Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Oct. 3rd, 2024

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I don't think this is a question for the law clerk, but I have a question for the committee members. We didn't consider inviting Ian McDonald, who is the head clerk of committees, to this study. The reason I'm asking this is I'd like to understand the implications for committees.

If a committee like ours is doing a study on foreign interference, and we want to have access to specific information that is deemed classified, how would it work and how would this affect committees?

I'd like to ask the committee members.... I don't want to delay this. We're doing clause-by-clause next week, I believe.

If it's the will of the committee, could we have our clerk write to Ian McDonald, asking him specific questions, so that we can consider the implications on committees of this bill passing? Is that okay with the committee? I don't want to delay this, but could we write to the head clerk and ask how this pratico-pratique would function?

I just want to ask everyone if they're okay with that. Again, it's not to delay this at all. I'd just like to ask what the implications would be.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Lindsay.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

I don't have a problem with that. We don't want to delay this too much, but would just an hour with Mr. McDonald work for everybody? If we write it all down, I can see us potentially not getting it back in time. What are the deadlines?

Maybe we could add just an additional hour with that witness, if everybody's amenable.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

I caution against that, only because we have clause-by-clause already planned. We have a question of privilege that's very likely coming our way in the immediate future. That's going to disrupt the schedule we already have, and I suspect we may need time, if we get through clause-by-clause in an efficient manner, to go into committee business to talk about the question of privilege. We have a harassment study that's supposed to pick up on Thursday, if we keep it, and we still need some witnesses for that.

Those are my two cents, Ms. Mathyssen. I appreciate the suggestion, but for the sake of keeping us effective and efficient in our planning purposes, written testimony is perhaps the better route to go down, should that be the will of the committee.

Mr. Ruff, I know you want to speak to this briefly.

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

I have no concerns with the ask. However, it really has nothing to do with my bill, because it deals with that next step. Should a committee down the road ever decide it wants access to secret information—no different from the special committees we've referred to already a number of times—in that process, the House of Commons assists in working with the security agencies to set up the appropriate protections necessary to have those meetings in a secure location or to handle the files, etc.

Will there be implications? Absolutely, but they're not really that relevant to my bill, because my bill addresses only applying for security clearance. I have no issues with the ask; I just don't think it's really relevant to the actual clause-by-clause study of Bill C-377.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you.

Madame Gaudreau.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

We need to be constructive and efficient. Can we wait for our next witnesses?

At the end of the meeting, when I have my two minutes, I will be able to decide whether a question can be asked without infringing on the time the witnesses are allowed. I am thinking about the interpretation and the time for answers.

Before saying yes, it would be a very good idea, I would need about an hour, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Right. That is a good suggestion.

Colleagues, here's what we're going to do. We're going to suspend, as we had originally planned, to transition over to our second hour. I will ask members to speak with one another during the break. See if we can find consensus on this, and then we can decide whether or not we want to provide some direction to the clerk on that basis.

Thanks to all those who offered commentary.

Monsieur Bédard and Madame Gauthier, thank you very much for being here with us today.

Colleagues, we're going to suspend. We'll pick it up in a few minutes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

We are getting going with our second hour of testimony.

We have a number of witnesses with us here today. I would like to welcome them.

From the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, we have Nicole Giles, senior assistant deputy minister, policy and strategic partnerships, as well as Bo Basler, director general and coordinator, foreign interference. From the Privy Council Office, we have Sean Jorgensen, director general and chief security officer. From the RCMP, we have chief superintendent Jeffrey Beaulac, acting chief security officer, departmental security. From the Treasury Board Secretariat, we have Mike MacDonald, senior assistant deputy minister, security policy modernization.

Thank you very much to all the witnesses who are here today to add their insight and guidance as we delve further into Bill C-377.

Ms. Giles, I understand you'll be speaking on behalf of the entire group. I will turn the floor over to you for five minutes.

I just have a friendly note for our witnesses. If you're not used to appearing in front of committees, you have those earpieces. If you are not using them, please make sure you place them on those stickers in front of you. Obviously, if they're on your ears, you can go ahead and use the function as normal.

With that, Madam Giles, it's five minutes for you.

[Dr. Nicole Giles, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Policy and Strategic Partnerships, Canadian Security Intelligence Service]

Good morning, Chair and members of the committee. It's an honour to join you today and to have the opportunity to discuss Bill C-377.

We hope to provide some insight to this committee on government security screening processes and policies, as well as on access to classified information and the importance of protecting it.

In the interest of time, as the chair mentioned, I have the honour of providing opening remarks on behalf of the entire panel of witnesses.

Security screening is a fundamental practice that makes it possible to establish and maintain a relationship of trust within the government, between the government and Canadians, and between Canada and foreign countries.

Security screening involves the collection of personal information from individuals with their informed consent, as well as information from law enforcement, intelligence sources and other sources, using methods to assess their reliability and loyalty to Canada. My colleagues here from TBS and PCO will be very pleased to expand upon these issues.

A security clearance is sometimes misunderstood or portrayed as a special designation, a set of privileges or an earned qualification like a rank. It is none of these. Simply put, in the Government of Canada, it is an administrative decision taken by the deputy head of an organization that an individual is an acceptable security risk when accessing government information, assets and facilities, and when working with others in government.

The deputy head makes their decision based on the information and advice provided by the police and intelligence services, including the RCMP and CSIS. A security clearance may be granted, denied or revoked by the deputy head at any time.

Since clearance holders work in every part of government, a security clearance does not automatically grant the holder access to all information or assets at that level of clearance.

Safeguarding sensitive information is critical to the Government of Canada's ability to function and to keep Canada and Canadians safe. There are rigorous measures in place to prevent the release of classified information to anyone who does not strictly require it.

These measures are imposed with very good reason. The inadvertent release of sensitive information can result—and, very sadly, has resulted—in serious harm to individuals, even costing lives, Canada's national interest and our international relations. Mitigating this risk underpins everything that members of the security and intelligence community do. The release of information could mean risking the safety of human sources, exposing the tradecraft and other methodologies used to conduct investigations, and threatening the stability of indispensable allied relationships upon which Canada depends so heavily for intelligence. Put simply, if partners cannot trust Canada with their information, they will no longer provide it to us.

Similarly, if human sources do not trust that CSIS can protect them by safeguarding the information that they provide to us, our ability to recruit sources and collect information vital to Canadian security will be seriously impeded. We could also lose access to a valuable technical collection source that took years and expensive investments to develop.

What may appear in the first instance as information that's not especially sensitive or harmful, when viewed in conjunction with other publicly released information, can be used by adversaries to make inferences with very serious consequences. This is called the mosaic effect. Our adversaries carefully watch and track every word we say and release publicly, and we're very confident that they are watching now. They put together many pieces of information to identify our sources, our methodologies, our tradecraft and intelligence gaps. Many adversaries are very good at their jobs.

There are important principles that reinforce this system and that lie at the foundation of safeguarding all sensitive information. This is the need-to-know principle. An individual's specific duties and functions and the files they were working on at that particular moment in time are what establish their need to know for relevant sensitive information. Even the most senior officials at CSIS, who have the highest possible clearance levels, do not receive sensitive information that is not relevant to the current job and files that they're working on. In other words, there is no deemed need to know.

We need to ensure that sufficient information is disclosed to hold the government to account while also ensuring that classified information is protected. There are several critical avenues for review and oversight of classified information, including the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, the National Security Intelligence Review Agency, the intelligence commissioner and the Federal Court, among others.

The people who work for these organizations have the necessary security clearances; they will receive the information classified as secret that they need for performing their specific jobs.

There are safeguards in place to ensure that no national security injury occurs as a result of disclosure of that information. These individuals are bound to secrecy under the foreign interference and security of information act, formerly known as the Security of Information Act, SOIA, and they must not knowingly disclose any information they obtained or to which they had access in the course of their duties and that a department is taking measures to protect.

At the same time, CSIS is making efforts to enhance its transparency, including in its public annual reports, which now say more than ever about its operations and the threat overview, and in its discussions with the media and the information it communicates to the public proactively.

We have taken extensive efforts to “write for release” information, for example in the proactive provision of chronologies of events to parliamentary committees. We've done that in the last couple of months.

Recent amendments to the CSIS Act through Bill C-70 further enhance CSIS's ability to share information, and we look forward to working more closely with parliamentarians as we up the national security conversation in this country.

We will be happy to answer your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you very much, Madam Giles.

With that, Mr. Ruff, the floor is yours for six minutes.

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

Thanks, Chair.

Thanks, Ms. Giles, for the opening remarks.

Thanks to everybody here for what you do on a daily basis to help keep our country safe. There are some very familiar faces sitting at the table.

Ms. Giles, you talked about the threats, about the need to up our game and about the important changes that Bill C-70 allows that will allow CSIS, in particular, to share additional information. However, one of those conditions upon sharing additional classified information—and we're talking only at the secret level here, with my bill—is that you're still going to want those people to have a clearance before you share that information. That could be other levels of government. That could be—in particular here with Bill C-377—parliamentarians, so that's MPs and senators. That's a necessary safeguard that they're going to need in order to get that information.

Is that correct?

I would just ask if that is part of the reason this was evident and brought forward by CSIS—whether to NSICOP through reporting up to the government—and why it was included in Bill C-70.

Is it that there is that recognition that more classified information needs to be shared at a much wider level in order to address the ongoing security threats?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

Mr. Chair, I think those are excellent observations, and I have perhaps two comments to offer.

First of all, one of the changes that was made to section 19 of the CSIS Act as part of Bill C-70 really removed what essentially was a prohibition from CSIS sharing any information or analysis outside the federal government, including unclassified information. Those amendments enable us to also provide a lot more unclassified information, advice and expertise in a way that we couldn't before.

That's enabling us, for example, to participate with allies in multibranded security advisories in a way that perhaps we couldn't before. It's also to enable sharing unclassified information that we previously couldn't provide. As the member mentioned, this gives us a great opportunity to have a far more sophisticated national security conversation.

Now, in some particular cases there will be specific pieces of information that are classified that we would like to be able to share outside the federal government to those who have the appropriate clearance. For example, there could be a situation where a parliamentarian is representing a particular constituency where we know a foreign interference actor might be interested, given the natural resources in the area or a particular ethnic or minority community that makes up the riding.

What we would like to be able to do is provide that specific and perhaps classified information to the parliamentarian to enable the parliamentarian to build their resiliency by being able to recognize and then, as a result of that, manage the threat.

That's the purpose of the changes to the CSIS Act. It is to allow us to do those resiliency disclosures.

Sometimes it will be unclassified information. Sometimes it would be classified, but classified information would be provided to only those who do have the requisite clearance.

In each of those cases there would need to be a determination by the owner of the information as to whether there was a specific need to know for that particular specific piece of information.

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

My next question, Mr. Jorgensen, will be for you.

We had some interesting testimony here on Tuesday.

Just to be up front, you're the former director of operations, if I got the title right, for NSICOP—since its formation, really.

We had testimony here from Mr. Wark, who said that if parliamentarians even applied and were granted a secret security clearance, it would be fatal to NSICOP.

In your opinion, would just having parliamentarians with a secret security clearance somehow undermine NSICOP?

[Sean Jorgensen, Director General and Chief Security Officer, Privy Council Office]

Thank you very much.

Through the chair, I'm not sure that I would go and criticize Mr. Wark for his opinion. Obviously, that's his opinion.

I would say that what he's getting at, if I were to interpret his remarks, is the issue around safeguards. In fact, Parliament has discussed safeguards in the context of NSICOP before. You'll recall, Mr. Ruff, that you went through a clearance, which is what we're discussing here.

There is more to security in the Government of Canada than just a clearance, as you well know. If you look at NSICOP, for example, every member there is permanently bound to secrecy. They have given up their parliamentary privilege. In fact, if they divulge something in Parliament, that information can be used against them in a court of law. They've taken an oath.

The other thing I would emphasize, though, is that Parliament allowed the Governor General to pass regulations. Those regulations set in place all the very safeguards that I think Ms. Giles covered very well. That is around who can do what, when they can share the information, how they can process it and what they need to use. All of those safeguards are what I think make up—and I hate this word—the ecosystem of security in the Government of Canada, of which security clearance is one part.

I'm not sure I'd agree that it's fatal. We already give clearances in certain circumstances to MPs. The NML issue is one and NSICOP is another. I think that all of those were buttressed with the safeguards that we're talking about.

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

Just quickly, on the NML or the Winnipeg lab stuff, is there any awareness from the officials here of those MPs who did not waive their parliamentary privilege having leaked information utilizing their privilege in the chamber?

[Sean Jorgensen]

I can't say that this has been the case.

I would also just remind everyone here that they also took an oath not to do so.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you very much, Mr. Ruff.

Madam Romanado, you have six minutes.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Through you, I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here today. I think it's a great panel, because the witnesses here today can kind of walk us through the process.

I want to make sure everyone understands how one would currently obtain security clearance. If I'm understanding correctly, there needs to be an administrator or someone who deems that, for the person who is applying for security clearance, there's a reason they need it. There has to be a justification for that. Once that is made, they can apply for the screening. They go through the screening. They have to pass said screening. There's a recommendation. I believe in some cases CSIS would do the screening and make a recommendation saying yes or no. At that point, the person would get their secret clearance. Again, that's in the case of secret clearance.

Once they have the secret clearance, it does not mean they can access every secret document of the Government of Canada. Is that correct?

[Mike MacDonald, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Security Policy Modernization, Treasury Board Secretariat]

Chair, I'll answer that question.

Parts of that are correct. For other parts I can provide a bit more clarity, perhaps. I'll be brief, because at times it's not a short, simple process, but other times it can be.

The easiest thing to say is that with security screening, the way it's conducted in the federal government is as per a Treasury Board standard. That standard lays out the responsibilities of those who actually take security in a department. One of their jobs will be to do security screening.

Essentially, the process starts—you are correct—when a person is considered for a position, or will be going into a position, or is being hired by the Public Service of Canada. Therefore, they are deemed...but that may not be the right word. They need to require access to a facility, access to assets, access to information technology, and so on. They must have a need in order to have a clearance.

Basically, the process begins when you're considered for a position. There are information assets and facilities. You don't ask for a clearance. Your department has decided that you need it. Then you as a candidate provide a range of information about yourself. You fill out forms. Some of you may have done that in the past. The department then collects that information about you. You are aware of this. In fact, you have to consent to all that. That's a key part. You're consenting to sharing your personal information and so on. You can look at things like work history, financial information records, maybe records of engagement with law enforcement in the past, your habits, your personal habits and your behaviours. There are searches of intelligence databases. There could be searches of the Internet, for example. There could be searches of national security holdings, some of your social media behaviour and so on.

All of this will be captured, or more, depending on what level you are looking at getting. It could be a top secret. It could be a secret. It could just be what's called a reliability status, which is the lowest.

Essentially, then, the decision-maker, like in administrative law, takes in all of this information and will send off a CSIS assessment, if required; a request for or a law enforcement check; or a request for or a financial check, if that's required. Basically, we'll take all this information and put that person through a judgment process. We'll take the totality of the information and think it through. Is there something that is causing concern? Is there something that would cause us to question their judgment, their trustworthiness or their reliability? If you're going to secret or top secret, you will then have questions around loyalty to Canada and reliability as it relates to loyalty.

If you come up to something where there is a concern, you may be called in for further security screening or questions. If not, you will proceed through the process.

It's important to say that if you do not get a security clearance, there is a right of redress. There are steps one must follow in order to address that redress, and the applicant has steps to follow if they disagree with the redress process.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

What I want to get to, though, is that in this bill, the intent, as per the sponsor, is that first step. As members of Parliament, we do not have an administrator or someone saying that this person's job requires access to those assets, information, technology and so on. From what we heard from the last panel, there are two steps. First is what I'd like to call the justification or reason to apply, which is the administrator step. Second, once you've passed your security clearance, there's the need to know.

The fact that there is a reference to the words “need to know” in this bill may cause some ambiguity in terms of.... What are we referring to here? Are we referring to the application part, or are we referring to the fact that once you've passed all of that, you must now have a need to know?

Would you recommend any changes to this bill that would eliminate any ambiguity or remove any little bémol that you may have with respect to this bill? I understand the intent is really about parliamentarians applying.

Is the concern about the need to know, because it's in the second step in terms of the access to this information?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

As officials we're never in a position to provide policy advice on specific pieces of legislation, but there is often some confusion around language and vocabulary. The term “need to know” is understood differently in different contexts.

When we talk about need to know, that applies to each and every individual specific piece of information. Therefore, in our work, there is no deemed need to know on any piece of information. It's the originator and owner of the information that determines who gets access to it. To give you an example, when we get information from an international partner and we want to provide it to the RCMP for a law enforcement investigation, we at CSIS have to go back to the international partner, ask if we can use these exact words, and give this exact information to the RCMP for the purposes of a criminal investigation. It's very regimented.

From our perspective, there's always value in being very precise about the language that's used. In our business, in our world, there is no deemed need to know on pieces of information. It's determined on the basis of that very specific circumstance.

Every day, for example, there are a number of meetings that I'm not allowed to attend, because, despite my position, I don't have a need to know for that specific operation.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Just to clarify, I have way too many as well, and I really don't want to be in some of those meetings.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you, Mrs. Romanado.

Ms. Gaudreau, you have six minutes.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you very much for enlightening us, Dr. Giles. I understood very clearly from your opening remarks what the distinction is between need to know and right to know.

What concerns me when it comes to parliamentary privileges is actually whether I can get access to the information that is going to be useful to me in my role as a legislator. You have reassured me tremendously on that point.

Where you worried me is when you talked about international relations, particularly with the Five Eyes member countries, about CSIS's image and about potentially sullying its reputation. I heard that clearly.

I also heard clearly that Bill C‑70, which lacks teeth, in my opinion, has also contributed to providing us with more information in order to potentially avoid what we are experiencing in our legislative menu, which is going to last a very long time and is coming back to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

So I am trying to understand what benefit is provided by Bill C‑377 when I could get the information I need by making a request, unless the government decides not to authorize access, obviously.

I would like to get your opinion.

Since there is some delay in answering me, I am thinking my question was a very good one, Mr. Chair.