The liberals promised a number of crime measures. Here is what you record

Ottawa – After an election in which the conservatives campaigned heavily on crime, while the liberal stricter measures for crimes such as violent car theft promised to implement the new liberal government of the new minority a stack of new criminal policy.

Lisa Kerr, Associate Professor at Queen's University Law School, said that the suggestions are “all in the management of being harder in terms of crimes, but in a way that aims at more serious offenders”.

She said that they will “probably still preserve the discretion of the public prosecutors and judges of the crown in order to react to individual cases in a reasonable way”.

The suggestions include harder deposit and guidelines for conviction for some crimes as well as the creation of new crimes, intimidating intimidation at schools and worship centers as well as online sexploitation.

Justin Piché, Professor of Criminology at the University of Ottawa, said the moment reminded him when Bill Clinton became President of the United States and laws to increase the use of police and prisons and imposed steeper punishments.

“I don't necessarily think he believed in her. I think it was because he did not want to be used up on the right in these topics and the power and the ability to rule more generally,” he said.

He said the liberals did not want the crime “a problem for them, and that is clearly in the kind of politics that they promote”.

The conservative leader Pierre Poilievre spent a large part of the recent election for the election of the federal government against what he described as the “HUG-A-THUG” Inprict policy of the former liberal government. He promised to counter these guidelines with measures such as mandatory lifelong sentences for several crimes.

If experts said a number of these guidelines were unconstitutional, Poilievre said that he was ready to use the clause to make them legally.

The liberals presented a list of their own crime guidelines, including a promise to “move aggressively” in order to implement stricter deposit laws for a number of crimes.

They have undertaken to make the deposit more difficult for those who are involved in violence or criminal organization because of car theft, as well as for domestic invasions and some human trafficking and crimes.

Kerr said the step to create a reverse responsibility for the deposit for these crimes, which shifted the prosecutor's burden of proof to the accused – “probably a reaction to some of the heated rhetoric about the deposit that was part of the federal elections”.

But she said that those who make decisions in the Court of Justice have already been aware of public security in these cases, and for decades we have repeatedly recorded the public restriction in a province like Ontario “.

Michael Spratt, a criminal lawyer based in Ottawa, said that people with previous records that were against the deposit against the deposit, and those who used weapons to commit crimes are already “exposed to a hard battle” for deposit.

“The promise to interrupt or treat these cases ignores the fact that our dishes are already doing,” he said.

He gave the example of a liberal election promise that the courts arrange for people to have firearms or weapons if they are charged with a criminal organization because of a violent crime or a criminal offense. Spratt said that is something that has already happened.

Spratt said that the liberal gave “some approaches” “some nod”, but described some of these measures as “largely performative”.

He argued that these promises were “much less harmful to our democratic institutions than the menu, which the conservative and Pierre Poilievre wanted to use in order to be tough through sub -cuts and overarching charter protection.”

The liberal party platform also promised harder convict guidelines for repetition car thieves and violent and organized crimes. They promised to allow a successive conviction for some cases of car theft and serious and violent crimes.

The liberals also vowed to make it a criminal offense, intentionally hinder access to worship positions, schools and community centers or to intimidate or threaten individuals in these places.

It is a problem that the conservatives used to repeatedly attack the liberals. The liberals were accused by some Jewish organizations not to do enough to protect Jewish communities from violence and hatred.

Carney also promised to make the distribution of non-consensual sexual Deepfakes a criminal offense and to introduce a law to protect children from online sexploitation and blackmail.

Kerr said that the proposal for Deepfakes was “only a reasonable response to changing technology”.

Spratt gave it an example of “positive reform of the criminal justice, which is really necessary to keep up with modern times”.

The measures will be in the hands of the new Minister of Justice Sean Fraser. It is not clear which of the promised guidelines will be the priorities of the government – Carney has published a single mandate letter for all of his ministers and does not mention the guidelines for the judiciary.

Carney nodded his government to the importance of crime problems by naming Ruby Sahota about the new office of Foreign Minister to combat crimes.

Spratt referred to the move with the baseball term “eye laundry”.

“It is the performative act to make your uniform dirty so that it looks like they are really trying,” he said.

This report by Canadian Press was first published on May 24, 2025

Anja Karadeglija, the Canadian press