Canada’s House passed radical internet bill that could lead to ‘surveillance infrastructure’
Mark Carney’s government pushed Bill C-22 through the House of Commons last week. The bill requires internet companies to ensure that their systems include surveillance capabilities.
OTTAWA, Ontario (LifeSiteNews) — The Liberal Canadian government’s “dystopian” internet censorship bill, which would demand that people’s data be kept for potential police review, was rammed through the House of Commons with unvetted amendments.
Late last week, Bill C-22, or “An Act respecting lawful access,” passed third reading in a rush by the governing Liberal Party under Prime Minister Mark Carney.
The Liberals had earlier put forward a motion that ended all debate on the bill and used a procedural motion to combine multiple bills and ram them through Parliament before the summer break.
In effect, the Liberals used the “guillotine” move, as it’s known, to pass Bill C-22, which now moves to the Senate.
As reported by LifeSiteNews, Bill C-22 was recently introduced by Canada’s Minister of Public Safety, Gary Anandasangaree. It gives bold new powers to police, as it permits them and government officials to open and examine Canadians’ personal mail, and would also have banned cash donations over $10,000.
The bill mandates that telecom and internet companies ensure that their systems include surveillance and monitoring capabilities, which could be shared with police and intelligence agencies.
Anandasangaree claimed that using the motion to force Bill C-22 through was needed and accused the conservatives of trying to filibuster it.
However, Conservative MP Frank Caputo rejected this outright, noting that “What [Anandasangaree] calls a filibuster, I call scrutiny.”
“What he calls taking time, we call democracy,” he added.
Conservative MP Andrew Lawton lambasted the move, saying earlier the motion is “an insane abuse of parliament to ram through a bill fraught with privacy, security, and civil liberties concerns.”
Recently, tech giants Google and Apple warned that Bill C-22 would lead to a “surveillance infrastructure” in Canada.
As reported by LifeSiteNews, after pressure from the world’s largest tech giants, such as Meta and Google, as well as VPN providers, the Liberal government said that it would amend C-22.
Recently, a petition with over 42,000 Canadians’ signatures demanding a stop to Bill C-22 was delivered to federal authorities.