Minister says he listen to concerns over religious defences removal

OTTAWA — The federal justice minister says he will personally be involved in trying to understand concerns religious groups are expressing over the removal of religious defences from a section of the Criminal Code on hate speech.

Sean Fraser says his team had already begun that work, as Liberal MPs on the parliamentary justice committee voted late Tuesday to accept an amendment from the Bloc Québécois to remove that defence from two sections of the code that target the promotion of hate. That change has not yet been passed into law.

“I’m personally, over the next number of weeks, going to be engaging as well to make sure that we fully, first, understand the nature of the concerns being addressed,” the minister said on Wednesday.

He said those conversations would also be “an opportunit