Bill C-44 (Historical)

Protection of Canada from Terrorists Act

An Act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act and other Acts

This enactment amends the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act to give greater protection to the Canadian Security Intelligence Service’s human sources. Also, so as to enable the Service to more effectively investigate threats to the security of Canada, the enactment clarifies the scope of the Service’s mandate and confirms the jurisdiction of the Federal Court to issue warrants that have effect outside Canada. In addition, it makes a consequential amendment to the Access to Information Act.
The enactment also amends the Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act to allow for the coming into force of provisions relating to the revocation of Canadian citizenship on a different day than the day on which certain other provisions of that Act come into force.

Motions in amendment

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I know they are chirping because they do not want to hear the truth. They do not want to hear the facts.

People in my constituency expect me to bring their views to the House. Those members can talk as much as they want, but they are not going to stop this member from speaking for his constituents.

What are some of the things we need? I feel strongly about the need for strong civilian oversight. It is critical that enhanced civilian oversight accompany any new powers that we give CSIS. The Security Intelligence Review Committee, SIRC, does not have the powers necessary to properly oversee CSIS, and the Conservatives used an omnibus bill in 2012 to eliminate the position of inspector general at CSIS.

Let me give the House a bit of history as to where we are and where we need to go.

Bill C-44 proposes to modernize CSIS and provide additional powers to the organization. However, there are no proposed improvements to the oversight that is desperately needed in the modernization of the service. Recommendations were made in 2006 by the Maher Arar commission of inquiry calling for new accountability measures for Canada's intelligence agency. Eight years later those recommendations have yet to be put in place by the government.

The Conservatives talk about protecting public safety and civil liberties, but when it comes time to deliver on some of these public safety issues, such as civil liberties for Canadians, time after time the Conservatives have failed to deliver. This was another opportunity to bring in more transparency, accountability and oversight of our intelligence community, but again the Conservatives have failed.

The privacy and information commissioners of Canada at their annual meeting asked the government to ensure that effective oversight be included in any legislation that would establish additional powers for intelligence and law enforcement. I am not making this up. I will quote the privacy and information commissioners of Canada: “We acknowledge that security is essential to maintaining our democratic rights...” All of us in the House would agree with that, and I would say that 99% of Canadians would agree with that as well, but, they continued, “At the same time, the response to such events must be measured and proportionate, and crafted so as to preserve our democratic values.” That is where the government has failed.

Daniel Therrien, the Privacy Commissioner, also said that it was understandable that the government would want to consider boosting the powers of law enforcement and national security agencies to address potential gaps, but that any new tools should be accompanied by a beefed-up role for the watchdogs who keep an eye on spies and police.

To me, it is not either/or. To me, it is pretty clear if additional powers are to be granted to our spy agency.

Six years ago we heard calls for proper oversight but that is not proposed in this legislation. Here, I could go on and on about this legislation, about the lack of oversight, the lack of commitment by the Conservatives to ensuring the protection of Canadians and civil liberties.

I will be voting against this particular legislation. The Conservatives had an opportunity to make improvements, but have failed again.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Mr. Speaker, the NDP has such a strange way of showing different priorities. Those members would rather bring in a registry for law-abiding farmers, hunters, and sportsmen than tracking terrorists.

Could the member please explain to me why that is more of a priority than giving tools to our RCMP and our law enforcement officers so they can do their jobs and track these terrorists down?

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, here are the facts, which the Conservatives actually do not like.

This is providing resources to our security agency. What have the Conservatives done? They have actually cut the funding for these organizations that provide for the security and safety of Canadians. This is what the Conservatives have done. I know these are facts. This is taken from the ministry of Public Safety. The Conservatives have been cutting funding for our public safety programs for three years now, for a total of $687.9 million by 2015. There are ongoing cuts. For CSIS, it is $24 million by 2015.

How is the government planning to protect Canadians and provide resources to these agencies if it is cutting their funds?

I thank the member for his question.

[Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet, NDP, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in a bill that talks about civil liberties, there are opportunities for civil liberties to be breached. It is possible.

Does my colleague think it is logical that the Privacy Commissioner has not even been invited to appear before the committee? Could this be because he said that any new tool must be accompanied by an enhanced role for the watchdogs who keep an eye on spies and the police? Are the Conservatives afraid of this?

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt.

The Conservatives rammed this bill through the committee. It would have been nice to hear the Privacy Commissioner. He stated his position. He basically said that any new tools should be accompanied by a beefed-up role for the watchdogs who keep an eye on these spy and police agencies.

I do not think the Conservatives wanted to hear this in committee. The commissioner has been very clear, as have a number of inquiries looking into some of the lapses over the years. Unfortunately, Conservatives do not want to hear these kinds of issues about civil liberties and protecting Canadians' rights.

[Djaouida Sellah, NDP, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his eloquent speech and his knowledge of the matter.

We know that the public feels it is the government’s duty to protect both public security and civil liberties.

However, we see that, in terms of this bill, the government has chosen to ignore all of the amendments that the official opposition put forward in order to improve the bill and to prevent costly legal wrangling. I would like to hear my colleague’s views on this issue.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, protecting civil liberties and public safety are both Canadian core values. We can do both. They are not either-or propositions. I think we can do both at the same time. I know the Conservatives have trouble doing that.

As parliamentarians, people send us to this House in Ottawa to scrutinize the bills being passed by the government. We had an opportunity to listen to the witnesses. We could have brought in more witnesses, but this bill was actually rammed through the committee in only four hours. Two of those hours were for the ministerial staff. There was no opportunity to properly look at the bill and some of the implications of the changes being offered by the government.

Time after time we have seen time allocation in this House and legislation being rammed through at the committee stage. That is not what Canadians expect from us. They expect much better.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today to speak to Bill C-44, an act to amend the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act and other acts. It is always a pleasure to stand in the House and represent the voices from the riding of Newton—North Delta.

I want to get something on the table right at the beginning. There is no one on this side of the House who supports terrorists or any acts of terrorism. Before my friends across the way start to have conversations and yell things, I wanted to make that clear. All of my life I have worked for peace. I am a mother. I am a grandmother. I have been a teacher for most of my life, and I can say that I abhor acts of violence.

Occasionally members are accused of liking terrorists, but those kinds of things do not help us when we debate in the House.

I want to talk about the substance of this bill today. First, I supported this bill at second reading. Why? It was because New Democrats, like everyone else in the House, want measures that will enhance public safety. It is because of this that we supported this bill at second reading, and it went to committee. Once it got to committee, the government repeated the same mistakes it makes over and over again. It limited hearings.

When there is such critical legislation that has not been debated or had any changes for decades, some major changes need to be made. The committee needed to hear from witnesses. As much as we all like to think we are experts on everything, there are great experts out there we need to hear from who know far more about public safety than we do. They know what works. They have evidence of what works in other jurisdictions and of what would be good in Canada. Our job is to listen to it.

Two hours to hear from officials from the department was fair enough, but two hours for all other witnesses was just unacceptable. I can assure the House that when trying to address public safety in a serious way, the government once again used the hammer of its majority to push through legislation without giving it the due process and oversight it needed. I do not hesitate in opposing this legislation any more because of what happened at committee.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Surprise, surprise, predictable.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague across the way says, “Surprise, surprise”. I am surprised that when it came to the critical issue of public safety, the members of the government cut off debate and did not accept amendments that were very reasonable and well informed and that actually would have improved this legislation, but no, the government knows everything and does not need to hear from anyone else, because it is its way or the highway. That is the way it brought the legislation forward.

The Conservatives are then surprised when opposition members stand and say that there are flaws in this legislation that need to be addressed.

New Democrats never give up. We will keep trying to improve this legislation and will hope that the government will wake up one day and realize that there is a different way of doing things if it is really serious. We are really serious.

What would Bill C-44 do? It would make significant changes to expand CSIS's powers, but instead of giving this bill the careful study it deserved, once again the government did not feel the need to hear from experts. It knew what it wanted to do. It is its way or the highway. Independent experts and other witnesses were ignored.

The bill would give powers to CSIS without providing adequate oversight, and it presents real dangers. I fear that the government is going to end up spending taxpayers' hard-earned money fighting more legal problems and having this legislation stuck in court. However, the government does not seem to mind doing that. It would rather pay the money to the courts than provide services and good legislation to Canadians.

Even the witnesses who appeared put forward recommendations and suggestions. They were ignored.

This bill is fundamentally flawed. It is going to be very hard to support. What would we have wanted to see? We should always say what it is we want to see in legislation. I can point to lots of things that are wrong with the bill. What I wanted to see in the legislation that is not there is strong civilian oversight. It is critical that enhanced civilian oversight accompany any new powers for CSIS.

Everyone knows that the Security Intelligence Review Committee does not have the powers necessary to properly oversee CSIS. The Conservatives used an omnibus budget bill in 2012 to eliminate the position of CSIS's inspector general. Once again, anyone who questions anything the government does is deleted and the government gets rid of the position.

Something else the bill needs and that we want to see in it is strong protection of civil liberties. Some people say that we have to choose between public safety and civil liberties. I say that this is a false dichotomy. To have good public safety, we need to have protection of civil liberties. To have protection of civil liberties, we need to ensure that we have strong public safety. They are both core Canadian values, and Canadians do not have to choose A or B. It is possible to have both, and once again, the government failed to address that. There are no trade-offs here. It is not one or the other. We can have both, and that is what needs to be in this bill. We, as New Democrats, want legislation that both improves security and reinforces our civil liberties. That is essential.

My colleagues across the way always talk a good game. All the rhetoric is there. However, it is also a party that keeps cutting resources. It wants to have all these enhancements, but it has cut funding for our public safety agencies for three straight years, for a total of almost $688 million by 2015. That is not a figure I have made up. That is a figure the government can verify.

How can the government say it wants to make improvements yet at the same time take millions of dollars in resources out of the CSIS budget? CSIS will face ongoing cuts of $24.5 million by 2015, while budget 2012 scrapped the CSIS inspector general position altogether. At the same time we have this rhetoric that the government is going to make everyone safer and that public safety is going to improve, it is taking away the tools and resources our agencies need to do that. As with many other things, it is all talk. When it comes to what the government actually does, it underfunds, it cuts, or it just does not spend the money, even when it allocates it to certain programs.

A myriad of validators absolutely support the position we are taking as the NDP. I wish I had time to read all of them into the record, but I know I am short of time.

Let me say that this legislation can be fixed to get our support. First, put strong civilian oversight in place. Second, put in protection for civil liberties. Third, let us give them the resources and get the job done.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member opposite saying that she abhors terrorism and acts of violence. On this point, we could not agree more.

For that reason, will the member call on the member for Scarborough—Rouge River to apologize for her comment, comparing a day celebrating Tamil Tiger terrorists to our solemn Canadian occasion of Remembrance Day. These comments were shameful and must be retracted.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, every member on this side of the House abhors violence and acts of terrorism—every member.

[Hélène LeBlanc, NDP, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for her speech, her passion and her commitment to her family and her community in her riding.

She very clearly mentioned that all of this is reflected in her deep beliefs, as it is a matter of ensuring the safety of the community and of all Canadians and of being engaged within our communities. It is also a matter of ensuring this balance among all the values that we hold dear, that consist of keeping our land not only strong, but free.

However, how is all this reflected in the member's very diverse riding? How do her constituents feel about the importance of public safety and the protection of rights and freedoms?

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for the very thoughtful question that she asked about my community of Surrey, Newton and North Delta. She is absolutely right. I live in a beautiful Canadian mosaic of a riding. It is very diverse and very concerned about public safety.

On Saturday, we had another meeting with the RCMP and the members of our community, including the members from the masjid, the representatives from the BC Muslim Association, the local mufti, and other communities leaders and service providers, to talk about the kinds of things we need to do in our community to tackle the issue of radicalization.

What came through was a real will on the part of the Muslim community in my riding that we need to tackle this. However, at the same time, what also came through was the fear that is instilled in many of them. Every time they hear of a bombing or a shooting, immediately there is a sort of frozen second when it happens and their hope that it is not anybody associated with the Muslim faith. They are scared of all the repercussion in the community.

We have been working on this on an ongoing basis. What we are really talking about is how to provide resources and support for our kids, and how to build safe and inclusive communities in such a way as to prevent any windows of opportunity for radicalization of youth.

I can assure the House that every one of those members abhors any acts of terrorism. They are Canadians. They live here and they want to do their part, but they are also telling me that they are distressed at having fingers pointed at them all the time.