Declaration of Emergency Committee on April 26th, 2022

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

What's the point of it?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Consultations are always helpful.

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

Yes, but what's the point of them?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

We consulted the provinces and police forces in advance. We had…

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

Minister, you aren't answering my question. As you know, our speaking time is limited.

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

I'll answer your question, Mr. Fortin. We had…

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

My question is this: what's the point of these consultations?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

They help sound out authorities.

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

Why?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

It's very important to know what the premiers think.

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

What's the point of doing it, if you don't then take their thoughts into consideration?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

We were monitoring the situation in Gatineau and Lacolle, Quebec. It's true that…

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

Minister, you're telling me that…

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

…Sûreté du Québec did a good job in Quebec City, but…

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

Minister, you're telling me it's important to consider what the premiers think, but seven provinces and three territories told you they didn't agree, and you nevertheless declared a state of emergency throughout Canada.

How can you tell me it's important for you to know the premiers' opinions when you clearly didn't consider them?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

That's not true. We were always in touch with our counterparts.

Mr. Mulroney, who had the act drafted, had the brilliant idea to specify that unanimity wasn't necessary. Sometimes the federal government has a duty to take necessary measures to resolve a situation. Under the act, we did what had to be done, and we consulted the provinces and territories. As you can see in the report, we had…

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

My time is up, Minister. I say that out of a concern for transparency.

[The Joint Chair, NDP, Matthew Green]

Thank you.

Mr. Fortin, the floor is back to you as the chair.

[The Joint Chair, Bloc, Rhéal Fortin]

Thank you, Mr. Green.

Thank you, Minister.

Mr. Green, you have the floor for five minutes.

[The Joint Chair, NDP, Matthew Green]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I'll do the best I can to put my questions through you.

I want to pick up on this notion of charter compliance, because I think Canadians rightly deserve to know that the decisions that were made by government were proportional to the threat. I believe the challenge of this committee is to delve into the preconditions and the facts pertaining to what was before us.

We've heard, I think very passionately, a disagreement about the nature of the threat. I will go on the record and say that when an MOU of that nature is present, when the kind of open-source evidence that is present on the Internet is talking about dropping bullets in our heads, and when Coutts has munitions found on site, I would take them at their word that they are a threat. However, given that, the declaration's invocation in and of itself was light on the language of or around the threat to national security under the CSIS Act.

My question through you, Mr. Chair, to the honourable Attorney General, is this: What facts or considerations did he provide in providing advice to the language of the invocation that would have considered paragraph 2(d) of the CSIS Act?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Thank you for the question, Mr. Green. You'll understand that, first of all, I'm constrained by cabinet confidence, which is a fundamental principle of the Westminster system, as well as by solicitor-client privilege, which is also a fundamental principle according to our Supreme Court and our legal system.

That being said, I'll answer your question in two ways. First of all, the document that we tabled goes through the nature of the various threats across the country, including some of the threats that you very rightly identified in the way that you framed your question. These, we felt, met the question of serious threats to persons under the CSIS Act definition—primarily that. There is also the economic damage, which could be considered part of the property question.

[The Joint Chair, NDP, Matthew Green]

Thank you for that, but more specifically, given that the national emergency....

You've stated that there is a threat to persons, but in paragraph 3(b), under the application and construction of the act, it talks about threatening “the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity...and that cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada.”

When your colleague was before us, I put forward questions noting the similarity in the language under section one, which talked about activities that are directed towards or use the threat of serious acts of violence against persons or property, or critical infrastructure, for the purpose of achieving “political or ideological” objectives. That language is very similar to the language under the definition of terrorism under the Criminal Code in section 83.01.

I guess when we're looking objectively at whether or not this could have been dealt with using any other laws in Canada, given the close nature in which you've identified ideologically motivated extremists, the infiltration of our security members past and present, including the police, Joint Task Force 2 and the military, why was it not considered to use the definition of terrorism, given the weapons that were found in Coutts and the MOU?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

Thank you for that question. It's a good question. It's a complex question. Please let me answer it.

The Criminal Code is a complex instrument. Each offence under the Criminal Code has its own mens rea component and its own actus reus component—a mental element and an active element, if you will. It doesn't help us go down that road because, in order to be applied, they might carry with them other obligations on the part of police officers—

[The Joint Chair, NDP, Matthew Green]

Is it, then, the case that it was easier to invoke the Emergencies Act than it was to apply the strict high threshold of evidence under that language, which seems to go between both definitions?

[David Lametti, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, QC]

The Emergencies Act is, I think, a well-crafted act. Again, it was brought in by the Mulroney government as a remedy to the old War Measures Act. It has in it a series of balances, it remains subject to the charter, and it gives processes like these for further review.