Procedure and House Affairs Committee on Nov. 7th, 2024

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

I do not want to—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

You have 15 seconds left, Ms. Michaud.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

I just want to know the following. When it comes to the 14‑day loophole in the Safe Third Country Agreement, do you plan to talk to the Americans to find out how to close that loophole and ensure the safety of people who want to cross the border irregularly or illegally to enter Canada?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

When you asked your first question, you even congratulated me on my appointment as vice-chair of the new cabinet committee. We haven’t had our first meeting yet. The Prime Minister called me last night when I was in Montréal to talk to me about it. I don’t know what will be on the agenda. However, I place a great deal of trust in the amendments we made with the Biden administration and which, in large part, solved the situation at Roxham Road. I don’t want to presume….

I may not share your concern about the 14 days representing a threat or an invitation for people to come here. However, in every possible eventuality, we are ready to shoulder our responsibilities and work with our allies. We will wait to see what happens over the next months, without speculating on any agreement of that nature.

I understand the technical detail you raised, but I do not think we are at the point where we have to discuss a purely hypothetical situation for the moment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you very much, Ms. Michaud.

Ms. Barron, the floor is yours for two minutes and 30 seconds.

[Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Minister.

We've seen the horrific impacts on Canadian soil of Sikhs who have had violence inflicted on them. We know that there's information that is shared between Canada and India and that this information is being used to directly provide information that people need to be able to inflict this violence on Canadian soil. It's a big concern, obviously. I'm wondering if you could please share a little bit about what that looks like until we get to the bottom of it and make sure that Canadians are safe.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

I certainly share your concern and the concern of those in the Sikh community and the Hindu community. There's this disinformation that the Government of India is fuelling that can create these divisions. It's turning Canadians against each other. It's saying to communities that their safety is in question. I have a lot of confidence, again, in the local and regional police. The RCMP work with them. I share your concern about this escalation and work as hard as I can to ensure that these people are safe and free from this intimidation and violence.

The director of CSIS just said that the idea that we're sharing information with the Indian government that then boomerangs back to create or to fuel, directly or indirectly, the circumstance is not accurate. There are very careful provisions around information sharing in order to protect human rights. There's an act of Parliament that specifically prevents the sharing of information if there's a risk of mistreatment. Again, the director of CSIS can talk about that. I don't participate in that information sharing on a daily basis with allies or other countries. He's in a position, I think, to reassure people that we would not share with the Government of India information that would in any way be possibly used to create this unacceptable circumstance on Canadian soil that we've seen.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thanks, Minister.

Ms. Barron, there's very little time left. Do you want to allow the director the remaining time, because there's not going to be much time for a follow-up?

Director Rogers, is there anything you want to quickly add here?

[Daniel Rogers, Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service]

I think the minister summarized it well. There is an act that we have to comply with called the Avoiding Complicity in Mistreatment by Foreign Entities Act. We have strict information-sharing protocols within the service to assess information before it's shared with any foreign partner, and that takes into account their human rights record. The minister is correct. We take great efforts not to share information that could result in mistreatment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you.

Mr. Calkins, the floor is yours for five minutes.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

Minister, since 2015, total violent crime in Canada is up 49.84%. This isn't my number; this is Statistics Canada's. Homicides are up, as of last year, 43%. Gang-related homicides are up 78% as of last year. Total sexual assaults are up 74%. Total violent firearms offences, which is use of, discharge or pointing a gun, are up 116% since 2015. Extortion is up 357% since 2015. Auto theft is up 45%.

Minister, I was there when you and your cabinet colleagues voted for Bill C-75, voted for Bill C-21 and Bill C-5 as well. One of the impacts of voting for the legislation that your government has tabled was to reduce minimum penalties for a number of offences. One of them was extortion with a firearm with a mandatory minimum penalty of four years. That was the initiative that your government had and that you voted for. In your home province of New Brunswick, extortion is up 301%.

Why do you continue to pursue an agenda that goes after law-abiding firearms owners instead of an agenda that targets criminals and reduces crime on our streets?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Calkins, it won't surprise you that I don't share your view that our agenda goes against law-abiding sportspersons or firearms owners. We certainly share the concern that you articulated that's shared by many Canadians around recent incidents involving violent crime.

Some of these extortion circumstances that we've witnessed in recent months.... If I stick to the news conference of the commissioner of the RCMP on Thanksgiving Monday, some of this rise in extortion in the South Asian community, for example.... The mayor of Edmonton has talked to me about it and the mayor of Brampton—perhaps you're familiar with Patrick Brown, who was a colleague of ours here in the House of Commons—has talked to me about this.

A lot of good work is being done by our law enforcement authorities. They rely on partnerships with provinces and territories and municipal police forces. This work is done collaboratively. I have a great deal of confidence in that work, but I don't minimize the concern of Canadians.

In my conversations with the Ontario Solicitor General, we try and figure out ways that we can work better together to bring down those very statistics that you spoke about.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Minister, it's simply not true. Your government has spent millions of dollars to confiscate the firearms, the lawfully owned property of vetted firearms owners across this country. Tens of millions of dollars have been spent so far. Millions more will have to be spent in order to achieve your goal to take property away from people who are simply not the problem, and yet your government has continued to pass legislation to make it easier for people to get out on bail, to make it easier for people to get out on parole. Even with the recent bill, I will applaud the fact that the only thing your government has done to unite the country is that the premiers of every province have written a letter saying that they would like you to reverse the bail provisions that your government made in Bill C-75.

You continue to focus on the wrong people, Minister, which is who you're focusing on right now. I know this because I am intimately involved in the community. I am a hunter. I am an outdoorsman. I have actually been a law enforcement officer in the conservation enforcement field. I deal with people with firearms all of the time, and they will tell me, and your Prime Minister has even said in interviews, that they're going to confiscate some of the guns that are being used by hunters.

Your leader is even being trolled by police associations. When he celebrated the two-year handgun freeze transfer, Toronto Police and Vancouver Police basically said that everything your government is doing to reduce gun violence and the optics of going after law-abiding citizens is not working.

When will you reverse course? When will you go to your leader and say, “Reverse course. Leave law-abiding citizens alone. Let's focus on criminals, and let's focus on the borders and keep Canadians safe”?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Minister, you have about 25 seconds.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

I have 25 seconds because Mr. Calkins conflated a whole series of issues from removing military assault-style firearms—

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

You haven't removed any firearms. The firearms that were in our lockers four or five years ago are still there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Mr. Calkins.

[An hon. member]

I have a point of order, Chair.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

They're still there. You haven't banned anything, Minister.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Mr. Turnbull is rising on a point of order.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

It's the same thing here, running roughshod over the witnesses. If you wanted the minister to be here for two hours and he has come, it would be nice if you gave him a chance to answer the question. An answer would be helpful.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

The real tragedy here is I was just about to hold the minister and Mr. Calkins up as a fantastic example of how we can have an exchange without interruption.

Mr. Calkins, you took a good chunk of time to ask the question. I'm going to give the minister a few seconds to respond.

I'm going to ask colleagues that we try not to interrupt, and we'll be out of this round before we know it.

Minister, I'll give you a few seconds.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Chair, thank you for your indulgence.

Mr. Calkins conflated bail reform. We also work with the provinces. the House passed legislation, in fact, to provide reverse onuses on some violent repeat offenders in terms of their access to bail. He forgot that piece of it.

Our government made a commitment in 2021 to remove assault-style firearms from the streets of Canada. Mr. Calkins says he's a hunter. He knows a lot of people who are hunters. I know a lot of people who are law-abiding gun owners as well who are sportspersons or go hunting. They don't normally go hunting with an assault-style military firearm. We think that it's in the public safety—

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

That's because they're restricted.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

I'm sorry, Mr. Chair. I'm hearing some background noise here—