I’m going to be very honest: 2025 is not going to be a good-looking year for trans people in Canada. The biggest reason why? The federal Conservatives. The risk of further anti-trans developments in Canada, especially at the federal level and in transphobic jurisdictions (such as Alberta), is at an all-time high, especially considering the imminent risk of a federal election that would likely spell disaster for trans people living in the Great White North.
About this map
Since I began tracking anti-trans developments in Canada (as early as 2021, when I was fighting against the initial iteration of Québec Bill 2), I’ve had people ask me: “I’m planning on moving to Canada, where should I move?” I’d also get similar questions from people who are considering moving within Canada owing to an anti-trans climate — sometimes as simple as parents seeking to enroll their trans kids in another school for their safety, in other cases people seeking move between entire provinces because of hateful legislation and policy.
I created my original anti-trans risk map in September 2023, inspired off of Erin Reed’s anti-trans risk map, as an exercise in visualizing anti-trans hate across Canada. At the time, nationwide protests against trans participation in public life were taking place, and Saskatchewan would become the second Canadian jurisdiction introducing such measures — whilst my home province of Québec promised to introduce its own homegrown brand of government-administered hate.
Anti-trans legislation in Canada, whilst taking forms that are different from the U.S., remain similar: examples include gender-affirming care bans, Pride flag bans, and forced outing laws. The influences behind anti-trans groups, both foreign-funded and domestically grown, are so marked that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service had to publish its own warning.
Unlike Erin Reed’s map, I focus on documenting risk for both trans youth and adults, with the assumption that both are correlated. Most anti-trans legislation (and anti-2SLGBTQ+ legislation at large), within the Canadian context, either targets trans youth (targeting them either because they are under the age of majority, or because they are attending school) or trans women (see: transmisogyny). If the status quo in Canada becomes one in which trans adults are targeted differently than trans youth, I will split the map in two.
Methodology
First and foremost, all jurisdictions are presumed to be of ‘moderate risk’. From there, I rate each jurisdiction using qualitative measures, being notably the reach and severity of anti-trans legislation, as well as what the local Conservative Party (or equivalent) is discussing. Both the policies of the current party in power, the ones of any opposition parties with a certain likelihood of forming government, and polling for upcoming elections (with a higher weight going to imminent elections) are evaluated whilst qualifying a jurisdiction’s level of safety.
Any bill, policy, or law which actively harms a significant proportion of the trans community, or a socio-political climate favorable to making such legislation pass prior to or soon after the next elections (which encompasses, in this case, the federal Conservative Party), will bump a jurisdiction to ‘high risk’. The ‘worst anti-trans laws’ qualifier is reserved for jurisdictions which either ban gender-affirming care for trans youth, forcibly out trans youth to their parents, or otherwise has a combination of anti-trans laws and policies creating a climate so hostile to trans people that it would be analogous to a ‘worst jurisdiction’ under Erin Reed’s map.
On the other side of the spectrum, the ‘low-risk’ qualifier is reserved for jurisdictions which have either created policies and proposed & implemented laws supporting trans well-being, or shown to be willing to actively defend trans youth. Given that more porous nature of Canadian federalism than American federalism (for example, the Canadian federal government controls criminal law all across the country, unlike the U.S., where both states and the federal government have jurisdiction), “shield laws” per se can’t really exist in Canada, but any steps taken by a given government to defend trans people will be taken into account.
The worst jurisdiction: Alberta
Alberta is the only Canadian jurisdiction to get the “worst anti-trans laws” label attached to it, for two main reasons: Alberta Bills 26 and 27, a ban on gender-affirming healthcare and a forced outing bill respectively. The latter also serves as a de facto sex ed ban.
In addition, another law and two by-laws targeting trans people are active in Alberta right now: Bill 29 (a sports ban, including at the recreational level), and Pride flag bans implemented by the towns of Westlock and Barrhaven respectively. All of said pieces of legislation and delegated legislation (municipalities being governed by provincial law in Canada) were introduced in 2024.
As a quick reminder: gender-affirming care is medically necessary and saves lives. The prospect of these anti-trans bills existing have already taken at least one life in Alberta, and probably many more.
High risk: Canada’s federal government and Saskatchewan
The federal government of Canada gets a high risk rating for one reason, and one reason only: the Conservative Party of Canada (CPC), and its leader, Pierre Poilievre.
Pierre Poilievre is the type of person that would hang around, and do supra-hour-long interviews with some of Canada’s most noted transphobes (ahem, Jordan Peterson, the same guy who got famous opposing Canada’s federal gender identity protection bill, C-16, and has referred to a non-binary city councillor in tweets as an “appalling self-righteous moralizing thing“). He tries to pretend not to be anti-abortion, despite being rated as anti-choice by the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada, and sits comfortably around anti-abortion advertising and legislation. Seeing the correlation between anti-abortion and anti-trans laws (both by their modus operandi and the people supporting them), it’s impossible for me to assume anything but bad faith from him.
Pierre Poilievre is also the same person who has spoken out against trans women in, ahem, women’s bathrooms, and has suggested instituting a bathroom ban, calling trans women “biological men”. Y’know, the same rooms so many trans people try to avoid at all costs, and the same term used so often to demean trans people whilst dismissing them for who they are? That’s on the table for him. He’s also more recently spoken out against trans women merely requesting to be transferred to a women’s prison — something that’s often too necessary for trans prisoners to avoid cruel and unusual treatment (that often doubles as an additional sentence), such as V-coding.
Poilievre’s Conservative colleagues cannot be trusted either. Melissa Lantman, MP for Thornhill (part of the Greater Toronto Area), formerly an ardent defender of queer people within the Conservative Party, called Poilievre’s statement “the position of the Conservative Party, and the common sense Conservative position”. His colleague Michelle Rempel Garner, Calgary Nose Hill MP and also a former defender of queer people from within tbe CPC, literally ran away from the Hill Times’ journalist attempting to question her on the issue. In both cases, it seems said women’s prior work on the matter seems to have been for nothing; considering that they were the closest allies we’ve ever had in said party, it’s likely that no one from the CPC will stand up for trans rights in Canada.
It doesn’t help that the CPC’s membership has passed explicitly anti-trans party resolutions less than two years ago, and that Poilievre has increasingly used the dogwhistle “gender ideology” to refer to trans people’s very existence. And that’s without discounting the fact that Poilievre has literally denied the existence of racism. All of this is nothing short of shameful, yet the Conservative government is very likely going to be reelected with a sweeping majority this year. Scary, eh?
As for Saskatchewan, its use of the notwithstanding clause of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, a mechanism shielding laws from judicial review for breaches of fundamental freedoms as simple as the right to life, liberty and security of the person to impose a forced outing bill, cannot be understated. Scott Moe, leader of the Saskatchewan Party, had also suggested instituting a change room ban for trans youth “on day one” in reaction to a news story about two trans girls using the changing room. This has yet to come true, but would likely push Saskatchewan ever closer to becoming a “worst jurisdiction” for trans youth in Canada.
Medium risk: in particular, B.C., Ontario, Québec, and New Brunswick
B.C. was, for the longest time, a little sea of blue — and of relative safety — for trans people. However, that is not the case. The B.C. NDP, which currently still holds power by a razor-thin margin, has, prior to the elections in October 2024, introduced and passed legislation disproportionately affecting trans people, forbidding some of them from changing their names for life (unlike similar laws in the rest of Canada allowing ministerial discretion in granting name changes). The B.C. Conservatives, on the other hand, has repeatedly spewed misinformation and disinformation about trans people, advocated for further restrictions on trans well-being, has attempted to introduce anti-trans legislation prior to the last election, even going as far as to create an entire opposition portfolio for attacking trans people under the guise of “parental rights”. It’s impossible to tell right now if B.C. is going to stay relatively calm for the next few years, or is going to end up becoming dangerous for trans folks living there.
Ontario recently amended, in a little-publicized move, its Change of Name Act to restrict people having been convicted from a yet-to-be-determined list of criminal offenses from changing their names. except if requested “to prevent significant harm to the person to whose name the application relates”. This is, at first glance, less strict than B.C.’s Name Amendment Act. However, whether the Ontario Attorney General understands that name changes are necessary for trans people to prevent significant harm remains to be determined.
I don’t have any further legislative updates to share regarding Ontario, but there’s been some action as of late. First, London, Ontario is allowing anti-trans ads calling for a gender-affirming care ban to be run on its municipal buses, claiming it does not violate the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. This is a direct copy of similar tactics used by anti-abortion groups, which have repeatedly attempted to get their ads placed wherever they can. In addition, the anti-trans 18-year-old Josh Alexander — notorious for organizing several anti-trans protests in Ottawa, an for attending a particularly notorious one in June 2023 — saw his school suspension, initially issued for harrassing trans youth at his school, upheld — a positive development for trans youth needing protection from increasingly virulent teenagers, in particular misogynistic teenage boys.
Québec remains a bit of a wildcard, being culturally distinct from much of the rest of Canada. However, it is not spared from the influence of anti-trans hate. The Québec Ministry of Education, since May 2024, requires that all new public school bathrooms be gendered — a measure introduced in the wake of public backlash against a teacher using “Mx.” as a title. The Québec government’s Comité de sages sur l’identité de genre, an advisory committee on trans people composed of three cisgender non-experts, is still undertaking its work, and will come out with its report by the end of March. I suspect that whichever hateful measures end up being adopted next by the Québec government will be the ones recommended by said committee, if not any.
Finally, New Brunswick is the only province with positive recent developments. Following the October election of Liberal premier Susan Holt, and the incumbent PCNB’s failure to get re-elected, New Brunswick has since allowed abortions to be performed outside hospitals, and has reversed course on Policy 713, allowing trans youth to go by their chosen names and pronouns without having to forcibly out themselves to their parents. This alone isn’t enough for me to bump down New Brunswick to “low risk”, since these changes remain bandages fixing what the previous Higgs government did. One thing remains certain though: New Brunswick is, for now, on the right track.
Other medium-risk jurisdictions are PEI and Nova Scotia, where I do not have much additional news to share.
Low risk: Manitoba, Newfoundland, the Northwest Territories and Yukon
There’s not much to note here. The worst developments in Manitoba and Newfoundland are recent laws tightening up the name change process, but which provide for ministerial discretion and exceptions, unlike B.C.’s Name Amendment Act and the Ontario Change of Name Act. How these laws will be applied remains to be determined. As for the Northwest Territories, trans youth living there now face additional barriers to care, since they’re no longer able to go to Alberta (which is geographically closest for many NWT communities!) to access gender-affirming healthcare.
Note that my risk assessments for Canada’s territories are limited, owing to limited data and the fact that it is safer to be trans in some communities than others. That’s why Nunavut is grayed out: I’d rather not report than report inaccurately!