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.

Report Stage

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I know that many who are currently heckling me were not here in the 41st Parliament, but I can assure them that we had no time to turn around before there was yet another time allocation motion. The Conservatives broke through all historical records. However, this does not excuse the Liberals for doing the same thing.

I would urge members on both sides of the House to consider what we really want in terms of parliamentary decorum and in terms of being able to address bills and get them through the House in an expeditious way while also ensuring that we do not trample on the rights of each of us here as members of Parliament to do the work we were elected to do, which is to study the legislation, provide suggestions, work together, and produce what the people of Canada want. They want parliamentarians who see the big picture and are prepared to put their heads together to come up with better legislation by taking the time that is needed.

Time allocation is in no one's interest here. I very much regret that the current government has brought it in now, for the ninth time. Again, for those who live in glass houses, I will remind them that it was 100 times that time allocation was brought in during the 41st Parliament.

I urge the Liberals in this place to consider what the threshold is against which they strive to achieve their goals. I would urge them not to think that their goal is to be better on any issue—the environment, climate, the treatment of veterans, criminal justice, Bill C-51, parliamentary decorum, the use of time allocation—than what Prime Minister Harper did. I want to set a really ambitious goal for them: Do better than what Prime Minister Mulroney did.

Obviously, I did not agree with everything done by the Progressive Conservative majority back in the 1980s, but I think if members go back and look at the use of time allocation, the number of whipped votes, and the treatment of issues and use that as a benchmark, they will find that they have to set their sights a good deal higher than trying to do better than the prime minister in the 41st Parliament.

Turning to the specifics of Bill C-26, I wish it did include—

Freedom of the Press

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Mr. Speaker, those journalists were on the Hill today calling for a full public inquiry.

The government has no right to spy on journalists, period. The Liberals are all talk and no action. They refused to conduct a public inquiry. They refused to repeal Bill C-51 and they refused to fix Bill C-22.

What concrete measures are the Liberals going to take to protect freedom of the press in Canada?

Privacy

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am proud to stand here as a New Democrat. New Democrats have often brought truth to the powers that be, whether on climate change, on rights, or on a number of different things that have taken place in this chamber, and moved a number of causes. Cybersecurity, privacy rights, personal rights, and of course user rights are very important for our future.

I am not pleased to hear the response, in the sense that we know Bill C-51 has exposed so many Canadians to personal privacy data breach. Most recently, journalists have been spied on in our country, so we need this issue very sincerely looked at immediately. It needs to protect personal privacy and it needs to make sure there will be accountability to the government resources and those that expose or use the data.

Most important, it is part of our individual collective freedom in a civil society that we actually have the rights and our information protected at all times.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his question regarding Canada’s privacy laws and the challenges faced by law enforcement in an era where communications technologies are changing rapidly. As the hon. member knows, these are important issues.

On the one hand, our law enforcement and national security agencies need to be able to collect information and evidence to investigate crimes and protect our national security. At the same time, we must ensure that the authorities that we give these agencies are consistent with our values and our rights and freedoms as set out in the charter.

As well, it is vitally important that the government work with the private sector to ensure that organizations take appropriate steps to protect the information that they receive from Canadians.

That is why the government has launched two sets of consultations. The first set of consultations on cybersecurity was launched on August 16. As hon. members know, the cybersecurity landscape is constantly evolving, and our government is committed to ensuring that Canada is an innovative leader in cybersecurity while also keeping Canadians safe online.

We heard from thousands of Canadians on the cyber security threat and how we can capitalize on the advantages of new technologies and the digital economy. That consultation wrapped up recently, and Public Safety is analyzing the many submissions.

The second set of consultations on national security was launched by both the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness on September 8. These consultations are an invaluable opportunity to engage Canadians on Canada's national security framework. They are an important step toward fulfilling this government's commitment to review Bill C-51, the Anti-terrorism Act, 2015.

As part of the consultations on national security, we have invited Canadians to provide feedback on a number of different issues, including how best to ensure that our law enforcement and national security agencies have the tools they need to protect Canadians while simultaneously ensuring that Canadians' rights, including privacy rights, are protected.

We are also inviting Canadians to provide their thoughts on how we can ensure that our national security agencies are accountable to Canadians, and a range of other issues.

We have already begun to make important changes in this regard with the introduction of Bill C-22, the national security and intelligence committee of parliamentarians act. If passed, Bill C-22 would, for the first time, enable parliamentarians to meaningfully review the activities of our national security agencies.

The Government of Canada has two fundamental duties: to protect the safety and security of Canadians, and to uphold the Constitution to ensure that our laws respect the rights and personal freedoms we enjoy in this country.

I look forward to a diverse and vigorous debate on these issues. I hope that hon. members of this House will join Canadians in participating in these important consultations.

Opposition Motion—Preferential access to government

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Mr. Speaker, seeing the Liberals tripping over themselves to avoid the real question, it makes me wonder if they even read the motion. Allow me to read it:

That, in the opinion of the House, the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner should be granted the authority to oversee and enforce the directives to Ministers listed in Open and Accountable Government in order to end the current practice of “cash-for-access” by ensuring there is no preferential access to government, or appearance of preferential access, accorded to individuals or organizations because they have made financial contributions to politicians or political parties.

It is quite easy to understand why people want to make this real, because it is one of the things the government promised.

You might recall, Mr. Speaker, because I am sure you went through it like we did, that the Liberals promised real change. Unfortunately now, in their second year and listening to the answers today, we realize that there is nothing real and there has been no change.

Here is the reality. Yesterday I asked a simple question of the Prime Minister, quoting his own document. I will read it, word for word. The Prime Minister wrote in the mandate letter of every one of his ministers the following:

...you must uphold the highest standards of honesty and impartiality.... This is an obligation that is not fully discharged by simply acting within the law.

Now we have just heard the deputy House leader in his 20-minute speech and his 10-minute Q and A, say about 50 times that they are acting within the law, but that is not what the Prime Minister promised Canadians. The deputy House leader talked about openness, accountability, but he was evading the real issue. Are they respecting what the Prime Minister said was the higher standard that his government would be held to?

Those questions remain wholly unanswered. There are other sections in what the Prime Minister published that are worth repeating, such as, “Ministers and parliamentary secretaries must avoid conflict of interest”, which should go without saying, “the appearance of conflict of interest and situations that have the potential to involve conflicts of interest”, or favouritism.

He goes on, “Ministers and Parliamentary Secretaries must ensure that political fundraising activities or considerations do not affect, or appear to affect, the exercise of their official duties or the access of individuals or organizations to government.” We are talking about big, rich companies like Apotex, and we know Apotex' sad history of being involved in fundraising for the Liberal Party, 1-800-Joe Volpe.

There should be no preferential access to government or appearance of preferential access accorded to individuals or organizations because they have made financial contributions to politicians and political parties.

To listened to the Liberals say today that these are things that anybody can pay $5 and just walk into. The problem is that it costs $1,500 and it is being held behind closed doors in an elite law office in downtown Toronto. That is the problem. When I asked the Prime Minister yesterday, when I quoted his own words to him that “you must uphold the highest standards of honesty and impartiality”, and “This is an obligation not fully discharged by simply acting within the law”, I asked a simple, one sentence question: what did he mean by that?

I feel like George Carlin, who used to read the tax act to get laughs. I will read the Prime Minister's answer, which is a masterwork of equivocation and has nothing whatsoever to do with the question I asked him, which was about what he meant by this higher standard. I will read it word for word, because we cannot make this stuff up.

He said, “Mr. Speaker, after 10 years of a government that did not do a good job of living up to Canadians' expectations”. What does that have to do with what he told Canadians? For somebody who said he had a higher standard, he seems to have a lot of trouble explaining it.

He went on, “we know people needed and wanted a government that was more open, transparent,” and this is my favourite part, “and mostly accessible. That is exactly what we have been in terms of pre-budget consultations that the minister has done”. Talk about obfuscation. He is trying to hint that a pay-for-play fundraiser at $1,500 a head in a private law office in downtown Toronto is actually a consultation.

That is amusing, because for the last budget, for the first time in memory, the government failed to include the opposition parties in its pre-budget consultations. I would dare say that if the Conservatives had ever dared exclude the opposition parties from a pre-budget consultation, they would have been up in arms in the Liberal Party, and they would have had half the press gallery piling on with them.

They got away with it. It was amazing. It was the first time in living memory that a government that says it is open and transparent held private consultations heading into the budget. Maybe it means it. Maybe it actually believes that we can have a consultation in an elite law firm behind closed doors. That is not my definition of consultation, and I suspect that it is also not the definition most Canadians have of consultation.

Let us continue with the Prime Minister's non-answer, shall we?

That is exactly what we have been in terms of pre-budget consultations that the minister has done, in terms of consultations that we have done right across the country, and been roundly criticized for talking too much with Canadians, for listening too much to Canadians.

What does that have to do with anything we were discussing yesterday? We were discussing his own words, that their obligations are “not fully discharged by simply acting within the law”. They were going to be held to a higher standard.

He skated around it:

We have demonstrated a level of openness and accountability that no government up until ours has ever had, and we are proud of that.

I learned in law school that one of the best ways to win an argument is to make concessions. I will make a concession to the Liberal Party. In terms of PR, in terms of coming up with words the Liberals keep repeating that somehow sink in, they are quite good. It is when we spend a little bit of time peeling away—it is like peeling an onion, because we start to cry when we realize just how vapid it is, how vacuous it is—that we realize that this is all it is. It is sloganeering. It is words for the sake of words. It is totally empty.

That is what the Prime Minister showed when he could not answer in his own words yesterday. What did he mean when he said that it is not enough to obey the law? I just read his answer word for word. As I said, we cannot make this stuff up. That is exactly what the Prime Minister said.

This is what we have been seeing with the Liberal government since it got here.

I know that a lot of young people voted for the Liberals because they promised that they were going to legalize pot once they were elected.

We said that there was one thing they could do right away, which was decriminalize it, because nobody, given the fact that we are heading in that direction, should ever have a criminal record that will affect the rest of their lives for possession of a small amount of pot for personal use.

The Liberals are now in their second year. Do members know what the answer has been from the former chief of police of Toronto? No action. Thousands upon thousands of mostly young Canadians will have criminal records that will hobble them for the rest of their careers in terms of travel, in terms of job opportunities. That is a broken promise that is going to affect lives. Pigheadedly, they still will not say whether they will accept having a full pardon for people who were convicted for that alone.

It is the same sort of thing. On fundraising, they said they were going to do better.

The Liberals promised that they would be beyond reproach when it comes to political financing. They drafted stricter rules, which I just read. It is not enough to obey the law, they must uphold a higher standard. However, we heard the complete opposite from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons. In his speech, he said about 50 times that they were acting according to the letter of the law. That is not what the Prime Minister promised. This ambiguity is a way to dodge the promises they made to Canadians in this area. There are many more promises, however, and I think it is worth going over them.

On electoral reform, they promised that they would listen to Canadians. Ninety per cent of the Canadian experts they heard from said that they wanted a system based on proportional representation.

In an article by Hélène Buzzetti that appeared in Le Devoir, the Prime Minister said that he believed it was necessary to reform our electoral system because it had resulted in the Harper government. Now that “Mr. Sunshine” is in power, he thinks that it may no longer be necessary to reform our electoral system. If this system elected him, why on earth would we have to change a thing?

It is mind-boggling that a government has the gall to present itself as an agent of change and then, when elected, starts breaking such important promises.

On climate change, who would have thought it? I was there in Paris at the climate conference almost exactly a year ago. I saw our newly minted Prime Minister throw his arms wide open and say, “Canada is back”, to thundering silence in a room of people scratching their heads thinking they did not know we had ever left. He said that everything was going to be different from now on, different until the day he reappeared to say that now that he thought about it, Stephen Harper's climate change plan was all he had. It is the same plan, the same targets, the same timelines.

It is interesting, because yesterday, out of nowhere, the head of the Treasury Board stood up and said that we have a new target. It is 40% for 2030. Really? Can we see the economy-wide plan, which is precisely what article 4, paragraph 4 of the Paris Agreement says we have to have? Nothing.

I was there in Montreal in 2005 when the former Liberal minister, today the international affairs minister, said he had a plan. The plan was called the one-tonne challenge.

Why did the Liberals at the time have to say that it was up to individual Canadians to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by one tonne? The main poster for the whole thing was someone turning off the lights, as if that could eliminate one tonne per person in Canada. The Liberals were about 40 million tonnes off what they had promised to do, and that corresponded roughly to about a tonne per Canadian. Therefore, it was not the government's fault, the Liberals' fault, that they had done nothing on climate change. It had to be the fault of Canadians. It was extraordinary as an exercise in public relations.

After the Liberals were defeated, and I will never forget, Eddie Goldenberg, Jean Chrétien's former chief of staff, made an interesting admission, the best form of evidence. He admitted that the Liberals had no plan and no intention of respecting Kyoto. They had signed Kyoto “to galvanize public opinion”. What was he saying? It was an exercise in public relations to have signed Kyoto.

Now, I will never agree with the Conservatives for having made us the only country in the world to withdraw from Kyoto, but I will say that at least the Conservatives were telling Canadians that they did not believe in climate change and that they were going to withdraw from Kyoto. The Liberals, on the other hand, were going to fake it. When they could not do it, because they did not have a plan and did not do it, they were going to say it was the fault of Canadians and that it was up to Canadians to come up with a solution. This time it is the exact same thing.

We will increase our greenhouse gases every year of this first and last mandate of the current Liberal government. The reason we will do that is that they still have no plan. They promised a carbon tax for 2018 knowing full well that the statistics for greenhouse gas production for 2018 will only be published in 2020. It will never be measured at the time of the next election. Does this sound familiar? It is a little bit like our economic update this week. They will let us know in 11 years how we are doing. Really?

Some $15 billion is taken away from what was promised to municipalities and put into a privatization bank. I heard a lot of words from the Prime Minister during the election campaign. Funny, we actually did a scour of everything that was said, but we cannot find the word “privatization” in there anywhere. The Liberals said they were going to build public infrastructure. They never said they were going to sell public infrastructure.

On health care, it is the same thing. There is a reduction from a 6% escalator to 3%. That will gravely affect the provinces' ability to deliver health care. The Liberals pretend that they are going to dictate to the provinces precisely what areas they are going to concentrate in. However, the government delivers health care in three areas: in penitentiaries, to the Armed Forces, and on first nation reserves. With a track record like that, it should be a little bit more modest before it pretends that it can dictate to the provinces what they are doing right and wrong in health care.

On labour rights, my favourite part, the Liberals have new buddies in the labour movement. They stand there and emote with them. We saw last week some young people turning their backs, with good reason.

We presented anti-scab legislation. My colleague, the member of Parliament for Jonquière, stood up and presented anti-scab legislation, which is the basic underpinning of any real system of negotiation of collective agreements. The Liberals stood up and voted against it. That is the real Liberal track record on labour rights, and we have to debunk that one as well.

Oh, but can they emote. They can emote about human rights and Canada's role in the world. What we see them actually doing is selling thousands of armoured personnel carriers to one of the most gruesome, repressive regimes on the planet earth, Saudi Arabia. We have films of Saudi Arabia using exactly that type of equipment on civilian populations. We know that military equipment that came from Canada is being used against civilians. We know that Raif Badawi's family, his wife and three children, are in Sherbrooke at the same time the same Saudi government is going to recommence torturing that man, because he dares have an opinion on anything. That is Saudi Arabia. That is the best friend of the current government that claims to be all about human rights around the world.

It is the same government that is negotiating an extradition treaty with China, where there is no rule of law and no independent tribunal and where people are executed and tortured, according to the world's most credible groups, like Democracy Watch and Amnesty International. That is the reality of the Liberals with regard to human rights. Forget about the talking points. Forget about the public relations. That is who they are.

Regarding first nations, there is money missing from the budget, of course, for first nations education. This week, we put forth a motion calling on the Liberals to come up with the $155 million that was ordered by the courts. There are three compliance orders by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. We are not talking about our opinion versus their opinion. This is the courts ordering them to spend it.

I will never forget the Liberal member of Parliament for Spadina—Fort York standing up here in the House of Commons and attacking us for coming up with that motion to put that money into those health and social services for first nations children, and then he voted for it. Go figure.

Maybe the House leader is actually going to stand up and vote for our motion. That would be a problem in and of itself, because that would mean that this motion is going to be like all the other things they have talked about. It is going to get flushed into this bottomless Liberal pit of broken promises.

With regard to gender equality, it is the same thing. They will get to it. It has only been 25 years since the courts ordered the government to provide real gender equity for women in this country, but the Liberals always have a talking point on that. They will talk about what they did when they named the government last year. That has nothing to do with how women who actually work in the federal government are treated. The Liberals voted with the Conservatives to impose penalties on any union that would defend gender equality in this country. That is the real track record of the Liberals.

Directly related to what we are living this week, with the police surveillance of journalists, is Bill C-51. During the campaign, the Liberal leader swore up and down that it would be a top priority to fix Bill C-51, which is an egregious, unprecedented assault on the individual privacy rights and freedoms of Canadians. So far, the Liberals have done sweet nothing.

Is it the most transparent government in the history of Canada? We asked the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness how many journalists are under surveillance by the RCMP or CSIS. He did not answer. In Quebec, there is a royal commission of inquiry, because it has been found out that not only did the Montreal police spy on journalists but the SQ did the same thing. The Quebec government immediately ordered a royal commission of inquiry.

There is preening, posing, pretending, and no action. However, the Liberals get the title. They say that the Prime Minister is thinking about it, hoping that this will go away like everything else. That is the reality of the Liberals. As for real change, that is malarkey. It is the same old Liberals on fundraising, which is what we are discussing today, and on all these other issues we have talked about.

The Liberals talk about having reduced taxes for some Canadians and having increased them for the one per cent. In fact, the Liberals are taking the money from the one per cent and giving it to the Liberal Party, because every single one of those donations gets a tax return. Whenever Apotex and all those bigwigs stand behind closed doors in an elite law firm, know one thing. It is not just their money; it is taxpayers' money, and that is why the government has to respect its undertaking to be clear with the public.

Budget Implementation Act, 2016, No. 2

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to take the floor on the budget implementation bill, since it gives me the opportunity to speak to the shortcomings or errors that the government has made in its budget. There are many of them, and I would like to talk about those that are related to the issues I represent for the NDP, namely public safety and infrastructure. Naturally, I will also be talking about the repercussions of the Liberal government’s decisions on the lives of the people in our communities and in my riding.

First of all, I would like to talk about Bill C-51. This is not a budgetary measure in itself, but it grants budgets to the various committees that oversee the national security agencies. I am referring in particular to the SIRC, which reviews the activities of CSIS and, in certain circumstances, of the RCMP. But it primarily monitors those of CSIS, which has always experienced difficulties with its operating budget.

In the 2015-2016 budget, before the Liberals came to power and while the Conservatives were still in power, the budget of the committee that monitors the activities of CSIS was increased, after the population had expressed its opposition to the passage of Bill C-51.

However, in the last budget tabled by the Liberals, last spring, there was a decrease of $2.5 million per year in this budget, spread over the years ahead. Coming from a party that said it wanted to address the shortcomings in Bill C-51 and increase transparency and oversight, this is totally unacceptable.

Considering the size of the budget of a country such as Canada, that $2.5 million may not look like much, but I am going to demonstrate the consequences of this change for the committee that provides oversight of CSIS. It is the equivalent of 11 full-time positions that will be lost. And those are not receptionists or people who fetch coffee: they are high-level analysts who look into CSIS activities.

If the government really wanted to increase transparency and oversight, it would not confine itself to half measures, and it would not reverse course and cut the budget of a group of experts that already exists to provide oversight of those agencies.

Moreover, it is important to note that these budget cuts are taking place in a context where CSIS is using the powers it was granted by Bill C-51. Therefore, on one hand, those powers are being used, which is very worrisome—our colleagues are well aware of our position on that bill—and on the other hand, cuts are being made to the budget of the only committee that currently exists to oversee CSIS’s activities, pending the establishment of a committee of parliamentarians.

I am sure I can anticipate the government’s response on this issue. It is the response that the minister gave me in committee. He told us not to worry, because they were going to strike a committee of parliamentarians. That is fine, and that is why we supported the bill at second reading. We also plan to propose some amendments to address a few of its serious deficiencies.

However, let’s be clear: all the experts we heard in committee as part of our study on national security and the study of Bill C-22 that begins today have told us that the committee of parliamentarians could not exist in a vacuum.

Independent experts are needed to provide oversight and review in partnership with the committee of parliamentarians. However, the government is in the process of slashing the budget of an existing independent oversight agency. That is completely unacceptable.

Since we are talking about public safety, we also need to raise the issue of the ability of the police to do their job. For us, at the federal level, that means the RCMP. By focusing all of our efforts on preventing terrorism, we are ignoring a number of other areas.

In the last Parliament, budget cuts were made to the Eclipse squad, and we saw the impact that had on cities such as Montréal, with the proliferation of street gangs and the radicalization of youth. We have to be honest: radicalization is not just about religion. The aim is not to profile a single community. Radicalization takes many forms. It involves young people, sometimes street gangs, and sometimes extreme right-wing groups. We are well aware that our police services lack resources, and we are not taking these other factors seriously when we focus on a single threat. It is not me saying this, it is the RCMP commissioner.

In committee, we asked the RCMP commissioner whether we were neglecting other types of threats by focusing on the terrorist threat. He replied that that was quite true. For example, the RCMP no longer pays enough attention to organized crime. That is not the fault of the men and women who work for the RCMP; it is due to the lack of resources. It is a negative trend that started under the previous government and is continuing under the Liberal government.

I also want to talk about infrastructure, another topic that has raised some very serious concerns over the past few weeks. We are seeing this government's true colours when it comes to investing in infrastructure.

During the election campaign, the Liberals promised that they would take a progressive approach to infrastructure. They said that they would work with the provinces and municipalities by investing, spending, and running a deficit. That is nice, but we are starting to realize that the government is planning to privatize.

The most glaring example of that is the involvement of Crédit Suisse in the discussions with the Minister of Finance. We know that Crédit Suisse specializes in privatizing airports. I would therefore ask the government to explain to me how it fails to see a conflict in interest when a private company that earns a living privatizing airports is working in close collaboration with the Minister of Finance. We are told not to worry, that there will be no privatization.

As my colleague from Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques put it so well yesterday, this is letting a fox into the henhouse. This is troubling. We saw this tendency with CHUM in Montreal and with Highway 407 in Ontario. These seem to have inspired this government in the development of its infrastructure plan. It is completely unacceptable. We need to stand up and oppose this privatization. This problem is not just about foreign investment and the loss of control over our own infrastructure, which are public at this time, nor about the fact that taxpayers will then be accountable and assume all the risk while private corporations rake in all the profits. It is also about the user-pay principle. We will set up the toll booths, but the profits will go to private companies.

With regard to the Champlain Bridge, my former colleague from Brossard—La Prairie, Hoang Mai, the former members for Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert and Saint-Lambert, as well as my current colleague from Longueuil—Saint-Hubert and I all took a stand against the previous government. It is to the current government's credit that it respected that commitment. There will be no tolls on the Champlain Bridge.

However, if the government decides to sell the bridge to a private company tomorrow, and the company wants to introduce a toll system, that system will benefit only that private company, not Canadian taxpayers. It is completely unacceptable.

The clock is ticking, so I will wrap up with some comments on the local issues I mentioned. The most important issue for the City of Chambly is the dispute between the federal government and the municipalities over payments in lieu of taxes, an issue that has been festering for a very long time. As promised during the last election campaign, I introduced a bill about that as soon as possible after the election. Every year, the City of Chambly has to absorb a $500,000 shortfall because the Liberal government is not honouring its commitment to the municipality to pay its fair share of costs related to the Fort Chambly site. The timing is good because the Liberal candidate set herself up as the great champion of this issue, which I have been fighting for since I was elected in 2011. Of course, that is another broken promise because there is nothing in the budget for it.

That is another battle we still need to fight, and we could go on at length about it, but I see that my time is up, so I will take this opportunity to answer my colleagues' questions.

Freedom of the Press

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this morning we learned that, once again, a La Presse reporter is under police surveillance.

This dredges up memories of a similar incident involving the federal government: a Vice reporter may go to jail for refusing to disclose his sources to the RCMP. With Bill C-51 measures still in effect, journalists and civil liberties groups are worried things could get worse.

Does the government see that there is an urgent need to order the RCMP to honour freedom of the press?

Salaries Act

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am rising today to contribute to the debate on Bill C-24.

I am always interested when governments present bills. We have to understand the motivation of a bill in order to really judge its worth. Part of my comments today are going to be about what I think the motivation for this bill really is, and hopefully in assessing that, we will be able to get a better sense of the worth of the bill.

The government would have us believe that there is an important principle of equality at stake in this bill, but in fact, the bill fails to manifest any greater equality between ministers or between men and women in cabinet, for that matter, than the existing legislative regime. It entrenches an important regional inequality created by the new Liberal government.

In the press release issued by the government when it introduced the bill, it said that the legislation is meant to show that “The Government of Canada is committed to creating a one-tier ministry that recognizes the equality of all Cabinet members.”

That statement strikes me as a little strange. I wonder how many governments regularly issue statements affirming that they do, in fact, value the opinion of the people they put around the cabinet table. I cannot imagine that there are that many. I would think it goes without saying, that if prime ministers put people at the cabinet table, they do in fact value the opinion of those members of cabinet.

I found it passing strange that the government felt the need to let Canadians know that it does actually take cabinet members seriously. In the post-2015 world, I suppose anything really is possible.

In addition to being odd, the statement about a one-tier ministry is also vague. It is not exactly clear in what sense the legislation will make all cabinet ministers equal. For instance, there are a number of ways in which cabinet ministers might be found to be equal or unequal. They might be equal or unequal, as the case may be, with respect to pay, experience, title, resources, competence, and so on.

Some of these things are obviously not fixable by way of legislation and some are. It is clear to me that the bill, obviously, has to deal with those equalities or inequalities that could be established by legislation.

We still have to figure out what exactly is the relevant sense of equality that the government is trying to zero in on here. The kinds of inequalities between ministers that could be addressed through legislation are differences in resources, pay, level of responsibility, and in title. I want to come to those in a little bit.

First, I want to give members some of the context for the bill as I see it, and briefly explain the changes contained in the bill. The origin of the bill goes back to a year ago today, after the election, when the Prime Minister said, about building his cabinet, and having committed in the Liberal platform to include an equal number of women in cabinet.

When he announced the new cabinet, observers quickly noticed that, excluding himself, there were 15 male ministers, 10 female ministers, and 5 female ministers of state to assist other ministers. Ministers of state are not department heads, and before the election received less pay than ministers. This meant that five of the female cabinet members were to be paid less, and enjoy less responsibility than their male colleagues.

Despite having almost, but not quite, achieved his promise of including an equal number of men and women in cabinet, for the benefit of the Prime Minister and other members who may wonder, 16 is not equal to 15. Despite that, he had clearly not achieved gender equality in cabinet.

It is fair to say that this was an embarrassment for the Prime Minister. If he did not feel embarrassed, he probably should have. It was an embarrassment because the Prime Minister showed a lack of competence in simple math, failing to recognize that 16 men is not the same as 15 women, and that it does not balance.

It was also an embarrassment because the Prime Minister, who went out of his way to promote himself as a feminist, filled all his junior cabinet posts with women, thereby creating a gender gap in both pay and responsibility inside his cabinet.

Either that is embarrassing because it exposes a rather superficial feminism, and shows that the Prime Minister is willing to do just enough to get credit for being a feminist and no more, or it is embarrassing because it shows a complete lack of comprehension of the different cabinet posts that were available to him, and the tools that were available to him to build a cabinet. He clearly did not understand, if he was sincere in his feminist intention, the difference between a minister of state and a minister.

It may, in fact, be a bit of both. That would be even more embarrassing. The bill, as it stands, seems to suggest that it is actually a little bit of both. I will get into why.

Consider that the Prime Minister could have avoided this embarrassment by simply adding, or eliminating, one minister of state, and ensuring that those positions were distributed equally between men and women. That would have solved the gender difference in cabinet.

He could also have avoided the embarrassment if he knew his options a little better, and apparently he did, or does, because the bill, I think, adds to the confusion about what the options are for building a cabinet. He could have established, under the authority of the existing Ministries and Ministers of State Act, ministries of state for the five ministers of state. These could have functioned, essentially, as mini-departments resourced by reallocating staff and funds from other departments.

A minister of state responsible for a ministry of state would be the head of that ministry of state and not assigned to assist another minister. Furthermore, under existing legislation, ministers of state responsible for a ministry state are already mandated to receive the same pay as ministers or department heads. That is another way that the Prime Minister could have avoided both the pay gap, and alleviated that gap in responsibility between those positions.

For those keeping score, now, in terms of cabinet positions, I have mentioned three. There are ministers, ministers of state for a ministry of state, and ministers of state to assist.

This bill purports to create a further type of cabinet member, currently referred to in legislation simply as minister. If Bill C-24 were to pass, cabinet members would now be referred to as ministers for a department. Then a new type of minister would be created called ministers for whom a department is designated. Those ministers who are currently ministers of state would be converted to this new kind of minister, minister for whom a department is designated.

Bill C-24 allows that:

The appropriate Minister for a department...may delegate, to a minister in respect of whom that department is designated, any of the appropriate Minister’s powers, duties or functions...A minister in respect of whom a department is designated...may use the services and facilities of that department.

That might sound familiar, because I know all members are very familiar with the Ministries and Ministers of State Act, and they would have noticed, I am sure, that it sounds a lot like section 11 of the Ministries and Ministers of State Act that states that a minister of state to assist:

...shall exercise or perform such of the powers, duties or functions of any minister or ministers having responsibilities for any department or other portion of the federal public administration as may be assigned or transferred to him...shall make use of the services and facilities of the department or portion of the federal public administration concerned.

The language is very similar because the positions, at the end of the day, are very similar. They enjoy a similar level of responsibility, and are resourced in pretty much exactly the same way.

When we read it, it is a little bit like the first time we see an infomercial for a Snuggie, where they are saying, “Here's this blanket, with a lot of great conceptual innovation and new features”. We are sitting there thinking, “Isn't that just a backwards bathrobe, really, made of fleece?” There is this awkward tension where we are thinking, “No, this is not really a new thing, it's just a repackaged old thing, and I've already got one, so I don't need to buy a new one”.

There is no practical difference between ministers of state to assist and ministers for whom a department is designated.

If the government insists on having a new name for the same old thing, I would like to submit a different one. I think ministers formerly known as ministers of state would be a much catchier and probably more to the point title for these new ministers. Perhaps there will be an amendment at committee to that effect.

Bill C-24 is the government's response to the Prime Minister's awkward cabinet launch last fall where he pretty much fell flat on his face, but it is not clear how the bill really fixes anything. We know it is a response to that. We know that is where it comes from. The question is, “Does it fix any of that? Does it actually do the work that the government has identified as needed doing?”

If the idea is simply to close the gender wage gap, needlessly created by the Prime Minister, the bill is unnecessary.

First, the Prime Minister did not have to choose to appoint only women to minister of state positions. The gap could be closed by making more women full ministers and some men ministers of state. That would be fine.

Second, existing legislation allows the government to pay ministers of state the same as ministers. In fact, it has been doing that for years, so legislation is not required to do that.

Third, as I mentioned earlier, the Prime Minister could have created ministries of state out of the resources of existing departments, giving those ministers of state more authority and responsibility within the government and the current legislation would have required that the government pay them the same as ministers, not just choose to, but require them to do so.

If the idea of this bill is to close the gender responsibility gap needlessly created by the Prime Minister when he appointed only women to positions of ministers of state, then the bill is also unnecessary. This, too, could be solved simply by making more women full ministers and some men ministers of state or by establishing ministries of state.

If the idea is to eliminate the difference in administrative responsibility between ministers and in that sense make them equal, then the bill fails to do that, too. There will continue to be a difference between ministers for departments, on the one hand, and ministers of state to assist ministers for whom a department is designated, ministers formerly known as ministers of state or whatever the government ultimately chooses to call them. There is still going to be a real difference of administrative responsibility between those positions. They will not be equal in that sense, so the bill, if that is the point, is a failure.

Keep in mind that what I am trying to do is identify the relevant sense of “equal”, in which this bill would make them equal. As everyone can see, I have given it a lot of thought and I have not been able to come up with anything. I do not think it is because it is there and I cannot find it. I think it is because the conclusion of my study of the bill shows that it is not there.

Moreover, there is nothing wrong with having people at the cabinet table who have different levels of administrative responsibility. When the Prime Minister fell flat on his face in his cabinet unveiling because he did not manage to create gender equality in the cabinet, people were not outraged at the fact that there were ministers of state and ministers. No one said, “I can't believe the ministers aren't equal.” They said, “I can't believe that the Prime Minister, who calls himself a feminist, is not treating female members of the cabinet equally, because he's giving them junior roles in cabinet instead of senior roles in cabinet.” That was the issue. The issue was not that there were legitimate differences in administrative responsibility and corresponding titles. Again, it is not clear what real problem the bill is trying to solve.

The fact that ministers of state do not have a department or are called ministers of state instead of ministers should not detract from their contributions to discussions about war and peace, budgets, or other policy issues around the cabinet table. They are all entitled to sit there and if other cabinet ministers do not take them seriously simply because of their difference in title, that is not a legislative problem, that is a problem in organizational culture, and this bill will not fix that either. That would require real leadership from the Prime Minister.

Somewhere deep down, I think the government actually knows this. That is why it is not repealing the Ministries and Ministers of State Act. It is keeping that option open. In fact, in the speech by the member for Winnipeg North, he made a point of pointing out that the government is not repealing that act. It is keeping the option of ministers of state around.

There is an awkward tension in the principle that it is stating there. On the one hand, the government is saying that there is something wrong with having ministers of state, because that creates an inequality in cabinet. If, in the future of this ministry, the government wants to appoint ministers of state, I think Canadians should rightly say that, by the government's own standards, it has now decided to have inferior cabinet ministers and superior cabinet ministers.

I do not think that would be right, because I think there is a role for legitimate differences in administrative responsibility, but the government is arguing against that and yet not repealing the act, which I find strange. It helps right now to make a grand show of not having ministers of state, because what is driving the bill is this need to make up for and reduce the sense of shame and embarrassment by the Prime Minister for having failed to do something that he said he really wanted to do, which was to bring gender equality to cabinet.

If having ministers of state is not compatible with having a one-tier ministry, and having a one-tier ministry is an important matter of principle for the Liberals, I do not see why they would not just repeal the Ministries and Ministers of State Act, although, for the record, I want to say I think that would be a terrible idea. It is just a logical consequence of the arguments that they have been advancing on Bill C-24.

Interestingly, Liberals are locking in another choice they made: the choice not to have stand-alone ministers for regional economic development. This is another sense of equality we might talk about: regional equality.

Here the government is actually locking in a bad decision that goes hand in hand with the decision it made to centralize the management of the various regional economic development agencies in one minister. That means only one region of the country gets a minister from the region who understands the needs of the region, because he or she, and in this case it is a he, lives there and represents that area. All the other regions do not get that benefit and so they are not being treated equally.

Granted, it is the government's prerogative to experiment with new ways of doing this, but I think it made a poor decision. This kind of centralizing of decision-making for agencies that have a deliberately regional mandate does not make sense and ultimately is not helpful. The government wants to try something new and it is doing that, but I think the government will find that it does not work. Why are the Liberals closing the door behind them and making it harder to go back to a model which I think works better, which is actually having ministers from the regions in charge of the local regional development agencies? Particularly in tough economic times, the government may find in time that it is worth making it a full-time job of a cabinet minister to do that. That is what the government is taking away by doing this and that does not make sense.

The Liberals are leaving their options open with slush ministries or extra ministries that have not been designated yet. They are leaving their options open, even though they are saying there is some matter of principle at stake in not having ministers of state, but they are keeping the act around just in case they want to appoint some anyway. The Liberals embarked on a centralizing experiment when it comes to regional economic development, and they have decided instead to tie their hands. That does not make sense to me. They have their priorities backward.

People in Elmwood—Transcona would prefer to have a minister from western Canada who knows and understands western Canada's economy making the detailed decisions about how the government is going to encourage western economic diversification. I believe that people in other parts of the country feel the same way about their own region. The government should leave itself with more options, not less, when it comes to managing regional economic development. The government is creating three as yet unspecified ministries in the name of flexibility, so why not retain the flexibility it already has with respect to regional economic development?

Where does this leave us? It seems to me this bill was drafted by the minister's personal communications team with the full dearth of understanding of legislative and parliamentary process that that implies. The bill is not really about furthering any principle of equality. For any of the government's proposed goals in the bill with respect to equality, and I have gone through an exhaustive list of different senses of equality that the government might mean, Bill C-24 either fails or is completely unnecessary.

The bill would create an expanded and more complicated set of cabinet-building options for a Prime Minister who already did not understand the options that were available to him, while tending to mask real differences in responsibility by maintaining the tradition of junior and senior cabinet posts, and let me be clear that is what a minister for whom a department is designated is, while conferring the same title on each cabinet member.

The Prime Minister wants to be lauded for bringing real gender equality to cabinet, but in order to do that, and instead of taking real action on that, he is just glossing over the fact that his ministers formerly known as ministers of state really are just ministers of state with a better salary and a better title.

It is no secret that where the Prime Minister is concerned, style trumps substance. It is shocking to see that tendency drilled down to the level where it is starting to interfere with a relatively straightforward administrative matter such as determining what act of Parliament would authorize the payment of ministers of state. That is something else.

The end result is that we are forced to consider a bill that is a colossal waste of time. The Liberal government has been criticized for having a notoriously light legislative agenda, but the goal of those critics was not to encourage it to produce nonsense bills that would not change anything but rather that we might spur the Liberals on to introduce meaningful legislation that would help move the country forward. For instance, if they want a quick short list off the top of my head, they could move to repeal Bill C-51. They could move to protect Canadian water by reinstating the Navigable Waters Protection Act which was decimated in the last Parliament. They could reinstate the Fair Wages and Hours of Labour Act. That would get us back to a baseline of where we were before the last 10 years of government.

If the Liberals wanted to go further and begin improving on that baseline, they could bring forward legislation granting pay equity for Canadian women, which they have said they are going to wait until the end of 2018 to do. They could bring in a meaningful rail safety regime instead of continuing to rely on industry self-regulation, and the list goes on.

There are so many important issues facing the country that are crying out for government action and we are stuck with a bill that is really just about easing the Prime Minister sense of shame at having botched his own cabinet debut.

Public Safety

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-22 is only one piece of the puzzle to fix the breach in Canadians' rights that that minister voted for.

Still on the worrisome subject of Bill C-51, today we learned that CSIS and Global Affairs Canada finalized an information-sharing agreement.

This is despite the fact that the ministerial directive allowing the use of information obtained through torture, which happened recently with Canadian citizens tortured in Syria, is still in place under the Liberal government.

Will the government repeal that ministerial directive or at least give us a good reason for not doing so?

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals promised a massive rollback on Bill C-51. Yet it is a year into their mandate and they have absolutely nothing to show for it. Now we learn that CSIS is collecting information on Canadians using consular services without their knowledge or consent. This is exactly what Canada's Privacy Commissioner warned us of last week.

While it is mired in more consultations, can the government at least tell us what kind of information is being shared and what it is doing to protect Canadians' rights and freedoms?

National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we see that an attempt is being made to solve problems that really resonate with people. Many people considered these security issues to be important.

I have to say that that people talk about them constantly and for good reason. We all share this planet and we are grappling with complicated issues. Everyone is concerned about potential abuses. I am thinking first and foremost of indigenous people who, under Bill C-51, will come under suspicion if they oppose a pipeline route. We must resolve these issues.

What remains worrisome is that the Liberal election campaign identified a popular issue and promised the moon. We must watch the Liberals because they have a habit of signalling left and then turning right after an election.

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his very appropriate question.

I am not an expert in national security and police inspections, but I think that people back home are well aware of the value of wanting to oversee operations in real time and not after the fact, as my colleague says.

That being said, I would say to my colleague that his government repeatedly announced that it would make changes to Bill C-51. Now that is being pushed back. The government has decided to form a committee to oversee operations, but under Bill C-51, this adds to everyone's work because almost everyone is potentially under surveillance.

To use a very fine analogy: this work is like looking for a needle in a haystack. Bill C-51 essentially dumps a pile of hay on the bale. That is just great.

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in light of some of the reports we have heard on CBC over the past week, clearly, it seems appropriate to ask some questions. There were reports of incredible abuses committed against Canadian citizens who were literally sent to be tortured at the request of various Canadian agencies. That is precisely why I am pleased to rise here today to speak to Bill C-22 at second reading.

My good friend, the member for Victoria, has been handling this issue skilfully and intelligently. I will therefore be voting in favour of the bill at this stage so that it can be studied further in committee. As always, that is where the real work is done for the benefit of Quebeckers and Canadians.

We certainly commend the government's initiative in bringing this bill forward. Not only does it respond to a very clear call from various commissions of inquiry over the past several decades, but it also fulfills a promise made during the election campaign last fall regarding some recent issues.

This bill to create a national security and intelligence committee of parliamentarians is crucial. The committee has to be formed not only with the greatest of care, but also with the necessary tools to be credible in the eyes of everyone, citizens and politicians alike, as well on the international stage. Half measures are not an option.

When it comes to credibility and legitimacy regarding national security, the truth is that the previous Conservative government missed the mark with Bill C-51 in the last Parliament. They went in exactly the wrong direction. A critical mass of national security experts were against that bill that was rammed through.

The NDP was the only party that firmly opposed this bill, and Canadians overwhelmingly rejected this intrusive approach that did nothing to balance national security with the protection of the individual freedoms of Quebeckers and Canadians.

Let us be clear: the Liberals have to keep their promise to get rid of the problematic provisions in Bill C-51. We will hold them to it. If we as parliamentarians, and the government MPs in particular, want to win back the trust of Quebeckers and Canadians, then this is definitely the right first step.

Honestly, the public's trust in our institutions should be among the primary objectives of Canada's security policy. Let me explain.

We live in a world that is constantly evolving and, unfortunately, as shown by the tragic events in Istanbul, London, New York, Paris, and Brussels, it is unpredictable and quite dangerous. The length of this list should be enough to attest to that.

We must ensure that our national security organizations, the RCMP, CSE, and CSIS, have the necessary tools and resources to do their job, but that they also do not operate without administrative transparency, so that Canadians can know that they are effective and that they protect Canadians' rights in the best possible way.

Make no mistake, the world in which we live is not a John le Carré or Ian Fleming novel set in the cold war. The duty to protect is particularly important, but entails a responsibility.

I agree, our national security organizations already have oversight bodies, but the truth is that these bodies operate somewhat haphazardly and do not have full and systematic access to sensitive information.

The mandate of oversight and review bodies is limited to examining the work of their target organization. They are unable to follow the thread that connects them to various government organizations.

I want to remind everyone that the annual budget for CSIS, the RCMP, and CSE is close to $4 billion. That responsibility, not to mention the significant amount of taxpayer money involved, justifies the creation of this committee of parliamentarians. I know that every MP represents his or her constituents admirably. That is the spirit in which the members of this parliamentary committee will be tasked with overseeing these operations.

To get back to my first point, the committee must be put together very carefully. All of our allies have parliamentary committees for international security, but they differ in their makeup and especially in their mandate. We can learn from both their experience and their flaws to ensure that our review committee is robust.

Quebeckers and Canadians want a watchdog with sharp teeth. The new committee must have full access to classified information, sufficient resources, and independence. Within reasonable limits, it must be able to share its findings with Canadians in an informative and transparent way.

Twelve years ago, an interim committee of parliamentarians on national security recommended that, should such a committee be created, it should have complete access to all of the information it needs.

Of course, the NDP will be working hard to ensure that this new committee has access to that information.

In that regard, Kent Roach and Craig Forcese, legal experts and authors of a book that was recently published on Bill C-51 and Canada's anti-terrorism laws, have said that without full access to classified information, the committee would not be able to accomplish its task. Mr. Forcese added that this is a good bill, albeit one with inevitable flaws, which likely reflect compromises designed to reconcile elements within the government. Bill C-22 is a good start, but even the best review mechanism in the world cannot make up for flawed legislation, such as Bill C-51. It is therefore important not to lose sight of the bigger picture. These are very clear statements from very competent individuals.

It seems obvious to me that the new parliamentary oversight committee must act as a sufficient counterbalance to restore Canadians' confidence and, more importantly, prevent the kind of abuse that we have seen or bring it to light.

On that note, in order to demonstrate why we need an oversight committee with adequate powers, I would like to draw the House's attention to fact that the excellent journalists at CBC/Radio-Canada managed to report that, from 2001 to 2004, Canadians were imprisoned and tortured in Syria with the complicity of Canadian authorities.

Following the September 11, 2001, attacks in New York, CSIS and the RCMP wanted to find al-Qaeda cells located within the country. In the end, that contributed to massive human rights violations and complicity in the torture of three individuals in Syria. CBC/Radio-Canada had to comb through some 18,000 documents to bring this story to light.

Let us be clear: complicity in torture is unacceptable. It is unacceptable for our authorities to use such an approach. While waiting for a proper parliamentary committee with the right tools to be set up, it is up to talented reporters, like the ones at CBC/Radio-Canada, to ensure that our national security institutions do not engage in this sort of abuse.

I think it is high time that we had this tool so that Quebeckers and Canadians can have confidence in the institutions responsible for protecting us.

Public Safety

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Madam Speaker, on Monday, I introduced my bill to repeal Bill C-51. The New Democrats are still saying today what we said from the beginning: Bill C-51 infringes on our civil liberties without doing anything to make us safer.

The Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness now calls Bill C-22 the centrepiece of Liberal national security policy. During the campaign, of course, the Liberals' centrepiece was fixing Bill C-51.

What we have in Bill C-22 is a necessary but flawed review committee, a case of bait and switch, plus more consultation. Yet, more consultation is cold comfort to Canadians whose rights are under threat, including those engaged in legitimate dissent, like first nations leaders and environmentalists, or even ordinary citizens who value their privacy.

We all know what works when it comes to combatting terrorism. We need to devote adequate resources to de-radicalization and to traditional intelligence and enforcement work. Neither restricting our rights nor collecting so much information on all of us that we lose focus on the real threats will help keep us safe. That is why it is time to repeal Bill C-51.

National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, to suggest that the Liberal Party of the day had no problem with Bill C-51 I think is a great misrepresentation of the facts. In fact, the Liberal Party had a number of concerns and put forward a number of recommendations to change it.

The difference between the Liberal Party and the New Democrats is that we value both safeguards for Canadians and their right to freedom of expression and the other rights granted to them. Yes, there is a difference between the NDP and the Liberals, and it is the fact that we value both, not one having more priority than the other.