A bit late for introspection
National Post Published: Thursday, June 19, 2008

We don't hold out much hope that a review of the Canadian Human Rights Commission's powers to investigate allegations of hate speech will come to much. For one thing, the commission handpicked its own investigator. But mostly we are skeptical because even when calling for the review, chief commissioner Jennifer Lynch demonstrated no clear understanding of free speech or the value of protecting it.

There can be no doubt Canada's human rights bodies -- federal and provincial -- are in need of investigation. They are out of control, far more interested in imposing political correctness than defending free speech.
They have become laws unto themselves, too, routinely suspending rules of evidence that have taken centuries to perfect.

Consider that Ms. Lynch's own lead investigator at the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC), Dean Steacy, recently testified at a hate speech hearing that "freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don't give it any value." The man charged with pursuing incidents of allegedly hateful messaging on the Internet in Canada clearly has no clue of the 800-year-old tradition of free expression that protects Canadians.
The CHRC has a 100% conviction rate on hate speech complaints hateful messaging on the Internet in Canada clearly has no clue of the 800-year-old tradition of free expression that protects Canadians.
Even Ms. Lynch herself gets it largely wrong. In an interview with the Post on Tuesday, she exclaimed "I'm a free speecher. I'm also a human rightser," as though the two were separate. No human right is more basic than freedom of expression, not even the "right" to live one's life free from offence by remarks about one's ethnicity, gender, culture or orientation. Ms. Lynch seems mistakenly to believe there is a delicate balance between free expression and other, newer human "rights."

She also tipped her hand about the probable outcome of the review she had initiated: "We have a responsibility to lead the debate on how we can keep our policy up to date to effectively regulate hate on the Internet." Her interest appears to be not whether to regulate speech, but merely how to do it "effectively." There seems to be little doubt in her mind that a government agency must have the ultimate say.
Frankly, we doubt the sincerity of Ms. Lynch's call for review, especially given the timing. The CHRC has recently landed itself in hot water for the overly aggressive methods it appears to have used to investigate white supremacists on the Internet and for investigating Mark Steyn and Maclean's magazine over material they published that offended some Muslim law students. It's a little too precious that the CHRC has chosen now for its self-examination, when a private member's bill in Parliament would strip it of the right to investigate hate speech allegations altogether.
The only splinter of hope we hold out for the review is that the chief reviewer, University of Windsor law professor Richard Moon, appears to be a fairly impartial expert on the constitutionality of free expression. He has upbraided judges in obscenity trials for trying to impose their personal value judgments simply by "dressing them up in the objective garb of community standards." Yet at other times, he has appeared favourable to more collectivist notions, writing that speech has a "social character," with great "potential for harm." And that expression, if left unchecked, "can cause fear, it can harass and it can undermine self-esteem."

We hope the "free speecher" Prof. Moon conducts the review and recommends that CHRC rein in its overzealous regulation of speech.

Yet even if that happens, the main problems with the federal commission -- and its provincial counterparts -- will not have been addressed. It is increasingly obvious these commissions were set up deliberately to lower the standard of proof and get around rules of natural justice, thereby ensuring people who would never be convicted in court are punished to the satisfaction of the activists and special interest groups that hover around the tribunals.
Third parties not involved in the alleged offences may nonetheless file complaints. Occasionally, the plaintiff has been given access to the commissions' investigation files and given the power to direct investigators. Truth is not a defence. Defendants are not always permitted to face their accusers. Normal standards for assuring the validity of evidence do not apply. Hearsay is admitted. The government funds the plaintiff but the defendant is on his own and commission investigators may attempt to entrap suspects by getting them to say or do hateful things they might not have done on their own.

No wonder the CHRC has a 100% conviction rate on hate speech complaints.
Human rights commissions might have been created with the noblest intentions. But what they need now is to be pared way back, or eliminated altogether.