Thank you, Madam Chair.
Here we go again. The Liberals are trying to be on both sides of the issue, and that is why we're in this situation.
You take what was said today, and it becomes very clear that section 43 is where it is because that's where that section has to be. It says:
Every schoolteacher, parent or person standing in the place of a parent is justified in using force by way of correction toward a pupil or child, as the case may be
Why is that section there? It is there because, otherwise, if you were to grab somebody and take them to the principal's office or if you were to restrain your child, if you did that to someone else, that would be assault, and that is why it is in that section.
What the Liberals are saying now, then, is that for people who want to get rid of section 43, they're going to get rid of section 43. For people who recognize that completely eliminating section 43 is problematic, they're going to put the good parts of section 43 back in, just in a different part of the Criminal Code, where no one will notice.
That is the outrageous position of this government, and the opposition parties are doing the homework on this. The NDP brought in the bill. It's a flawed bill. It's trying to accomplish something, but it goes too far and it would criminalize teachers and parents.
The Supreme Court has already considered this issue and not only upheld the constitutionality of section 43 but very helpfully narrowed it in so that basically every example that was used by the proponent to justify his private member's bill is criminal in Canada. He talked about punching someone in the face. That's criminal. He talked about strapping someone with a paddle. That's criminal. That is not protected under section 43 as interpreted by the Supreme Court of Canada.
Our amendment establishes in the code the language that the court used. The Bloc have a different amendment to try to accomplish some of the same goals, but what the government's doing is saying, boy, we want to be able to say we got rid of section 43, but we know we can't get rid of section 43, so what we're going to do is we're going to say yes, we got rid of it here, but now we're hearing you teachers and parents so we're going to do something somewhere else.
You couldn't be more crass than that, Madam Chair. Our job here is to take the bill as presented. I cannot base my actions today on fourth-hand knowledge that maybe the minister told someone who told someone that they recognized this bill is a problem and at some point yet to be determined they're going to bring in legislation to address a problem that this bill creates.
If we are not prepared to address the problem that this bill creates, as a committee, then we're not doing our jobs. Conservatives have done their jobs. We have an amendment that would uphold the important parts of section 43, the parts that say that a teacher who's breaking up a fight and physically involves themselves in that fight while one person is maybe being assaulted, is not going to get charged with an assault.
Am I making up that scenario? No. Those very scenarios have gone before the courts, and the teacher's defence and the reason the teacher was not convicted criminally, is section 43. That is why teachers' organizations appeared at this committee and sat there as witnesses and testified that removing section 43, as this bill does, would put them in danger and would also put their classrooms in danger: Students are in danger if teachers are going to be charged criminally for intervening in an ongoing assault.
Now we could have other people say that would never happen, but the only problem with saying that would never happen is that it has happened; it does happen. That's why the teachers were here. We can deal only with what we have in front of us, and what we have in front of us is a flawed bill and a couple of amendments that would try to improve upon the bill. We haven't gotten to CPC-1 yet, our amendment, which I'm more convinced now than ever is necessary.
I was talking to our witnesses earlier, and I said I didn't have any questions. I was being absolutely truthful when I told you I didn't have any questions, because I didn't, but now I do. I do have questions now, because of the way this debate has unfolded.
I will put this to either witness from the department who wishes to answer it.
In his opening remarks, the proponent of the bill used at least four examples that would be criminal, in my understanding of the court decision.
He used the example of a teacher punching a student in the face or a parent punching a child in the face.
In your understanding of the Supreme Court leading decision in this case on section 43, would a parent or teacher punching a child in the face be protected under the code, as interpreted by the court?