Bill C-51 (Historical)

Anti-terrorism Act, 2015

An Act to enact the Security of Canada Information Sharing Act and the Secure Air Travel Act, to amend the Criminal Code, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts

Part 1 enacts the Security of Canada Information Sharing Act, which authorizes Government of Canada institutions to disclose information to Government of Canada institutions that have jurisdiction or responsibilities in respect of activities that undermine the security of Canada. It also makes related amendments to other Acts.
Part 2 enacts the Secure Air Travel Act in order to provide a new legislative framework for identifying and responding to persons who may engage in an act that poses a threat to transportation security or who may travel by air for the purpose of committing a terrorism offence. That Act authorizes the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness to establish a list of such persons and to direct air carriers to take a specific action to prevent the commission of such acts. In addition, that Act establishes powers and prohibitions governing the collection, use and disclosure of information in support of its administration and enforcement. That Act includes an administrative recourse process for listed persons who have been denied transportation in accordance with a direction from the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness and provides appeal procedures for persons affected by any decision or action taken under that Act. That Act also specifies punishment for contraventions of listed provisions and authorizes the Minister of Transport to conduct inspections and issue compliance orders. Finally, this Part makes consequential amendments to the Aeronautics Act and the Canada Evidence Act.
Part 3 amends the Criminal Code to, with respect to recognizances to keep the peace relating to a terrorist activity or a terrorism offence, extend their duration, provide for new thresholds, authorize a judge to impose sureties and require a judge to consider whether it is desirable to include in a recognizance conditions regarding passports and specified geographic areas. With respect to all recognizances to keep the peace, the amendments also allow hearings to be conducted by video conference and orders to be transferred to a judge in a territorial division other than the one in which the order was made and increase the maximum sentences for breach of those recognizances.
It further amends the Criminal Code to provide for an offence of knowingly advocating or promoting the commission of terrorism offences in general. It also provides a judge with the power to order the seizure of terrorist propaganda or, if the propaganda is in electronic form, to order the deletion of the propaganda from a computer system.
Finally, it amends the Criminal Code to provide for the increased protection of witnesses, in particular of persons who play a role in respect of proceedings involving security information or criminal intelligence information, and makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Part 4 amends the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act to permit the Canadian Security Intelligence Service to take, within and outside Canada, measures to reduce threats to the security of Canada, including measures that are authorized by the Federal Court. It authorizes the Federal Court to make an assistance order to give effect to a warrant issued under that Act. It also creates new reporting requirements for the Service and requires the Security Intelligence Review Committee to review the Service’s performance in taking measures to reduce threats to the security of Canada.
Part 5 amends Divisions 8 and 9 of Part 1 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to, among other things,
(a) define obligations related to the provision of information in proceedings under that Division 9;
(b) authorize the judge, on the request of the Minister, to exempt the Minister from providing the special advocate with certain relevant information that has not been filed with the Federal Court, if the judge is satisfied that the information does not enable the person named in a certificate to be reasonably informed of the case made by the Minister, and authorize the judge to ask the special advocate to make submissions with respect to the exemption; and
(c) allow the Minister to appeal, or to apply for judicial review of, any decision requiring the disclosure of information or other evidence if, in the Minister’s opinion, the disclosure would be injurious to national security or endanger the safety of any person.

Public Safety

[Peter MacKay, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, that is patently false. Many departments of government, including the justice department, have cross-cultural round tables. Our security forces themselves are often involved in outreach, and they will continue to do so.

However, with respect to the substance of Bill C-51 before the House, the bill would give tools to our security forces to allow them to do more to prevent terrorism, to prevent violence. That is something that all communities in Canada are interested in and engaged in the discussion.

Anti-Terrorism Act, 2015

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to my colleague and I appreciate his comments.

The NDP has asked for more time to debate the issue of Bill C-51, a very important piece of legislation to make sure Canadians are safe, yet the NDP moves concurrence motions and uses delay tactics such as slow voting. I think a number of people were probably not able to take part in this debate because of the delays by the NDP.

Would the member agree that there are unreasonable and illogical delays from the NDP?

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I would like to thank my outstanding hon. colleague for Richmond Hill for sharing his time with me and also for his hard work on this file. It is an important file, and I am pleased to be on the public safety committee. It is also my pleasure to rise today in the House to debate Bill C-51, the anti-terrorism act, 2015.

We find that the world we live in today is a dark and dangerous place. This was most brutally demonstrated by last October's attacks in Ottawa and in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu. We are not immune to the threat of terrorism, nor are our allies. We have tragically seen this in Paris, Sydney, and Copenhagen, beacons of western civilization struck by jihadist terrorists. Let us make no mistake: the international jihadist movement has declared war on Canada and her allies.

The legislation before us today would provide Canadian law enforcement and national security agencies with additional tools and the flexibility to keep pace with evolving threats and better protect Canadians here at home.

However, that is not all we are doing. It is important to fight terrorism at home, but we are also fighting it abroad. Our brave men and women of the Canadian Armed Forces are engaged in a battle with the barbaric so-called Islamic State.

In line with the measures taken by our allies, the government is taking additional action to ensure that our law enforcement and national security agencies can counter those who advocate terrorism, prevent terrorism from travelling, prevent the efforts of those who seek to use Canada as a recruiting ground, and disrupt planned attacks on Canadian soil.

The proposed legislation includes checks and balances to ensure it respects the rights of Canadians and complements other legislation passed by our Conservative government in order to better protect Canadians and secure institutions. These measures include the Combating Terrorism Act and the Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act. However, I would be remiss if I did not note that the Liberals and the NDP have consistently voted against these types of measures for increasing our national security.

We have heard from both the Liberals and the NDP that they believe more money ought to be invested in CSIS and the RCMP. I find it interesting that when our Conservative government brought forward more funding for these agencies for parliamentary approval, on seven separate occasions the Liberals and NDP voted against this funding.

I would like to look at the facts. The fact is that our Conservative government has increased funding to both CSIS and the RCMP by over one-third since forming government. We will hold that record up any day of the week.

Much has been made by the NDP of portions of the anti-terrorism act that relate to disrupting terrorist threats. I would like to give some concrete examples of how these powers would help keep Canadians safe.

One example would be if a 21-year-old Canadian citizen had become disenchanted with his home life due to videos of sermons given by radical imams. He has additionally sought to acquire copies of Inspire, the English-language magazine published by al Qaeda in the Arabian peninsula. Individuals with this local mosque have advised CSIS that he is planning to travel overseas to engage in terrorist activity.

Currently, CSIS can investigate but cannot do anything to stop the individual from travelling. The furthest CSIS could go is to advise the RCMP that it believes he is about to commit an offence, and the RCMP could launch its own investigation. However, under Bill C-51, CSIS would be able to engage with a trusted friend or relative who could speak to this individual and advise against travelling for terrorist purposes. Further, CSIS would be able to meet with the individual to advise him that they know what he is planning to do and what the consequences of taking further action would be.

Another example would be if CSIS learned that a planned shipment of chemicals might be used in a terrorist attack on a Canadian business operating in a foreign country, but the exact timing was not known. Currently CSIS can share that information with the foreign government and other foreign partners. A travel alert could potentially be issued by Foreign Affairs. Under Bill C-51, CSIS could engage in a joint operation with a foreign partner to disrupt the shipment. For example, the shipment could be rerouted so that it would not be delivered into the hands of terrorists.

Lastly, let us say a Canadian ally warns CSIS that foreign spies are planning to meet with a Canadian avionics firm. CSIS investigates and determines that the spies are posing as businessmen in order to purchase telemetry equipment. This dual-use technology has a civilian application in test programs, but it is also used in ballistic missile targeting.

Currently CSIS, as part of its investigation, can interview officials from the Canadian company to gather information. CSIS can ask the CBSA to check the parts' paperwork at the time of export to determine if there are customs violations.

Under Bill C-51, CSIS could seek and receive a warrant to intercept equipment and alter it so that it would not have any suitability for non-civilian applications.

With this new mandate, CSIS could take measures at home and abroad to disrupt threats when it had reasonable grounds to believe there was a threat to the security of Canada. These threats to the security of Canada are defined in the CSIS Act and include espionage, sabotage, foreign-influenced activities, terrorism, and domestic subversion, which refers to activities directed against the constitutionally established system of government in Canada.

CSIS would only be able to take reasonable and proportional measures to disrupt threats. To do this, CSIS would consider the nature of the threat, the nature of the proposed measures, and the reasonable availability of other means to disrupt the threat. The intelligence services of most of Canada's democratic allies have had similar mandates and powers for many years.

It is important not to misconstrue definitions under the security of Canada information sharing act and the CSIS Act. The threat disruption mandate covers threats as defined in the CSIS Act, namely espionage, sabotage, foreign-influenced activities, terrorism, and domestic subversion.

CSIS is strictly prohibited from undertaking threat disruption activities against individuals engaged in lawful protest or dissent.

I know my time is probably running short and I would like to end my remarks today with a question. Opposition members like to say that this bill will somehow take away rights from Canadians. I would like someone on the other side of the House to explain to me where this legislation authorizes that. As far as I can tell, the only people this legislation will impact are those engaged in terrorist activities, those planning to become engaged in terrorist activities, and those who are advocating terrorist activities. If those are the types of individuals the NDP and Liberals are choosing to defend, I suspect Canadians will have a strong message for them in the next election.

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

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-51 is broad in scope—too broad. If the Conservatives want to deal with radicalization and the serious and complex problem of terrorism in the world, then they need carefully targeted tools, rather than broad measures like the ones they are introducing.

I would like to ask the parliamentary secretary a question. I doubt he will be able to answer me since, unfortunately, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Public Safety could not, but I will try anyway.

Bill C-51 indicates that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service will be able to disrupt or intercept any threat to the Canadian economy or infrastructure, among other things. I would like the parliamentary secretary to tell us exactly what is being targeted.

Can he explain to us what exactly constitutes a threat to Canada's security when it comes to its infrastructure and economy? I am asking for just one example.

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

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca for his excellent speech. I thank him not just for his excellent speech, but also because we have the opportunity to work together on the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.

I am very proud to second his motion today and to see the incredible work we do as the official opposition when it comes to a bill like Bill C-51.

In his speech, he mentioned that we are very aware that terrorism is a real threat to everyone. We agree that public safety is, or should be, one of the top priorities of any government in the world. However, Bill C-51 does not directly tackle the problem. My colleague pointed out that the bill is too broad, does not necessarily address the real problems, does not provide the right tools and does not really deal with what we should be targeting.

As we mentioned during the questions and comments in the debate on the time allocation motion, we have realized that the more people learn about the content of Bill C-51 and the more they understand the consequences of this bill, the less they agree with the government's position.

What does my colleague think about the fact that the Conservatives have decided to shut down such an important debate and refuse to let MPs talk about this extremely important issue? Why are they muzzling us when they do not have as much support as they thought? People are realizing that Bill C-51 is not such a good bill.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, at the conclusion of my remarks, I intend to move a motion.

It is with a genuine sense of disappointment that I rise to speak against Bill C-51, the anti-terrorism act, 2015. I am particularly disappointed to be doing it under time allocation, which will have the effect of not allowing many of my colleagues to actually speak to this important bill. It will also have the effect of making it difficult for Canadians to understand the full extent of what is in this bill.

This is a very important bill. I would remind all of us that all of Canada, and indeed much of the world, was shocked at the deaths of two Canadian soldiers here at home last October. Certainly those deaths, along with the attack on Parliament Hill, were sobering for all of us.

All of us here in the House, and I believe all Canadians, were proud to see their MPs back at work the next morning, standing together in our determination not to be cowed by violence. At that time, all of us made the commitment to work together to meet the terrorist threats Canada now faces in this new world we live in.

What happened to those lofty promises to work together? Just days later, when the new CSIS bill, Bill C-44, was introduced, suddenly the government, by itself, had all the answers. The government argued that the urgency of the threat meant that there was no time for debate at second reading, no time for a full study at the public safety committee, and no time for serious consideration of amendments put forward by the official opposition.

New Democrats supported Bill C-44 at second reading, still hoping the government was serious about co-operation between the government and the opposition on this important topic, still hoping that there would be adequate time for debate and consideration of amendments to improve the bill.

We ended up voting against that bill, a bill of questionable constitutionality in its attempt to have judges authorize illegal activities abroad and a bill without an ounce of improvement in CSIS oversight, despite granting new powers to CSIS. It was also a bill lacking any direct connection to the events of October. The government said to wait for the next bill.

Here we are, four months later, with a new bill in front of us. Unfortunately, this is another bill of questionable constitutionality, this time attempting to get judges to authorize illegal and unconstitutional activities right here at home. As well, it is another bill without an ounce of improvement in oversight of our security agencies.

However, this bill goes even further. This is a bill that will wreak havoc on the privacy rights of all Canadians in the name of threats to national security. Further, it is a bill that contains definitions so broad and so far-reaching that it risks lumping together legitimate dissent with terrorism. It is at one and the same time broad, dangerously vague, and most likely ineffective in confronting the threats we face. This is a bill that still lacks any direct link to the actual events we faced in October or the ongoing threats we face today.

The government has rushed ahead with this bill and with changes to security on the Hill, again without consultation, and without even waiting for full reports on the October incidents. It is my understanding that when the Prime Minister was asked at his campaign-style event in Richmond Hill, where he unveiled this bill, instead of in the House of Commons, where it should have taken place, whether this bill would have prevented either of the October events, he had to say that he was not sure.

New Democrats have given this bill careful consideration before coming to our decision to oppose it in principle. We have consulted broadly with groups potentially most directly affected by this bill, with legal experts, and with our constituents when back in our ridings last week.

We have repeatedly asked the government to explain what some of the broad wording in this bill would cover and what specific new security actions will be authorized by this bill, all to no avail. The response more often that not has consisted of reciting general talking points about the severity of the threats we face, in a transparent attempt to use fear to marshal support for its bill, support that it obviously hopes will carry through to the ballot box.

We have not taken this decision to oppose Bill C-51 lightly. We have done our due diligence before pronouncing on a bill that would make major changes to over two dozen pieces of legislation and that would potentially have major impacts on privacy rights, rights to peaceful dissent, and fundamental freedoms, like freedom from detention without charge.

It will clearly have impacts on Muslim Canadians in particular because of the unfortunate tendency of the government to stray into Islamophobic rhetoric and bizarre claims by the Minister of Justice that terrorism is somehow culturally based.

It will clearly have an impact on those concerned with climate change and other environmental issues, especially when read in concert with the RCMP's 44-page memo on so-called anti-petroleum activists, a memo that, just as this bill does, tends to lump together both dissent and extremist and violent activities.

Neither the Muslim community nor environmental activists or first nations activists will be surprised to find themselves targets of the new measures in this bill. What I hope Canadians will come to understand is that it is not just the Conservative government's tendency to divide Canadians that makes some of us targets of this bill; it is the tendency of the government to overreach that makes all of us potential casualties of this bill.

Let us look at the changes the government is proposing that would have the biggest impact. Here I would start with part 1 of the bill, entitled “Security of Canada Information Sharing Act”. I believe that this part of the bill would have the broadest potential impacts for all Canadians.

This bill would allow all federal departments and agencies to share information that may be relevant to national security with Canadian intelligence and law enforcement agencies. The NDP agrees that government departments and agencies should be able to share information about real threats to public safety, but it must be done with appropriate safeguards that do not catch innocent Canadians in the net.

The Privacy Commissioner has expressed concerns that this bill would allow the information of many law-abiding Canadians to be collected and shared with a long list of other government agencies and used for purposes other than those for which it was collected. This would clearly undermine a fundamental principle of our privacy rights when it comes to the government's use of our personal information. Many of the departments and agencies that would now be allowed to share information do not have adequate privacy protections in place, nor do they have any oversight mechanisms governing their information sharing activities.

A second aspect of this bill with very broad implications is the section granting new powers to CSIS. They are powers that would change the nature of CSIS as an organization, moving it from being an intelligence gathering agency to an active arm of the government in opposing threats to security and to the economy, infrastructure, and a wide list of activities, which potentially raises the question of whether the government would be able to use CSIS for political purposes.

This rolls back the clock more than 30 years and ignores the lessons of the McDonald Commission, which resulted in the creation of CSIS. It abandons the important lesson that combining intelligence gathering activities with disruption activities not only is mostly ineffective but almost inevitably leads to the kind of sordid activities the RCMP engaged in the 1970s in Quebec. These kinds of activities undermine public confidence in police and security agencies, and when we undermine public confidence in these agencies, we undermine the very co-operation with the public that is necessary for their success.

Bill C-51 would now give CSIS the ability to conduct threat disruption. These provisions would allow CSIS to take measures at home and abroad to disrupt threats when CSIS decides that it has “reasonable grounds to believe” that there is a threat to the security of Canada. Activities to disrupt threats that would contravene a right or freedom guaranteed under the charter would require CSIS to seek authorization from a judge. However, here is the important point on this question. The government likes to say that this amounts to oversight of CSIS activities. The point I would raise is that CSIS would not require a warrant for any and all disruption activities, only those that CSIS itself judged might involve illegal or unconstitutional activities. Once a judge issued a warrant, the judge would have no further oversight role over what CSIS did with that warrant.

If we look carefully at the Mosley decision, we see that the judge said that not only was CSIS not fully forthright in the material it presented to the court to get a warrant but that once it had the warrant, it did not carry the warrant out in the manner it had prescribed to the judge. In other words, it did not do what it said it would do with the warrant.

For me, the important point is that it would still be left for CSIS to decide if the warrant application was necessary, and it would be left to CSIS to decide on its own and without oversight what activities that warrant authorized and how it would carry them out. As I mentioned, CSIS's record before the courts leaves much to be desired on this point.

When asked in question period, the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness has been unable or unwilling to provide examples of the kinds of activities that would be allowed under threat disruption. We have asked him repeatedly to give us a single example of what those kinds of thing are.

The presumption always is that disruption activities would always be illegal or unconstitutional, but we know quite well that this bill would authorize CSIS to do things like shut down someone's Internet service, maybe shut off someone's phone service, or conduct surveillance on private conversations carried out in public places.

There are all kinds of things here that will not require a warrant, and there are all kinds of things, as I said, that we would leave to CSIS to decide if a warrant were even required. Remember, the power to disrupt includes giving CSIS the right to enter any place, open or obtain access to anything, as well as obtain or copy any document, install or remove anything, and to do any other thing that is reasonably necessary to take those measures. I submit that this is a pretty broad mandate when it comes to these activities.

In other words, in taking measures to reduce a threat, Bill C-51 would give CSIS a free rein. It would only prohibit CSIS from killing or causing bodily harm, violating the sexual integrity of an individual, or obstructing justice.

I know that those provisions were put in to reassure us, but I do not find it very reassuring that those are the only limitations on CSIS' disruption activities. These are not very robust limits for an organization carrying out secret activities, and not very reassuring for an agency with such weak oversight and review.

The government always likes to say that there is active, robust oversight of CSIS, pointing to the activities of SIRC. However, it is not just a technical point to say that when the government eliminated the position of inspector general in CSIS, it actually eliminated the one independent officer who provided oversight in real time of the activities of CSIS. It was the mandate of the inspector general of CSIS to make sure that CSIS' activities conformed to the law. Those responsibilities have in theory been transferred to SIRC, which has no capacity and no access to the information it would need to provide that kind of active oversight, and to make sure that CSIS were always acting legally.

I will refrain from talking about whether those appointed to SIRC have always been the best appointees, because of the limited amount of time I have. However, I only need to mention Arthur Porter. Also, I would question whether part-time appointees and non-specialists can be expected to successfully carry out the kind of oversight we need for a body like this.

If we look at the last annual report of SIRC, SIRC itself said similar things to Justice Mosley. It said that CSIS did not always provide full and timely information when SIRC was trying to investigate CSIS activities. It said that in some cases, CSIS had not been fully forthright in providing information to its review body. Therefore, we do not have robust oversight and review; we have problematic oversight and review, and now we would expect that same body to take on oversight of this much broader mandate we would give CSIS.

A third aspect of the bill that has broad implications is the provision that criminalizes the promotion of terrorism and the related provision that authorizes the removal of online terror propaganda. Bill C-51 would make it a criminal offence to knowingly advocate and promote “...the commission of terrorist offences in general”. This provision is designed to make the general promotion of terrorism an offence, in addition to the existing legislation that outlaws advocacy of specific terrorist acts. The new offence would be punishable by a prison term of up to five years.

Again, when the leader of the opposition asked the government to give us an example of what would now be illegal but is not already illegal under existing legislation, a question that I think he asked five times, he did not get an answer from the government. However, such a provision would certainly place a chill on free speech by its very enactment. It would also lower the threshold for what is considered promotion of terrorism.

The existing hate propaganda section of the Criminal Code criminalizes communication that advocates violence, where such incitement is likely to lead to breach of the peace. Why is that not adequate? Certainly we have seen RCMP able to lay terrorism charges frequently, and very recently here in Ottawa. Again, we ask, why is this new much broader provision needed?

Under the new provision, a person may be convicted if their statements are simply “being reckless” as to whether or not any of these offences may be committed. Again, this new offence would expand the existing Criminal Code offence, which makes promoting a specific terrorist act a crime, without explaining how this would help reduce threats to our security.

There is always a danger when we have limited resources—and certainly, the current government has severely limited the resources available to both the RCMP and CSIS—and when we spread the net too wide that we will miss the real terrorists, that we will miss the real threats to society, because we will not have enough resources to actually take on the hard work necessary to identify them. As one person said, “Searching for terrorists is like looking for a needle in a haystack and the last thing we need people doing is adding extra hay”. To me, when we spread this broad net, we start adding extra hay that makes it much more difficult to identify the real and urgent threats to our security.

Under the new law, a judge would be able to order Internet service providers, website administrators, and so on to remove any material when he or she has grounds to believe that the material might be terrorist propaganda. The judge could also order the custodian of a computer network to provide the court with information about who posted it. Moreover, the court would be able to order the seizure of physical materials. In both cases the authors or owners of the materials could appeal the decision before the material is destroyed.

This brings back shades of the old government bill that sparked the creation of the “tell Vic everything” campaign, by its expansion of government access to information about the online activity of perhaps any of us.

The inclusion of amendments to the Youth Criminal Justice Act also raise the question about how the government is proposing to spend the limited resources police and security agencies have. Again, in Richmond Hill, I understand that the Prime Minister was asked whether the bill would apply to teenagers in their parents' basement. He said yes. My question is, do we really want to waste time chasing kids in basements at the possible cost of letting the real terrorists slip through an overfull net?

A fourth element of the bill that should raise general concerns is the changes to preventative arrests and peace bonds, which threaten one of our most fundamental rights, the right to freedom from detention without charge.

I have heard many people comment that this is something that has been in place for something like 800 years in our legal system. Again, there is a serious question of what value this new provision has, especially when weighed against its negative aspects.

We should remember that legislation allowing for preventative arrests was first adopted under the Liberals after the events of September 11, 2001. This allowed police to detain someone for up to three days without laying charges. However, between 2001 and 2007, that clause was never used, before sun-setting in that latter year. Nonetheless, it was reinstated by the Conservatives in 2013.

Now, Bill C-51 proposes to lower the threshold required for a judge to authorize preventative detention from reasonable grounds that a terrorist activity “will” be carried out to “may” be carried out. The RCMP would now need to establish only that a terrorist activity might happen, instead of the previous grounds that there was some certainty that the person would commit a terrorist act. One lawyer described to me that what we had in the previous preventative detention was the lowest possible evidentiary standard, and now we are lowering that.

While keeping in mind that law enforcement agencies never found the preventative arrest provisions useful, we also need to remember the historical record of Canada on detention in times of crisis. Japanese Canadians were interned on the west coast despite the lack of any evidence at the time, or thereafter, of a single Japanese Canadian aiding the enemy in World War II. Ukrainian Canadians were similarly interned. At the time of the FLQ crisis in Quebec, hundreds of Quebeckers were arrested and detained without charge, and no one so detained was ever charged with, let alone convicted of, a criminal offence.

Certainly fears of political injustices resulting from the interaction of this bill with the apparent ongoing practices of racial profiling in Canada will need to be addressed.

Therefore, I am voting against the bill and hope that we can have a full airing of the issues. However, we have not had a very good indication of that today with the introduction of time allocation. I remain disappointed that the Liberals have given the government a blank cheque on Bill C-51, offering their support for the bill even if it is unamended.

Do I have confidence that the government will listen to evidence, experts, or the communities affected by this bill? Frankly, I do not. Therefore, I move:

That, the motion be amended by deleting all the words after “That” and substituting the following:

this House declines to give second reading to Bill C-51, An act to enact the Security of Canada Information Sharing Act and the Secure Air Travel Act, to amend the Criminal Code, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts, because it: (a) threatens our way of life by asking Canadians to choose between their security and their freedoms; (b) was not developed in consultation with other parties, all of whom recognize the real threat of terrorism and support effective, concrete measures to keep Canadians safe; (c) irresponsibly provide CSIS with a sweeping new mandate without equally increasing oversight; (d) contains definitions that are broad, vague and threaten to lump together legitimate dissent with terrorism; and (e) does not include the type of concrete, effective measures that have been proven to work, such as working with communities on measures to counter radicalization of youth.

The House resumed from February 18 consideration of the motion that Bill C-51, An Act to enact the Security of Canada Information Sharing Act and the Secure Air Travel Act, to amend the Criminal Code, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Bill C-51—Time Allocation Motion

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

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, 22,000 people signed a petition to say “no” to the Conservatives. They do not agree with what is in Bill C-51. Today, an open letter signed by former prime ministers and Supreme Court justices made the point that civilian oversight of CSIS is virtually non-existent relative to the powers that will be given to the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

I would like to ask the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons why he moved a time allocation motion for Bill C-51. Is it because the more people talk about it, the more they understand the bill and the less they agree with it?

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the importance of the legislation should speak to the need for us to be able to debate it and not to cut off debate.

I could not believe the disdain coming from the government House leader when he effectively said that one of his goals here was to cut off “tub-thumping” speeches. I have already spent dozens of hours reading and analyzing Bill C-51. I come from a background where I know a lot about security law. I will likely not get to speak to this bill. My constituents, and Canadians in general, will not have the benefit of the time I have spent on this and the knowledge I bring to the House in this area. That is a complete travesty and an affront to democracy.

A further affront that I see is that the government House leader is taking these questions, not the minister, who should be here to defend the bill. We all know, and we have already seen, that he does not even understand his own bill. It has been a travesty, listening to the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, whose bill this is, when it is as clear as day that they do not know their own bill. Personally, I doubt that the minister has even read the entirety of his bill.

The time has come to speak up for what the government is doing to our democracy. It is not just one more affront in one more bill, it is undermining our entire parliamentary democracy on one of the most important bills to come before the House in the three years since I have been here.

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

Mr. Speaker, this is the 88th time the government has imposed time allocation on a bill. It is really a sad record for the Conservative government. When the Conservatives announced Bill C-51, they promised that we would have enough time to debate and study at length this immense bill and its very serious repercussions for Canada.

Why did the government break its promise to give us enough time to properly study and debate this bill in the House?

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I know we're combining a couple of conversations, but I'm not sure if Mr. Saxton heard when I initially introduced this that an incredibly similar but not identical motion has been moved at the public safety committee, which will be dealing concurrently with C-51 when it leaves the House. We don't have a sense from the government if that's going under time allocation, but it's been imagined today already. So that committee is dealing with the broader aspects of terrorism and terrorist financing. It seems like a natural fit to a committee that's already engaged in changing Canadian law around terrorism and anti-terrorism measures.

The Governor of the Bank of Canada did do a study on this and then acted. That was part of the point. The bank surprisingly lowered the lending rate, which was surprising to the markets. No one predicted it. If the finance department is studying this, one wonders why it isn't also engaged in studying terrorism financing, if that's the first priority.

I'm a bit befuddled, Mr. Chair. It's a bit of a strange moment, I suppose, when it's New Democrats who are asking to study the economy, particularly the impacts on the oil sector, which we think is very important, and we have Conservative colleagues across the way saying it's not as important. I suppose it's just a moment in time for the dynamic of this government, which spent a great deal of energy, effort, and time talking about oil in particular and the economy at large. This is a motion that we are willing to amend. However, simply saying that others are doing the work.... Again, I'm glad for the government's new-found enthusiasm for the Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, and not seeing them in court maybe on their particular assessment of the economy.

My point is this. If there is a reason why, and the government says it has new coherence and understanding about what the impact of low oil is on the Canadian economy, I would love to see it.

I think this is exactly what the finance committee should be doing. I think this is what Canadians would be looking for us to do, and if we're able to have an undertaking of terrorist financing, which is an important issue for all Canadians, done at the committee that is dealing with terrorism issues, then it's complementary, certainly.

I would urge the government again to rethink its stated position on this, and there is give-and-take that happens at committee. We are spending four days on the renminbi. That was something of the government's interest. We've had this throughout the history of this committee. This is an important issue to study. This is an important issue, I would assume, for government members to understand, as well.

I'll end on this, Mr. Chair. I truly want to know what the impact is on the manufacturing sector of an 80¢ dollar. Are we picking up the gravitational pull from a helpful U.S. economy that's performing GDP-wise at twice or so the rate that we are, or are we not? We had some significant manufacturing losses. Are those losses being picked up? We are hearing conflicting signals from some in the manufacturing sector as to whether this is good or not and whether they are going to replace some of those jobs. We've seen recent reports out of Alberta and some of the other provinces impacted by oil prices that the housing market is being impacted. How?

I dare say that nobody around this table fully understands and appreciates what that impact is on the Canadian economy. If the next election, and what we're engaged in, is about the economy, which everyone tells us, then why not understand it? Why not get to this motion? Why not simply accept it? Again, we are open to amendments. We are open to a focused debate on this.

I want to say one last thing. I was given some concern that this motion had been discussed and issues had been discussed. I'll note that the finance minister's letter to us was also given to the National Post to ensure there was some public commentary on this before the committee had a chance to review it. It's somewhat concerning to me and some others that, after being so properly chastised by some of my colleagues across the way, the next thing the government did was send its intentions for this committee out to the public through a national newspaper. There we have it; do as I say, not as I do.

Bill C-51—Notice of time allocation motion

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to advise that agreements could not be reached under the provisions of Standing Order 78(1) or 78(2) with respect to the second reading stage of Bill C-51, an act to enact the security of Canada information sharing act and the secure air travel act, to amend the Criminal Code, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts.

Under the provisions of Standing Order 78(3), I give notice that a minister of the crown will propose at the next sitting a motion to allot a specific number of days or hours for the consideration and disposal of proceedings at the said stage.

Anti-terrorism Act, 2015

[Peter MacKay, Conservative, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise and take part in what is obviously a very important debate on Bill C-51, the government's comprehensive counterterrorism package. This bill, which is titled the anti-terrorism act, 2015, deals, first and foremost, with public safety and efforts by our government to embrace methods that would improve and enhance safety for all Canadians.

The bill builds upon concrete legislative steps this government has already taken to combat terrorism, including through the Combating Terrorism Act, the Nuclear Terrorism Act of 2013, as well as more recent proposals found in Bill C-44, the protection of Canada from terrorists act. Therefore, members can see there is a litany of legislative action already demonstrated by this government.

We can make no mistake about it, these are real dangers, not theoretical or hypothetical scenarios. As we have seen in places like Paris, Australia, Brussels, and in Canada, these acts have deadly effects. This is why there is simply no denying the existence of the threat and the necessity to take practical steps to improve the way in which our security forces operate, coordinate and respond to acts of terrorism. This is also to increase our capacity to learn from international examples. The ability for CSIS to operate outside of our borders is the security capacity that is found in most of our allies, certainly most of our Five Eyes partners.

The government is involved in broad-based efforts to counter domestic and international terrorism in order to protect our country, our citizens and our interest in our allies. This is consistent with our counterterrorism strategy, which is to build resilience against terrorism. Therefore, clearly working through partnerships, including with all levels of government and community leaders, is key to effectively implementing this strategy.

As the Speaker may know and members may be aware, we have an outreach effort at the Department of Justice that involves a cultural round table where we regularly consult and receive input from various communities around the country. This is an effective way to gain insight and understanding of how Canadians perceive this issue of terrorism.

As well as implementing this strategy, we are including our efforts to counter violent extremism. Engaging with the cross-cultural round tables on security-related issues is of great benefit in getting the balance right. There is also significant collaboration with international partners in addressing the terrorist threat.

As the Minister of Justice, I am responsible for ensuring that Canada's laws remain robust, fair and just. This is particularly important in the area of criminal law. Canada, like its friends and allies, must ensure that our laws remain responsive and effective in combatting the scourge of terrorism, while at the same time ensuring our laws respect our fundamental rights and freedoms.

Bill C-51 contains a suite of criminal law reforms that will do just that by amending the Criminal Code to strengthen terrorism recognizance with conditions and peace bond provisions; create a new criminal offence for abdicating or promoting the commission of terrorism offences in general; provide courts with the powers to seize, forfeit and remove terrorist propaganda, including from web sites located inside our borders; and to better protect individuals participating in national security proceedings and prosecutions.

These steps, in addition to those discussed earlier by my colleague the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, will go a long way to closing any real or perceived gaps in our ability to respond to terrorist acts.

I would like to take a closer look at each of the four pillars of criminal law reform in this bill. However, I would like to begin by pointing out that these four pillars of reform have common denominators.

The Criminal Code reforms individually and collectively seek to provide law enforcement agencies with appropriate tools to thwart the activities of terrorists who actively engage in terrorism. Within these reforms, and with these in place, police officers will now be able to intervene sooner, more effectively, and achieve better results before the matters get more serious. This aims to provide our protection for all Canadians through enabling the police to pre-empt and prevent acts of terrorism.

I want to emphasize here that judicial oversight is the backbone of these criminal reforms consistent with Canada's values and principles, including, as the Supreme Court of Canada has often repeated and I will emphasize again today, the values of democracy, constitutionalism and the rule of law. This is the type of oversight that should provide considerable comfort and relief to those who have criticized the bill at its early stage.

I would suggest that this type of insight that comes from the courts in enabling our security agents to make those types of interventions prior to acts of terrorism is at the very crux of what we are attempting to do. It is not just to be responsive; it is to be pre-emptive in protecting Canadians from acts of terrorism.

The first area of criminal law reform found in Bill C-51 would strengthen the existing provisions on the recognizance with conditions and terrorism peace bonds contained in sections 83.3 and 810.01, respectively, of the Criminal Code. Let me go further. This Criminal Code recognizance with conditions is already a tool that can be used. It is designed to disrupt and prevent terrorist activity from occurring in the first place. For example, this provision allows a peace officer, with the consent of the Attorney General, a prosecutor acting with delegated authority, to bring an individual before the court with evidence to determine whether there are sufficient grounds to require the individual to abide by specific conditions designed to prevent terrorist activity from occurring.

It bears noting that the individual in question would not necessarily be the person who might carry out that activity. In other words, the person could be a party to the offence or enabling the offence. It is important to note here that the provisions currently require that the court be satisfied that there are reasonable grounds to believe that a terrorism activity will occur and that there be reasonable grounds to suspect that the recognizance with conditions is necessary to prevent that activity from occurring.

To move to the reforms, those introduced in section 83.3 of the Criminal Code found in Bill C-51 would lower the threshold required to obtain the recognizance from reasonable grounds to believe that terrorist activity will be carried out to the test of may be carried out. This threshold is also lowered from reasonable grounds to suspect that conditions are necessary to prevent the carrying out of the terrorist activity to are likely to prevent the carrying out of the terrorist activity.

These changes have the practical effect of making it easier to disrupt terrorist plans before they are executed. Therefore, going before a judge and making the case, based on evidence collected, that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the terrorist activity may be carried out lowers the threshold, thus allowing police to act more efficiently and, in many cases, quicker.

In the bill, our government would also increase the possible maximum period of preventive detention from a total of three days to seven days, with safeguards, including periodic judicial review of the detention, to ensure that it is still required. Again, if we look at international examples, in the United Kingdom, it is twice that period of detention. As it currently stands in Canada, it is three days. We would extend that to allow the police agencies to ensure that they are doing everything in their power to prevent the terrorist act from occurring on Canadian soil.

The bill, through the Criminal Code, would also provide similar measures with respect to preventing the commission of terrorist offences. Terrorism peace bonds, as we know, are preventive tools used to disrupt and prevent individuals from committing terrorism offences. Peace bonds and recognizance are used in the domestic criminal justice system as well, but here there are specific provisions found in this bill that expand the use of recognizance and peace bonds. An application to impose a peace bond can be brought even where there has been no criminal charge or no prior conviction, but enables a judge to impose any reasonable conditions in order to prevent the commission of an offence.

What we are talking about here is enabling the judiciary, the police and the prosecution, to put in place preventive measures, such as requiring the person to forfeit their passports, requiring them to report to police or authorities, or staying away from certain individuals, staying away from certain public places, for example, like a military base.

All of these might be seen as extraordinary in normal circumstances, but I would suggest that in the context of this entire debate, we are talking about an elevated threat assessment based on what occurred here in October, 2014, based on what is happening around the world and based on the assessment of our security forces. These are practical steps that allow our security forces, with judicial oversight, to take preventative steps.

Currently, the Criminal Code provides that any person who fears on reasonable grounds that the individual will commit a terrorism offence, with the consent of the attorney general or a prosecutor in his or her stead, can apply to the court to have a terrorism peace bond imposed requiring the individual to keep the peace and be of good behaviour, or to comply with any other reasonable condition that the court believes necessary to ensure their good conduct, some of the provisions I mentioned. These conditions can be for a period of up to one year or, in the case of a person who has previously been convicted of a terrorism offence, up to two years.

These amendments would strengthen the terrorism peace bond by lowering the threshold to obtain that peace bond to where a person believed an individual “may” commit a terrorism offence, instead of the current “will” commit a terrorism offence. The bill would extend the duration of a terrorism peace bond from two to five years for those previously convicted of a terrorism offence.

More generally, in respect of both recognizance conditions and terrorism peace bond conditions, the bill would authorize the imposition of sureties, which is someone who agrees to take the responsibility of ensuring that the person subject to the court order complies with the conditions imposed. The bill would also require judges to specifically consider the desirability of imposing geographic limitations. I mentioned earlier surrendering passports or other conditions that the judge deems appropriate.

Moreover, these reforms would increase the penalty for breaches of these court ordered conditions from two to four years of imprisonment, consistent with similar conditions imposed found in Bill C-26, the tougher penalties for child predators act.

Finally, I suggest that these reforms would have the added benefit of improving the efficiency and effectiveness of recognizance with conditions and peace bonds across the country by allowing for the use of video conferencing when necessary and interprovincial transfers of any peace bonds on the consent of the appropriate attorney general.

The proposed reform with respect to recognizance with conditions and recognizance to keep the peace relating to a terrorist offence would also apply to adolescents in accordance with the Youth Criminal Justice Act.

In short, the proposed amendments, which I have just referred to and described, seek to facilitate the use of the provisions to make them easier to obtain and to make them more effective in preventing terrorism, all with the backdrop of judicial oversight.

It is important to emphasize that the improvements we want to make to our terrorism prevention tools are compatible with what like-minded countries have in place.

For example, the United Kingdom uses similar measures to protect the public by subjecting individuals believed to pose a threat to public safety to conditions.

Australia also uses these control orders to prevent terrorist acts from occurring, which is to help enable the imposition of conditions on individuals. It is important because it shows that countries with strong democratic conditions, such as ours, and strong institutions which respect the rule of law, like ours, have also recognized that they can take measures that are firm in their response to terrorism, but fair in their approach to citizens, respecting the rights of those who are subject to these preventative tools.

Let us remind ourselves again of what we are trying to prevent: mass casualties, attacks on our institutions and the planting of bombs. What we see in other countries on the nightly news is no longer something that we are protected from merely because of our geography.

There are individuals who have sworn to cause us harm and who continue to make very pointed and prescribed threats against Canadian citizens. That is the backdrop in which we must remind ourselves this bill is rooted.

I pause here to emphasize that we are mindful of the concerns expressed by many stakeholders about these changes. Some have suggested that these proposals pose an unjustified and unnecessary infringement on fundamental charter rights. In response, I would note that there are many safeguards associated with the tools I have just described. I mentioned judicial oversight, the discretion exercised by our judiciary, and the requirement of the Attorney General's consent in their use. We have prosecutors now specifically trained in the use and application of this type of legislation.

In addition, there are reports to Parliament from our security agencies that refer specifically to recognizance with conditions. In addition, there is the requirement of a mandatory parliamentary review in 2018 and a sunset clause with respect to the recognizance with conditions I mentioned. This would all result in an ability to have eyes on and insight into the way the legislation would be applied.

Let us remember the objective of these tools: namely, the imposition of reasonable conditions on persons by the courts with a view to preventing terrorism activity and the commission of terrorism offences.

Our government takes the position that these measures are necessary to protect public safety. They are not to be used arbitrarily, and they are based on genuine concerns that put the public at risk.

The second area of the Criminal Code reform contained in Bill C-51, which would indicate a new indictable offence for advocating or promoting the commission of terrorism offences in general, is again an area of the law we think is necessary.

[Bruce Hyer, Green, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as a former adjudicator myself, I am quite alarmed by Bill C-51. It is not, in my opinion, primarily directed against terrorism. Let us look the definition of “illegality”: “activities that undermine the security of Canada”. That is so vague and broad that it could apply to nearly any action taken in an act of non-violent civil disobedience or to groups even considering such actions. Maybe a better name for the bill would have been “an act to monitor and suppress the raging grannies”.

My question for the hon. member is this: what would stop the bill from being used against philosophical and political enemies of the party in power?

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with care to the member for Papineau's address on Bill C-51 and I am still having trouble making sense out of the position he has taken.

It is the primary duty of members of this House to give a full and complete review of bills and to stand up to bad bills, especially those bills that threaten basic rights and freedoms. The member for Papineau has said, “Yes, the bill is flawed, but even if the amendments aren't accepted, we're going to vote for this bill anyway.” It is very hard for me to understand when he calls for a review three years down the road. What about ensuring that the review happens now, before this bad legislation is passed? I simply cannot understand where the member is coming from in offering a blank cheque to the Conservatives on this bill.