Public Accounts Committee on May 26th, 2009

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Can you tell us when we might see a regime change?

[Suzanne Hurtubise]

That would be for the government to decide. But all the analysis, the options, have been set out, and the government recently said that it was awaiting the Air India recommendations.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Ms. Ratansi.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Madame Morin, you were asked whether we are more secure today than in 2001. You were very candid in your response. You said that the terrorism issue is very complex and that perhaps we are more coordinated. Whether we are totally prepared, we don't know.

In the global context, we have countries that are being destabilized even as we speak. We have outside interference in sovereign states. We know nothing about the culture or traditions of some areas. We are taking our eye from the ball. We are concentrating on some groups, but we do not know that others are percolating. I do not know whether we are secure. You were talking about challenges, about information-sharing and the need for government to balance it with transparency. Could you explain the concept of transparency with respect to Abdelrazik, who is a Canadian citizen sitting in the Canadian embassy compound in Sudan? Can anybody give me any guarantees that there will not be another inquiry?

[Marie-Lucie Morin]

I was candid in saying that the world presents a great number of challenges, but I hope I was also clear that I believe we have made huge progress in being more prepared if we have to face security incidents. I firmly believe that we are.

We are able to gather a lot of information and intelligence with respect to what happens around the world. We have embassies around the world. We have a fairly clear picture of what goes on from a geopolitical point of view. This allows us to look at the threatened environment and to learn what it means for North America, for Canada. I believe we have good mechanisms for providing this kind of landscape to the government. We can assure Canadians that we are cognizant of what happens in the greater world. As for Mr. Abdelrazik, I believe this issue is in front of the courts. Because of this, I would refrain from making any further comments on the matter.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Fair enough.

Madame Hurtubise, a question was asked regarding the secret-level communication system implementation. The Auditor General said that because it was over budget it might not move forward. I'm not putting words in the Auditor General's mouth. Is there enough budget now? Is it going to be implemented? A system of this kind might have prevented the Air India disaster

[Suzanne Hurtubise]

With respect to the secure communications project that you're referring to, I can certainly say that we were given sufficient budget, about $34 million, to create it, devise it, and implement it as a pilot, which we have done--to develop the technical specifications, to develop the protocols for use, to test it, to make sure it could then be rolled out. That has been done. Parliament voted sufficient funds for us to do that, and that phase is now complete.

I don't believe we referred to it explicitly, but the next phase now is whether or not it gets implemented, and how it gets implemented. For it to be implemented, additional funds will be required, absolutely. But we certainly had the funds to do the pilot we were responsible for.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Ms. Ratansi.

Mr. Young, for four minutes.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Thank you, Madam Hurtubise.

I'd like to learn a little more about the Government Operations Centre. Is it just an ongoing administrative centre or does it serve us in emergencies? Does it make Canadians safer from terrorism and extremism? Is it that kind of operations centre, or is it just a communications hub?

[Suzanne Hurtubise]

It is basically a communications and coordination hub. It does, however, receive input from a variety of sources to coordinate and provide information. So if we were dealing with a particular incident, if there were important intelligence information, it might get that from ITAC, the Integrated Threat Assessment Centre, for example. It might receive information and be in regular contact with the RCMP, if it's an ongoing incident and the RCMP is involved. We might also be dealing with local police forces or local first responders as well, to transfer and provide as much information as we have.

So it is not a creator of information or intelligence; it coordinates and transmits it. But it does operate 24/7. Obviously, when there's an incident, we bring in additional people.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

So you would support ITAC if there were an apparent emergency?

[Suzanne Hurtubise]

We would support any government department or agency, not just in the security community. We would support, for example, the Public Health Agency in the latest H1N1 outbreak. We would support any government department in any of its activities in any way they need.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Grégoire, there's a five-point plan that the Minister of Public Safety and Security and the Minister of Transportation put together, and part of that plan is to improve the screening at airports. You mentioned biometrics.

Can you tell us a little bit about how biometrics work, how it works on the front line, how the employees are screened to work at airports?

[Marc Grégoire]

Yes, absolutely.

First, the government provided money to increase the physical screening of workers. CATSA screens a number of people today. The government provided money for more workers to be screened, and I mean physically screened, not the background check.

Then we have the restricted area identity card, which is the biometric card. The concept of this card is that the biometrics of the person, that is the fingerprints, digital information, as well as the iris scan, are embedded in a little chip on the card. When the employee wants to enter the restricted area, they have to swipe their card through a magnetic reader that then compares the biometrics on the card with the biometrics of the person. It also compares them with a database of valid security clearances.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Where does that data come from for that database? Is that an international database?

[Marc Grégoire]

Well, CATSA manages the system on a national basis. We manage the validity of security clearances. CATSA checks with us, Transport Canada, once a day for the validity of the clearance. So, for instance, if the RCMP gave us information about somebody whose card we should suspend, that would be in the database immediately. It would be transmitted back by CATSA to the airport, and when the employee tried to open the door, it wouldn't work.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

I get it. Thank you.

I had a question for Madam Morin. I want to find out a little bit more about how your office works, if I may. Is it like a secretariat? Where do you get security information? What are the sources? How is it provided, and is it provided on a 24-hour basis?

[Marie-Lucie Morin]

My office is located, as you know, in the Privy Council Office. I have mentioned my role of coordination from a security and intelligence point of view. If you want to call it a secretariat, essentially what I do is provide this coordinating role, if I may borrow the analogy, at the top of the pyramid. In other words, the security and intelligence apparatus comes through me in terms of the advice I need to provide to the Prime Minister and the government on specific issues.

Again, I think it is important to remind us all that in our Westminster style of government, the various departments and agencies have their own vertical accountability to ministers. My role exists, in fact, in the U.K. and in Australia, but it is not to be confused, as it is at times, with the same role that exists in the United States at a political cabinet level; I am obviously a public servant, and my role is one of coordination of the community.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you very much, Mr. Young.

The committee has a couple of items of business we want to look after, so I'm going to suspend this part of the meeting, but it will still be public.

Before we do that, though, on behalf of all members of the committee and all members of Parliament, I want to thank all the witnesses for their appearance here today. Our country of Canada is an advanced democracy where the fundamental right and the fundamental obligation of the country is to protect its citizens, but we have the competing interests of privacy and intrusion into the rights of citizens. These concepts have to be balanced, and we certainly want to thank you for all your efforts in doing that. I want to thank you for your appearance here today, and I want to thank the Office of the Auditor General for their report.

Before I go on to the next part of the meeting, do any members have any closing remarks or comments that they want to make? Before I do that, I want to ask you, Madam Auditor General, if you could stay around for the next part too, because I believe there may be a question on the supplementary estimates (A).

Are there any closing comments?

[Sheila Fraser]

Chair, I'd like to thank the committee for their interest in our report on what I think is a very important issue. We are very pleased to note that the government has made satisfactory progress on many complex issues since our last audits.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Is there anyone else? Mr. Ranger or Madame Hurtubise, would you like to comment?

Go ahead, Madame Morin, please.

[Marie-Lucie Morin]

May I use my privilege of coordination to thank you all on behalf of the community? I hope that we have been able to answer most of your questions, and we thank you for your interest.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you very much.

We're going right to the next item of business, colleagues. The next item I'd like to deal with--and I'm going to ask the Auditor General to stay--is the review of the minutes of the steering committee meeting held earlier today. Those minutes have been circulated.

The first paragraph just deals with the possible scheduling of a hearing on June 16. You also have the schedule circulated with the report, and at the meeting on June 4 we're going to allow a 10-minute session to be with the parliamentary delegation from Serbia.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Could you do them one at a time? I'd like to talk about them.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I'm just going over it before we open it up. I'm just going to highlight it.

Then we're going to bring in a couple of the academics in the fall. That's item 4. The next item is the supplementary estimates (A), which I'm going to ask perhaps the Auditor General or the analyst to explain. The last one is that the departmental action plan and progress reports received by the committee be published on the committee's website, subject to the approval of the committee.

I would like an explanation. I think it's appropriate that the committee receive an explanation on the supplementary estimates (A).