definition here is “interference.” Can the Attorney General explain why that word was included and defined?

Hon. Niki Sharma: This is a term…. Of course, the reason that the act is important is not only about the establishing of the zone but actually defining what behaviour is not allowed within that access zone. So then you think about how these definitions of the types of behaviours actually become quite important. “Interference” is defined for that reason. So it’s not just the ordinary meaning of the word. It’s a specific meaning of interference related to places of worship.

This is a very similar definition to what was in the School Act. Of course, it’s changed to include places of worship because of the different application, but it’s just to define the type of behaviour we would consider interference.

Steve Kooner: Can the Attorney General elaborate on the next definition here, which is “multi-use building”?

[2:55 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: This is important, also, because I think, as most people know, a lot of times places of worship are multi-use buildings in the sense of where other activities besides worship can occur, or there can be other buildings or portions of the building associated with other uses. So the reason for this definition is to make clear that just because it’s a multi-use building does not mean it’s not a place of worship that is under an access zone.

Steve Kooner: Does the definition of a “multi-use building” include the outdoor space of that building, such as a lawn or patio or other non-indoor spaces?

Hon. Niki Sharma: I think the question was related to front lawns or what the extent is of the property covered, even if it’s a multi-use building. I think to answer fully, you have to think about the act and how it defines an access zone.

The access zone is the end of the property line plus 20 metres. So if there is a lawn in the front of the place of worship and that’s part of the property, then it would be included in the access zone plus 20 metres around that property line.

[3:00 p.m.]

There’s a particular thing related, and we can get to that when we get to clause 4. I can explain that in more detail about multi-use buildings where the sign is instead posted at the point of entry if it’s a complicated situation.

But we can get to that when we get to clause 4.

Steve Kooner: Just a question related to that.

It’s my understanding that we have a prayer room here at the Legislature, just as an example. The Legislature building is a very large building. Around the Legislature building, we do have lawn and property. That’s also a very large piece of land. Beyond that, another 20 metres makes it a very round, far, distant radius around the building.

We have had protests here at the Legislature, and there’s a prayer room here at the Legislature. So if this legislation were to come into force, and if there are protests happening here at the Legislature, would they be prohibited under this legislation?

Hon. Niki Sharma: To explain that a little bit deeper, you have to look at the definition that’s coming up, which is: what is a place of worship? The prayer room in the Legislature would not be defined as a place of worship. It’s a property that….

We tied it to the tax exemption. This was something we talked about with faith leaders as well, that religious institutions benefit from tax exemptions that are held under various community charters and municipal bylaws. It defines the property at which the tax exemption is allotted to.

So we tied our definition of “place of worship” to that, because we decided it was the clearest way to understand which properties we were talking about. In the example that the member gave, a prayer room inside of a bigger building, it doesn’t receive the tax exemption for a place of worship, which is a different standard related to that. This legislation would not be applicable.

Steve Kooner: Let me just elaborate on that question.

I believe I used the wrong terminology when I said “prayer room.” There’s actually a chapel here at the Legislature. In addition to that, I believe…. My understanding is that the Legislature is property tax-exempt.

Now, looking pretty closely at the words in this legislation, based upon that tax exemption and based upon there being a chapel at the Legislature, would protest activities be prohibited on the grounds of the Legislature and within 20 metres beyond the grounds?

Hon. Niki Sharma: No, it would not be. We were pretty clear that every time you design this piece of legislation, you need to have a clear idea of which properties you’re talking about and which ones you are attaching through the signage — these types of access zones.

If you look at the definition of place of worship, it very particularly ties it to subsections of the Community Charter, the Vancouver Charter and the Taxation (Rural Area) Act. It also gives a regulatory-making power in the case we need to add anything.

So that’s a very specific cross-reference to those statutes that ties it to properties that are places of worship and primarily places of worship.

Steve Kooner: Some explanations were provided, and the references were made to other statutes such as the Community Charter, Vancouver Charter and, I believe, the Taxation Act. But under “place of public worship,” subsection (iv) talks about “property that is within a prescribed class of property.”

[3:05 p.m.]

Now, subsection (iv) does not refer to any sort of statute. It talks about a prescribed class of property. How does that come into the explanation? Does the Attorney General’s explanation change as a result of subsection (iv) not referring to any particular statute?

The Chair: Members of the committee are again reminded that when the member or the minister is speaking, it would be preferred that nobody else was doing so. Thank you so very much.

Hon. Niki Sharma: The reason that we added that subsection, the “property that is within a prescribed class of properties,” was specifically because of feedback that we received from faith leaders.

One thing that’s very important with this type of legislation is to have a clear, defined boundary so it’s very clear what the prohibitions are, and it’s limited to that area.

But we heard from some faith leaders that there are…. Most of them, I think, are captured. Most places of worship that we would think of as primary places of worship in all our communities would be captured by the first three.

But some of them said that they have certain situations that are like: “Oh, we rent this place. So we’re not necessarily owners with the property tax exemption, but we rent this place.” Or there are other scenarios that, at this stage, we didn’t have a legal or legislative solution for, trying to piece through how you could define that and set boundaries on it.

We wanted to leave space for the fact that governments in the future or when people grapple with this as a sunset clause…. If there are issues that are happening in places of worship that are primarily places of worship that are outside of those definitions in the first three subsections, there would be a regulatory-making ability to add a class of property that would capture what we might have been missing.

Steve Kooner: I just want to kind of clarify my understanding here. In subclause (iv), under “place of public worship,” there is some leeway for the government to determine what would be a place of public worship, although clause (iv) doesn’t refer to any of the statutes mentioned under “place of public worship.”

So if that is the case, if we have here the Legislature and it has a chapel that has grounds around the building, does this clause not provide the government a mechanism to prevent protests here at the Legislature?

[3:10 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: The suggestion that I think the member made is wildly out of scope with anything in the legislation. We have to remember our legislative principles, first of all that any regulation is put in place under the context and binds of the piece of legislation it sits within.

This is clearly a piece of legislation that’s about safe access to places of public worship. I cannot imagine a scenario that’s not wildly ultra vires or out of the scope of the legislation that some future government would make a regulation that says the Legislature was included in that. I can’t conceive of that, and even if that did happen, it would be struck down, probably pretty quickly, in a court if the government were to take such a dramatic and out-of-scope and likely illegal step.

Steve Kooner: I have one final question here on clause 1, and I believe the leader of the Green Party has one question, as well, after this. So I will pass it off to him after I ask this final question on this one.

My last question in clause 1 has to do with the parcel. It’s stated here that a parcel means “a lot, block or other area in which land is held or into which land is subdivided” — so other area in which land is held.

How does this…? We have this thing called trespass. It’s a legal definition of trespass. How does trespass jibe with this definition of parcel? And to add to that, why is trespass not part of the consideration?

Hon. Niki Sharma: Happy to explain this one. The term “parcel”…. You’ll see it’s used in subsection 4. It’s obviously important to this act in terms of defining what the clear area of land is, but also you have to remember it’s 20 metres around it.

[3:15 p.m.]

It was something that was important to a lot of faith leaders — that it wasn’t just the property line; it was an access zone around the place of worship. In that scenario, for the 20 metres that we’ve extended the access zone around, the Trespass Act would not apply. There’s a differentiator there in terms of what the access zone is, and the definition of “parcel” is important in section 4.

Steve Kooner: I just have one follow-up question. So does that mean somebody can be on their private property, and they come within 20 metres of the access zone — they’re on their private property, their own private property that they’ve purchased, but they’re within that 20 metres — and they cannot do any form of protest? Is my understanding accurate based upon what the Attorney General just stated?

Hon. Niki Sharma: I’m happy to answer that question quite fully in subsection (4), because the member can look at 4(4), where private residences are excluded.

Jeremy Valeriote: Thanks to the minister. I have one…. I might slip in a second one on clause 1. Pretty straightforward. Considering that places of public worship are often used as venues for secular events, what steps is the government taking to ensure the public’s right to protest non-religious events is maintained?

Hon. Niki Sharma: There’s, I guess, a multilevel answer to that question.

So first of all, I would say that there is no reference to protests in the types of behaviours that are prohibited. The types of the behaviours that are prohibited, and this comes up in one of the future sections, are about obstructing somebody’s access to their place of worship, intimidation affecting their mental/physical well-being — those kind of things. We picked certain particular behaviours that are not allowed in the access zone so when somebody’s accessing their place of worship, that won’t be something that impacts them.

There’s no reference in this one to protests. And if the protest does not lead to those kinds of prohibited behaviours…. So that’s one answer to that.

The other one is when you design legislation like this, it’s super important that it’s content-neutral. So that means that the government of the day has no power to decide what they agree with or what they don’t agree with related to the content of somebody’s political expression, because that’s not the role of government, and I think in a free and democratic society we never want that to be the role of government.

So once we define behaviours that are not allowed, it’s content-neutral on what they’re about or why they’re doing it. It’s just whether or not they’re doing it. That is prohibited in that access zone.

Of course, it’s not everywhere. You have to be outside the access zone if you’re doing the prohibited activities or just the things that are not allowed within the access zone. This is 20 metres outside of the property line of the place of worship.

Jeremy Valeriote: Thanks to the minister for clarifying. I apologize for using the term “protest” to incorporate what is basically interference under the legislation and other behaviours. So that was a bit of an oversimplification.

Just one more. I have a very dedicated constituent who thinks that the solution to all the world’s problems is to tax religion. I’m not necessarily endorsing that, but let’s say that the legislation changes so that the tax exemption under section 220 of the Community Charter or 396 of the Vancouver Charter changes.

[3:20 p.m.]

How would the government have to change this? Would it move to prescription by order in council, or is there another method that was considered that could be used?

Hon. Niki Sharma: I think probably the government of the day would have to consider two different things or two different solutions.

One is, I’m sure there would be a misc bill with consequential amendments that would have to respond to take out the references to outdated cross-references to those acts that the member was talking about.

Then they would have another policy problem, which would be trying to figure out how to have a clear definition to define places of worship. I think it’s an easier task when we looked at how you define a school ground, because schools are very regulated and legislated entities. This definition, attaching to a property exemption, was, I think, the clearest one that we could find.

If that were to happen, there’d likely be consequential amendments. The government of the day would have to figure out how to define a place of worship. Maybe there’d be a way to use those existing definitions to carry it to here.

Clause 1 approved.

On clause 2.

Sheldon Clare: Would any of the activities listed in section 2 impart a criminal record upon conviction? Would such conviction be by summary, would it be indictable, or would it be a hybrid?

Hon. Niki Sharma: This isn’t structured as a…. Of course, we don’t have authority under the Criminal Code. It’s not a criminal offence. What the enforcement mechanisms are, are a ticket or an arrest, but then it goes to the Offence Act after that. It doesn’t go through the Criminal Code procedures.

I heard that we were recessing also, Chair. Is that correct?

The Chair: Okay, at this time we will have a five-minute recess. I have 3:25 on my watch. At 3:30, please, everybody be back in their seats.

The committee recessed from 3:25 p.m. to 3:37 p.m.

[Jennifer Blatherwick in the chair.]

The Chair: Good afternoon, Members. I call Committee of the Whole on Bill 13, the Safe Access to Places of Public Worship Act, back to order. We are on clause 2.

Sheldon Clare: I wish to thank the minister for her answer to my question.

I have another one. As I understand it, you mentioned the Offence Act. I believe the Offence Act works on summary conviction, if I understand my long-ago days in taking a few courses in such matters.

In that regard, where in section 92 is the constitutional authority to make such a law, as is included in clause 2 and under the Offence Act? I’m a little confused as to how the province has the constitutional authority to make a law like this. I would just draw your attention to subsection 92(15) of the Constitution Act. I will also draw your attention to section 91(27) of the Constitution Act, about the role of the law.

Now, I know you did try to make the point that this was not criminal law but that it was by regulation, which means the imposition of a fine. And I’m to understand that there is no jail time associated with this too. Is that correct?

[3:40 p.m. - 3:45 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: I think if the member wants to clarify that…. If we got the question a little bit off, then he can have a follow-up question.

I think he’s saying that the Offence Act is outside of our jurisdiction as a province. The Offence Act has been in place since 1996, and it’s for any breaches of provincial enactments. It sits under our constitutional jurisdiction of property and civil rights — this particular type of law.

Yes, if there are breaches to provincial enactments, the Offence Act does kick in. It’s been around since 1996, and there have never been any constitutional issues with it in terms of us crossing over into the federal jurisdiction on criminal law. So using the Offence Act through this piece of legislation is within our constitutional jurisdiction as a province.

Sheldon Clare: So you’re arguing that subsection (13) of section 92 applies, then, I take it. I think I understand your answer, and I appreciate your consideration of that constitutional question.

I have some other questions. In terms of the word choices in subsection 2(1)(a), the choice of the word “impede.” Was this chosen based on other legislation, or was this taken from a legal definition? What was the origin of that particular choice of word?

In order to save time and not impede the matter, I would also say I will be asking the same question with regards to “disrupt,” “engage” and “intimidate.”

[3:50 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: I’ll just go through a general answer for each of the words that the member…. I appreciate the advance notice of what he’s going to be asking. So I’ll try to answer it globally, and then if there are specific questions, the member can let me know.

First of all, when we’re drafting legislation, the consideration that the policy-makers make is: does the word in its ordinary meaning capture the thing that we want it to capture? If it in its ordinary meaning doesn’t, there may be a need for some form of definition.

In these cases, the words “impede,” “disrupt,” “engage,” “intimidate….” First of all, those are the behaviours that came from the consultations with the places of worship. As a policy decision to put it in legislation, it started with: what were the behaviours that we’re hearing from faith leaders that are behaviours that we want to prohibit in a place of worship?

So it starts from the problem statement. What’s the thing we’re trying to solve? And then the policy-makers, the drafters, would think about how to consider that in the document of the legislation.

And then that balance I talked about is that…. Can we use the ordinary meaning of the word to get the concept of what we’re trying to prohibit? And if we can’t, is there a definition needed?

So you’ll see “interference” is defined, because it’s a little bit of a more nebulous concept that needed to be pinned down by a definition.

Hopefully that helps.

Sheldon Clare: To the Attorney General, thank you for the answer. It is helpful. I wonder what the source of determining ordinary meaning of these terms would be. Did you also consult any legal references or other use in legislation of these particular words?

Hon. Niki Sharma: Yes, you would do all of the things that the member suggested. So looking at other pieces of legislation — I’m told the word “impede” shows up quite often in legislative drafting and concepts — or case law, if it’s applicable to the scenario, to guide what words you choose to get the concepts you want nailed down in legislation.

[3:55 p.m.]

Sheldon Clare: But I was asking again about the sources for those particular choices of word. I mean, I appreciate the generality of the answer, but the question is rather a specific one. So do you have specific sources? Was this other legislation? Was this Black’s Law Dictionary? Was it another province’s legislation? Were there any sources like that considered in determining what would be chosen in use with ordinary meaning?

Hon. Niki Sharma: This type of legislation is modelled after various previous ones, the safe schools act, the COVID bubble zone and the Access to Abortion Services Act, which are pieces of legislation that came from B.C. as well.

So you can see these words or similar words located in those pieces of legislation. That’s the primary guide. That was the choice of what you see before you in this section. Again, they’re the ordinary meaning of the word.

Sheldon Clare: There was one question I asked a little earlier that I don’t believe I got an answer to. Do any of these offences come with any jail time, or are they just fines? What other sanctions are imposed against a person who is deemed to have committed an offence and been convicted under the Offence Act or this act on summary conviction?

Hon. Niki Sharma: Within the structure of this act, in terms of what the punishment might be, there’s a ticket option, which would be associated with a fine that would be implemented through regulation in terms of the amounts. There’s also, through the Offence Act, the possibility of imprisonment. Of course, the discretion for that is left to law enforcement and the justice system to decide. Likely it would be the most serious of offences under this act that would lead to that.

I also want to talk about — I think it’s helpful in this conversation — what our experience has been with the school act. So of the times that this…. This has been in force for a couple of years, or similar legislation under the Safe Access to Schools Act. There’s only been one ticket, and that, I think was…. The primary method that the police use to enforce this is to just move people along, which makes it an effective deterrent.

[4:00 p.m.]

Sheldon Clare: In subsection 2(1)(d), the term is “attempt to intimidate.” How is intent determined in an attempt to intimidate?

Hon. Niki Sharma: Putting a concept of attempting to do something is pretty well-established in the legal realm.

Let me give you an example that I think would be helpful of where this might show up. If you have the intent to do something but you don’t actually do it, then you would be captured, of course under the discretion of the enforcement officer, on the attempt category.

Let’s give an example of…. You’re at the place of worship. You have the signs and everything. It’s clear that you’re going to be attempting to intimidate the worshippers, but nobody is there to worship. The police might be able to capture you on the intent to do so.

Or if you did do all the things that would intimidate a person, but the person’s not intimidated, that would also capture it. It’s just a legal concept that’s put in place to capture what the person’s intent is, even if it’s not achieved through the outcome of what they’re doing.

Hopefully that helps.

Sheldon Clare: Thank you for your answer. That is helpful.

[4:05 p.m.]

I wonder. Is it possible that another religious activity could be taking place outside of a religious establishment of a different faith, and this could be seen as intimidating? Would that be a potential conflict? Say religion A is inside and has the place of worship, and religion B is outside engaged in some of these activities, but they see this as part of their particular religious faith or culture or means of demonstrating their religion.

Is that a possibility that could engage this particular act?

Hon. Niki Sharma: We have to start with the fact that everything within this legislation is content neutral. Again, it’s not government’s job to decide whether or not the content of what you’re doing is appropriate or not. It’s just the behaviours that would be triggered into being stopped in this area.

In the scenario that the member describes, it’s totally fact-specific, or depending on the facts and the discretion of the enforcement officer. But let’s say that religion B was on that ground — or whatever the scenario was — in front, and religion A didn’t like that they were practising their faith or found it intimidating.

Well, the question would be, depending on the facts: did those individuals impede access or egress to the place of worship? Did they disrupt the activities of the place, or did they engage in interference or intimidate or attempt to intimidate?

Now, I think one that would be a fact-based scenario, if one of the groups called a police officer to enforce, is whether there was intimidation in the conduct of whatever parties that were not there for, primarily, the religion of where that place of worship was.

To some extent, it’s a fact-specific answer to that, in terms of who’s enforcing and interpreting the law. But this gives them the discretion to determine if specific behaviours that are caught by this act were at play in that specific fact scenario.

Sheldon Clare: Thank you to the Attorney General for the answer.

I think what I want to just point out a little bit more in this…. Is it theoretically possible that the activities of religion A could be intimidating to religion B, or vice versa, in terms of the activities that are, in here, called “intimidate or intent to intimidate,” just by them being practised within the 20 metres of that particular religious place of worship?

Is that a possibility, that officers would have discretion to assess, deal with and issue a ticket or other sanction?

[4:10 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: I don’t have a different answer than the one that I gave before. It really is fact-specific. I mean, we could sit here probably all day and think of scenarios where a decision-maker in that scenario might actually see that conduct as intimidating to the other religion or not.

When you design legal thresholds and legal provisions like this one, you always leave discretion up to the specific facts of the matter. As the law evolves, different facts get thrown at different provisions, and then there are determinations that evolve the law in one direction or another.

It’s really hard for me to speculate in hypotheticals. But yes, theoretically, I guess there’s a level…. There could be a determination based on a fact scenario that there is intimidation at play, but it really depends on what’s going on and what the officer sees at the time of arrival.

Sheldon Clare: Okay, thank you to the Attorney General for the answers.

In subsection (3), there is a sub-subsection (c), “a prescribed activity or class of activities.” Could you perhaps enlighten us with some examples of possibilities where impeding access, disrupting activities, engaging in interference or intimidating or attempting to intimidate could be prescribed as being okey-dokey at a place of worship, with regard to the other sections there about striking and things authorized by the owner, as opposed to those in juxtaposition?

Hon. Niki Sharma: This is a typical kind of just-in-case regulatory power. The reason it’s there is not because I can tell you specifically what might be included in a future regulatory power. It’s just a way, when you’re designing legislation, to see if there was something that was not contemplated at the time of drafting that emerges as a societal issue or that just emerges through the course of human action that actually should be a prescribed activity — that there’s an ability to do that through regulation.

Jeremy Valeriote: A couple of things on clause 2.

In the interest of clarity and to mitigate the risk of subjective perceptions on the part of enforcement, under section 1(a) of “Access protected”, what could impeding access look like? Is it limited to physically impeding access, or would other situations be considered impediments?

[4:15 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: That is very specific to the plain reading of it. So if you’re impeding access to or egress from the place of worship, that’s very much a physical block to have somebody accessing their place of worship.

Jeremy Valeriote: Thank you for that.

Just also asking the minister to define or describe the terms “disturbance” and “mental safety” as they’re intended by this legislation.

Hon. Niki Sharma: I think it was the subsection (b), “disrupt activities at the place of worship.” So this is as it reads in the ordinary meaning, that if somebody showed up and stopped an activity that was happening at a place of worship, that would be not allowed in the access zone.

And in terms of mental safety, I’ll give you a really clear example. This also comes from the COVID-19 bubble zones, where people were, obviously, intimidating health care workers that were trying to make it to their life-saving work.

I’ll give you a very clear example of why this is needed in this type of legislation. During our consultations, we heard about mosques that were…. The Sons of Odin group was showing up at mosques, and they are intimidating. They were showing up to spread their perspectives to the worshippers. Obviously, that affected the mental safety of people that were there just to pray.

It gives the ability of a clear statement to people like that, saying: “You can’t show up at a place of worship around this zone and conduct this type of behaviour.”

Clause 2 approved.

On clause 3.

Steve Kooner: Clause 3 talks about signs and posting of signs. My question is: will these signs be multilingual, or will they be just in one language?

[4:20 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: The answer to that is that it can be in as many languages as could be appropriate for the place of worship, including English.

You may have to…. The place of worship may consider that other languages besides English are also necessary for it to be clearly visible or clearly understood by the users of the place of worship.

Steve Kooner: Who has to pay for these signs, and who will install these signs?

[4:25 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: The idea behind this is to make it as low barrier as possible. That’s why we took great care to list as many of the details of what’s needed in the legislation.

For example, if you just put up a printed sign on your door that was visible in the ways that are described in the legislation, that would be acceptable. It’s meant to be not an expensive and a very low-barrier thing for places of worship to do.

Clause 3 approved.

On clause 4.

Steve Kooner: There were some questions that were asked earlier, and they had to do with the access zone and the 20 metres from the place of worship. We left one question to be answered in this particular clause, so I’m going to go back to that.

Subsection (4) of clause 4 says: “Despite subsections (1) to (3) and the regulations, the following are excluded from an access zone: a private residence; a place to which the public does not ordinarily have access.” The Attorney General referred my attention to “private residence” because I asked the question about private property. What if somebody is on their own private property? Would this legislation prevent them from doing a protest on their own property that they have purchased?

Now, this has an exemption for private residence, but that states “residence.” What if somebody has bought a piece of commercial property? They don’t live there, but they own that property. It’s theirs. They may do some business from there, or they may use it for some other purpose other than residential. Would they still be prevented from using their property to the fullest extent of their rights as a result of this legislation under clause 4 and the rest of the clauses?

Hon. Niki Sharma: The key to answering that question is subsection (b). It’s a place to which public does not ordinarily have access. That’s also included. So the thinking behind that was…. Let’s say there’s a parking lot of a restaurant that’s in that access zone. That could be used to conduct the behaviours that we want prohibited, so that would be captured.

But if it was another commercial zone where that wasn’t true, where the public doesn’t ordinarily have access to it, then it wouldn’t be captured.

Steve Kooner: Going back to those trespass laws, the public may have access to a certain piece of property. It may be private property. That’s because the landowner has allowed certain people to come, so it’s now accessible to the public. But that landlord or that owner of that property still has control. They could say: “Okay, now I don’t want to use it for that purpose.”

[4:30 p.m.]

My question is…. This legislation seems to state that regardless of whether it’s somebody’s private property, this legislation could apply. I’d like confirmation from the Attorney General if that is accurate.

Hon. Niki Sharma: Yes, it’s complicated in the fact that it’s a private residence, and subsection (b), a place to which public does not ordinarily have access, is also captured.

You have to remember that that could be some area of a commercial property, but you have to remember that it’s only the behaviours that are prohibited that are captured. I think just members of the society would pass the smell test.

Like if you’re just standing in a commercial area and doing your business, and it’s separate, then that is fine. If you’re there in a parking lot of an area, but what your behaviour is, is intimidating the people accessing the place of worship, well, then, it should be captured. If it’s inside that access zone, it should be captured.

So it was a way of balancing the ability to make the access zone actually have teeth to prevent people from kind of skirting them by thinking that if they just stood in the parking lot of a restaurant or something that they would be able to do that inside the access zone.

Steve Kooner: This does seem that…. Well, it seems to be an assertion from the government that private property rights will be limited to a certain extent in certain situations.

I’ll ask another question on this particular clause. Subsection (3) deals with passageways in multi-use buildings. Now, when I try to think about what passageways could be, I think about a strata building where there are multiple floors. There are multiple units. Then there are passageways. There are hallways.

Under this subclause here, subclause 3(c), these passageways…. Would that cover hallways in a multi-use building such as a strata building?

Hon. Niki Sharma: Yes, it would.

Steve Kooner: So to that extent, if that’s a strata building, that could be a form of private property too, or commonly held property in terms of hallways. It could involve the mixed-use building. It could be partly residential. It could be partly business use.

But there could still be restrictions. It doesn’t really differentiate in terms of the use of the building. It’s multi-use. So it could actually affect….

I guess the answer is that it can affect…. There’s no real distinction. Hallways are covered.

[4:35 p.m.]

Is there anything in this legislation that would allow the private property holders, whether it’s like strata property, some leeway where they could try to limit the exposure on their private property?

Hon. Niki Sharma: I’m not sure where this line of questioning is going because it’s not an infringement on people’s property rights, and that seems to be the line of questioning that is happening. You can see private residence is clearly excluded. If it’s somebody’s private home in a strata, obviously, they have the ability to be in their home without any problem.

If somebody’s in the hallway in this scenario that we’re talking about and they’re there to intimidate and harass and interfere with and all the things that are prohibited around somebody’s access to their place of worship — that’s what we’re saying is not allowed.

I’m a bit confused about the line that we would be infringing upon somebody’s property rights at all here. It’s about protecting people’s ability to practise their religion and access their places of worship free from the, I think, clearly abhorrent behaviours that are listed, in this access zone.

I guess I’ll just leave it there because I think we can all agree that if somebody, like the Sons of Odin I mentioned, is going to a place of worship to do these hateful things to people accessing their place of worship, even if they’re in the passageway as described, that would still be something that should be stopped.

So I’m not sure what the member is asking we want to give private property owners relief from. Maybe if he can clarify that question, I can answer.

Clause 4 approved.

On clause 5.

Sheldon Clare: In schedule B of the Constitution Act, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms as it’s commonly called, I wonder in reference to the section about arrest, clause 5, do sections 8, 9, and 11 apply?

[4:40 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: As the law of the constitution of the country, then those provisions of course would apply. If there’s a follow-up question in particular about that, you can let me know.

Sheldon Clare: Is the action of a police officer arresting an individual without warrant limited only by the fact that they must witness the contravention of section 2?

Hon. Niki Sharma: If the member is, I think, wondering about arbitrary arrest, if it meets the Charter compliance, the balance is that there has to be reasonable grounds, so it’s not an arbitrary action by that police officer. And there is a similar provision under the Offence Act.

Sheldon Clare: What are considered reasonable grounds?

[4:45 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: We were debating on this side whether or not to give you the big quotes of case law that define this standard.

I’ll just direct you to R. v. Storrey, which I think is the case that really talks about it. It’s a very well-defined legal standard, and it can’t just be somebody’s personal belief that there’s something. There has to be kind of an objective standard that a reasonable person would believe that there were grounds, that there was a contravention of those sections.

So that’s the case, and there are provisions. There are paragraphs there, in many cases, that really define this legal standard.

[4:50 p.m.]

Sheldon Clare: Thank you to the Attorney General for the case reference. I appreciate that.

Would a peaceful protest with blunt-language placards justify an arrest?

Hon. Niki Sharma: This really depends. It’s really hard. Sometimes when we get in these debates, I get asked hypothetical questions about what legal standard is met in the scenario. In a hypothetical scenario, it’s just impossible for me to give you a legal opinion on whether or not it’s met.

I can just tell you what the legislation says. The rest is left to the discretion of the arriving officer. That’s, I think, the normal functioning of a lot of things. With the legislation, we set the boundaries, and then we leave it to the discretion of the police officer and the court system and the facts that are present at the case.

I’ll just say that it doesn’t capture peaceful protest. There’s nothing in here that would say that a peaceful protest, as the member said, would be captured. It’s the behaviours that are prohibited. There could be scenarios where something on a sign might reach that level or might not be. It just kind of depends on the facts of each case.

Sheldon Clare: For example, would people standing around shouting justify an arrest? What is the de minimis standard for the shouting? Is there a decibel level that applies? Or is this entirely at the discretion of an officer involved? Is there a standard where something goes from being peaceful, legitimate protest to intimidation? What is the standard here that determines whether or not an officer arrests without a warrant?

Hon. Niki Sharma: There is a standard that’s set out in the legislation. There must be reasonable grounds for the officer arriving at the scene or in conduct of the matter that the contraventions listed in the section that lists out all the things that we’re prohibiting…. Impede access or egress from the place of worship, disrupt activities at the place of worship, engage in interference or intimidate or attempt to intimidate a person — those provisions. If there are reasonable grounds that one of those has occurred, then the police officer has the choice.

Like I said, under the safe schools act, a lot of times it’s just used as a tool to move people along, as only one ticket was issued in that scenario. But the police officer has a choice, depending on what they see before them, on how to respond.

Bryan Tepper: I’ve just a couple of quick questions. If I could ask the….

Deputy Speaker: I’m so sorry. You can’t use an electronic device when asking a question.

Bryan Tepper: Okay. Perfect.

[4:55 p.m.]

As a police officer, right now, without this legislation, would I be able to arrest somebody without a warrant if I was stopping them from walking towards a place of worship or, really, anywhere in British Columbia, at this point, with or without this law? Is that an arrestable offence?

Hon. Niki Sharma: If the member’s question is about this power of warrantless arrest, it does exist in other laws, including the trespass law, and also Criminal Code provisions. There’s a lot of discretion to the police officer in the scenarios where it already exists. This law puts that ability to do that when somebody is doing these behaviours to disrupt a place of worship.

Maybe that answers the question, and I’m happy to go further down a different path if it didn’t.

Bryan Tepper: Maybe this will be quicker and easier if I say now that the next question would be: can I arrest, without a warrant, somebody I find causing a disturbance at a place of worship or, really, anywhere else in British Columbia?

[5:00 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: We’re having some trouble answering this question. Maybe I’ll try, and then we’ll see if we can clarify.

The police generally have a power to arrest — I mean, not every circumstance, but within a range of circumstances, particularly when they’re witnessing a crime happening — without a warrant. You can imagine police showing up in some situation where maybe there’s violence or there’s something happening. They don’t go to a court to get a warrant to arrest that person. They have this authority for certain things to be able to arrest without a warrant.

That’s not a new thing as what we’ll find in this act. What we’re saying is this is available to them if the person in an access zone — so in a limited area around a place of worship — is doing the very particular behaviours that we’ve outlined in here, if this law were to come in force.

Bryan Tepper: To speed things up, the point, I think, is that arrest without a warrant is available in those under clause 2. The questions were around (a) and (b). And (c) and (d) basically also come under Criminal Code. It’s counselling somebody to commit an offence of the same thing, and the other one is basically threatening somebody. I think we all know those are criminal offences that can be arrested on in any case by a police officer without a warrant.

Having said that, the arrest without a warrant refers back to clause 2. I would say all of these are things that are covered under the Criminal Code, and you’ve talked about them being already available to police officers. What does this bill do that allows police officers to do something different than is already allowed under the Criminal Code?

Hon. Niki Sharma: We’ve canvassed this question quite a bit, and I’m happy to break it down again.

Civil remedies and criminal remedies are separate in their scope and their thresholds and the processes that are available to them for individuals. Access zones like this work in cooperation with any Criminal Code provisions.

I’ll give you an example. When we did consultation, we talked to the B.C. chiefs of police. They got to see a draft of this legislation, and what they found and what they reported was what happens with access zone legislation.

For example, the safe schools act, which was an example that was running for a couple of years, gives the police the ability to have a defined geographical zone to control behaviour and act as a deterrent to prevent harm or things from happening. It also de-escalates issues in a clear way, because what you’re saying is that you can conduct this activity, just not here in this space. In the school, it was during school hours. We saw a drop in the escalation and harm done by those types of activities.

Now, in terms of places of worship, criminal thresholds are much different than the thresholds that you see here. The way that it would operate is the police would have a defined access zone in which to work, and also the places of worship would have a defined access zone. It would be a deterrent for people that are coming there to know which types of behaviours are just not allowed.

There is a separate tool that exists around an access zone, and the chiefs of police acknowledge that it’s very useful in terms of their enforcement and their ability to prevent harm and prevent crimes from happening.

Clauses 5 to 7 inclusive approved.

On clause 8.

Jeremy Valeriote: Apologies for the inexperience. I haven’t dealt with sunset clauses or repeals.

Can the minister just help me understand how the four years was chosen and why?

[5:05 p.m.]

Hon. Niki Sharma: Okay. There’s no magic to this. It’s a good question in terms of how these things operate.

The general idea is that when you have something that is impacting people’s Charter rights or freedoms in different ways, it’s upon the government doing it to understand that there are certain protections in place, where it’s clear what’s prohibited. It’s time-limited. That’s why sunset clauses are often found in this type of legislation. It gives the Legislature a time to consider — whether the balance was right, whether there need to be changes to it and the impacts of that legislation — at a certain point that’s clear to everybody when that will be happening.

I think the idea of four years was just landed on as a policy decision as something that we considered would be long enough for people to receive those protections so that society would adjust to know that these are the access zones and that the places of worship would receive that benefit for long enough for those shifts to happen.

We saw that with the school act. Once we set the legislation in place, we saw a steady decline in the number of disruptive activities during school hours around kids. We’re hopeful that this certain timeline will also do that so people can protest or do these types of activities not around these access areas — just to make it really clear.

That’s kind of why we landed at the four years, but there’s no set legal requirement there.

Jeremy Valeriote: Thank you for that. Then, just in terms of evaluating this, as we come closer to the four-year mark, how will the impacts of the legislation be measured, evaluated, assessed? Will there be metrics such as enforcement data, incident prevention, number of institutions using access zones? Will that data be collected and reported?

Hon. Niki Sharma: I appreciate the member’s list. I think it’s an excellent list, and those are exactly the kinds of things that we would consider when we think about whether it’s needed. You’re always hopeful that this type of legislation at some point is not needed, at a certain time. All those things would be exactly the type of information that we would look at and would be debated in the House if it was renewed or extended or if it wasn’t extended. I’m sure there would also be a public debate about that.

Clauses 8 and 9 approved.

Title approved.

Hon. Niki Sharma: A big thank-you, before we wrap up, to my team for helping me out. I know it was a bit awkward virtually, but I really appreciate their help.

I move that the committee rise and report the bill complete without amendment.

Motion approved.

The Chair: The committee stands adjourned.

The committee rose at 5:09 p.m.