Chamber
commons
Stage
Cmte Reading
Introduced
Dec 9, 2025
Progress
This bill strengthens protections for victims of gender-based violence, child sexual abuse, and other crimes by creating new offences and expanding victim rights.
Key Changes
- Creates a new Criminal Code offence for patterns of coercive or controlling conduct toward an intimate partner, punishable by up to 10 years in prison
- Classifies murder as first-degree (femicide) when committed against an intimate partner in a context of coercive control, sexual violence, human trafficking, or hate
- Expands the definition of non-consensual intimate image sharing to include AI-generated or digitally manipulated deepfake images
- Removes the subjective fear requirement from criminal harassment, replacing it with an objective 'reasonable expectation' standard
- Strengthens rules protecting complainants' therapeutic records and past sexual history from being used as evidence in sexual offence trials
- Bars individuals from holding a firearms licence if a chief firearms officer has reasonable grounds to suspect they engaged in domestic violence or stalking
- Gives victims automatic entitlement to support persons or animals when testifying in cases involving sexual offences, criminal harassment, or intimate partner violence
- Creates a new framework for addressing unreasonable court delays, including specific factors courts must consider before staying proceedings
Gotchas
- Courts are given a new power to impose a sentence below a mandatory minimum if that minimum would constitute cruel and unusual punishment for a specific offender, which may affect how mandatory minimums function in practice
- Therapeutic records (e.g., counselling notes) are now treated separately from other private records, with a higher bar for the accused to access them — requiring evidence they could raise a reasonable doubt about guilt, not just relevance
- The new coercive control offence includes a broad range of behaviours such as controlling finances, diet, medication, religious expression, and language use, which may raise questions about how courts define and prove a 'pattern' in practice
- Several key provisions — including the new coercive control offence and some firearms changes — come into force up to two years after royal assent, meaning implementation is delayed
- The bill includes coordinating amendments to manage overlap with other bills (C-9, C-11, C-14, C-221) currently before Parliament, indicating complex legislative interactions that could affect which version of certain provisions ultimately takes effect
Who's Affected
- Victims of intimate partner violence, sexual assault, and gender-based violence
- Accused persons in sexual offence trials (new evidence rules apply)
- Children and youth (new protections against recruitment into crime and expanded sexual offence definitions)
- Internet service providers (expanded mandatory reporting of child sexual abuse material)
- Firearms licence holders suspected of domestic violence or stalking
- Correctional Service Canada and the Parole Board (new victim information-sharing obligations)
- Military personnel (National Defence Act aligned with Criminal Code changes)
- International law enforcement cooperation (expanded to include supranational bodies like the European Public Prosecutor's Office)
Vibes
0 responses
Gotchas
- Courts are given a new power to impose a sentence below a mandatory minimum if that minimum would constitute cruel and unusual punishment for a specific offender, which may affect how mandatory minimums function in practice
- Therapeutic records (e.g., counselling notes) are now treated separately from other private records, with a higher bar for the accused to access them — requiring evidence they could raise a reasonable doubt about guilt, not just relevance
- The new coercive control offence includes a broad range of behaviours such as controlling finances, diet, medication, religious expression, and language use, which may raise questions about how courts define and prove a 'pattern' in practice
- Several key provisions — including the new coercive control offence and some firearms changes — come into force up to two years after royal assent, meaning implementation is delayed
- The bill includes coordinating amendments to manage overlap with other bills (C-9, C-11, C-14, C-221) currently before Parliament, indicating complex legislative interactions that could affect which version of certain provisions ultimately takes effect
Summary
Bill C-16, the Protecting Victims Act, makes wide-ranging changes to Canada's criminal and correctional laws. It creates new Criminal Code offences, including one for coercive or controlling behaviour toward an intimate partner, and expands when murder is automatically classified as first-degree (such as when committed in the context of sexual violence, human trafficking, or hate). It also criminalizes distributing fake-looking images of bestiality, expands the definition of non-consensual intimate image sharing to include AI-generated deepfakes, and creates a new offence for recruiting youth under 18 to commit crimes. The bill also reforms how sexual offence trials work, including tightening rules around when a complainant's past sexual activity or private therapeutic records can be used as evidence. It expands access to support persons and animals for victims testifying in court, and makes it easier for victims to submit impact statements at sentencing and parole hearings. The criminal harassment law is updated to remove the requirement that the victim personally felt fear, replacing it with an objective standard. Beyond the Criminal Code, the bill updates the Youth Criminal Justice Act to better reflect victims' rights, strengthens the Canadian Victims Bill of Rights, improves information sharing between Correctional Service Canada and victims, tightens firearms licence rules for people suspected of domestic violence or stalking, and expands Canada's ability to cooperate with international bodies like the European Public Prosecutor's Office on criminal matters.
Automatically generated from bill text using Claude
Vibes
0 responses