Children’s advocates want new online harm law before year’s end

A national coalition of advocacy groups, health care organizations and a telecommunications company have come together to demand the federal government re-enact laws protecting children from online exploitation.

The coalition held an event in Ottawa on Thursday – marking National Children’s Day – to announce its demand that legislation be introduced into Parliament before midnight on New Year’s Eve, saying the federal government must act swiftly to combat online bullying and abuse.

“Today should be a day of celebration; instead we are here to sound the alarm,” said Andrea Chrysanthou, chair of the board of Children First Canada, one of the coalition’s groups.

“Children all across the country are being exploited, extorted, bullied, molested and exposed to dangers that no child should ever have to face,” she said. “We have waited years to act. During that time, too many children have been hurt, too many families torn apart, and too many preventable tragedies have occurred.”

The coalition includes Telus, children’s hospitals, such as Sick Kids and CHEO, and other child advocacy organizations, such as the Canadian Child and Youth Advocacy Center and the Canadian Child and Youth Advocacy Centre. Amanda Todd Heritage Society.

“Keeping children safe online is not a ‘good thing.’ That’s what we choose to be as a country,” Dr. Margot Burnell, president of the Canadian Medical Association and another member, said in a statement.

“This is how we build a Canada fit for their future.”

In June 2021, the federal government introduced Bill C-36, online harm legislation aimed at cracking down on hate propaganda, hate crime and hate speech. But when a federal election was called two months later, C-36 died on order paper, without even going to committee for debate.

The Liberal platform that year promised to introduce new online harm laws within the first 100 days of re-election. But it took until February last year for the Liberal government to introduce the next version of that legislation, Bill C-63, the Online Harms Act.

The law was written to tackle material that threatens children or encourages them to harm themselves, as well as material that sexually exploits children and sexual material posted without consent. It also more broadly addressed hate speech as well as content inciting violence or terrorism.

To address those additional concerns, Bill C-63 includes amendments to the Criminal Code and the Canadian Human Rights Act, which target hate in a single law. But critics say some of those provisions risk compromising freedom of expression.

Then the Liberal government announced last December that it would split C-63 into two parts, with one part dealing with protecting children and the other dealing with hate speech and incitement to violence.

None of this had happened before this spring’s federal election was called; Once again, the bill ended up on the order paper.

40 day campaign

The coalition said Thursday it is launching a 40-day campaign to pressure the Liberal government to withdraw the law before the year ends — called Countdown for Kids, and is pushing for the upcoming legislation to be renamed the “Online Safety Act.”

While this is not right, the coalition says, there is such an urgent need for legislation to protect children that C-63 should be introduced now, then improved with amendments over time.

The coalition’s campaign includes a clock that will count down to midnight on New Year’s Eve, in an effort to convey the urgency to tackle the ongoing threat to children.

Look Amanda Todd’s mother says new online harm bill ‘could have saved her life’:

He says he wants the bill to include two key “non-negotiable” elements.

The first legislation aims to create an independent regulator with the power to force online platforms to comply with the law and issue fines if the act is violated.

The second demand is to impose a “binding duty of care” on digital platforms “to prevent and respond to online harm against children.”

Chrysanthou said, “We are calling on every member of parliament and every senator of all parties to treat this as a national emergency. We need to get this done.”

points towards alliance Showing latest statistics As evidence, the government needs to act swiftly on the increasing number of online child sexual exploitation cases reported to the police.

According to Statistics Canada, 19,516 incidents of online child sexual exploitation Was reported by police in 2023 – A 59 percent increase from the rate reported by police in 2022.

The coalition also says incidents of cyberbullying have reached worrying levels, with 31 per cent of them involving young Canadians. Saying that they have been cyber attacked.

In June, Justice Minister Sean Fraser told The Canadian Press that the federal government has not decided whether to rewrite or reimplement the Online Harms Act, which was introduced in 2024.

In their spring election platform, the Liberals promised to make the distribution of non-consensual sexual deepfakes a criminal offense.

He also promised to introduce a bill to protect children from online sexual exploitation and extortion and to give law enforcement and prosecutors additional tools to pursue those crimes.