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“The bar is set quite high,” said Ms. Young, adding that it could be applied to hackers who take down digital networks.

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Justice Minister Peter MacKay said the bill is consistent with the government’s agenda. “I applaud MP Young for introducing this bill,” he said in a news release.

Ms. Young said she introduced the bill at the behest of industry, notably the Canadian Electricity Association and railway companies who’ve recently had a problem with thieves stealing rail spikes.

But when Toronto lawyer Ed Prutschi read the bill, his first reaction was: “Is this about pipeline protection?”

Mr. Prutschi said the fact that energy infrastructure was included has one obvious purpose.

“It would have application for pipeline protests,” he said, noting that the legislation doesn’t require damage to be done — to be convicted, you would just need to be in the way of critical infrastructure.

He said the bill could almost certainly be applied to the current protests on Burnaby Mountain blocking Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain pipeline expansion. Ms. Young’s Vancouver South riding is adjacent to the mountain.

Ms. Young wouldn’t confirm the bill would be used to prosecute protesters who were, for example, blocking a railway, a common target during First Nations’ Idle No More protests.

“If some protesters are blocking access to a hospital where victims or people don’t have access then, yes, that’s critical infrastructure,” she said, adding that “in some very small communities, they may only have one road or airport. So that would certainly be critical infrastructure.”