Foreign Affairs Committee on March 7th, 2011

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

But understanding what you just said here, a review is better than a sunset clause.

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Niagara Falls, ON]

Definitely it is.

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

A sunset clause would kill this bill. A review would not kill—

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Niagara Falls, ON]

A review is better than a sunset, without question.

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

Am I right in my assumption?

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Niagara Falls, ON]

You're almost always right, Mr. Obhrai, and this would be certainly no exception to the general rule on your opinion, yes.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Deepak Obhrai, Conservative, Calgary East, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Mr. Lunney.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thank you very much.

First, I appreciate the ministers being here on short notice to address Bill C-61, and also the officials. I know they've been acting quickly. They briefed the opposition members on Thursday and have briefed many of us this morning already on this technical bill.

First of all, I just want to say by way of review that we have a legal framework that governs our relations with other nations on some of these criminal matters. We've already mentioned the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act. There is also the Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Act, and we have mentioned the Special Economic Measures Act, SEMA.

Those things normally govern our affairs, but we have seen a need to act quickly because of the rapid changes around the world. It seems that, for the pace at which things normally move around here, this has gone very quickly. While on the surface it looks as though it is quickly, I know officials have been working very hard analyzing what has been done around the world with many of our democratic partners.

Can you give us some idea how this legislation compares with what many of our Commonwealth or other democratic partners are doing?

[Sabine Nölke]

Switzerland has in place very similar legislation to this, although it allows the quick freezing for up to ten years, so their time period is a little bit longer than ours.

The United States has the capability of quick freezing assets through the tool of the executive order. This is not a tool that is available to us. Just by way of example, the United States issued a presidential order a week ago Friday freezing the assets of named members of the Gadhafi regime prior to the passage of the UN Security Council resolution that required UN member states to do so. They were able to do that with a very nimble tool that they have in their particular kit.

The EU has a similar tool, which also does not require an evidentiary basis for an asset freeze. Once the EU passes a directive ordering their member states to freeze those assets, it is binding on all EU member states at the same time. So our democratic partners have very similar tools already in place. We are simply using the Canadian legislative framework to do what they're doing through different ways and means.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thank you. I have a second question.

Because things are happening and changing so quickly on the international scene, we have seen nations in which you have an authority in place and you have a prime minister or in some cases the entire cabinet dismissed, and it may be that within a week or two that you see another change and they're gone and somebody else appears in those positions.

When you're triggering this kind of action, who actually asks or makes the request on behalf of another state? And how do you make those determinations?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

I'll let the lawyers answer that, but I would suspect that we maintain relations with a foreign state under international law. We recognize these foreign states, and that's the very reason why we have diplomatic relations with a foreign state. In terms of a determination, that is a guiding feature. But so also is the international community. We could point out a number of states with some differences.

My colleague from the Bloc was mentioning that if, for instance, we are not assured that the requesting state is stable, or if a state is somewhat rogue, obviously we'll make a determination, under the guise of our legislation, as to how we deal with our international relations with that country.

I'll see whether legally....

[Alan H. Kessel]

I think the question is a good one. It's not often noted that many countries change their cabinets on a frequent basis. One could look only at Italy in terms of the number of times they've changed. We deal with the government of the day; as long as we consider that government to be our counterpart, how a prime minister organizes his cabinet and who is in it is entirely up to that state. We just accept, when they ask us for something, that we will try to live up to it.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thank you very much.

The last, quick question here is related to those assets. I think I heard a remark that we're hoping that if we're lucky, a request will come with some identification of assets.

When you're triggering a response like this and want to freeze assets, could you give us some idea of how this plays out? Is it the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions that engages, and how exactly does that kind of thing roll out?

[Rob Nicholson, Conservative, Niagara Falls, ON]

It becomes a policing matter, and we rely, of course, on the RCMP. They get input from FINTRAC and other sources. It's the usual procedure, which you'd find ordinarily under the identification of criminal assets, that would apply to this bill as well.

This is one of the reasons for the bill, that sometimes you don't get as much information as you would like. Obviously, the more Canada is given, the more likely it is that it will have a successful conclusion or that we'll be able to freeze those assets. Again, it becomes a policing matter.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much.

We're going to move over to Mr. Dewar for the last question of the first round.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our colleagues and to the people who have been working hard on this bill.

My first question would be to Minister Cannon, Chair.

When you were asked in the House about requests, one thing that came up in your response was that there wasn't a tool that you can use, that alas, there's a loophole. We're hearing that this legislation is to plug that loophole; that in the case of Tunisia or Egypt, you weren't able to act through SEMA, and that essentially what we're dealing with here is to give you that tool and the toolkit. Is that a fair assessment?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

Yes, that's a fair assessment, colleague.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

One of the things that had been asked at the time was if you had been asked formally by representatives of Tunisia or Egypt--but I think Tunisia was the focus at the time--to have assets frozen, the reality is that you wouldn't be able to have the assets frozen, is what I'm hearing you say. That's why we have this legislation in front of us. Were you asked by the Tunisian officials to freeze assets?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

We were indeed asked by the Tunisian officials to do so. I think, if I'm not mistaken, it was at the very end of January, or in that period of time.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I'm trying to measure that with what I was hearing in the House. You weren't clear at the time, because I thought you were saying that you just didn't have the powers to do it. But I didn't get the clarity at the time. So you were asked in January, is what we'll say, for the record.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

Basically, what occurred from there, Mr. Dewar, was there was an exchange of...a request from the Tunisian authorities in place. We took that. Minister Nicholson at the Department of Justice looked at the options. We came to the conclusion that obviously the foreign government in question--Tunisia--wasn't in a position to be able to give us the information that we needed to be able to proceed, and therefore we came quite quickly to the conclusion that we needed to have a tool that would enable us to do it.

You mentioned a United Nations resolution--

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I didn't.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Pontiac, QC]

No, but I'm saying there are two ways here--