Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Nov. 1st, 2018

[D/Commr Jennifer Strachan]

Absolutely.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. O'Reilly, you mentioned that this type of communication was out of the norm in terms of providing information before the parliamentary process comes into place. You mentioned a little bit about the approval process going up to the director general level. I find it interesting that along this process no one flagged the initial communications document regarding the fact that the bill was still before Parliament. Is there a concern within the firearms program or within the RCMP that there is not enough knowledge or not enough awareness of the parliamentary process, that there are not sufficient people in that process who are aware that Parliament has to do its job and that the appropriate stages of the legislation are adhered to?

Is there a concern that the department doesn't have that internal knowledge when it comes to this type of communication?

[Rob O'Reilly]

I would say no. As was probably evidenced in the first version of the website dated May 8, there was very much an intention to speak about the future state of the legislation. There are many parts of that document in which the future state of the legislation is spoken to. There was certainly an inconsistency, and I suspect we probably fell back on focusing too much on the technicality of the content rather than, necessarily, on the verb tenses, in some cases, speaking about the legislation in the future tense. I can assure you that everyone who works in the Canadian firearms program and who had a hand in working on this piece of communication and all communications related to this bill is very firmly aware of the parliamentary process and the privilege that comes with that.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Immediately after the point of privilege was found to be a prima facie point of privilege in the House of Commons, the RCMP had some holding lines that were delivered to the media that the force was assessing the ruling. Was there a formal assessment of the prima facie ruling and, if that was so, what information could be provided to this committee if there was a formal document, a formal review.

[D/Commr Jennifer Strachan]

Can you repeat the question?

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

Sure. There were documents released by the PCO through the Access to Information Act. About 90 minutes after the Speaker's ruling, the RCMP had holding lines for the media that said the force was assessing the ruling. I was just curious as to what that assessment was and whether there was a formal document that came out of that assessment.

[D/Commr Jennifer Strachan]

I know that on May 9 Public Safety did ask for media lines in relation to what was going on the web. I can't speak to what you're asking, but I would certainly indulge you to come back with that information, if that's okay.

[John Nater, Conservative, Perth—Wellington, ON]

I would appreciate that. If that information could be sent to the clerk, that would be appreciated.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Thank you.

Ms. Sahota.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

We've been through this quite thoroughly at this point, I think, but, Deputy Commissioner, at the beginning you indicated that what you would generally talk about would be the spirit of the legislation or of whatever action you wanted to convey or message you wanted to convey on the website.

In your conversations with the ministry and in your conversations internally, can you describe a little bit about what the spirit was at that point? You said this happens in very rare circumstances, when you're actually communicating stuff about legislation. Why, in this case, did you feel the need to communicate and what were those internal conversations about the spirit?

[D/Commr Jennifer Strachan]

I would ask my colleague, because, as I mentioned, I just started in the job on September 7, so it's third party in this context. I wasn't necessarily in those conversations.

Were you, Rob?

[Rob O'Reilly]

I was not at the level that you have suggested. As I said earlier, we were feeling the need to respond to some of the inquiries we were starting to receive via our website and we wanted to provide accurate and, hopefully, clear information on what we knew to be a particularly complex issue. The intent and the spirit of that were to inform our client base in what has always been a non-partisan fashion.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

What risk do you face in not doing so? What were the particular inquiries—some examples—that you were getting? What did you fear would happen had you not provided information to them?

[Rob O'Reilly]

As I probably mangled in French a little earlier, the concern in not communicating on this particular issue is that some individuals may have inadvertently acquired these firearms after the June 30 date, and should the legislation pass as written, those individuals would be ineligible to register those firearms. They would have potentially bought them in good faith on July 1 of this year. Assuming the bill passes as it is currently written, fast-forward two years from now when they would go to register this firearm and in doing so would acknowledge that they had acquired it past the June 30 date, and then in fact would be ineligible for registration. We knew that was certainly the potential.

Also, because the legislation does not grandfather businesses, there was a need to communicate to businesses that firearms that were in their inventory past the June 30 date, if they remained in their inventory, could also be adversely affected if the legislation passed as it is currently written. We do not know the exact numbers of the firearms, but there has been speculation that they could be in the tens of thousands, so we felt it very important to inform individuals at the earliest opportunity about the decisions that we felt they should be aware of and that they would need to make going forward.

June 30 has come and gone and nothing has changed, but individuals who are going to decide to register these firearms in the future, if the bill is passed as it is written, need to upgrade their licence. They will also need to take the appropriate level of safety training. Some individuals may choose not to do that, so we felt it important to communicate the significance of the June 30 date in the pending legislation.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

In our previous meeting, there were comments made and questions asked to the effect that this information on the website created fear in people, the fear of becoming a criminal overnight, or that it was done with the intent to confuse them about legislation that might not in fact pass. How would you reply to that?

[Rob O'Reilly]

I would reply that it goes completely contrary to what the Canadian firearms program attempts to do. We serve our client base of 2.1 million firearms licence-holders, and confusing them is absolutely the last thing we want to do. These things tend to have a ripple effect, and misinformation at the outset can tend to escalate going down the chain.

No, our intention was to inform Canadian firearms owners.

[Ruby Sahota, Liberal, Brampton North, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Thank you very much.

Now we'll go on to Mr. Motz.

[Glen Motz]

Thank you, Commissioner and Mr. O'Reilly, for being here.

Is there a mechanism—you briefly described it previously—within your departments regarding how you actually communicate these? You explained it briefly, and I wouldn't mind your explaining again how, when you're doing this sort of publication or ministerial or government legislation like this, you follow a process. You meet with officials from the department. You have a leadership team that reviews them. You may have someone who actually writes the content, and it's approved. Can you explain how you did that previously and if you've made any internal changes to that moving forward?

[D/Commr Jennifer Strachan]

I did some research coming into this committee, mindful that I wasn't in the seat at the time and wanting to learn and support my colleagues in a better way forward, potentially, so that all of us don't end up here again.

I think in this case, as was mentioned by Rob, due to the haste because of the date, we were talking with Public Safety about why we were seeking to create web content. In our colleagues' haste to try to get it out well before that June 30 date, since it was a month and a half away—I believe it was April 8—the oversight wasn't applied above and beyond the firearms program. As mentioned, there's not a process per se, because this is such a rarity in relation to our wanting to comment on any bill that's before Parliament.

But I would suggest to you, sir, that going forward, as long as I'm in.... And I have a lot of unique programs—DNA, criminal records, some really critical programs for Canadians—which do often involve bills that are forthcoming, so I can learn a lot from this. That process, going forward, I would suggest to you, will come to my chair, at the very least.

I think you make a really good point that there's still the value of consultation. I can say in this case—I don't think it's been mentioned yet—that we did consult with our Department of Justice colleagues as well, just in relation to the appropriateness of our putting messaging out to better support Canadians, mindful that the bill was still moving through the process.

Your points about having a better system regarding who has had the opportunity to review the material and who's been part of the conversations are well taken. Again, not being in the chair, I'm not sure exactly with whom at Public Safety the conversation was had, but I do not believe the lines, as they were going forward on May 9, were reviewed distinctly by them. It was strictly within the firearms program.

[Glen Motz]

I think earlier, Mr. O'Reilly, you briefly explained the process for how you have deal with publications. Can you just remind me of that briefly again and then say specifically in this case how it may have happened?

[Rob O'Reilly]

As I mentioned, sometimes what the program is posting on its website may cause a reaction, a negative reaction. If we're posting a bulletin on a determination of classification around something, not only are we internally dialoguing around the clarity of the messaging and ensuring that what we are saying is factually correct, but if there is some sensitivity around what we are saying, we often do communicate that for awareness simply so that the deputy commissioner—or even the commissioner, for that matter—isn't seeing something for the very first time reading the morning news clippings.

[Glen Motz]

That being said, though, in this circumstance, you don't want to be in a position where you're commenting or putting information out while a bill is still being discussed, and I understand that. Here, again, because of the sensitivity of the timing and the impacts of a date that was set in legislation—which we tried to amend, by the way to avoid this exact issue, right? We said this is exactly what would happen, folks, and we advised people not to get stuck on this date. Would you have Public Safety communication specialists, or somebody, who you would go back and forth with on something like this?

[Rob O'Reilly]

In this particular instance, no. Our dialogue with Public Safety at the outset, which occurred from late March through April, was simply on our intentions, rather than saying nothing, to post something online and strategically provide a self-identification guide, let's call it, rather than having individuals contacting me saying, “I have my CZ in front of me. Is my CZ impacted?” We communicated early on our intentions to put such a publication online and to outline the process of identification and the potential impacts, but at no point did we ever speak to the language around the impending or the tenuous nature of the legislation itself.

[The Chair, Liberal, Larry Bagnell]

Thank you, Mr. Motz.

Thank you both for coming, and thank you for your forthright answers.

I think it has been a very informative session for all of us.

The meeting is adjourned.