Public Safety Committee on Oct. 8th, 2014

[Michel Coulombe]

Mr. Chair, I'll comment on this question, but it won't fully answer the question.

CSIS's role is to collect information, analyze it and advise the government, in particular Citizenship and Immigration Canada and Passport Canada. If new information was brought to our attention, we would analyze that information and assess the threat. Then, in the case of the example you gave, we would inform Passport Canada.

CSIS would not have the final say over whether to reissue the passport. CSIS's duty is to constantly reassess the potential threat to Canadians' safety, whether we are talking about information that exacerbates the threat or information that shows that the individual in question doesn't pose the alleged threat or no longer poses that threat.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Coulombe. You gave me a much more objective answer to my question. Thank you very much.

This is what I'd like to know.

Mr. Minister, you mentioned earlier that research is underway so that we can try to better understand how recruitment for terrorist organizations works and how these organizations work. Is research also being done so that we can better understand the factors that might lead young people to become radicalized?

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Yes.

As I indicated in my speech, our government created a program in response to the Kanishka terrorist attack. Nearly $10 million has been invested in research. We are looking to give the agencies responsible for enforcing the act the tools to look at how terrorists communicate, exchange information, use social media and travel. Resources have been allocated to that.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Do I have a bit of time left, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

I'm sorry. Your time is over now.

Ms. James, go ahead, please.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I will be passing my time over to my colleague, Mr. Norlock.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

Thank you very much Mr. Chair, and once again, through you, I'd like to thank the witnesses.

My question will be for any of the witnesses, but we'll start with Monsieur Coulombe.

I was recently at an event in my riding. One of the people at this event has a young son in his early 20s, who is with the American armed forces. He's with the infantry and is serving in Afghanistan. He's at the end of his service there. They go through a nine-month rotation. Ours is six.

The father was telling me that many American families, including his, who are in Canada put on the front of their porch, when their children are serving—or a grandparent or whoever might do it—a sign that says, “proud military family”.

He said recently that people who display the sign have been asked by the authorities, by the armed forces, to take the signs down because their intelligence agencies have learned that these homes will be targeted.

I'm asking you this because many of my constituents, especially during our stint in Afghanistan, had lawn signs that said, “we support our military”.

I'm wondering if CSIS is aware of the U.S. situation and whether you have any reason to send the same message to Canadians, because quite frankly I found it very disturbing when I found that out. As is the case for Mr. Falk and Ms. Ablonczy, our constituents are asking us certain questions. I didn't respond to them, and I didn't comment. I just shook my head when you mentioned that.

[Michel Coulombe]

Specifically on that issue, you may remember several months ago the serviceman in Britain who was stabbed to death on the street while he was wearing his uniform. The service obviously will look at that kind of incident—and not just the service but ITAC also. It's part of their job to do the terrorist assessment. And we'll make an assessment in terms of potential threat against, in this case, military personnel.

As I mentioned, the role of the service is to advise the government. In this case, we would advise DND, and it would be up to National Defence to decide what kind of stance it had to take to mitigate that threat, whether there really was a threat, and what measures they needed to put in place.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

Thank you very much.

We've heard various questions this afternoon concerning prevention. As a former police officer, I always say prevention is always very good. Based on one of the things that Ms. Ablonczy mentioned, I'm wondering if we shouldn't start something like Crime Stoppers to make Canadians more aware about reporting terrorist threats, just as you would contact Crime Stoppers to report a crime.

I do truly believe we need these outreach programs such as cross-cultural round tables and our counterterrorism information, and we need to work with them.

Mr. Coulombe, you repeated a statement made by the radical Islamists. Do you think showing more love to people who want to do us harm and taking advantage of the freedoms will entice them to understand us better and dissuade them from their terrorist ways, or whether that could affect even Canadians?

We have a multipronged approach, so feel free to talk further about your feelings—and any of the other witnesses can as well—towards these extremists and whether by showing them more love and understanding we will somehow dissuade them from doing what they are doing.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

We are dealing with individuals who have deep beliefs and who are rejecting western values, western ways of thinking, and western ways of living. They are ready to use violence and in some cases to return what they got from this society. Unfortunately, we have seen recently in some videos some of those examples of hatred.

We have to be steadfast in our message to anyone who is willing to undertake terrorist activities, that these individuals will face the full force of the law, whether here or abroad. In no way can we compromise with individuals who are willing to attack and kill innocent victims. There is nothing that can prevent us from doing everything in our capability to intervene. What will they face? They will face the full force of the law. They will go to jail. They will benefit from our correctional services rehabilitation system, whereby they can give second thoughts to their beliefs.

But one thing is certain.

We can't have wild cards like this in Canadian society, jumping back and forth between fanaticism and terrorism. We can't allow that because they represent mobile threats. As a society, we need to do what we can to protect citizens so that they can continue to live their lives. We need to ensure that these people are charged and that they are punished. At that point they will be able to work on rehabilitation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you very much, Minister Blaney.

Mr. Easter, please.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

In all fairness, Mr. Minister, this “Public Report on the Terrorist Threat to Canada” is not new information but what we read some time ago. But on page 14, we read, “The Government is aware of about 80 individuals who returned to Canada after travel abroad for a variety of suspected terrorism-related purposes.” It states specifically—because we're getting some confusion from the answers—“80 individuals who have returned to Canada”.

My question earlier was, how many have been charged? It's not looking at operational details. I know that CSIS and SIRC, the RCMP, and the Canada Border Services Agency are doing all they can, but specifically how many were charged?

There's another concern that I'll raise. Terrorism is a real threat. I will quote what the chairman of the United States House Committee on Homeland Security said, which is that these are people—13,000 according to the UN's statement following the Security Council meeting of September 24, 2014—with legitimate passports from any of 80 countries from which these foreign fighters have originated. There is no question that this is a real risk to Canada and to our allies, and I think we need to see someone respond with the fact that there is concrete, specific action being taken.

The second point that I want to mention, Mr. Chair, comes back to the mosque.

Mr. Minister, I'm not going to be political, but I do not think it does national security any good for you or your parliamentary secretary, in terms of whatever you may say about another leader in this country, to have the collateral damage happen to a mosque that may or may not be causing problems. If there are problems with individuals in a mosque, then take action against them. Don't make crazy statements out there about the leader of some party making statements; he may or may not know that he's in where he shouldn't be. I think that is risky business from the other side of the coin: that hate isn't set up against that mosque because of somebody's perception. I just raise that as a point.

I have a last point. This is for Mr. Paulson. You can answer all of these together.

I don't know your exact words, Mr. Paulson, but I recognize that you couldn't support the tone that was in this document, “United Against Terrorism”, which was put together by the Islamic Social Services Association, the National Council of Canadian Muslims, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. I wonder if you could you expand on that a little, because the document, at the end, says, “Together, we will build a secure, inclusive and just Canada”.

I've read the RCMP's section 3 of that document, and I think there's tremendous information in there for parents on Internet safety, the root causes of terrorism, where to go for assistance, and so on. Could you expand on that? Because I think the wrong impression is being left since you withdrew your support for this document, which your name is now on and is in public circles.

That's two questions, really. I'm sorry, Mr. Chair, for being so long.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Commissioner Paulson.

[Commr Bob Paulson]

Let's start with your first question first. We have charged Yusufzai. We are actively investigating many other criminal allegations. That's not by way of an excuse. This is complicated work and it's hard to get the evidence, but we're on it. As I said, the pace and tempo of investigations I think is brisk.

On your last question—and I think there were three of them, but I'll go to the last question with respect to the pamphlet—the chapter on the RCMP is quite good because we wrote it. I think what I took issue with was that all of our efforts that we're talking about here today are in this collaborative joint engagement with communities. There is a tone in some elements of the pamphlet that I think sets an adversarial tone between authorities and communities, and that's not what we're after. I stand by the RCMP's chapter, and I stand by our commitment to continue to work with communities to provide the programs that we've discussed here today.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

That's five. Thank you very much.

Do you have a question, Madame Doré Lefebvre?

[Rosane Doré Lefebvre, NDP, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Yes.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Blaney, I'd like to talk about the Report on Plans and Priorities 2013-2014 from Public Safety Canada, which announced even more cuts to public safety.

I will read a quote in English, since I only have a copy of the English report.

“That the Government Operations Centre (GOC) infrastructure may be unable to support a coordinated response to large-scale or multiple significant events affecting the national interest.”

Are we prepared, at the national level, to respond to a terrorist threat in Canada? According to this report, at the moment, we may not be able to do so within the country or at the multilateral level.

What's in place? How can we manage this? Can we truly manage this, since the report from Public Safety Canada seems to indicate that we can't?

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Thank you for the question.

As I mentioned in the beginning, in 2011, our government was the first to implement a strategy for combatting terrorism. Not only did we implement an intergovernmental strategy, but we also brought in legislative tools to combat terrorism. Unfortunately, our government did not have the support of your political party.

You have to walk the talk, as they say, and we need an integrated approach. We need the appropriate legislative tools and a strategy. That's what we're doing. Soon enough you'll have the opportunity to reaffirm your desire to combat terrorism with concrete measures to ensure that our national security agencies can protect us.

[Rosane Doré Lefebvre, NDP, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

You talk a lot about the legislative tools that are needed in order to take action. You often say during question period or during your speeches that we need concrete measures in order to take action.

In your answers, you said that the government would allocate resources based on needs. In light of the budget cuts that have been made to public safety, where will the resources to combat terrorism come from? Resources are needed in one area, so they'll have to be taken from another.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

First of all, the role of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service is to protect us, especially against the terrorist threat. We are talking about very substantial resources.

This afternoon I mentioned in my speech the special training for RCMP officers assigned specifically to combating terrorism.

I would like to invite the commissioner to tell us about the RCMP's initiatives in that regard. There have been hundreds of activities and meetings with cultural communities. Prevention will be key to reducing the terrorist threat to Canada.

Commissioner, I would ask you to share with us everything that the RCMP is doing. If you like, you could submit that to the committee and it could just be translated.

I will give the floor to the commissioner. He is in a better position than I am to talk about these matters.

[Commr Bob Paulson]

Are you referring to the list of meetings?

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Yes, you could talk about the strategies and considerable resources you have allocated to counterterrorism.

[Rosane Doré Lefebvre, NDP, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

I would really like you to tell me where you will get the resources given that there have been budget cuts at the RCMP as well.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Lévis—Bellechasse, QC]

Let us clarify things. The cuts were made during the 2008 economic downturn and all departments were affected. However, there were no cuts to front-line services.

Resources are currently being redistributed. For example, most of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service's budget covers the main priority of our strategy.

I would like the commissioner to talk to you about this strategy.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Very briefly, as you have half a minute.

[Commr Bob Paulson]

Okay.

We're prioritizing our investigations. We're taking investigators and resources, and I think Public Safety in the crime prevention area gives us resources for outreach programs, as the minister was mentioning, for literally hundreds upon hundreds of community outreach events where we've gone into the community and engaged with local citizens. The resources are existing within our allocations.