A new legislation is being considered by the Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that would provide broad legal protection to transgender people all over Canada. The said legislation will broaden the Canadian Human Rights Act to envelop transgender people.
The said proposal would also enhance the Criminal Code hate speech provisions to involve transgender. The details of the legislation would be announced in Tuesday, said the Liberal government. Same measure was proposed in the House of Commons in 2011 but Senate didn't pass it.
According to BBC news, the idea comes as the issue of transgender rights became conspicuous in the U.S. President Barack concluded on Friday a general order stating that transgender school pupils should be permitted to use toilets or changing rooms that is exactly their gender identity.
The legislation will be formally presented on Tuesday, which happens to be the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia. According to the mandate letter sent by the Prime Minister to Justice Minister, the bill will include "gender identity" aside from other traits such as age, sex, sexual orientation, race and religion to be protected under the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code.
The Prime Minister will on Monday the Laurent McCutcheon Award, named after a Montreal pioneer gay-rights activist, presented by the Fondation Émergence. He will be the first ruling Prime Minister to join in a gay pride parade this summer. He will also be honored for his dedication to permit sexually active gay men to donate blood, give amnesty to men convicted of gross indecency before homosexuality was decriminalized in 1969, and legislative added security for transgender individuals, as reported by The Globe and Mail.
"We must continue to demand true equality," Trudeau said. "We must carry on the legacy of those who fought for justice by being bold and ambitious in our actions and we must work diligently to close the gap between our principles and our reality," as quoted by Global News.
His father, the former prime minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau also received the same award in 2005 that decriminalized homosexuality in Canada.
Previous efforts to pass same legislation did not succeed after facing opposition in the House and Senate, mostly from the Conservative Party of Canada members.
