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.

[Peter Edelmann]

I'd like to start by pointing out that certain parts of Bill C-51 are clearly unconstitutional. According to the bill, a judge can authorize violations of the charter. No such precedent exists in the law. I think it's important to stress the fact that none of the legal experts who appeared before the committee stated clearly and in no uncertain terms that the provision was constitutional. Even the Minister of Justice was ambiguous about that. He said that the legislation had been studied and adopted but that no opinion had been formed, pursuant to the Department of Justice Act. If you really consider what he said, you will see that his position wasn't clear.

In short, I would say that certain provisions are clearly unconstitutional. And as for judges being empowered to authorize charter violations, I don't think judges will get on board.

To be clear, when we're talking about search warrants, a search warrant is not authorizing a breach of the charter. A search warrant is authorization for a search that renders the search legal, and therefore is not a breach of the charter. It's very different from saying that you're going to authorize a breach of some other section. Section 8 functions very differently than other sections of the charter. When we talk about section 8 authorizations, those are not charter violations.

We have no precedent in Canadian law for judges authorizing breaches of the charter.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being with us today.

My questions are for the Canadian Bar Association representatives.

I had a brief look at your submission, and I found your proposal extremely interesting. I'd like to discuss it in more detail, but first, I'd like to ask whether you think Bill C-51 is constitutional and respects the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

[Dr. Zuhdi Jasser]

Thank you for the question.

At some point we have to realize that this whack-a-mole program we have right now, which is just to get them before they commit an act of violence, is not only failing but at some point we're not going to be able to keep up because it's increasing. The arrests in terrorism in the U.S. and in the west have increased exponentially in just the last two years, with the United States, Canada, Australia, and others being at the front line. We've seen not only our businesses attacked and 9/11, we've now seen the media in Paris; our government, as in Ottawa; and our military are now on the front lines. There is a kill list of 100 American military members. Their addresses were found off Facebook and social media and they are posted by ISIS as being on a kill list for acts of terror.

At some point we're not going to be able to keep up with that. So what's our long-term strategy? As countries in the Middle East, by the way, start to fuel this Islamo-patriotism in this Sunni versus Shia radicalism, we're going to find ourselves not being able to keep up because our lack of foreign policy strategy is coming to roost at home. If they can't get a passport to go to Syria, they are going to commit an act of terror in Toronto, Montreal, or in the United States. Ultimately, the threat is increasing. Why? The war of ideas is being filled in by social media radicals, from Wahhabis in Saudi Arabia, Sunni radicals, Shia radicals, or the Khomeinists with Assad in Syria, in Iran and Hezbollah. That vacuum is being filled by radical Islamism. The counter to that is not countering the militancy but filling it with ideas of liberty.

I think the greatest story in the last few months was Tunisia. You saw a secular anti-Islamist party replace democratically an Islamist party—Ennahda. That was undercover. They did it on their own without western help, and ultimately the greatest anti-terror movement was the secular party that took over in Tunisia. That's why ISIS wanted to break their economy a few weeks ago with an attack on their museum. They want the west out so that they can put the Islamists back into power and fuel that. It's growing exponentially. We need a strategy for the short term like Bill C-51, and for the long-term, that engages reformers like our organization, Raheel's organization, and others.

[Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, President, American Islamic Forum for Democracy]

Thank you.

Thank you, Chairman Kramp and honourable committee members. My name is Zuhdi Jasser. I am president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy based in Phoenix. Thank you for the opportunity to lend our perspective to your committee as you consider diverse points of view both from inside and outside Muslim communities, and also regarding especially the merits and concerns of Canadians to this very important counterterrorism legislation, Bill C-51.

While our nations may have had varied trajectories on our homeland security post-9/11, it is imperative that we learn from one another so that we may learn from each other's successes and failures.

Let me first begin by expressing my heartfelt prayers and sympathies for the family of the fallen hero Corporal Cirillo and your Sergeant-at-Arms Kevin Vickers who heroically stopped the savage attacks on Parliament Hill by the Islamist terrorist Michael Zehaf-Bibeau on October 22nd, as well as the victims of the ramming terror attack which killed Officer Patrice Vincent and injured another in Quebec.

As a former U.S. navy lieutenant commander, a dedicated American citizen, a devout Muslim, and a Syrian American with deep roots in Syria and its revolution—I'm the son of Syrian political refugees from the 1960s—I've taken every opportunity and ounce of time, as you've seen from other witnesses like Raheel Raza, Salim Mansur, and others since 9/11, to work towards the changes and the reforms that we need to see enacted for our communities both from within and outside Muslim communities to protect our nation from the scourge of Islamist terrorism.

One of the gravest errors we can make in the west is to compartmentalize efforts at home from those abroad, or even abroad between nations, as we ignore common themes and common challenges assuming only that battles fall conveniently along countries' borders. I've testified to Congress before on Muslim radicalization here in the U.S. in 2011 and 2013, and also on counterterrorism in 2012. I've testified a number of times on religious liberty issues regarding the Arab awakening in Egypt, Syria, and Saudi Arabia.

Our organization—just to let you know about it—is a think tank, an activist American Muslim organization dedicated to the mission that we believe the protection of liberty and freedom and the future of Islam will come through the separation of mosque and state. Terrorism is simply a tactic or a symptom of an underlying more pervasive ideology of which the militancy and violence are only one means by which they can achieve their goals of a form of an Islamic state. We believe that the underlying root cause is that Islamic state, Islamo-patriotism, or Islamism—a supremacist ideology held by those who seek the advancement of political Islam over all other forms of governance.

No. The repugnancy of the ideology of Islamism should not be made illegal, nor can it be defeated by being made illegal, but having said that, the single end point of militants' radical Islamism, among many end points of Islamism, cannot be defeated or cornered by your security apparatuses unless you understand the greater ideology of Islamism and you begin to focus on it and give your officers the ability to see Islamism and its attendant Islamo-patriotism and ideology as the core threat source across the world, despite its far-reaching and less relevant ethnic nuances. Ultimately that commonality is what makes movements like Boko Haram and the Nigerian Islamic supremacist movement ally with caliphists of the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, as we just saw a few weeks ago.

As we saw with Zehaf-Bibeau's recent pre-terror video that was released, he was driven by that similar Islamo-patriotism that both demonizes Canada, Canadians, and the west, and also blames us all for the ills of Muslim communities. We need our security operations to be able to broaden their net from those who they know will commit an act of violence or terror to those like Zehaf-Bibeau, or Vincent's killer, or Nidal Hasan in Fort Hood here in 2009, who for much longer we likely could have known that they may commit, and that's such an important distinction. For then your security apparatus will have the ability to disrupt threats, which is oddly prohibited now, and also block speech which openly and clearly advocates violence and acts of terror against all citizens, which should never be protected speech, nor be protected groups, for our liberty is not a suicide pact.

As an American Muslim I'm reminded of Nidal Hasan who, long before ISIS was on the radar, plotted in 2009 his attacks emanating from the same stream of Islamist jihadi suprematism, which led him to assassinate 13 of our fellow soldiers and injure over 30. The relevance here between Bibeau and Hasan is that they were both Islamo-patriots, traitors to our nations who swore allegiance to the global Islamic cause.

For Hasan, it was Imam al-Awlaki and his caliphism. For Bibeau it was ISIS and its caliphism. These are not two different unrelated cases since one was ISIS and the other was al Qaeda. Six years later, multiple reports later, sadly, we are still tiptoeing around naming the ideology that drove them both and drove so many other radicals across the world.

It is unfathomable that, 14 years post-9/11, our nations cannot line up experts on Islamist ideology, state craft of Islamists, legalism of their sharia of our enemies, or my sharia, which I believe is the faith that I love. But there's a difference between the sharia of the Islamic State and our personal pietistic sharia. We need to have experts about that, who can talk about it. So far, political correctness has prevented that.

Once you understand these elements—the process of radicalization or what I call “Islamo-patriotization” and jihadization toward groups like ISIS—you'll be better able to legislate good police and homeland security work. The seminal work on this was published by the NYPD here in America, called “Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat”.

With political correctness and the pressure of Islamist groups in America bent on suppressing the real reform that we reformists are trying to do, that report is on its way to being removed from the website. I'd ask you to download it before they do. It's been up there since 2007. It is because the analysts at the NYPD intelligence division committed the crime of educating their forces on this association, granted not the rule but the association between militant Islamism, jihadism, Salafism, and those imams who are spiritual sanctioners, like Imam al-Awlaki, and various other so-called benign Islamic faith practices that are exploited by Islamist movements.

While certainly not all Muslims are Islamists, all radical Islamists are Muslims. Ultimately they travel down very common benchmarks of radicalization, which only we Muslims can address but to which our security and intelligence apparatuses should not and cannot be blind.

I believe the only rational reason that various Muslim groups and other legal groups may, on behalf of our community, voice concern about a very appropriate criminalization of the advocacy and promotion of terrorism offences in general, as Bill C-51 states, is that it will eventually obligate them to take a position on the ideologies that fuel and feed militant Islamism, or specifically stake out a position on Islamism itself.

If the militancy is not criminalized, they will continue to claim ignorance of the fuel and ultimately not be put under the antiseptic of sunlight. There are many fronts in this battle, and ultimately, I believe this is a very western battle, between theocracy and liberalism. But we need the tools to confront that. It should not be about if they will commit, but if they may commit. With speech advocating terror, just because it doesn't advocate for a specific person to be attacked, or a group, does not mean that's speech that should be protected.

Ultimately, if it's advocating violence, it should be stopped. I can tell you from where I sit, ultimately, that these tools will be very helpful in shining this antiseptic of sunlight on it. You don't have to make all this type of speech illegal, not the violent part, just especially the Islamist part. Actually, if you make it illegal, it will drive it underground. But the violent speech that advocates violence and terror should be exposed and rooted out.

I think if Muslims are going to do that and be held accountable, our faith community ultimately needs to be engaged in that. Reformists should have a seat at the table.

I think ultimately explicit calls for terrorism or violence or the endorsement and promotion of groups and individuals on the terror list should not be protected speech. One example I want to give you is that a website, ummah.com, said just last month that Muslims like Canadian Tarek Fatah and American Zuhdi Jasser are 100,000 times more dangerous to the Muslim community than infidels or kuffar in the west.

The implications here are obvious. Now, I'm not saying that speech should be made illegal, but certainly I hope your security forces are looking at websites like ummah.com as organizations with individuals who may commit acts of terror. Right now, we can't do that.

The people who you would protect first with Bill C-51 would be Muslims, our faith community, that is in fear and silence because of radicals that suppress reform and suppress dissidence.

I want to end with some final thoughts. One is that the mantra of violent extremism needs to end. I think Canada is a little ahead of us on that. Second, the lone-wolf theory is nonsense. These are not lone wolves any more than the Ebola virus in Dallas was lone wolf, with the Liberia source of the Ebola virus. Broader approaches against terror advocacy and with destruction are very important. We need to take the side of reformers within the Muslim community against political Islam and ally with groups and platforms that allow us to have that debate.

I look forward to our conversation. Thank you.

[Eric Gottardi, Chair, Criminal Justice Section, Canadian Bar Association]

Good evening, Mr. Chair, Mr. Clerk, and committee members.

We are grateful for the opportunity to appear before this committee this evening. As you know, the CBA is a national association of over 36,000 lawyers, law students, notaries, and academics. I am pleased that our president, Michele Hollins could join us here tonight.

An important aspect of CBA's mandate is seeking improvements in the law and the administration of justice. That is the perspective that brings us here before you today. Personally, I am chair of the national criminal justice section, a section that is represented equally by defence lawyers and crown prosecutors. With me is Peter Edelmann, an executive member of the immigration law section. With over 36,000 members, we can offer legal expertise in many areas of law relevant to your study of Bill C-51. In fact, experts in criminal, privacy, charities, immigration, aboriginal, and environmental law all contributed to the CBA written brief that you should have before you today.

We offer this range of legal advice to the committee because we want to help improve the bill. It is difficult to overstate how important this bill is, and we believe the committee should take the time required for careful, not cursory, study, hearing from all groups with a serious interest in the legislation. We've taken a common-sense approach to our review of Bill C-51. Creating new laws of questionable constitutionality, laws that outlaw acts already caught under existing laws, or laws that overlap with existing laws only leads to uncertainty in the law, more court cases, and costs to the taxpayers.

Let me be equally clear about something else. Keeping Canadians safe is something that the CBA supports without reservation. As such, we support the stated objective of Bill C-51, and we have offered 23 specific recommendations in our written submission in order to help fix this bill. As I said, I don't have time to cover all those recommendations. I only wish to focus on two points in my opening remarks, before handing it over to Mr. Edelmann.

The first has to do with the creation of the promotion offence. The CBA opposes the creation of an advocating or promoting terrorism offence in the Criminal Code. This provision is largely redundant. It is illegal to counsel anyone to commit a terrorist offence or engage in hate speech. The definition of terrorism is broad and covers preparatory acts or supporting activity. This offence may, as others have already testified to, be counterproductive and self-defeating by driving discussion of terrorism and radicalization further underground, making it harder for the police to detect. Finally, this provision is corrosive of our concept of free expression in a democratic society. Let's be clear; it makes thoughts given expression in words illegal. Freedom of expression protects even those thoughts and opinions that might be repulsive to the majority of Canadians. Is our Canadian democracy really so fragile that we must outlaw recklessly made statements? I think Canadians are made of sterner stuff.

The most concerning aspect of the bill that I want to touch on is the proposed transformation of CSIS from a simple intelligence-gathering agency to essentially a law enforcement body. CSIS operates in the shadows, with much of its work kept highly confidential for national security reasons. Its activities are generally not revealed publicly or subject to judicial review. In these circumstances, expanding the CSIS mandate to include policing powers raises the risk of state abuses of that power. Indeed, this has happened before. These powers are not, as one witness said, ahistorical. Prior to the 1980s, both security intelligence and law enforcement were handled by the RCMP. Eventually it came to light that throughout the 1970s the RCMP engaged in what was colloquially known as “dirty tricks”, illegal activities in the name of protecting Canada from subversive groups such as the FLQ in Quebec.. Unchecked, the RCMP used radical means to acquire security intelligence and promote national security, including burglary, arson, and kidnapping.

The McDonald commission was established in 1977 to look into RCMP abuses. The result of the McDonald commission was the dissolution of the RCMP Security Service and the creation of CSIS, a new civil intelligence service with a limited mandate to engage in intelligence gathering and analysis. A careful line was then drawn between national security activities and activities that cross the line into operational policing. The idea was that abuses of state power are less likely to occur if the two roles are separated.

Bill C-51 threatens to disrupt this balance and blur the lines by essentially giving CSIS operational powers, many of which will overlap with RCMP powers. As the saying goes, those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

As counsel who was involved on one of the teams working on the Air India trial, we saw first-hand some of the problems that arose when you didn't have complete cooperation between CSIS and the RCMP. Imagine now in light of the solid verdict in the Via Rail trial, if CSIS hadn't handed over the information they had to the RCMP so that could be operationalized. If they had wanted to keep their hands on it and not share it, we might not have a prosecution in that case.

These are the kinds of concerns that we have about CSIS and the operation of their mandate. It's covered in detail in our recommendations in our written submission.

[Thomas Quiggin, As an Individual]

Mr. Chairman, honourable members, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your invitation for my being here this evening.

I'll talk a little less about terrorism and perhaps a little more about political violence and extremism, and less about over there and more about over here. Public discussions recently have focused on ISIS-inspired attacks in Canada, France, Tunisia, Australia, and Denmark. However, this is not a new phenomenon. Starting in the early 1980s, Canada has produced a steady stream of individuals dedicated to Islamicist causes, and I use that term in the Raheel Raza sense of the term.

Ahmed Said Khadr, for instance, was radicalized in the early 1980s while a part of the Muslim Students Association at the University of Ottawa. He became a major financial and operational figure in al Qaeda, using taxpayers' money funnelled through the Human Concern International charity.

As noted by Michelle Shephard of the Toronto Star, and by the Muslim Brotherhood itself, the Muslim Students Association was founded by the Muslim Brotherhood.

Qutbi al-Mahdi was a part of the Muslim Students Association at McGill University before becoming head of the foreign intelligence services of Sudan in 1989, when a Muslim Brotherhood-inspired government was running that country. Salman Ashrafi was president of the Muslim Students Association at the University of Lethbridge before he became a suicide bomber in Iraq, killing some 20 to 40 people, depending on which report you believe.

This recruiting, this extremism, does not occur in isolation. Canada has a deep series of networks that have the money, ideology, and infrastructure to encourage this activity. The intent of these organizations is to create a political, social, and cultural space where issues of extremism and political violence could be advanced, while opposition is silenced through claims of Islamophobia and racism. These extremist networks are created by groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood, Hizb ut-Tahrir, and those loyal to Iran's Khomeinist movement. Information also suggests that in Canada right now Babbar Khalsa and the International Sikh Youth Federation are making a comeback—separate and distinct, of course, from the Islamicist groups.

Given the limited time this evening, I'll focus only on the brotherhood. According to the Quilliam Foundation, perhaps the world's leading institute on extremism, the Muslim Brotherhood is the intellectual inspiration behind virtually all of the Islamicist groups in operation today. This view is also held by a number of Middle Eastern scholars and by President el-Sisi of Egypt, who recently just made this rather clear in Egypt.

The Muslim Brotherhood, founded in 1928, has an objective of creating a global Islamicist state governed by their highly politicized interpretation of Islam. According to the Quilliam Foundation and the Muslim Brotherhood itself, they operate through a series of front organizations. The Muslim Brotherhood stated in the mid-1970s that they had walked away from violence, albeit their spinoff groups, such as the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, and Egyptian Islamic Jihad, maintained their violent tendencies.

In January of this year, however, the Muslim Brotherhood officially announced through Ikhwanweb, their website, that they would return to a new path. They would seek out violence. They said, “a long, uncompromising jihad, and during this stage we ask for martyrdom”.

In addition to being anti-democratic, anti-secular, and anti-pluralist, the Muslim Brotherhood is also anti-female. I think it's reasonably fair to say they're flat-out misogynistic. For instance, the Muslim Students' Association of York University handed out free books for its annual Islam awareness week in February of this year. One of the books has a section on wife disciplining. It advises that wives should only be beaten as part of a three-part correction and educational process.

It also notes that there are different kinds of women in the world, and I quote, “Submissive or subdued women. These women may even enjoy being beaten at times as a sign of love and concern.” The name of the book, ironically, is Women in Islam & Refutation of some Common Misconceptions. Let me just say that again, “These women may even enjoy being beaten at times as a sign of love and concern.”

Hello, Margaret Atwood. Hello, feminists. Where are they on this sort of situation?

Also, last year Le Journal de Montréal raised the possibility that Mr. Chiheb Battikh, who had attempted to kidnap a Montreal billionaire's grandson for ransom, may have been a Muslim Brotherhood adherent and the kidnapping was to profit them. The five-page story was written by Andrew McIntosh in June 2014.

What about the view from the Middle East? In 2014 the United Arab Emirates produced a list of 86 organizations that are terrorist entities, front groups, proxy groups, finance providers, and/or weapons providers. The list was welcomed and approved by the Arab League. Among the global list of front organizations, two have their headquarters in the United States, with offices and personnel in Canada. These are CAIR-USA and the Muslim American Society. It is worth noting that there are more than 20 statements that have been made by CAIR-USA, CAIR-CAN, or NCCM, and the United States State Department. Among them, first, the United States State Department has identified that CAIR-CAN, now NCCM, is the Canadian chapter of CAIR-USA. CAIR-USA repeatedly claims that it has a Canadian chapter, which it calls CAIR-CAN. CAIR-CAN, NCCM itself, has repeatedly claimed in its own legal documents that it was formed to support CAIR-USA.

Quickly take a look at the mission of the Muslim Brotherhood. In their own words, in a 1991 document, after a 10-year review, they came out with this statement as part of a larger document:

The [Brothers] must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and “sabotaging” its miserable house by their hands.

We see similar statements being made here in Canada. As of last week, Young Muslims in Canada still had their website up and we find a Dr. Fahmy quoting Hassan al-Banna, the founder the Muslim Brotherhood. What does he say? “Therefore prepare for jihad and be the lovers of death. Life itself shall come searching after you.”

If you wonder where the radicalization and extremism comes from, if you wonder why young people sometimes go off and do crazy things, you may want to start looking at some of this.

What are the effects of these networks? What's been happening? In October of 2014 the Ottawa-based president of the Assalam Mosque Association, a gentleman by the name of Abdulhakim Moalimishak, said that mainstream mosques in Canada are being challenged by extremists.

He says:

I would not say this is an isolated incident. I would say there are groups out there that are trying to have a foothold in Islamic centres.

In February of this year, a Calgary man testified to the senate, which I believe I'm supposed to call “the other place” when I'm here, that terrorist ideology is being preached in Canadian mosques and universities and that Ottawa—I presume he means the government—is slow to stop the “brainwashing”.

The CBC sent an undercover reporter into Montreal's Al Sunnah mosque. The video revealed a number of interesting statements, including the idea that they should, “kill all the enemies of Islam to the last.”

An Environics poll concerning the Toronto 18 arrests said that 12% of Canadian Muslims believe that the Toronto 18 attacks would have been justified and 5% of them said that they would welcome a terrorist attack in Canada.

My suggestion, Mr. Chair, and honourable members, is the denialists who say this sort of thing is not happening in mosques, it's not happening in our schools, it's not happening in our universities, are incorrect because we see a series of Canadian imams raising the issue, we see physical evidence coming out of the universities, and we see a variety of media examples.

With respect to Bill C-51, non-violent extremism can shroud itself in legitimacy. As far as Canadian values, the Constitution, and the Charter of Rights are concerned, I believe they're every bit as dangerous as those groups that are overtly dangerous and overtly violent. To face this, we need to change the definition and practices of security, including terms such as “deradicalization”. The bill does not address entryism in Canada or how the political process, charities, schools, and universities may be used to advance the cause of extremism. The honourable members may wish to follow the governments of the United Kingdom and France right now as they tackle these issues. You will see words such as “disrupt”, “entryism”, and “challenging the discourse of the Muslim Brotherhood” used in that context.

In closing, Mr. Chair, as in intelligence analyst—and I've been in that racket since 1986—I believe we're facing a rapidly evolving world where Canadian values and Canadians are now in the crosshairs of those who would undermine us from within, attack us from within, and attack us from without. As a former soldier deployed overseas, I have seen the results of what happens when extremists get in control. Bosnia and Croatia are good examples. People in Canada are currently shocked by the pictures of heads being cut off and held aloft as trophies. For those of us who served on the ground in Bosnia and Croatia, we saw pictures of severed heads being held aloft by foreign mujahedeen and by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. These were depressingly common sites and they showed up again when we were working at the war crimes tribunal.

As a citizen I have a slight different direction on this.

My belief is that we must keep the Immigration and Refugee Board, the Federal Court, and the criminal courts as open as possible. As a court expert on terrorism and as an individual who has expertise on the reliability of intelligence as evidence in the Federal Court, I helped train special advocates and judges. I believe they provided a valuable service to the country and to the intelligence community. The courts, admittedly, may be slow, awkward and on occasion, painful, but they are the key partners in the defence against extremism. I believe they are the ultimate form of oversight for the intelligence community and the law enforcement community. If we keep the courts open, if we keep them functioning, and if citizens and those charged have access to a court system, I believe we're good.

Mr. Chairman and honourable members, thank you.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for joining us today. Their input has been very enlightening, and I have a number of questions based on their comments.

My first question is for Mr. Hay.

In your presentation, you mentioned that Bill C-51 would not have prevented last October's attacks against Canada. You also said that the current problem was the lack of integration and coordination in terms of existing legislation. First, could you tell us more about that problem?

Second, I'd like to know if you have any suggestions as to how we can keep Canada from becoming a target? And third, do you have any thoughts on radicalization?

[Raheel Raza]

I am aware of some of the programs, and in speaking to law enforcement agencies, I have found that they have a great deal of difficulty in reaching out to the Muslim communities. They have said very clearly that doors are closed in their faces.

I'll give you an example. A few years ago I met with some law enforcement officers who said they had been called by a Pakistani family because their son had been sent to Pakistan and radicalized. When he came back, his parents wanted the law enforcement officers to speak to him, but the community told the boy not to, so the officers could not get through. They definitely need help in breaking those barriers.

It's not an easy job for law enforcement agencies to break through some of the communities' victim ideology perpetrated by the other side, these organizations that are pushing this on young people and saying that Bill C-51 is racist and Islamophobic. But as you said, it's about terrorism. It doesn't matter what colour the terrorism comes in or who is doing it.

There is a push to close the doors and make this a victim issue.

Public Safety

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

Mr. Speaker, once again, I am dismayed on the point that the word “lawful” was removed in 2001, because it inevitably does include non-violent civil disobedience, wildcat strikes and perhaps events that take place without a permit.

The language to which the parliamentary secretary referred is the very definition that I just read out, which numerous legal experts, including 100 law professors in our country, four former prime ministers and five former Supreme Court justices, have said is vague and over broad. In particular, the Privacy Commissioner for our country has said it would actually blow a hole through privacy rights. That is why it is a very scandalous reality that the Privacy Commissioner is not allowed to testify at the Bill C-51 public safety hearings that are taking place just now.

I will also add for anyone listening that the act would allow the sharing of information “to any person, for any purpose”. This is a dangerous provision for information sharing and it should be removed.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Mr. Speaker, I will attempt to respond to the member's question, although I think it is fairly straightforward and understandable. It is in the notes here, but I am surprised she would not actually realize it.

The international jihadist movement has declared war on Canada. Canadians are being targeted by jihadist terrorist simply because they hate our society and the values that we hold dear.

We reject the argument that every time we talk about security, our freedoms are threatened. Canadians understand that their freedom and security go hand in hand. Canadians expect us to protect both, and there are safeguards in the legislation to do exactly that.

There is the fundamental fact that our police and national security agencies are working to protect our rights and freedoms, and it is jihadist terrorist who endanger our security and want to take away those very rights and freedoms. Under our government, Canada is not sitting on the sidelines, as the Liberals and NDP would have us do. Instead, we are joining our allies in the international coalition to fight ISIL.

I would like to take this opportunity to dispel some serious misconceptions about the important bill.

First, the definition of activities that undermine the security of Canada applies only to part 1 of Bill C-51, which would enact the security of Canada information sharing act. Under the security of Canada information sharing act, information could only be shared if it related to a specific activity that would undermine the sovereignty, security or territorial integrity of Canada, or the lives or the security of the people of Canada. Information that meets this threshold may only be shared if it is relevant to the recipient organization's jurisdiction or responsibilities for national security.

First and foremost is national security. The security of Canada information sharing act notes for clarity that lawful advocacy, protest, dissent and artistic expression do not fall within the definition of activities that undermine the security of Canada. Even if some activities of advocacy, some that the member spoke about, protest, dissent or artistic expression are unlawful if they violate the Criminal Code, they would also need to have a national security impact to qualify. Therefore, in addition to being criminal, they would actually need to undermine the sovereignty, security or territorial integrity of Canada. As Rosa Parks did by sitting in her seat, while it may at the time have been deemed unlawful, it certainly would not have met any of those three thresholds.

The act would not authorize any new collection or use of personal information, and recipient institutions would still limited by their lawful mandate in the collection and use of information, including information received under the act. The act does not override specific limitations respecting collection or sharing of information and recipient institution statutes.

Part 4 of Bill C-51 would amend the CSIS Act. This is not linked to the security of Canada information sharing act. In fact, part 4 of the bill would mandate CSIS to disrupt threats to the security of Canada. The concept of a threat to the security of Canada is clearly defined in the act and includes terrorism, espionage, sabotage and foreign-influenced activities. It also includes violent or unlawful covert acts to overthrow our system of government.

[Raheel Raza]

Absolutely, I do believe that is true, because what we see today is unique in the sense that this is also an ideological war, as I said before, so tools are needed to understand where it's coming from.

But our own law enforcement agencies have been quite cognizant of this. Again, I refer you to the document in which I reported that, even as far back as what was happening in Canada before and after 9/11, even in the early 1990s, the Islamist groups in Canada were identified—Hezbollah, Hamas, and several Sunni and Islamic extremist groups with ties to Egypt, Algeria, and Libya.

In 1998 Ward Elcock, the then-director of CSIS, testified that there were more international terrorist organizations active in Canada than in any other country in the world, perhaps with the exception of the United States. When I saw that, that really made Bill C-51 valid.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight at adjournment proceedings to pursue a question that I initially asked earlier this year. I asked the question on February 17. It relates to the current debate, Bill C-51, the so-called anti-terrorism act but it is actually an omnibus bill with a much longer title, five bills rolled into one.

The Prime Minister gave me the courtesy of actually responding to my question and this is his entire response. He said:

I think it is very well known that the anti-terrorism act, 2015, is designed to deal with the promotion and actual execution of terrorist activities, and not other lawful activities.

Having heard that very sensible sentence from the Prime Minister, now let me say what the question was and why the Prime Minister's response formed no answer at all.

What I have been trying to ascertain from the Minister of Public Safety, from the Minister of Justice and, indeed, from the Prime Minister, is how this bill would affect dissent in this country if it should fall outside of the modifying word “lawful”. We will find that phrase in the bill, in part 1, following a great long list, which I must emphasize. In describing activities that undermine the security of Canada, the list that is provided in that section from (a) to (i) is not an exhaustive list. It comes under a list that has the preface, “including any of the following activities”.

It is not exclusively just this list of activities, but it is quite overbroad in its definition. In the list, (a), for example, is:

interference with the capability of the Government of Canada in relation to intelligence, defence, border operations, public safety, the administration of justice, diplomatic or consular relations, or the economic or financial stability of Canada;

It goes on from there to list, “interference with critical infrastructure”. However, this is just a list. It could be almost anything. At the end of this list, comes this phrase, “For greater certainty, it does not include lawful advocacy, protest, dissent and artistic expression”.

As I said on three occasions in question period when my questions were responded to by the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Public Safety and the Prime Minister, what I have been trying to point out is this. How will that phrase protect the kind of dissent that falls outside the word “lawful”; such as an activity that does not have a permit, such as an activity that is a conscious and deliberate decision to conduct non-violent civil disobedience, knowing that the activity is not lawful, knowing that one may be arrested, but also knowing that one has no intention whatsoever to do anything that is violent or a threat to anyone except to make a statement of conscience? When Rosa Parks sat down in the whites-only section of the bus, that was illegal and under this language we are in trouble.

In 2001, when the previous government first put forward an anti-terrorism act in response to 9/11, this same debate took place. The word “lawful” appeared as a modifier in front of “protest”. It took then Minister of Justice, Anne McLellan, some considerable time to agree with the opposition that the word “lawful” would make illegal wildcat strikes the subject of security and intelligence operations.

The word “lawful” should be removed from Bill C-51; and I wonder when Conservatives will understand the question.

[Brian Hay, Chair, Board of Governors, Mackenzie Institute]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

As chair of the Mackenzie Institute's board of governors, I am going to deliver the presentation, but our general manager, Andrew Majoran, will be able to respond to questions as well.

The board thanks the chair and the committee for the opportunity to make comments on Bill C-51. As you may know, the Mackenzie Institute is a not-for-profit organization and has worked for more than two decades to make Canadian leaders and the public more aware of the importance of security. For us, truly, security matters.

I am going to skip over our commercial parts as to our background, what we've done, where we've spoken, and in which articles we've appeared. Let me just say that our board of governors is entirely Canadian, with members who have lengthy careers in senior positions in the police, military, corrections, academia, and business. Our advisory board, which is chaired by the recently retired Major-General Lewis MacKenzie, currently has members with senior experience in the security and military sectors in Canada, the United States, Great Britain, and India. We tend to be very focused nationally, but our view is also international.

Before commenting directly on Bill C-51, we would like to make several key observations.

First, like many western societies, Canada faces historically unparalleled threats to its physical and social security from economic, ideological, and perhaps perverted religious forces. Strong challenges from any one of these sectors would be sufficient for concern and for policy action. Simultaneous challenges, even if uncoordinated, could be extremely taxing, requiring substantial, integrated, and well-coordinated government action, but as with any government action, care must be taken to ensure that the result of the action is as intended and not just an exercise in job creation or building bureaucracy.

Second, many point to a concern about the impact of governments' actions, and in particular this bill, on the rights of the citizens. This is a valid concern. As a friend of mine likes to say, rights are much like employee benefits; they are much more difficult to reduce and take away than they are to give.

Third, to those who express sincere concern about what appears to be a government invasion of citizens' privacy, one can remark that perhaps that invasion is now about to become at least more transparent. We should all remember that Echelon, an international communications and information sharing protocol and program among Canada, the U.S., the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Australia, has been used by the respective governments to review the communication of the citizens of the other participants and then share it with the government of those citizens. This system actually allowed, for many years, plausible deniability for governments to claim that they did not spy on their own citizens.

Private business and personal communications have been given increasing scrutiny by governments over several decades. Fortunately, much of this scrutiny has prompted greater transparency in business reporting. However, the growth of the Internet and numerous commercially available apps have also allowed greater access to and intrusion upon what was once private information. The basic issue is perhaps not the intrusion on privacy, or the degree thereof, in an information age. Perhaps the greater issue is, as so well stated by others, why the intrusion is made, by whom, and on what authority. How is it done and what recourse does the individual have?

Some may question the need for more and new laws when current laws, well applied, seem to work. Those who would assault our society are being apprehended, such as the Toronto 18 or the more recent train attackers. Yet a member of the Canadian Forces was run down in a parking lot and another was shot and killed on Parliament Hill by lone-wolf attackers. New laws would not have prevented those events from happening. Both individuals who committed these heinous crimes were on one or more watch-lists and had been visited by authorities. The key point, however, is that there was little coordination between these authorities.

When Parliament was assaulted, there appears to have been no coordinated preplanning to deal with such a situation. My goodness, why should Canadian security officials consider Canada an exception to attacks when Canada has been identified as a target by overseas terror organizations?

Perhaps the greater problem is not the lack of law or the need for more laws, but the lack of integrated planning and coordination of enforcement agencies as they have applied the existing law.

For example, I know personally that several years ago a municipal jurisdiction in the Ottawa region issued an RFP for new police radio systems. One of the criteria for the bid was that the system should not use or even carry the same frequencies as those in adjacent or nearby jurisdictions. You might ask why that was. The given rationale—and it was stated to me personally—was that one jurisdiction did not want the other to eavesdrop on their communications or conversations.

Crime and terrorism, like weather, respect no borders and no jurisdictions.

Perhaps it's time to look at developing a coordination mechanism like the fusion centres that have been established by our friends to the south. Government needs to enable the effective and responsible sharing of relevant, national, and local security information across departments and agencies at the operational level and not just at the executive level. Information is still at the discretion of each department, but there need to be strict regulations on information sharing to better identify and address threats.

No system will be perfect, but a system that has various security organizations working together and sharing information on a daily basis might utilize existing capabilities rather than simply adding more laws.

The Mackenzie Institute applauds those provisions of Bill C-51 that promote and fund enhanced coordination and information sharing under appropriate guidelines, but we also share concerns relating to the possible outcomes of other aspects of the bill.

For starters, we believe that even more clarity regarding the differences between the terms “dissent” and “terrorism” should also be sought. Bill C-51 will criminalize the advocacy or promotion of terrorism offences. The government's position is that lawful advocacy, protest, dissent, and artistic expression are fine, but how is “lawful” defined and by who? The language must be clear. Reasonable opposition, even to the point of demonstration, should not be considered terrorism unless and until the demonstration becomes destructive. Even then, one needs to distinguish between a riot, which is handled by conventional means, and a terrorist attack, which requires an unconventional response.

Changes in existing legislation may be needed, but the implications of those changes must be fully thought through.

For example, the CSIS Act as it stands is a good piece of legislation, but as it now stands, it provides CSIS with little authority for direct action. With the current security environment it may be desirable to give CSIS a little more power to act in low-level interventions and threat diminishment activities, for example, to reach out and prevent someone from going down the path of radicalization. Today CSIS isn't even allowed to tell a parent that their child is about to engage in violent jihad activity or to travel offshore.

In the past, the Security Intelligence Review Committee has actually criticized CSIS for taking these steps to diminish threats, partly because doing so is not in their mandate.

This act anticipates that with judicial warrants CSIS could break the law and contravene the charter, according to one commentator who has testified before you. This latter aspect may certainly represent overreaching by both the authorizing judge and CSIS itself in terms of the charter. More balance is needed between desired action and legal reach to get it.

Others have commented on the need for greater independent non-political oversight of how the law is applied. We believe that independent expert non-partisan oversight of our national security agencies is a better model than is political intervention in the process. Australia's inspector-general represents an independent example of how this can be done.

Further, the key powers of the new legislation must be clearly subject to judicial review and legal authorization.

Another area of concern is the potential for misuse of the powers granted on a day-to-day basis under current or new laws. In examples raised in the media and heard recently and known to me personally, existing laws and the powers they convey have been misused through either sloth or poor judgment or even deliberate actions.

Those charged with the responsibility of upholding the law are hopefully not automatons, but every human has weak points, which is at least good reason why there must be a well-defined and accountable approval process for any intrusion on privacy. Even thereafter, there must be an independent, transparent, fair, and expeditious appeal procedure. Thus, while the Mackenzie Institute applauds those provisions of Bill C-51 that promote and fund enhanced coordination and information sharing under appropriate guidelines, we share the concerns of possible outcomes of other aspects of the bill.

To search personal files at home or in the office requires a valid search warrant. To demand a password for a computer at a border crossing seems to be quite a reach of the law. Suspicion is no replacement for probable cause. Curiosity is no substitute for evidence. Permitting a judge to break a law, or to ignore the charter to uphold the law or protect a society that is to be based on law, seems at best contradictory.

Any legislation will be imperfect regardless of its—

[Raheel Raza, President, Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the standing committee. Good evening—and I will be brief.

I'm honoured by the privilege of being here tonight as president for the Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow.

My organization supports the general drift of Bill C-51, and we thank the government for taking Islamism—political Islam, as we call it—as a clear and present danger in the world and specifically in Canada.

We are also grateful that the government shares our concerns, first, to rationalize the sharing of security information within government, and second, to make sure that air travel is safe for passengers and is not used for terroristic purposes. Third is that the government make an attempt to limit terrorist propaganda, which is embedded in the language of political Islam and is spread through some individuals, some Islamic organizations, and some pulpits. I'm sure you are aware that this has had an extensive impact on Canadian-Muslim communities and especially our youth. Fourth is the fact that the government recognizes the value of disruption in countering terror threats.

As an aside, let me mention that I have just flown in directly from Florida, U.S.A., where I was speaking to some very politically charged Americans about radicalization and terrorism. When I mentioned Bill C-51 and our Prime Minister's stance on recognizing the problem, I was surprised to get a standing ovation. You may know that to the south of us, they can't even use the word “Islamist” and “terrorism” in the same sentence, let alone do something about it.

This is to say that the world has its eyes on Canada, so that we don't become another Europe, where the problem of extremism has exploded in such a way that it seems practically impossible to reverse the tide. When I picked up today's National Post, I was delighted to read the quote from Stephen Harper saying, “Canadians did not invent the threat of jihadi terrorism and we certainly did not invite it, nor...can we protect [our country or] our communities by choosing to ignore it.”

I think that that says a lot for our Prime Minister.

Speaking on a personal note as an immigrant to Canada in December 1988 with my husband and two sons, the only motivation we had to face life, and of course the harsh winters that come with it in Canada, was that we were escaping from the government of General Zia-ul-Haq in Pakistan, who was slowly shaping the same ideology that today has undone Pakistan. Unfortunately, now we see that same ideology being imported into Canada.

Way back in 2000, I started writing articles warning Canadian Muslims about the dangers of radicalization, especially among the youth, who were confused with nowhere to go between the mosque and the mall for answers to their questions. They had all the prerequisites of fodder for Islamic mercenaries looking for victims to brainwash.

Let me retract there for a second. The word is “Islamist”, and not “Islamic”; I want to keep a very clear distinction between the spiritual Islam and political Islam, which is “Islam” and “Islamism.”

These youth had grievances, both real and imagined, and the burgeoning number of recruiters offered an ideology they could latch on to. If needed, they would doubtless have foreign funding to support their nascent extremist viewpoints. That is when we realized that Wahhabism, Salafism—that ideology—had found its way into Canada.

You may ask, what is that ideology? We, as Muslims loyal to Canada and holding Canadian safety and security as our top priority, are not new to this game and we have been tracking the rise of extremism in Canada for a very long time. Radicalization and extremism are not always overt, and the kind of battle we are waging today is an ideological battle, which means that it can't always be fought with weapons.

It's with this reference that I have an essay that was published by the Mackenzie Institute—it's quite a coincidence that they are here—and written by me about four years ago.

It outlines the rise of Islamist terrorism in Canada as I have seen it unfold in the past 28 years. I think you will find that it covers much of what is being discussed here and our concerns about the scale of the threats—radicalism, extremism, and terrorism in Canada—and this does not even begin to address the current issues posed by ISIS and how it is recruiting our children to its own cause.

I have to apologize, as this is not in the two official languages, but at the time of publication that was not a requirement. I would humbly request that this document be tabled as part of my presentation—I have 12 copies here—because it speaks to why I am here tonight and why, along with some other organizations and individuals, we are dedicating our time and effort to support Bill C-51.

Regarding specifically Bill C-51, I would like to take the liberty of offering that we also see some weaknesses as well as its overarching strengths. I am not a legal expert by a long shot, but my work as a community activist and a basic understanding of the bill suggest this.

The proposed granting to CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, of the power to disrupt is a challenging thing. In defence of the government, it can be said that where such powers would otherwise breach law, CSIS would first have to seek a warrant authorizing the disruption operation. However, I might suggest that the approach to gaining authority to do this might not be sufficient to guarantee appropriate limits on this technique. Therefore, it might be useful to expand the mandate of SIRC, the Security Intelligence Review Committee, in order to make sure that any new departmental or agency powers have suitable review.

I would also like to point out that all government activity taking place in Canada is subject to the Canadian Constitution, notably including the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Therefore, we look to the government to tailor review and other mechanisms appropriately, as all government activity will in the end be subject to the ultimate test, which is the Constitution.

Let me also add that we would like to consider Bill C-51 to be a work-in-progress, and that we are therefore confident that appropriate adjustment will be made in the legislation before it eventually becomes law. There is no doubt that our organization and the individuals involved would like to see this bill become the law. I fully understand and appreciate that in the western world, where our democracy is based on civil liberties, such an act may be perceived as encroaching on personal freedoms and values. However, we want to keep away threats to Canada, threats we are all familiar with as we see trial after trial unfolding and look at incidents where loyalty to the land in which we live was never made a priority.

Thank you very much for your time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Colleagues, witnesses, ladies, and gentlemen, welcome to meeting 59 of the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.

Today, pursuant to the order of reference of Monday, February 23, 2015, on Bill C-51, we will be continuing our study and hearing from our witnesses.

I will introduce the first group of witnesses we have before us tonight. From the Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow, we have Raheel Raza, president. From the Canadian Labour Congress, we have Hassan Yussuff, president, and also David Onyalo, acting director, anti-racism and human rights. From the Mackenzie Institute, we have Andrew Majoran, general manager, and Brian Hay, chair of the board of governors.

Welcome, all. Each group will have an opportunity to make opening remarks for up to 10 minutes. You can divide your own time amongst yourselves if you have multiple representation. We will go ahead and start now. Of course, if you can be more brief, that will give us more opportunity for Q and A from our parliamentary members here today.

We will start off with the Council for Muslims Facing Tomorrow.

Raheel Raza, you have the floor.