Given the limited information in the annual reports regarding the RCMP, from the types of investigations where acts were justified under these provisions, and just applying my experience, it would seem to me these are not cases where a last-minute decision would have to be made by an officer who all of a sudden found himself in the middle of a criminal conspiracy that he had no prior notice of.
In the investigation of criminal organizations, whether it's in the drug context, in the migrant smuggling context, the tobacco or alcohol smuggling context, information is obtained, relationships are cultivated over a lengthy period of time, and there is ample time in the general course to put together a brief affidavit to provide to a judicial officer saying: “This is the type of investigation we are undertaking; these are the targets of the investigation; this is what we understand the nature of the offences they are committing to be. We propose making recourse to these provisions, including committing the following types of offences: possessing materials it would otherwise be illegal to possess, or fabricating false passports, to the extent that it appears to have been done in other investigations.”
It may be that in the course of a particular justified investigation, the designated officer or the person authorized after the judicial authorization to be engaged in that justified undercover operation may find himself or herself in a circumstance where criminal conduct has to be performed, or a decision made whether to engage in it or not, on the fly. There could be, in addition to the prior judicial authorization scheme, an exigent circumstances exception—that's also something that is not foreign to our system of prior judicial authorization—where the police are involved in an investigation and exigent circumstances exist such that they can't obtain a warrant without risking harm to individuals or the loss of evidence. They may act and then explain their conduct afterwards.