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Banning residential school denialism

C-254 An Act to amend the Criminal Code (promotion of hatred against Indigenous peoples)

Makes it a crime to publicly promote hatred against Indigenous peoples by denying or downplaying residential schools.

What Bill C-254 would do

The bill would amend the Criminal Code to create a new offence for wilfully promoting hatred against Indigenous peoples. This offence would apply to statements made outside private conversation that condone, deny, downplay, or justify the Indian residential school system in Canada. The published material gives no further detail.

Official text

Official summary

This enactment amends the Criminal Code to create an offence of wilfully promoting hatred against Indigenous peoples by condoning, denying, downplaying or justifying the Indian residential school system in Canada through statements communicated other than in private conversation.

The government's summary, printed at the front of the bill as introduced.

Kind
Private member's bill
Sponsor
Leah Gazan, Member of Parliament (Winnipeg Centre)
Introduced
in the House of Commons
Last activity

Where it stands

  1. ProposedOct 31, 2025 Exact stageOutside the Order of Precedence · since October 31, 2025Introduced, but not debated yet.
  2. Being debated
  3. Almost law
  4. Law

Waiting its turn; not scheduled for debate

  1. First reading in the House done

    Before the House on 1 sitting day,

  2. Second reading in the House now

  3. Committee in the House not yet

  4. Report stage in the House not yet

  5. Third reading in the House not yet

  6. First reading in the Senate not yet

  7. Second reading in the Senate not yet

  8. Third reading in the Senate not yet

  9. Royal assent not yet

Exact procedural stages

Officially: Outside the Order of Precedence · since October 31, 2025.

  1. House
  2. Senate
  3. Royal assent

Debates in the House 0

No debate on this bill is in the record we hold yet.

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Status, stages and votes from LEGISinfo. Debates are linked from the House's own record of what was before it. Grades are the site's analysis of each statement.