This private member’s bill replaces one subsection of the Criminal Code to change how courts must order custodial sentences for sexual offences. The statutory text creates a mandatory ordering rule that will change aggregate punishment for persons convicted of multiple sexual offences.
The change shifts where the sentencing system expresses denunciation and public protection: from judicial exercise of concurrency/consecutiveness to a statutory presumption for consecutive custodial terms. That matters to defence counsel, prosecutors, correctional planners and victim services because it will alter case outcomes, plea-bargaining incentives and the expected prison population resulting from sexual-offence convictions.
At a Glance
What It Does
The bill replaces subsection 718.3(7) of the Criminal Code and requires that any sentence of imprisonment imposed for a sexual offence be directed to run consecutively to (a) any other sentence of imprisonment for a sexual offence imposed at the same time and (b) any other sentence of imprisonment for a sexual offence to which the accused is subject at the time of sentencing.
Who It Affects
Directly affects trial and sentencing judges, Crown prosecutors, defence counsel, and corrections administrators; indirectly affects victims, accused persons, and parole boards because total time served and parole timelines can change. It applies to imprisonments imposed under the Criminal Code for offences classified as sexual offences.
Why It Matters
The bill converts what is typically a discretionary sentencing choice into a mandatory ordering rule for a whole class of offences, shifting the balance between individualized sentencing and categorical denunciation. Practitioners should expect different plea dynamics, longer aggregated custodial time for multi-count convictions, and operational impacts on correctional capacity and release planning.
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What This Bill Actually Does
The bill is short and surgical: it overwrites the current subsection of the Criminal Code that deals with how multiple sentences interact when the crimes are sexual offences. Under the new wording, whenever a court imposes a custodial sentence for a sexual offence it must order that imprisonment to run after — not at the same time as — any other custodial sentence for a sexual offence that the court is imposing then, and after any custodial sentence for a sexual offence the offender is already serving or subject to at the time of sentencing.
Two practical features in the text matter for lawyers and courts. First, the rule targets "the sentence of imprisonment it imposes," so the mandatory ordering applies specifically to custodial sentences rather than to non-custodial dispositions (for example, conditional sentences).
Second, the requirement covers both sentences being imposed in the same proceeding and sentences that the accused is already subject to, which captures situations where an offender is already serving time for a sexual offence when they are sentenced on later charges.Because the bill prescribes ordering rather than adjusting maximums or changing offence definitions, its immediate effect is on aggregate time in custody and on how judges structure multi-count sentencing. Sentencing judges retain their role in fixing the length of each individual sentence and must still respect principles such as proportionality, but they no longer have statutory license under that subsection to make two sexual-offence imprisonments run concurrently.
That change will ripple into plea negotiations (crowns and defence will renegotiate risk assessments), into corrections (longer aggregate terms raise population and resource questions), and into administrative timelines for parole eligibility and release planning.
The Five Things You Need to Know
The bill replaces subsection 718.3(7) of the Criminal Code with a new mandatory ordering rule for sexual-offence imprisonments.
The mandatory rule applies to "the sentence of imprisonment" for a sexual offence, so it targets custodial terms rather than non-custodial sanctions.
It requires consecutiveness in two instances: (a) between any sexual-offence imprisonments imposed at the same sentencing event and (b) between a new sexual-offence imprisonment and any sexual-offence imprisonment the accused is already subject to at sentencing.
The text amends only that subsection and does not itself change offence definitions, maximum penalties, parole statutes, or other sentencing provisions elsewhere in the Criminal Code.
The bill’s preamble frames the change around denunciation, deterrence and protection of vulnerable persons—legislative objectives that inform how courts and practitioners will read the new mandatory rule.
Section-by-Section Breakdown
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Statement of purpose and sentencing objectives
The preamble declares Parliament’s concern about the harm of sexual offences and articulates objectives—denunciation, deterrence and protection of vulnerable persons—alongside a nod to proportionality. Practically, preambles guide statutory interpretation; here, the drafters signal that courts should understand the amendment as aimed at stronger denunciation and deterrence even as judges remain bound by other proportionality obligations.
Mandatory consecutive imprisonments for sexual offences
The core change is a direct substitution of the existing subsection with a short rule: a court must direct that any imprisonment it imposes for a sexual offence be served consecutively to (a) other sexual-offence imprisonments imposed at the same time and (b) any sexual-offence imprisonments to which the offender is subject at sentencing. The provision addresses ordering of terms, not the length of those terms, so judges still set individual sentences but must stack custodial terms for sexual offences rather than run them together.
What the wording includes—and what it leaves alone
Because the amendment speaks to "the sentence of imprisonment it imposes," it does not explicitly address non-custodial sanctions; conditional sentences or other community dispositions are not expressly captured by this ordering requirement. The amendment also does not amend other Criminal Code provisions governing parole eligibility, dangerous offender findings or sentencing principles; those statutory regimes will operate alongside the new ordering rule and determine release, supervision and other post-sentencing consequences.
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Every bill creates winners and losers. Here's who stands to gain and who bears the cost.
Who Benefits
- Victim-survivors and advocacy organizations — they gain a statutory guarantee that separate sexual-offence convictions will produce separate custodial periods, which may increase the perceived and actual denunciation of each offence.
- Crown prosecutors — the mandatory rule strengthens the Crown’s leverage in seeking consecutive custody on sexual-offence charges and narrows a defence argument for concurrency at sentencing.
- Communities and public safety planners — in the short term, mandatory stacking of sexual-offence imprisonments can be seen as increasing incapacitation of convicted sexual offenders, affecting risk management expectations.
Who Bears the Cost
- Accused persons and defence counsel — the amendment removes a sentencing tool (concurrency) that defence lawyers use to limit total custodial exposure, increasing the likely aggregate time in custody for clients with multiple sexual-offence convictions.
- Correctional services and taxpayers — longer combined custodial terms will increase operational demands and costs for provincial and federal correctional systems over time.
- Courts and plea negotiation processes — mandatory consecutive ordering changes the risk calculus that underpins pleas and may lengthen sentencing hearings as counsel contest individual sentence lengths knowing overall time will be stacked.
- Overrepresented groups, including Indigenous offenders — because these populations are already disproportionately represented in custody, a rule that increases aggregate imprisonment may have disproportionate systemic effects.
Key Issues
The Core Tension
The central dilemma is between a statutory imperative to treat each sexual offence as deserving separate, consecutive custodial punishment (serving denunciation and perceived public protection) and the competing sentencing values of individualized justice and proportionality, which historically have allowed judges to temper aggregate punishment through concurrent sentences or blended global dispositions.
The bill solves a discrete legal question by replacing one subsection, but that surgical change creates several implementation and legal tensions. First, by focusing on "the sentence of imprisonment," the text leaves ambiguous the status of non-custodial outcomes: judges could still avoid additional custody by imposing conditional sentences or other non-imprisonment dispositions where statutory and doctrinally permissible, which shifts the decision pressure to earlier choices about whether to impose imprisonment at all.
Second, the amendment tightens statutory ordering while leaving individual sentence length to judicial discretion; that produces a predictable increase in aggregate custody without a parallel legislative recalibration of maximums, parole rules or release practices, raising administrative and fiscal questions for corrections authorities.
There are also doctrinal frictions. Sentencing law balances denunciation and proportionality; a blanket statutory ordering rule reduces the court’s ability to tailor global sentences that reflect the totality principle.
That tension could produce more contestation at trial and sentencing, and invites careful judicial explanation where consecutive terms produce extremely long cumulative sentences. Finally, the bill does not include transitional language or carve-outs for related legal regimes (for example, parole eligibility or remand credit), leaving unanswered questions about how those downstream processes will apply to stacked custodial terms and whether litigation will clarify contentious interactions.
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