In Canada, people will soon be arrested and fined without committing any crime

‘This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind’. Those were the days

For seven days The Telegraph is running a series of exclusive essays from international commentators examining the impact of Canada’s progressive legislation on issues such as drugs, free speech, trans rights and assisted dying.
Our fourth essay is by columnist Michael Taube, who was a speechwriter for former Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper.
Canada’s Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently identified his country’s greatest threat: people freely speaking their mind. A new online harms law, if passed, could potentially enable judges to put people under house arrest if they’re viewed as likely to commit a hate offence. 
You read this right. No actual crime would be required for this type of punishment.
Sadly, it’s part-and-parcel with the authoritarian response to free speech in Trudeau’s Canada. Streaming services were mandated last year to register with the government for regulatory controls, and appeals to exempt user generated content were rejected. Prominent author/psychologist Jordan Peterson was told he must go through social media training or lose his medical licence. And when the 2022 Freedom Convoy protested the totalitarian Covid restrictions, the Trudeau Liberals invoked the draconian Emergencies Act to break up the protests and freeze bank accounts. 
Here’s the odd thing about this. There was a time, not too long ago, when Canada was regarded as a strong defender of free speech. Canadians viewed it as a cherished principle that protected democratic institutions, defended individual rights and freedoms, promoted intellectual discourse and encouraged free and open debate without fear of retribution or repercussion.
Few Canadians would have disagreed with former Prime Minister John Diefenbaker’s impassioned defence of free speech, either. “I am Canadian, a free Canadian, free to speak without fear, free to worship God in my own way, free to stand for what I think right, free to oppose what I believe wrong, free to choose those who govern my country,” he said in Canada’s House of Commons on July 1, 1960. “This heritage of freedom I pledge to uphold for myself and all mankind.”
That was then, and this is now.
Trudeau obtusely claims to support a Canadian’s right to free speech. In reality, he’s made speech in Canada less free than in any other previous time in its history. The focus under Trudeau’s leadership has almost exclusively shifted to so-called “hate speech” laws.
Canada has had hate speech provisions in federal and provincial legislation for decades. Section 264 of Canada’s Criminal Code covers criminal harassment which would cause a person to “reasonably, in all the circumstances…fear for their safety or the safety of anyone known to them.” There’s also Section 319 related to “public incitement” and “wilful promotion” of hatred – and Section 157, which deals with “sexual offences, public morals and disorderly conduct.” These sections are applicable in legal matters related to child pornography, racist behaviour against individuals and groups, and hateful remarks made in public and on social media.  
The Canadian Human Rights Commission also used to hear complaints about hate speech through Section 13 of the Canada Human Rights Act. This controversial section prohibited online communications that were “likely to expose a person or persons to hatred or contempt.” It led to high profile complaints against media commentators Mark Steyn and Ezra Levant, and turned off Conservatives. Left-leaning voices, including linguist/philosopher Noam Chomsky, also gradually recognised it did far more harm to free speech than good. Section 13 was repealed by Parliament in 2014. 
Canada’s infatuation with progressive-style thinking on hate speech has reached a whole new level under Trudeau’s leadership. He’s attempted to introduce several flawed concepts of hate speech legislation, including bills that would recreate portions of the unpopular and unwanted Section 13.
Bill C-36, introduced in 2021, would have amended the Criminal Code and Canadian Human Rights Act to protect people from “hate crimes, hate propaganda and hate speech” and focused on the “online communication service provider.” Ottawa would have redefined hate speech as “the content of a communication that expresses detestation or vilification of an individual or group of individuals on the basis of a prohibited ground of discrimination.” Heavily criticised by left-leaning and right-leaning commentators in Canada and abroad as being draconian and an affront to free speech, it was soon abandoned. 
The most recent attempt is Bill C-63, or the Online Harms Act. Its purpose is to go after online hate speech and “amend the Criminal Code, the Canadian Human Rights Act and An Act respecting the mandatory reporting of Internet child pornography by persons who provide an Internet service and to make consequential and related amendments to other Acts.” 
Bill C-63, as it currently stands, would have a chilling effect on free speech and public discourse. It would enable a person, “with the Attorney General’s consent, [to] lay an information before a provincial court judge if the person fears on reasonable grounds that another person will commit” an offence. A judge could choose to issue a peace bond from a list of conditions, including home arrest and an electronic tag, without the person committing a crime. Fines of up to $50,000 per person could be issued on a supposed “balance of probabilities” rather than proof of criminal intent. Every person found guilty would pay “victims” up to $20,000 plus legal fees. New layers of bureaucratic control and taxpayer-funded departments would be introduced. It could potentially turn into a profit-generating industry for Canadians with political and personal agendas.
These nightmare scenarios would be expected from totalitarian societies that reject individual rights, liberties and freedoms, not a democracy like Canada’s. Alas, if Trudeau continues to fiddle with freedom of speech as Canada’s democratic flame burns out, that distinction could soon disappear.