Thank you, Mr. Chair. We thank you for inviting us to discuss chapter 1 of our 2009 status report, entitled “National Security: Intelligence and Information Sharing”.
As you mentioned, I'm accompanied today by Hugh McRoberts, assistant auditor general; and Gordon Stock, the principal responsible for our audits of national security.
The audit examined progress the government has made since the audit observations made in chapter 10, “Other Audit Observations—Independent Reviews of Security and Intelligence Agencies”, of our November 2003 report; and certain of our recommendations from chapter 3, “National Security in Canada—The 2001 Anti-Terrorism Initiative”, of our March 2004 report.
I would like to start by saying that we were encouraged by the government's progress in addressing the deficiencies noted in our original audits. Overall, we found that the federal government had made satisfactory progress in 8 of the original 12 recommendations.
In 2003, we recommended that the government assess the level of review and reporting to Parliament for security and intelligence agencies to ensure that agencies exercising intrusive powers are subject to levels of external review and disclosure proportionate to the level of intrusion. At the time of our follow-up audit, the government had completed its assessment and considerable preparatory work had been done. However, no decisions had been made on whether or when changes would be introduced.
We also found progress had been made in a number of other areas: organizing and coordinating priorities among federal departments and agencies involved in security; reducing the fingerprint backlog and progressing in its development of a computerized system to analyze digitized fingerprints, and improving the reliability of watch lists of individuals considered to be of interest to intelligence organizations.
In 2004 we noted that a barrier to information sharing was the lack of a government-wide system that would allow communication at the “secret” level among departments and agencies. While progress on this complex project was slow to start, better progress had been made in the latter period under examination; therefore, the government received a satisfactory rating for progress against this recommendation. However at the time of our audit, the project was still in the limited implementation stage and its success was contingent upon its receiving additional funding and user acceptance.
An area where we found little progress was in the balancing of privacy concerns with information sharing. The Department of Justice Canada had been tasked by the Deputy Minister Committee on National Security, which includes representatives from the Privy Council Office, the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, and Public Safety Canada, to prepare an inventory of legal problems related to the sharing of national security data. The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat collected 16 instances where departments and agencies reported legal barriers to information sharing. However, resolution of these barriers has not been achieved and the Department of Justice Canada and the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat have provided little direction to government departments and agencies.
We also found that Transport Canada and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were not sharing criminal intelligence information effectively. Transport Canada had implemented additional procedures for screening applicants for access to secure areas of airports; however, the process did not include looking at all information contained in the RCMP data systems. In addition, there were indications that Transport Canada and the RCMP did not give full information to each other. As a result, Transport Canada may be granting clearance to high-risk individuals for work in secure areas of Canada's airports. As noted in our report, Transport Canada does not see its role as preventing criminal organizations from infiltrating airports. If it does prevent unlawful activity at airports as a result of its screening process for airport workers, this is seen as a side benefit.
In the world of security intelligence, information sharing is critical; therefore it is important that the government find a way of resolving legal constraints, where appropriate. And for Canadians to have confidence in their security and intelligence organizations, they need to know that government agencies and departments maintain a balance between protecting the privacy of individuals and ensuring national security.
Since the 31st of March 2009, the date we tabled our report, I understand that the RCMP and Transport Canada have signed a memorandum of agreement on information sharing, but we have not reviewed this document. For the other new recommendations contained in the chapter, the committee may wish to request from departments and agencies an action plan that addresses our recommendations.
Mr. Chair, thank you. That concludes my opening statement. We would be happy to respond to the committee's questions.