ADAMS: The ‘Stand on Guard Act’ is a solution in search of a problem
There's a reason why Canadians historically haven't felt the need to fetishize self-defence legislation the way our neighbours to the south do. We understood, implicitly, that if you defended your life and your family when faced with a genuine threat, the law would have your back. It was common sense, baked into our national character.
But common sense doesn't win votes. Fear does. And that's the only explanation for Sandra Cobena's newly introduced Bill C-270, the so-called “Stand on Guard Act.”
If passed, Bill C-270 will amend Section 34 of the Criminal Code to create a presumption that force used against an illegal intruder is justified. On its surface, it sounds reasonable. Who wants a victim of crime to become a victim of the justice system? But here's the problem, the Conservatives don't want you to think about: we already have that law.
The current framework for self-defence, ironically enough, was created by the previous Conservative government. It requires force to be reasonable. It demands that your actions actually constitute self-defence, not revenge.
The cases where homeowners are wrongfully prosecuted for legitimate self-defence are so vanishingly rare that the Conservatives can't produce statistics to prove this is a crisis. They can't because they don't exist. Instead, they give us anecdotes—heartbreaking stories, sure—but anecdotes are not data, and they are certainly not a reason to overhaul the Criminal Code.
What the Conservatives are actually proposing is an invitation to vigilantism. They want to move us toward an American-style "shoot first, ask questions later" culture. They want to create a legal presumption that could protect someone who, after the threat has ended, makes the conscious decision to hunt down a fleeing intruder and shoot them in the back.
Let me be absolutely clear: if someone is in your home and your life is in danger, do what you have to do. The current law allows for that. It always has. But if you chase an unarmed person down the street and execute them as they run away, that isn't self-defence. That's murder. And no amount of Conservative posturing changes that.
The bill's proponents point to rising crime statistics since 2015. It's a convenient talking point, except those stats have nothing to do with the legal standard for self-defence. They're meant to scare you into thinking you need this bill. They're meant to make you feel like the Liberals have left you defenceless.
The reality is far less convenient for Conservative messaging. Crime rates are responding to economic factors, not a lack of legal permission to shoot intruders. The most break-and-enters happen in Lethbridge, Alberta, a province that has a Conservative premier whose policies have driven people into poverty. If Conservatives actually wanted to stop home invasions, they might start by looking at their own track record on housing and economic inequality.
Instead, they offer a redundant, useless piece of legislation designed to make them look tough while solving absolutely nothing.
This bill isn't about safety. It's about signaling to a base that craves confrontation. It's about pretending that the answer to complex social problems is simply more guns in more homes, with more legal protection to use them. It's about importing a culture war from the United States that has no place in a country that has historically trusted its citizens to act reasonably and its courts to judge accordingly.
The Stand on Guard Act doesn't make us safer. It makes us dumber. It cheapens the very real debates we should be having about poverty, policing, and prevention. And it insults the intelligence of Canadians who know the difference between defending your home and hunting a man down.
If you want to live in a country where every homeowner is a potential executioner and every intruder is a target, the United States is that way. The rest of us will stick with the reasonable, balanced laws we already have—the ones the Conservatives wrote themselves and then forgot about when votes were on the line.
This piece was written by an individual contributor and reflects the editorial position of The Provincial Times and Left Lane Media Group. Read our Content Policy here.
