Campaign Life Coalition had its day in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice on March 5 to contest a decision by the Parliamentary Protective Service (PPS) to prohibit the display of certain protest signs on Parliament Hill.

This case stems from the May 2023 Campaign Life press conference on the Hill, the day before the National March for Life. A PPS officer barred the group from displaying signs with abortion victim photography, deeming the images of fetal remains too graphic.

The rules cited prohibits signage that depicts “obscene messages or messages that promote hatred” and “signs or banners that display explicit graphic violence or blood.” 

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“Using graphic images to expose injustice has long been a catalyst for social change,” said Matthew Wojciechowski, spokesperson for the Campaign Life. “Though difficult to look at, images of abortion expose a truth that words cannot. Censoring them on Parliament Hill — the heart of our democracy — reveals a deep hypocrisy and an alarming erosion of freedom of expression.”

In the factum filed on behalf of the PPS, counsel suggested “the applicants’ misleading and discriminatory speech cannot be protected in the same way as speech that furthers the goals of (section 2b of the Charter),” and “the rules place a justified limit on this type of speech to ensure that Parliament Hill remains a welcoming place that all can safely gather.”

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Campaign Life’s legal representative, Hatim Kheir of Charter Advocates Canada, outlined how he argued against the obscene or hate speech the PPS officer employed to stop the Campaign Life team from using the signs they wished.

“The Supreme Court gave very narrow definitions for what hatred means and the promotion of hatred — it is a high bar,” said Kheir. “It's the most extreme form of emotions that leads to the vilification of a group of people. That's not how the Parliamentary Protective Service officers interpreted that provision, and the same with obscene messages. They gave them very broad, almost colloquial definitions that take away those important limits that the Supreme Court talked about.”

Kheir challenged the scope of the graphic violence or blood image rule, too. He said such an approach could censor people from sharing many types of content on Parliament Hill, such as images of animal cruelty or war casualties.

“Our argument is that this prohibition is so broad, and it relates to the most important kind of speech, political expression, at the place where that should be the most protected, Parliament Hill, where Canadians can gather to make their opinions, their displeasure with the government known,” said Kheir.

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A judgment in this case is reserved for now. Kheir anticipates having to wait for a decision for a bit, as various sub-issues have arisen over the course of the case to date. For example, Kheir’s team is challenging the admissibility of proposed expert evidence from the PPS representatives to delineate the potential harms of the kinds of images that are displayed on the signs Campaign Life wanted to show.

Expressing gratitude to the pro-life entity for taking this stand, Kheir declared his belief that Parliament Hill is the place “people should expect to have robust debate, even debate that makes people really uncomfortable and maybe even shocks people.”