Freedom of Expression & Its Limits

Centre for Free Expression

Leading Canadian legal and human rights scholars released an open letter today calling on the Regional Municipality of York to reinstate a long-time member of its Paramedic Services fired for a Facebook comment deploring the Government of Israel’s bombing of Iran and its killing of journalists, municipal and health care workers, and fellow first responders in Gaza.

Municipalities across Ontario are being pressured by lobby groups to pass so-called “bubble zone” bylaws to prevent legal protests they do not like. Such bylaws do two things. First, they prohibit already illegal behaviour like violence, threats of violence, preventing access to buildings, and harassment on public property (streets, sidewalks, parks) within a certain distance of designated infrastructure, such as religious centres, school buildings, hospitals, and childcare facilities. Second, they prohibit legal free expression on public property within the restricted zone. 

Supporters of the recently enacted bubble zone by-law in Toronto argue that the law is necessary to protect individuals, who are entering and leaving places such as synagogues and religious schools, from harassment and intimidation by protestors. While very little was said in these debates about the protection of “captive audiences” from speech they find objectionable, this concern is, I think, implicit in the claim that the speech of protestors, and more particularly pro-Palestinian protestors, is harmful. 

In a letter today to Toronto’s Mayor and City Council, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and the Centre for Free Expression urged rejection of the proposed by-law to create protest free zones around places of worship, schools, and child care centres.