Canada-China Relations Committee on Feb. 6th, 2023

[Sébastien Aubertin-Giguère]

The foreign agents registry is a tool for transparency above all. There obviously is the Lobbying Act, which is very constrained and applies to very specific conditions. At this point, there's no alternative. The foreign agents registry would fill a specific gap in that regard.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you, Mr. Fragiskatos.

We'll go over to you, Mr. Trudel, for two and a half minutes.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

FBI Director Wray said, I don't know at what point exactly, that the Chinese Communist Party had an obvious habit of exporting its repression to the United States. That is a fact that we know. He said that, in terms of law enforcement in the United States, harassment, stalking, surveillance and blackmail were among the uncoordinated measures taken by the People's Republic of China against its citizens who do not approve of its regime. We also suspect this to be the case. He added that the FBI was discussing the issue with its foreign partners.

So I'd like to know if you are discussing this with the United States, as well as measures that could be put into effect. Are there any coordinated measures? Are there discussions with countries other than the United States?

I'm addressing the whole group. I assume I will get a response.

[Sébastien Aubertin-Giguère]

Of course, we have close ongoing discussions with our traditional Group of Five partners. We also have discussions in the G7, as well as with our NATO partners. These are obviously ongoing discussions, which are very specific in their focus.

In that context, there are all sorts of subcommittees or forums where you can discuss very focused issues like interference, cybersecurity or whatever. So we are really well aligned with our colleagues. We share information, tools and analysis. We also try to work together when we can, which is not always easy.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

In closing, I'm going to ask you a trick question. Was the sounding balloon used for meteorological purposes or for espionage purposes?

You must know that.

[Sébastien Aubertin-Giguère]

For operational reasons, I obviously cannot discuss this matter.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

If it were just a weather balloon used for meteorological purposes, I imagine you would tell us.

[Sébastien Aubertin-Giguère]

I think the U.S. government specified that this sounding balloon had a surveillance function. The Americans shot it down for a specific reason, without going into details.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

All right. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you very much.

We'll now go to Ms. McPherson for two and a half minutes.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I said I would get back to you on my next round, but I don't have very much time.

As we think about the connections between the local police, CSIS and the RCMP, the obvious goal here is to identify when there is a risk at play and find a way to stop that risk, so that we are protecting Canadians and people in Canada from that risk.

Is there training being undertaken with local police officers, so they are able to play that key role?

[C/Supt Matt Peggs]

I'll speak to that question.

The policing landscape of the GTA is such that there are a lot of police services working together in that geographical area, with us doing the national security function. The model of our INSET unit is such that there are integrated partners within that unit.

The other thing we have in the GTA INSET is an integrated intake and assessment team. Not only are we getting complaints from the other national security agencies, but we also get some that come in through the police forces of jurisdiction, so there is that consistent analysis and triage of files. With that, there is some training and learning with the management, so they're aware of what to look for.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

What about local police officers? Let's go out of the GTA, because that's a very complex example. Let's talk about the Edmonton Police Service. We can assume there are probably situations across the country, not just in Toronto and Vancouver. We can assume there are situations happening in other cities.

If the Edmonton Police Service gets a complaint, how does that get to you? How does that get to Mr. Fisher? How does that get resolved to ensure that the people making the complaint are being protected? Where is the training in place to ensure those police officers know how to manage that?

[C/Supt Matt Peggs]

The INSET model across the country has those partnerships within them with the local police and the RCMP as well. With that comes an awareness of the files that they're working on, and the communication is also easier between the police service of jurisdiction and the INSET unit.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Peggs, if I have a citizen in Edmonton who has a concern, who perhaps is a Uighur activist or a Hong Kong activist, and they contact the local police, the local police will have had no training on how to manage that, but it will be escalated to the RCMP. Is that how I understand that?

[C/Supt Matt Peggs]

I don't know what the training has been with all the police agencies and what there is, but there should be that awareness. I think this is still very much a work-in-progress with the awareness of what they're looking for, because, as you can surely understand, what can sometimes appear to be just an initial Criminal Code complaint could be something much—

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

It could be more serious, which is why it's important to have an audit.

[C/Supt Matt Peggs]

—more sinister.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you, Ms. McPherson.

It sounds like maybe a little quick audit needs to happen there just to see who knows what about what.

We'll go now to Ms. Dancho for five minutes or less.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My questions are for Director General Fisher.

What is the role of CSIS concerning these alleged Chinese police stations operating in Canada? What role does CSIS play?

[Adam Fisher]

Through you, Mr. Chair, as has been said here, the RCMP is leading the investigation, but that doesn't mean we're not also looking at it. I can't say we are or we are not in an unclassified forum, but certainly any allegation of foreign influence activity, in particular one that is seemingly so bold, would certainly get our attention and—I'm speaking in the hypothetical—we would perform our own checks, while leaving the RCMP to lead the criminal investigation from their side.

We certainly would take an interest in it.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Certainly. Would it have been CSIS, in a hypothetical situation, that would have been the first agency of government that would have been made aware of these police stations? Would it have been your agency first or would the RCMP have been notified, or was it Global Affairs when they read the Charles Burton article in The Globe and Mail? In a hypothetical situation, would it have been CSIS that learned about this first?

[Adam Fisher]

Again, I won't speak to these police stations specifically.

From my experience in the national security environment, information like this can come in through various channels. It could come through the service. It could come through police channels. It could come through foreign intelligence partners or police partners. There's no one route into the government when something like this becomes known, but once it is known by one agency, it's very quickly shared amongst the community so that we can talk about it and talk about the best approach to managing it.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

The community being the government agencies, the RCMP and yourselves.

To share that information with the Five Eyes or our other allies, would Global Affairs take on that responsibility or would CSIS take on that responsibility of gathering information, if these are operating in another country, and sharing what we know about them if they are or are not in ours? Would it be CSIS?

[Adam Fisher]

Quite often where there's a criminal investigation into something that's threat-related, there's a parallel intelligence investigation. In the intelligence world that information is shared.

Going to an earlier question talking about interactions with our Five Eyes partners and other intelligence agencies, there's a very robust conversation that goes on in intelligence channels on issues of foreign influence activities. We would be comparing notes. We would be talking to one another in those intelligence channels.