Rosane Doré Lefebvre

[Business of Supply, February 4th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Ottawa—Vanier for his question.

He touched on a very important aspect of today's debate, which is the right to privacy and the fact that the Conservative government is dragging its feet in this debate and has not proposed anything meaningful for years.

As I mentioned, my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville introduced Bill C-475 on privacy protection. I know that my colleague opposite voted in favour of this bill, which proposed greater structure and some privacy safeguards.

We on this side of the House have noticed a flagrant lack of privacy regulations, and the fundamental rights of freedom and national security are being violated.

I find it sad to see that the Conservatives on the other side of the House do not want to create all-party structures and that they are trying to shut down the debate on the right to privacy.

[Business of Supply, February 4th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to the motion moved by the second opposition party. The motion reads as follows:

That the House express its deep concern over reports that Communications Security Establishment Canada (CSEC) has been actively and illegally monitoring Canadians and call on the government to immediately order CSEC to cease all such activities and increase proper oversight of CSEC, through the establishment of a National Security Committee of Parliamentarians as laid out in Bill C-551, An Act to establish the National Security Committee of Parliamentarians.

How did we come to the point where we are debating such a motion in the House? It all started on June 10, 2013, when the previous minister of national defence approved a CSEC program to monitor the telephone and Internet activities of Canadians by collecting metadata. The program was first created by the Liberals in 2005, but was later suspended because of the concerns raised by the organization responsible for overseeing CSEC.

The minister at the time denied that statement. The law is very clear in that regard: CSEC does not have the right to spy on Canadians. The legislation that sets out its mandate explicitly states that its activities:

273.64(2)(a) shall not be directed at Canadians or any person in Canada; and

(b) shall be subject to measures to protect the privacy...in the use and retention of intercepted information.

There is only one exception to that provision. If the Minister of National Defence authorizes it, CSEC can get around that provision, which happened 78 times between 2002 and 2012.

In June 2013, the minister said that he had authorized nothing of the sort. However, in August 2013, Justice Robert Décary indicated in his annual report that Canadians had been the target of some spying activities. Unfortunately, the saga does not end there. In the months that followed, numerous documents revealed that CSEC had been spying illegally on Canadians. The latest revelations are probably the most troubling. On January 30, 2014, CBC uncovered information indicating that CSEC was able to track the movements of passengers at Canadian airports who used the free Wi-Fi networks on their mobile devices, including phones, tablets and computers. Not only did CSEC track them in the airport, but it continued spying on their devices for several weeks.

Those kinds of discoveries about CSEC's actions are alarming. What happened to abiding by the law and upholding the public trust in our intelligence systems? What happens when the system is broken and the public becomes distrustful?

That is why the NDP will be supporting today's motion. We need to take action before this problem gets even worse. However, I must point out that there are some significant flaws in this motion, particularly in relation to some of the provisions in Bill C-551.

Bill C-551 proposes to establish a committee made up of members of the House of Commons and senators who would be mandated to review national security activities of federal government departments and agencies. First, this committee would report to the Prime Minister, and he would be entitled to hide information from Parliament. It is crucial that the Prime Minister not be able to conceal national security information from parliamentarians under Bill C-551.

Second, this bill would give unelected senators a seat on the review committee. Honestly, I am not entirely sure where the Liberals stand, with their Liberal senators who are sitting outside of the caucus, or their independent Liberal senators, or their Liberal sympathizers who happen, by sheer coincidence, to be senators. It is all rather confusing. The NDP feels that only individuals duly elected by Canadians should be part of the committee.

That is why, last October, my colleague from St. John's East moved a motion to that effect. The motion reads as follows:

That (a) a special committee on security and intelligence oversight be appointed to study and make recommendations with respect to the appropriate method of parliamentary oversight of Canadian government policies, regulations, and activities in the area of intelligence, including those of all departments, agencies, and review bodies, civilian and military, involved in the collection, analysis, and dissemination of intelligence for the purpose of Canada’s national security;

(b) in the course of its work the committee should consider the methods of oversight adopted by other countries and their experiences and make recommendations appropriate to Canada's unique circumstances;

(c) the Committee be composed of 12 members, 7 from the Conservative Party, 4 from the New Democratic Party, and 1 from the Liberal Party, to be named following the usual consultations with the Whips and filed with the Clerk of the House...;

The committee's makeup would reflect that of the House. The motion also provided that:

(i) the special committee report its findings and recommendations to the House no later than May 30, 2014.

Canada is not the only country to consider parliamentary oversight of national security issues. The United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand all have well-established systems that enable parliamentarians to ask the government for reports on national security issues. That is not the case in Canada. The only thing this Conservative Prime Minister has created is a cabinet committee on national security whose job is to supervise Canadian national security activities. However, this is a cabinet committee, not a parliamentary one, so it is not accountable to anyone.

If the Conservatives had really taken national security issues, protection of Canadians' privacy and problems related to CSEC disclosures seriously, they would have paid attention to this motion as soon as it was presented in the House, and we would already have a committee of elected representatives in place to deal with this kind of situation. Instead, the government is letting the problem persist and shows no interest in managing it. Worse still, in a recent report, the Privacy Commissioner suggested that privacy protection was not a priority for this government. That is shameful.

People have become distrustful. About 80% of Canadians are now connected to the Internet. People spend an average of 41 hours on the Internet a month. In terms of Internet use, we rank second in the world. In addition, the digital economy is growing fast. In 2012, Canadians spent $22.3 billion online. They already have serious doubts about how well their privacy is protected. Some 13% of people believe that their information is well protected on the Internet. If people can no longer trust that their own government will not spy on them, what or who can they turn to?

My colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville had also introduced an interesting bill on this, Bill C-475 on privacy protection. Canadian privacy laws have not kept pace with rapidly changing technologies, which is rather alarming. Those laws have not been updated since the first generation of iPods.

The purpose of Bill C-475 was to correct the situation by updating these laws and taking personal information protection seriously. We have the right to know when our personal information is gathered, used or communicated in any type of digital format. We have the right to feel safe. In that regard, this bill gave Canada's Privacy Commissioner increased law enforcement powers and made it mandatory to inform the persons concerned of any data leaks that might affect their privacy.

Canadians should not have to worry about the confidentiality of their personal information online. We must enhance our protection measures for children, for seniors and for all Canadians.

The NDP takes privacy protection and national security very seriously. We must protect the integrity of our country and ensure that people are safe. It is a matter of maintaining a delicate balance between liberty and security. National security is a top priority.

The government has a responsibility to make and apply policies to protect the country and its citizens, and not break its own laws and spy on the public. The fundamental problem with this government is the lack of openness and counterbalance. With our current institutional structure, we must make decisions for the common good and be more transparent to ensure that the right decisions are being made.

A number of the questions we have asked the Conservative government remain unanswered. Who authorized spying on Canadians through free Wi-Fi at a Canadian airport? Was the minister aware of this metadata collection program? Were these data saved? More worrisome yet, does this spying program still exist?

We sincerely hope that the Conservative government will go public with its legal reasoning and rationale behind CSEC's metadata collection operations. The Conservatives' vague answers will not do. We need clear answers.

[Public Safety, February 3rd, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives cut police services, then tried to convince people that theirs is the law-and-order party. Honestly.

Services such as the Canadian Police Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, the National DNA Data Bank of Canada, the Canadian Bomb Data Centre and the national sex offender registry are critical to keeping our communities safe. Our communities will pay the price for Conservative cuts.

What is their plan for maintaining the integrity of RCMP services despite these cuts?

[Business of Supply, January 30th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I think it is shameful that the government boasts about being there for members of the Canadian Forces, and then it completely abandons them. It is time for this government to stop shirking its responsibilities and to address the crisis facing soldiers and veterans.

Every year, the Résidence du Patrimoine in Laval invites me to commemorate our veterans on Remembrance Day. Many people shed tears as they shared their experiences in the Second World War. I listened to them with a lot of respect and thank them for sharing.

These men and women, who sacrificed part of their lives for their country, have to continue fighting to assert their most fundamental rights. That is unacceptable. We must help them and work with them.

Why do the Conservatives refuse to treat our veterans with respect?

[National Defence, January 30th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday we learned that the Treasury Board was brought in to take over supervising the Department of National Defence.

Only one in five projects has come in on time and on budget. The only thing they can do without going over budget is buy paper and paper clips. For everything else, they need someone else to be in charge.

If the department cannot manage the budgets for 80% of its projects, how can it be expected to keep its promises about shipbuilding and materiel for our troops?

[Respect for Communities Act, January 27th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for LaSalle—Émard for reminding us that a whole range of people and organizations are opposed to Bill C-2.

She rightly mentioned the Canadian Nurses Association. It is important to look at this also from the perspective of health and consider the impact it can have in our communities.

As I mentioned earlier, all those who are working hard for a supervised injection site or service on the island of Montreal are opposed to a bill like Bill C-2, which could derail all their efforts. We are talking about people in the field of public safety, meaning police officers in Montreal. We are also talking about community organizations, doctors and health care services. That is a lot of people.

[Respect for Communities Act, January 27th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague's question suggests to me that he may not know how such sites operate or what measures have been undertaken.

My colleague from Vancouver may know that Montreal is trying to set up a facility like InSite. We are not talking about some guy trying to set up an organization because he thought it might be nice to have a safe injection site in Montreal. That is not at all what happened. The City of Montreal, community partners, the police, psychologists and nurses have been working together to conduct a major study. We are talking about a whole lot of people who believe they need to find a way to make this kind of system work.

With respect to public safety, they have achieved something really important. I would encourage my colleague to read this really interesting report because Montreal is trying to set up a safe injection site.

My colleague opposite asked me a question because I am from the Montreal region. If we had such a site, it would have a significant impact on people who, like me, live in the area surrounding Montreal. Organizations such as Sida-Vie Laval are in favour of that kind of service, with staff who are working toward the same goal. It would have a positive impact on the whole community in Montreal proper and in the surrounding area.

[Respect for Communities Act, January 27th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, like the hon. member for Trois-Rivières, this is the second time I speak to Bill C-2. I made a speech before the holidays and, today, I am pleased to voice my opposition to the bill once again.

To begin, Mr. Speaker, I would like to welcome you to the start of the spring session. I would also like to extend my best wishes for a good parliamentary session to your entire team—the House clerks, translators, pages, security personnel and all of the members, regardless of political stripe.

Today, there are many topics I would like to discuss in relation to Bill C-2. For example, I would like to talk about health and public safety, the Conservatives' fear-mongering campaign surrounding the InSite safe injection site and the Supreme Court decision in 2011.

I would like to begin by talking about health and public safety. A safe injection site is a sanitary, hygienic location where intravenous drug users can shoot up under the watchful eye of trained staff, such as psychologists and nurses.

Drugs are not sold there, despite what some might think. It is often the place where support personnel make first contact with a user. InSite in east Vancouver was the first of its kind to open in 2003. Since then, more than 70 cities in Europe and Australia have set up similar services.

Since InSite opened, Vancouver has seen a 35% decrease in overdose deaths. Furthermore, InSite has been shown to decrease crime, infection rates of communicable diseases, such as HIV and hepatitis C, and relapse rates for drug users.

Before InSite was set up, the rates of communicable diseases among injection drug users skyrocketed in Vancouver. There was also a 12-fold increase in overdose deaths between 1987 and 1993.

As a result, community partners and the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority decided to set up the InSite project. In addition to a 35% drop in the rate of overdose deaths, InSite had a positive impact on a number of other levels, in public health and safety alike.

According to a 2004 study by Wood et al, there was a significant drop in the number of discarded needles and injection paraphernalia and in the number of people injecting drugs on the street, just in the year after the site opened.

In addition, 80% of respondents living or working in Vancouver's downtown east side support InSite. Over 30 studies have shown the benefits of InSite as a supervised injection site. Not one study produced evidence of a possible negative impact of a place like InSite.

I would also like to briefly speak from experience. As a mother of a young daughter, I am increasingly aware of the potential dangers in our communities. I am seeing public safety in a new light.

I have already said this in my first speech on Bill C-2, but I think it is worth repeating. Montreal has no injection sites. When I was little, my mom and I used to walk around Montreal. Whenever we walked through a park, my mother would tell me to look on the ground. Whether we were walking on grass or gravel, we had to look down on the ground in case there were syringes or things like that. We had seen syringes before when we were walking in the parks or on the street. I was struck by that. Unfortunately, that is what many people have to do to avoid stepping on a needle, especially in the summer when they are wearing sandals. It is unfortunate and sad, but that is the way it is.

I am the deputy critic for public safety. I did research on InSite to see whether a site like that actually had a positive impact.

Looking at the studies and personal experiences of people, especially those living and working in east Vancouver, there is no doubt that InSite has had a positive impact on people's quality of life and that it has made communities safer, especially in an area like east Vancouver, which, as most members in this House know, is unfortunately a place that is home to a large population of injection drug users. It is a unique little pocket of Vancouver. It is important to be aware of this when talking about InSite.

I believe in the importance of safe communities and to achieve that, it takes work. As legislators, we have a responsibility to not be complacent when drafting bills and to take action in the best interest of Canadians. This brings me to my second point, which was mentioned in the last couple of speeches, right before I rose to address the House. It has to do with the fearmongering and fundraising the Conservatives are doing in relation to Bill C-2. There is a campaign on the Conservative website called “Keep heroin out of our backyards”. I would like to quote from the text written on that page. It reads:

Do you want a supervised drug consumption site in your community? These are facilities where drug addicts get to shoot up heroin and other illicit drugs.

I don’t want one anywhere near my home.

Yet, as I write this, special interests are trying to open up these supervised drug consumption sites in cities and towns across Canada—over the objections of local residents and law enforcement.

We've had enough—that’s why I am pleased the [Conservative] government is acting to put the safety of our communities first.

It goes on to say:

The...Liberals and...[the] NDP are against us. They want to repeat the experiment of Vancouver’s Insite facility across the country — maybe even in your community.

This is fearmongering, as my colleague from Chicoutimi—Le Fjord pointed out. It is absolutely unbelievable that they are fearmongering and spreading misinformation about what a supervised injection site like InSite actually does. What bothers me even more is that the Conservatives are using Bill C-2 to raise money. The more they talk about it, the more they create fear among the public, the more they raise money to fund their next election campaign. It is absolutely unbelievable. It is disgusting. I cannot believe that they are using a topic as important as supervised injection sites to try to raise money. This takes the cake. If you do not have good arguments and resort to fearmongering, as the Conservatives are doing with this, I think it means that you have already lost the battle. Not us, but them. This is even worse than electioneering. There are so many adjectives I could use, but I will leave it at that.

As my colleague from Trois-Rivières pointed out, what happens is that people either start to fear the unknown or are unable to properly explain a subject, or maybe they simply do not understand exactly what a supervised injection site does. They are playing politics here. They are not able to explain why these supervised injection sites are in the best interests of Canadians, in terms of both health and public safety. The Conservatives are trying to convince the public that they are the champions of public safety because of the measures in Bill C-2, but that is not the case. The Conservatives are using these measures to try to win votes. They are also trying to mislead Canadians, and that is sad.

I would like to take a few minutes to talk about the Supreme Court's 2011 ruling. This bill is contrary to that decision, which called on the minister to consider exemptions for safe injection sites as a way to reconcile public health and public safety issues. The ruling urged the minister to examine all of the evidence in light of the benefits of safe injection sites, not to devise a long list of principles on which to base his decisions. The NDP believes that any new legislation about safe injection sites should respect the spirit of the Supreme Court ruling.

That is not what is happening with Bill C-2. The NDP believes that harm reduction programs, including safe injection sites, should benefit from exemptions based on evidence that they improve community health and save human lives, not on ideological beliefs.

[First Nations Elections Act, December 10th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques for his excellent speech on Bill C-9.

Today, we are looking into an extremely important issue. In fact, it is the very essence of this Parliament, namely, what to do about first nations issues. Do we want to have a nation-to-nation dialogue, as the Prime Minister promised us, or is the government going to continue with its paternalistic attitude toward first nations? The hon. member's speech was most enlightening.

That being said, my question will deal more with the consultations. I know that my colleague from Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, like most of my colleagues on the NDP side, has been conducting many public consultations. He has held many discussions with his constituents to find out their priorities.

A number of first nations communities—primarily in the Maritimes and Manitoba—have been consulted in connection with Bill C-9. However, the recommendations that came out of those consultations were not necessarily taken into consideration.

What does my colleague think about the fact that consultations were held but that the government did not consider the recommendations that were made?

[Laval Volunteer Centre, December 10th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the year is coming to a close. As they do every year during the holiday season, residents of Laval are working together to help the less fortunate. Along with community organizations and health care centres in Laval, the Centre de bénévolat et moisson Laval is collecting donations in order to make the 29th Christmas basket campaign a true success. The people of Laval are generous. Last year, over a million kilograms of food were distributed to Laval residents in need. This was made possible in part by the work of hundreds of volunteers. I would like to thank them.

Congratulations to the Centre de bénévolat et moisson Laval for its hard work and its dedication to this cause in these difficult times. We all want a society where nobody is left behind, which unfortunately is not the case right now. However, we will not lose hope and we will continue to fight together every day to eliminate inequities.