Finance Committee on March 7th, 2022

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, MP Fast. We're over time.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

We are moving to the Liberals and MP MacDonald for five minutes.

[Heath MacDonald, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to both gentlemen who are here today. Thank you for what you've done. There was a lot of stress, obviously, on downtown Ottawa and at points of entry across the country, and it disrupted daily lives and obviously our Canadian economy. It's scary to think what could actually transpire going forward.

We've heard a lot of things. People have been saying that there was disinformation and there have been accusations, and there was all kinds of information that wasn't necessarily available at the time.

Is not part of the process of going through this to ensure that your intelligence is withheld within the law enforcement community that is providing the services to eliminate, basically, the occupation of downtown Ottawa? How much does that play...? Some of the questions are basically reverting to “Why didn't you do this?”, or “Why didn't you say this publicly?”, but to me, would that not be part of the process to ensure that your intelligence was kept within, to ensure the protection of society and the protection of your officers who were going to be in charge of this whole process?

[A/Commr Michel Arcand]

Yes, exactly. To add to this, it's also the safety of the citizens of Ottawa. We needed to make sure that everybody was safe and there was no violence to this.

[Heath MacDonald, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I was there for two straight weeks at my residence. I was in the red zone, and I can tell you that watching you guys do your job when you started moving people out of the city was pretty amazing, with no injuries basically and no retaliation to some extent, especially after what we've seen at Coutts and what could have transpired in that regard.

How beneficial was invoking the Emergencies Act for law enforcement? Could you just touch on the jurisdictional...? I ask because that was a question at the time: Why isn't the OPP getting involved or the Ottawa Police or the RCMP? How important was invoking that Emergencies Act to ensure there was a consistent process put in place for you to do your job?

[A/Commr Michel Arcand]

It allowed the RCMP to get involved with all of the law enforcement partners. It allowed us to use tools other than those that already existed. The tools allowed the Ottawa police, the Ontario police and the RCMP to be able to address the situation more quickly.

[Heath MacDonald, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I'll change pace here for a second. With FINTRAC, what red flags were there? We've seen an infiltration from south of the border, mainly of funding into the convoy through crowdfunding platforms and payment processing, etc. At what point were you notified by FINTRAC that there were red flags going up?

Is there an amount or is there some other avenue that you see or they see, and they provide you with detailed information to raise that red flag?

[Supt Denis Beaudoin]

It comes through a variety of different means. It could be that the amount is not aligned with what this entity should be doing. It could be the top-up of the amount or the number of transactions happening. It could be the origin of the money.

FINTRAC looks at this with their analysts, and when they feel there's something that needs to be disclosed to the police services, this is when they do so. There's not one specific thing: They look at the totality of the evidence and information at their disposal.

[Heath MacDonald, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Okay.

How much time do I have, Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

You have about 30 seconds.

[Heath MacDonald, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I'll ask a quick question. How long did it take, once the Emergencies Act was put in place, for the RCMP, the OPP, the Ottawa police and parliament's security force to come together and provide the services you did to set up a plan of attack to remove people from downtown Ottawa?

[A/Commr Michel Arcand]

I don't have the specific answer to this, but as soon as the act was there, we looked at it and how we could apply it and other tools.

[Heath MacDonald, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Fonseca]

Thank you, MP MacDonald.

Members, we are moving into our third and final round. Each round takes about 25 minutes.

We're starting with the Conservatives and MP Albas for five minutes.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I will be sharing my time with MP Fast.

First of all, gentlemen, thank you for your service to our great country and for being here today to lend your testimony.

I have a few quick questions.

The first question is something that's been asked of me by a constituent, who noticed there's a certain amount of common sense involved when you want people to co-operate. One individual mentioned to me that it seems counterintuitive to say to someone, “We've frozen your accounts, so leave.” Usually, when you want to encourage people to drive away or leave, it requires money. How do you respond to that?

[Supt Denis Beaudoin]

We felt that it was a good measure to put in place. We can see it on a larger scale right now around the world, but restricting people's financial assets certainly played a part in this.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

If you want someone to drive home, they're going to need money to buy gas and get a breakfast at Denny's on the way home.

[Supt Denis Beaudoin]

We were not expecting people to drive 2,000 kilometres right away. We expected them to maybe drive two kilometres away from the unlawful protest.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Okay. Thank you for the answer, anyway.

The second question I had is how the order applied. Everyone seems to be fixated on Ottawa, and for good reason, but my understanding from reading the order is that anywhere there could be a blockade of any type of critical infrastructure like a bridge, etc., these tools would apply. Is that correct?

[A/Commr Michel Arcand]

Yes. You're right.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

There was no geographic targeting, as the Prime Minister and his ministers said. This is literally anywhere the government order could apply to a situation, and the RCMP could utilize those powers under the order.

[A/Commr Michel Arcand]

Yes, they could. Any law enforcement could provide the information to financial institutions.

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC]

Whether or not the provincial police....? In Quebec, for example, Premier Legault mentioned that he felt it was not necessary to apply this to their provincial police. Is that correct?

[A/Commr Michel Arcand]

Yes.