Justice Committee on June 13th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Is there anything else on any of those suggestions?

[Jeanine LeRoy]

Obviously we agree with number one, since that's what we're suggesting this committee do. We would be reluctant to get behind anything that limits the reporting further.

We would suggest that with respect to number six, there are a greater number of crimes that ought to be included in that list--the robbery I mentioned, a forcible confinement. You can kidnap someone and forcibly confine them under this legislation. You can extort from someone under this legislation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Thank you, Mr. Bagnell.

Ms. Freeman.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

I only have one comment because many of the questions I was considering were already asked.

Mr. Thompson's earlier plea was extremely interesting since there is always a dilemma between trusting the police and imposing limits on them. Courts have to interpret laws and regulations, and members of Parliament have a duty to oversee police activity. We cannot give police officers a completely open mandate. We have to give them the right laws to rely on.

Much is said about reports and control of information. It's understandable that you want everything to be reported but that would compromise surveillance and the safety of police officers. You mentioned an independent agency that would control these activities. Can you give us more details about this?

[Ken Swan]

I think we're probably thinking of—

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

In order to have access to police records and to know how they're using these provisions. Is my question clear? Do you want me to restate it?

[Alexi Wood]

In our formulation of such an independent body, it would be independent from government and from the police, and this body would have access to police personnel, to police records, to all of the infrastructure of law enforcement, to conduct, as Mr. Swan pointed out, proactive independent audits. It would not just be through the receipt of information, but they would actually go into the information, on their own initiative, and look through the information. There may be circumstances where the information isn't coming to light. If there are covert operations happening, that may never see the light of day in a courtroom because by its very nature, it's covert. We don't know that it's happening. The individuals may not know they are being monitored. So this type of organization would have the power to go inside the law enforcement body. As Mr. Swan pointed out, it's something very similar to the way SIRC operates with CSIS.

SIRC receives complaints from the public, but it also has the power to go inside CSIS itself. That is a model we would look to. As for the exact way it would work, that can be left to...but SIRC works as a model. SIRC works as a type of organization that we would look to when we talk about an independent audit.

The other thing with the reporting is that currently, as I've mentioned, you can delay the reports. As I read the legislation, it could be delayed indefinitely. There's no prohibition on that. So we would add in the level of judicial authorization if a law enforcement agency was choosing to delay. On the question of the chair, in terms of jeopardizing an ongoing investigation, there would be that safeguard that would help with that as well. There would be the two levels. One is the judicial authorization, but then also the independent body would be overseeing it all.

I hope that answers--

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

You have two recommendations.

[Alexi Wood]

Yes.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

One deals with an independent agency and the second with judicial authorization.

[Alexi Wood]

Yes.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Who exactly would your independent agency report to? Who would it be accountable to?

[Alexi Wood]

It would be accountable to the public. It would publicly report. The members of SIRC see everything, but not everything is put forward in SIRC reports. SIRC has the power, for security reasons, to keep information out, but the annual reports are made public so that the public can see--

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

This report would be public.

[Alexi Wood]

Yes.

[Carole Freeman, Bloc, Châteauguay—Saint-Constant, QC]

Okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Monsieur Harvey.

[Luc Harvey, Conservative, Louis-Hébert, QC]

I traveled a lot in the past few years. I went to Africa, Eastern Europe and many countries that may be considered as police states. In these countries, the police can do anything they want. When I saw a police officer, I didn't really care much, but I noticed that local people were rather nervous.

Politics is not easy. Infiltrating an organization is like having a part in a play. I can hardly see how you can train an officer, when he is on a police mission, to write a report or to reflect on whether or not he should act in a certain way. He must play his part in order to be accepted and trusted so that he can gather evidence. How is it possible to determine where this officer must stop? This is the question that's being asked today.

You talked about investigations and another possible role for the police, but things are getting more and more complicated. We shouldn't let police officers become criminals with a license. An officer never gets arrested because he always has his police badge.

Wouldn't it be better if the mandate given to an officer to infiltrate a criminal organization is strictly limited to two years? We shouldn't let him get used to these activities so they become a second nature. Without a time limit, the officer himself may become as dangerous as a criminal. If he can have this kind of activity during his whole career, he will probably take an approach typical of police states. I believe we can draw a line by giving police officers some leeway but only for limited period of time.

[Ken Swan]

I don't know the answer to that. I think probably there are a number of variables that would effect how you would make those decisions. From our point of view, police officers being justified in doing something that would otherwise be breaking the law—may I use the short form of breaking the law? Police officers breaking the law are doing so on our behalf. We're authorizing that police officer to do so. So it's our complicity in that act that concerns me. It's the extent to which society has said, you may commit what would otherwise be a criminal act in order to advance our interest. I think there simply have to be limits to how much, for how long, and of what kind of justification you can offer to police officers. Otherwise they become in effect our designated law breakers. I don't think we can tolerate that.

[Luc Harvey, Conservative, Louis-Hébert, QC]

In Montreal, the RCMP ran an exchange and double cashing operation. It was an easy way to make contact with street gangs, organized groups, drug dealers, etc. and to gather a lot of information.

Just 10 days ago, 17 persons with very disturbing intentions relating to Parliament Hill were arrested. Under these circumstances, I cannot see how you can avoid covert operations. Obviously, they must be controlled. I believe it is absolutely essential to do it in order, at least, to be on an equal footing with criminals who can cause serious harm to our population.

[Ken Swan]

If I understood you correctly, it was a money laundering operation.

[Luc Harvey, Conservative, Louis-Hébert, QC]

Yes.

[Ken Swan]

We've said from the beginning that we don't think there's any problem with authorizing police officers to engage in what would otherwise be an offence relating to the possession of contraband or transactional offences relating to contraband. That would include dirty money. That kind of operation may very well have enormous dividends, and it may be very reasonable to authorize what would otherwise be an offence, in order to get those dividends paid.

This is a much more general provision we're talking about here.

[The Chair, Conservative, Art Hanger]

Thank you, Mr. Harvey.

Ms. Barnes.

[Sue Barnes, Liberal, London West, ON]

Thank you very much.

I welcome your testimony. It's always helpful to us when we have difficult tasks before us.

I tend to agree that the lateness of the reports is a concern, and I think we should note that in our report. I also think, when you go across the land and pick up the reports, you do it individually by jurisdiction. Another witness came before us and suggested there should be one complete report for Canada on an annual basis. First, I want to know whether you think that's worthwhile. One of the things that happens when you collect data on an annual basis is you give everybody a deadline, so hopefully it would be helpful. We could get a real assessment across the country at a glance, basically.

When you answer that question, I do have some concerns about the safety after the fact from operations that have occurred. While I agree that the information tells us virtually nothing that you could get a logical conclusion from at this point, I would like to strike a balance between getting more information, to see the efficacy of the legislation, but not put anybody's personal safety.... If you go down to the point and to the extreme example, Ms. Wood, and you say this came from this geographical data and this thing, somebody's going to know what happened. I think that's very counter-productive to what we're trying to accomplish here.

What parameters when you say...? It has been suggested charges. Have charges been laid or are charges pending--those types of things. That's the type of information.... What other types of information? When we say let's get a better report, what do we really want that's not going to do harm as well as give information? It's that line that we're trying to find here, because I think we can all agree around this table, hopefully, that the reports right now don't give sufficient information.