Bill C-51 (Historical)

Safer Witnesses Act

An Act to amend the Witness Protection Program Act and to make a consequential amendment to another Act

This enactment amends the Witness Protection Program Act to, among other things,
(a) provide for the designation of a provincial or municipal witness protection program so that certain provisions of that Act apply to such a program;
(b) authorize the Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to coordinate, at the request of an official of a designated provincial or municipal program, the activities of federal departments, agencies and services in order to facilitate a change of identity for persons admitted to the designated program;
(c) add prohibitions on the disclosure of information relating to persons admitted to designated provincial and municipal programs, to the means and methods by which witnesses are protected and to persons who provide or assist in providing protection;
(d) specify the circumstances under which disclosure of protected information is nevertheless permitted;
(e) exempt a person from any liability or other punishment for stating that they do not provide or assist in providing protection to witnesses or that they do not know that a person is protected under a witness protection program;
(f) expand the categories of witnesses who may be admitted to the federal Witness Protection Program to include persons who assist federal departments, agencies or services that have a national security, national defence or public safety mandate and who may require protection as a result;
(g) allow witnesses in the federal Witness Protection Program to end their protection voluntarily;
(h) extend the period during which protection may, in an emergency, be provided to a person who has not been admitted to the federal Witness Protection Program; and
(i) make a consequential amendment to another Act.

Safer Witnesses Act

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I have had the opportunity to talk about this bill before. I want to make an important thing fairly clear and it goes back to when I was first elected in the by-election. We need to think of the witness protection program as a tool to be used by our law enforcement agencies and our prosecutors that will ultimately make our streets safer.

I want to do what I can as an individual member of Parliament and as an advocate for the Liberal Party to make sure that we move forward on issues relating to crime prevention. This legislation is an initiative that not only deals with crimes, but it also goes a long way in preventing crimes from taking place in the first place.

During that by-election period, all three major political parties incorporated crime and safety into our election campaigns in a very real and tangible way. I suggested when I arrived in Ottawa that the crime and safety file would be one of the most important issues for me to deal with. With respect to this particular issue, I would be a strong voice on the floor of the House of Commons in Ottawa to express what is happening not only in Winnipeg North but the broader community of Manitoba and indeed from coast to coast to coast where there are many similarities in terms of issues that cause criminal behaviour.

I want to focus if I may for the next couple of minutes on the issue of gangs. Gangs do perpetrate many of the crimes that are occurring in Winnipeg on a daily basis. I do not want to be seen as being negative about the community I represent; it is quite the opposite. I feel very passionate about Winnipeg North. It has a great deal of rich cultural heritage. It provides all sorts of economic and social opportunities for everyone who lives there and in the broader community.

Government is not doing enough to prevent crimes from taking place on the streets. There is a sense that we need to do more. We need to work with the different levels of government when it comes to dealing with crime in order to have any impact.

Bill C-51 is a good example of how co-operation and determination can see good legislation ultimately pass. I have indicated before and I will reinforce it again that the Liberal Party supports this legislation. We want to see the bill pass in a relatively quick fashion, and to do that we just need to focus some attention on one aspect of the bill.

This legislation would enable Crowns and, in particular, our police agencies, to infiltrate gangs. It would assist us in minimizing the negative activities that are being committed in many different communities throughout our country.

It saddens me to drive around and see the result of the young children who are involved in prostitution or drug sales, or in addictions such as drugs or gambling. The negative impact it has on all of our communities is profound.

One of the ways we can deal with these important issues is to enable our police officers to infiltrate the different gang organizations.

To give a sense of to what degree it has become a problem, when I was first elected into the Manitoba legislature in the late eighties, and through the nineties, there was marginal, if any, real debate on gang activity in Manitoba. It was not until maybe the late nineties that we started to see some signs of it. Then at the turn of the century it really started to pick up. Nothing has come out with the impact of making a strong difference in the local community. The problem I see is if governments do not recognize that they need to start working together in a more co-operative fashion, the issues will continue to get worse.

When we think in terms of numbers, for instance, what used to be four to ten gangs in Winnipeg are now literally dozens of gangs varying in the type of violence or destruction they cause. Not all gangs are the same, but there is a certain amount of criminal activity occurring within most of those gangs. What we have seen over the last number of years is a dramatic increase not only in the number of gangs but also in the number of individual gang members. I remember sitting on the justice committee of the Manitoba legislature when we were trying to get a sense of just how many gang members there were in Winnipeg. Even though we could not be provided hard numbers because it was felt that was of a confidential nature, we were able to get a better sense. If memory serves me correctly, that better sense is somewhere just under 3,000. We know it is well into the thousands, but we could not get a tangible number.

Over the last number of years we have seen the number of people involved in gangs continue to increase. I appreciate the member for Saint Boniface, who was a north end police officer. She did a phenomenal job in dealing with the issue, of wanting to come to grips with it and help. I am sure she can sympathize when she drives around and sees the amount of gang graffiti that is out there. As best we can, we try to marginalize that. We know that when something gets tagged we have to get rid of it as soon as possible or it starts to really blossom and become an eyesore for our community.

I believe there is so much more that we could and should be doing. When I look at Bill C-51, I see a bill that does provide some hope for us. When we take a look at the origins, and here is a bit of a history on this, I would say that it came up in 1996. I believe it was former prime minister Jean Chrétien who formalized it. When I say formalized it, there has always been some form of witness protection program, but it was more of an informal type of thing. The legislation was actually enacted in 1996. At the time, people could sense the value of the program and what that program would be doing.

Back in 1996, I do not believe the authors of the legislation really had an understanding of the explosion of gang membership that was coming, in particular with our younger generations getting engaged in gangs.

At the end of the day, we are seeing is an expansion of scope, to a certain degree, in terms of who can be brought in as witnesses under the program. There is a general feeling among law enforcement agencies that with the amendments, at least in part, it is going to allow for additional discretion to deal with gangs.

I see that a positive thing. That is why I wanted to emphasize, in the best way that I could, just how serious a problem gang activity is today in Canada, and in a very indirect fashion to say that we need to give more attention to the issues of gangs, gang violence and the different types of gang activities in our communities across Canada.

This message is not only for members of the House of Commons. It is also important that this message be given to different law enforcement agencies, our court system and so forth. The message is that there is a great deal of concern in our population about what we can do to deal with the issue of gangs in our communities. I wanted to highlight that point before I got under way on some other comments.

On the bill itself, members will know I am somewhat sensitive in terms of the process, and maybe it is because of my capacity as the deputy House leader for the Liberal Party. At the end of the day we would like to have seen a process that would allow all members who wished to do so to participate in the debate.

The bill itself, in first reading, came back in late last year, just before the House rose for the Christmas break. The Christmas break does not mean holidays; it quite often means that members will be doing more of their work in their constituencies.

February 12 was when it came back to the House for second reading. It passed relatively quickly, and then it was fast-tracked, to a certain degree, through the committee stage. Now we have it here today.

At each stage, there was general support for the legislation, and there was good reason for that support. It goes back to when former prime minister Jean Chrétien introduced the legislation back in 1996.

People understand that serious crimes take place. Quite often in order to be able to bring justice to a criminal act, there is a need to tap into individuals who would put their lives or their family members' lives at risk if they get engaged.

Most people realize that we have some sort of witness protection program, but they may not know the details. I suspect most might think there is one national program, and if someone is in the program, that is it. In fact, there is a national program, there are provincial programs and there are even some more local municipal-type programs. There is a great deal of variance among them.

In order to ensure more consistency, more accountability and more transparency, it was felt that it would be best to bring in legislation to formalize it in a more tangible way.

It was brought in through the RCMP, an institution that is world-renowned for what it has done in the past, is doing today and will continue to do into the future. It has an excellent reputation.

We were given this opportunity in legislation to try to put into place better standards and some sort of guidelines, if I could put it that way.

If we look at the bill, we will see that clause 7 talks about some of the factors that should be considered prior to determining whether a witness should even be permitted into the program. It makes reference to risks to witnesses, danger to the community, the nature of the inquiry, the importance of witnesses, the value of information, evidence to be given by witnesses, the likelihood that witnesses could adjust to the program, cost, alternate methods of protection and other factors that the commissioner might see as relevant. It almost like a catch-all. These are the types of things that were put into the act in its original form.

Bill C-51 would expand that to include such things such as national security matters or national interests. Over the last eight or 10 years, the threat of terrorism has continued to exist in a very real and tangible way, so it only seems natural that there would be legislation that would attempt to deal with it. The former prime minister brought in the original legislation, so it is only natural that the Liberal Party of Canada would support making changes that would make it even better legislation, and that is what we are seeing.

Liberals have some concerns, of course. If we look at the budgets, we see a couple of interesting numbers that I would like to throw out. I read in one newspaper article that there was a briefing note that showed the 2009-10 budget was about $7.5 million. The annual report indicated that the budget had grown to $9.1 million in 2011-12, which demonstrates that there is an increase in the program.

The commissioner is required to produce annual reports, and the 2011-12 annual report showed that 108 individuals were considered for admission to the program during that period. Of those, 30 were accepted, of whom 26 came from RCMP investigations while four were admitted on behalf of Canadian law enforcement agencies. The total cost of the program, including RCMP and public servant compensation, totalled $9.1 million. It is an effective tool, and I would argue that it could be an exceptionally cost-efficient tool. If we effectively administer and use the program to meet its potential, it could prevent a lot of crimes from taking place.

I would like more co-operation to exist among the different administrations of the different levels of programs. We are starting to see that in Bill C-51. It is another good reason to support it.

It would also expand the temporary emergency protection from 90 days to 180 days. If people are in the program, it does not necessarily mean that they are in it forever. Quite often, it is just during a trial or while going through court proceedings. There is a much smaller percentage of people who need to change their identities, relocate their families, and so forth.

I appreciate the opportunity to address Bill C-51 today.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate what my colleague from the Liberals has said. It is obvious that everyone recognizes that there was and is a need to improve the witness protection program. Since the Witness Protection Program Act passed in 1996, both the Liberal and the Conservative governments have done very little to respond to the criticism of the system. Here we have a program that is supposed to help protect people, but there need to be improvements and there is still a lack of funding.

Bills have been presented in the House of Commons to address small components of the protection program. For example, Bill C-223, from a Reform MP in 1999, dealt with witness protection in cases of domestic violence. It was supported by the NDP but was defeated by the Liberal government.

The overarching issues of eligibility, coordination and funding have not been addressed. The Liberals criticized the program when they were in government, and now they criticize the Conservative government as well for not doing enough in Bill C-51. I want to know why the criticism of eligibility and underfunding was not an issue they addressed when they were in government. They had 13 years to do it.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I disagree with the member. She said we had 13 years to deal with it, but it was in 1996, halfway through that 13 years, that the legislation was passed to create the federal witness protection program, which means that if it were not for the Liberal government of Jean Chrétien, we would not have it here today. To say that the Liberal Party did not do anything in 13 years could not be further from the truth, because we created the program in 1996 through legislation.

After a program is created, we quite often find that there is a need to allow the program to establish itself, and after it has the opportunity to establish itself, there is an obligation to work with law enforcement officers and other stakeholders to look at ways in which it could be improved.

I, like the member, would have liked to have seen the bill brought in three or four years ago. I think it was in 2007 when Conservatives first came up with the recommendations for changes. At the time we were not in government, unfortunately, primarily because the NDP supported the Conservatives to defeat the Liberals, but that is another issue.

I believe there is always room for some improvement, and we are seeing that improvement made to the original legislation brought in by former prime minister Jean Chrétien.

[Devinder Shory, Conservative, Calgary Northeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I will ask a direct question to my colleague, which is whether he and his party will support the bill or not.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thought that I had made it quite clear. Given our history on the witness protection program, it is very clear that not only did we create the program, we continue to support the program.

In regard to Bill C-51 at second reading, I said that the Liberal Party would be voting in favour of the bill. We will continue to vote in favour of the bill because we see it as yet another tool that can be used by law enforcement agencies, in particular our RCMP, along with other things. It is a valuable tool, and if it is used appropriately, there should be less crime on our streets and more convictions of individuals or groups who have committed crimes in our communities.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, let us be clear. The Liberals may have created the program, but there was still a deficit within the program. The fact of the matter is that they refused to address the difficulties that were still there and the humps in the road before them.

The member mentioned that it was the Conservatives and the NDP who defeated them. Let us be clear. It is Canadians who did not want to put them back because of the sponsorship scandal.

Although we can make improvements to the bills, we need to ensure that there is funding.

Here is a quote from the Dr. Alok Mukherjee, president of the Canadian Association of Police Boards:

Without the availability of sufficient funding, our ability to take advantage of the program will be limited. In places like Toronto, that's a big problem because, as you know, we're dealing with serious violent crimes and often rely on witnesses from the community, not informants and others but witnesses from the community. Their needs may not be significant, as was mentioned. All they may need is a little bit of protection, but that requires...sufficient funding for us...to be able to do it. That, for us, is a problem.

I think it is great that we are updating. However, how successful can it be if the funding is not in place?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member raises two points. One is with respect to commitment to the program. I indicated that it was former prime minister Jean Chrétien who introduced the program. Obviously, it shows that the Liberal Party, has been very supportive of the program since its origin.

I do not know how the NDP would have voted back in 1996. Maybe one of her colleagues could update the House as to whether the NDP actually supported the creation of it. Hindsight is 20/20, of course.

Regarding money, at both second reading and report stage, we have raised concerns with respect to the money issue. At the end of the day, not only is it important that we have appropriate funding levels for our RCMP in the national program, but we need to be concerned about the other witness protection programs, whether they are provincial or municipal. We need to recognize that one can anticipate an increase. I tried to provide an example. We saw close to a $2-million increase in a very short period of time.

Today, it is a $9-million program. I suspect that the costs of the program are going to increase. If we really want to use it as an effective tool, I suspect that it will not be long before we will be getting into double digits to properly and adequately finance the program.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I previously addressed this question to the hon. member for Edmonton Centre. I would like to ask my colleague the same question.

It appears that we will support this bill, but we have many reservations about the lack of resources for the protection program.

Even though the Canadian Police Association says there are enough resources at the federal level, the fact remains that smaller police forces with fewer means are very concerned about having the resources they need to properly implement these provisions.

I would like to know whether the member for Winnipeg North would agree to working with the government to increase these resources if the police forces that are tasked with implementing these provisions ask for such an increase.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I believe that we are going to see an increase in the need for financial resources. That is the reason I made reference to it. I am not exactly sure how much.

However, I believe that in the 2009-10 fiscal year, it was $7.5 million. Only a couple of years later, in the 2011-12 budget, it was $9.1 million. With the expansion being proposed in terms of criteria and so forth, I could easily see the demand for financial resources going up. That does not even deal with the other witness protection programs in other jurisdictions that might have limited resources for providing the same sort of protection.

The government needs to properly and adequately continue to finance the program so that it can continue to be a success.

[John Carmichael, Conservative, Don Valley West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am delighted that I will be sharing my time with my colleague, the member for Calgary Northeast, this afternoon.

I am very pleased to have this opportunity to join the debate on Bill C-51, the safer witnesses act. As several of my hon. colleagues have mentioned, the legislation before us today would help to strengthen Canada's federal witness protection program in a number of very important ways.

I would like to focus my remarks on how Bill C-51 would help to better align federal and provincial witness protection in order to offer a more efficient process to secure new identities as well as enhanced and expanded prohibitions against the disclosure of protectee and program information.

One key to fully understanding the significance of the legislation before us is to understand how witness protection has evolved in Canada and how it operates today. I would like to first briefly talk about this and then direct my attention to how Bill C-51 would achieve the benefits I have just mentioned.

Witness protection has existed in one form or another in Canada for quite a number of years. Law enforcement has long recognized that witnesses would be much more willing to come forward and co-operate in investigations or prosecutions of crime, including of organized crime groups, if they could, in effect, disappear and thereby avoid dangerous repercussions from violent and often lawless organized crime members.

Lots of movies have picked up on this idea, and witness protection has become something of a household word, even though most people do not really understand or know how it works.

Originally, federal witness protection in Canada was an informal set of arrangements without any formalized structure or procedures to define how it should operate. It became more formalized in the 1980s when the RCMP put in place a series of internal guidelines and protocols. That was followed by the introduction, as we have heard today, of legislation in 1996 to provide, among other things, a clear definition of admission criteria for witnesses and a more public and accountable structure for the management of the program.

Provincial governments, however, are responsible for the administration of justice, and so many have more recently established their own witness security programs. Provincial programs now exist in Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta. Provincially operated witness protection programs provide protective measures ranging from short-term protection to witness management activities to full-fledged relocation and identity changes.

However, only the federal program is legislatively mandated to provide a national protection service to all law enforcement agencies in Canada as well as to international courts and tribunals. As well, federal documents required for secure identity changes are today only provided through the federal program, which is administered by the RCMP.

At the present time, we have a witness protection regime in Canada in which two jurisdictions share a common goal: protecting key witnesses who can assist in our collective efforts to combat organized crime. The programs to accomplish this might, in some cases, be complementary, while many others do not always operate as seamlessly as they should.

A good example is in regard to security identity changes in cases where a provincial Attorney General decides to place an individual in a provincial witness protection program. The way to obtain a complete and secure identity change in this circumstance is for the individual in question to be temporarily admitted to the federal witness protection program, where the RCMP will assist him or her with obtaining federal documents. Some provinces have argued that this process can lead to delays.

Bill C-51 would remove the need to temporarily admit individuals from a provincial program into the federal program, thereby allowing the federal and provincial witness protection programs to function more seamlessly. The bill would establish a process whereby provincial, territorial and municipal witness protection programs could be designated.

On an operational level, this would involve having the provincial authority responsible for the program provide an attestation to the Minister of Public Safety, assuring that the program had the necessary capacity to protect its information.

As well, Bill C-51 would broaden the current prohibition against the disclosure of information for individuals under the federal witness protection program and would expand the scope to include individuals under designated provincial programs.

Today, the Witness Protection Program Act prohibits the disclosure of information about the location or change of identity of a federal protectee or former federal protectee. Bill C-51 will broaden the prohibition of disclosure to include the identity and role of persons who provide or assist in providing protection, any means or method of protection that could endanger protectees and the integrity of witness protection programs, and protectees from designated provincial programs.

The current federal witness protection program has served the criminal justice system well. Today there are nearly 800 individuals under this program. In 2011-12 alone, the RCMP considered a total of 108 cases for admission to the federal witness protection program. Thirty protectees were admitted to the program, of which 27 were granted a secure name change. The RCMP also provided assistance to other Canadian law enforcement agencies over the same year, as provided under the existing witness protection program.

The fact that the witness protection program is serving the criminal justice system well does not mean that there is no room for improvement. The Witness Protection Program Act has not been substantially changed since 1996, despite the increasingly sophisticated and global nature of organized crime.

Ongoing consultations with provincial and territorial stakeholders have also helped to highlight some areas where stronger provisions are needed, including those I have mentioned today. I am very pleased to note that some provincial jurisdictions, as well as law enforcement organizations, have already offered public support for Bill C-51.

Bill C-51 addresses the need for modernization and enhanced information protection and integration with provincial programs.

Bill C-51 introduces reforms to the present witness protection environment that would build on our collective efforts to combat organized crime as well as terrorist organizations, and in that way, help us all continue to build safer streets and communities for everyone.

I will therefore be supporting Bill C-51, and I join my colleagues in the government in encouraging all hon. members to do the same.

[Denis Blanchette, NDP, Louis-Hébert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his speech.

We have already announced that we will support the bill although we do not think it goes quite far enough. I would like to move on to the practical aspects.

It is a good idea to improve the program, but that costs money. Moreover, it is not just the federal police that are likely to need funds.

I would like my colleague to tell the House what he thinks about the increased funding that will be required to support this legislation.

[John Carmichael, Conservative, Don Valley West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think it is important to note that we have in this House of Commons 12 former police officers who have been integral in providing information during the deliberations and development of the bill. Some of them were high-ranking police chiefs who had great knowledge of what it takes to make a system work through development processes. Clearly, the cost issue, as my hon. friend opposite has brought up, was well discussed.

I would like to quote from the Assistant Commissioner of the RCMP, Mr. Todd Shean, who appeared before committee or commented twice on this very issue, on February 28 and March 5. He said:

[W]ith the changes this bill brings about, the RCMP is comfortable that we have the resources within our existing resources to run an effective witness protection program.

On March 5 he went on to comment:

I am confident that we have the necessary resources to conduct an effective witness protection program, even with what Bill C-51 adds.

Clearly, he demonstrated, as other police forces have, that the funding issue is not an issue at all, and within their own resources they will meet that requirement.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan—Coquihalla, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very excited about this bill moving forward and I appreciate the hon. member's speech. Certainly from watching movies, we all have our own impressions of witness protection, so I appreciate his giving us some of the history and also mapping out why he feels this is compelling legislation that needs to go forward.

Most people here want to have safety and security. We want to see a more efficiently run and more effective public safety system, and this is in our national interest. Sometimes we need to put aside partisanship. We have seen support at committee and the New Democrats and Liberals are in support of the bill.

Would the member reiterate why it is in our national interests, as Canadians, to see this legislation go forward?

[John Carmichael, Conservative, Don Valley West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very good question because our government is focused on keeping our streets and communities safe. An effective and reliable witness protection program is valuable in the fight against crime, especially organized crime and terrorism.

As I mentioned in my presentation, in today's world with technology moving at the rate it is and with the resources that organized crime groups have available to them, it is important that we provide our police forces and organizations with the tools they require to get the job done to protect our citizens and our constituents in our ridings, regardless of which party we represent.

[Devinder Shory, Conservative, Calgary Northeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, today I rise to add my voice in support of Bill C-51, the safer witnesses act. As we have heard from my hon. colleagues, the bill would make important amendments to the witness protection program, which first came into effect in 1996. Before that time, Canada offered witness protection services to those who could provide critical information during a police investigation and court proceedings. However, it was practised on an informal basis. The 1996 act introduced more formality into the process.

As with many laws that have been on the books for a while, the original act is now in need of amendments to reflect our changing environment and to strengthen the protection provided to witnesses, as well as to those who protect them.

As we have heard in the House and at committee, the proposed legislation contains recommendations that have come from a few sources. They include the 2008 report by the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security, the 2010 Commission of Inquiry into the Investigation of the Bombing of Air India Flight 182, and stakeholder consultations with the federal departments and agencies, the provinces and law enforcement agencies.

I would like to focus my remarks today on a couple of areas of proposed changes within the bill, which directly address the concerns we heard from our provincial stakeholders.

There are witness protection programs in five provinces, namely Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec. The federal program differs from the provincial ones in some areas. Typically, the provincial programs are aimed at victims of violence who need support before and during a trial, which could include accompanying the witness to trial, temporary relocation or limited financial support. They have their own administrative criteria and are designed to meet the needs of their own law enforcement agencies.

The decision whether to refer a witness for possible admission into the federal program or provincial program rests with the individual police forces dealing with criminal investigations. They make their decisions on a case by case basis, depending on cost, threat level and the length of time the protection is needed. For complex federal cases, provinces may choose to refer their witnesses for consideration of admission into the federal program.

One of the loudest calls we have had from our provincial counterparts is the need to streamline the current process for obtaining secure identity changes for their protectees. The concern among the provinces is that the RCMP can currently only assist federal protectees for the purpose of obtaining the federal documents required for secure identity changes. What this means is that the provinces must temporarily admit their protectees into the federal witness protection program to allow the RCMP to assist in this process.

Many of our provincial stakeholders have asked that we change the current system, which they have told us can result in time consuming paperwork and delays. We agree. When we are talking about protecting individuals from potentially life-threatening risks, we cannot afford delays in processing their secure identity changes. We also agree that improving federal and provincial collaboration will help us move ahead with a more seamless witness protection service across the board.

As such, under Bill C-51, we propose to streamline this process through a new framework that will allow for provincial programs to be officially designated as witness protection programs. The designation process will work as follows.

First, a provincial authority responsible for the program, such as the Attorney General, would make a request to the Minister of Public Safety who, once satisfied that the program has the capacity to protect its witnesses and its information, may recommend to the Governor in Council to designate the program. Once the program has been designated, the provincial official will be able to send a request to the RCMP for assistance in obtaining the federal documents required for a secure identity change for a provincial witness without having to first admit the witness into the federal program. Designation would only need to occur once.

I would note that we have also heard calls to remove the RCMP from the process completely so the provinces can request the secure identity documents directly from the federal departments. However, we believe it is more prudent and safer to keep the RCMP as the single point of contact for all document requests of this nature. There are many benefits to keeping the RCMP as a single point of contact. It helps ensure efficiency and enhances the security of the information and the safety of all those involved in the process. For these reasons, Bill C-51 would retain the RCMP as a liaison between the provincial and federal programs for the process of secured identity change.

A second area of change that directly addresses concerns of many of our provincial stakeholders relates to expanding the prohibitions of this program. As it currently stands, the Witness Protection Program Act only protects information about federal protectees. This is a legitimate concern raised by our provincial stakeholders and one which we have addressed in Bill C-51.

Under the proposed changes, the prohibitions of disclosure would be extended to include information about the witnesses, their designated witness protection program, as well as those who provide protection to these witnesses. This prohibition will apply across Canada. I should note these measures have been strongly supported by organizations that represent front-line police officers.

In addition, exceptions to the prohibitions of disclosure would also be clarified, allowing authorities at both the federal and provincial levels to fulfill their mandates, while still being mindful of the need to ensure the safety of protected persons.

At the federal level, this authority is the RCMP commissioner, while at the provincial level it is the official in charge of the designated program. For example, federal agencies will be able to share information about those protected persons who are also offenders being considered for release. At both levels, authorities would have the power to disclose information about protected persons if it was essential for the administration of justice, including if a serious offence were about to be committed.

It is clear that the Witness Protection Program Act is in need of amendments on a number of fronts. Bill C-51 is practical and comprehensive legislation that would do just that.

The provincial programs are a vital part of our network of witness protection in Canada and we are pleased that this bill has received positive response from the Attorneys General of Saskatchewan and B.C. as well as the Canadian Police Association.

I am also pleased to hear today in the House that for a change the opposition parties have openly said that they will support the bill.

This legislation sends a clear signal that we are on the right track. I therefore encourage all hon. members to continue their support of the good measures this government brings from time to time.