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Beryl P. Wajsman: To protect Jews, Canada needs to enforce existing laws, not create new ones

Bill C-9 will only serve to add another layer of law on top of a Criminal Code that is already more than adequate

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Canada is not facing a legal gap in the fight against antisemitism, it’s facing a failure of leadership.

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Across the country, Jewish-Canadians are being harassed, intimidated and targeted — not in the abstract, but in real places: outside synagogues, in university classrooms and in their own neighbourhoods.

Beryl P. Wajsman: To protect Jews, Canada needs to enforce existing laws, not create new ones Back to video

And yet, the political response, led by Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government, is to introduce Bill C-9 — another layer of law on top of a Criminal Code that is already more than adequate.

The uncomfortable truth is that Canada already has the laws it needs to confront antisemitism. What it lacks is the willingness to enforce them.

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The Criminal Code already captures the kinds of conduct we are seeing.

Section 423 prohibits intimidation, including conduct intended to compel or deter individuals from exercising their lawful rights. Targeting people at their places of worship, schools or homes in order to frighten or pressure them falls squarely within its scope.

Section 430, the mischief provision, makes it an offence to interfere with the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property. That includes blockades of roads, access points and public or private spaces — tactics that have increasingly been used to disrupt and intimidate Jewish communities.

Sections 63, 66 and 176 of the Criminal Code prohibit unlawful assemblies and protect religious worship — addressing gatherings that disturb the peace, create reasonable fear of harm or interfere with services.

Taken together, these are not marginal provisions. They form a comprehensive legal framework that already criminalizes intimidation, coercion and the obstruction of lawful activities.

So why are these laws so rarely used? Why are charges so seldom laid? And why are prosecutions the exception rather than the rule?

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Across Canada, demonstrations have been deliberately staged outside synagogues and other Jewish institutions, as well as in residential neighbourhoods with significant Jewish populations. These are not peaceful expressions of opinion. They are targeted acts designed to intimidate.

And yet, authorities stand by. The law is there, but it’s not enforced.

In Montreal, former mayor Valérie Plante repeatedly failed this test. Her administration tolerated demonstrations near synagogues and in Jewish neighbourhoods while offering little more than carefully worded statements about balance and dialogue.

But there is nothing balanced about intimidation, gunshots and Molotov cocktails, and there is no dialogue when one side is being targeted at its places of worship.

In Toronto, Mayor Olivia Chow faces similar scenes — protests escalating into harassment, Jewish institutions requiring heightened security due to violent attacks — yet the response has been silence.

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At the federal level, Justice Minister Sean Fraser and Prime Minister Carney have chosen the path of least resistance: propose new laws instead of demanding the enforcement of existing ones.

And now, the consequences of those failures are playing out in court.

In Montreal, lawyer Neil Oberman — assisted by my organization, the Institute for Public Affairs of Montreal —  filed a lawsuit when Plante was mayor, seeking to compel the city to enforce the Criminal Code.

The action continues not because there haven’t been noticeable improvements under the new mayor, Soraya Martinez Ferrada, but because of the fear of what might happen if another mayor like Plante is ever elected. Think about what that means: private citizens are asking the court to order a government to do its most basic job — uphold the law.

At the same time, Oberman has filed legal action against Concordia University and, with the institute’s assistance, another one against McGill is being prepared. Both include allegations that the universities have failed to protect Jewish students by refusing to enforce their own codes of conduct.

Under Quebec’s higher education framework, supported by jurisprudence, universities have a clear obligation to provide a safe and secure environment. That obligation has not been met.

This is what institutional failure looks like: not a lack of laws, but a lack of courage to enforce them, compelling citizens to act.

Bill C-9 will not fix this. Adding new offences and expanding state powers will not suddenly produce enforcement where none currently exists. If anything, it risks creating broader, vaguer tools that will either go unused or be applied inconsistently — potentially chilling legitimate expression while doing little to stop real intimidation.

Canada’s legal framework is already sufficient. It prohibits intimidation. It criminalizes interference with the lawful use of property, including blockades. It provides mechanisms to act when protests cross the line into unlawful assemblies.

The real failure is more basic. The law is not being enforced. That responsibility belongs to elected officials — and they are failing.

If Olivia Chow cannot maintain public order around places of worship, she should explain why. If Mark Carney and Sean Fraser believe new laws are needed because existing ones are not being used, they should admit that the problem is not legislative — but governmental.

Our current law even addresses extreme forms of hateful expression: Section 319 of the Criminal Code prohibits the wilful promotion of hatred against identifiable groups.

Passing new laws is easy. It produces headlines, press conferences and the illusion of action.

Enforcing the law is harder. It requires political will. It requires accepting that some conduct — however politically sensitive — must be confronted and prosecuted. That is the job.

For Jewish-Canadians facing intimidation in their daily lives, anything less is a failure of the most basic responsibility of government: to provide security under the law.

Canada does not need more promises. It needs enforcement. And until that happens, every new law will ring hollow.

Beryl P. Wajsman is president of the Institute for Public Affairs of Montreal.

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