Public Safety Committee on Oct. 3rd, 2006

[The Clerk of the Committee, Ms. Louise Hayes]

That's accurate. There are seven members. They're parliamentarians from Tanzania. They will be here on Thursday. The reason they were interested in our committee is because there are a couple of members of that delegation who are parliamentarians on their equivalent committee in their country, and they said they would like to observe the committee doing its work and then possibly meet with you afterwards. So it's up to the committee if it wishes to meet with them or for how long it would like to do that.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Chair, then we would need to have an order of business that day in order for them to observe us.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Exactly. So we'd have to come up with something, but I don't think we want to do it just to have something to do to entertain them. I think we should have some legitimate business we're dealing with.

So what do we feel is--

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Could we start with Bill C-12 that quickly?

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Yes.

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

Mr. Chair, I think we could start with Bill C-12. I don't know that it's going to take up a terribly long period of time. It is the bill that was here last time. I think, by and large, we fixed whatever the issues were. So I think it would be appropriate that we deal with that, and if you have your guests here, they could see the committee--

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Yes, they can observe how we deal with it.

If we agree that we can start with Bill C-12, how do you want to start?

Mr. Comartin.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

I would certainly agree that we do that. I think it actually might be helpful or educational for them if we have the officials here to do the overview, and I would think they would be available even on that short of notice.

They could see that, we could ask some questions, and they would get a sense of how the committee functions. So I would support that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Mr. MacKenzie, do you know whether the officials or the minister could be available?

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

I don't know, but I can find out. If we didn't do that, would you want to do the estimates?

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

I just don't know if it's going to be possible to get the minister here on that short of notice.

I would suggest, Mr. Chair, if we can't do that, that we go to Mr. Holland's point on the border guards.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

The minister has already been here on the estimates, so maybe we could have just the officials. I would suspect they can come on two days' notice; I'm sure they would. Maybe we'll continue with the meeting here while Mr. MacKenzie checks whether it's possible.

Mr. Holland.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Chair, I know we've set a number of items forward, and we were talking about the one meeting. But perhaps to finish the process what we need to do is try in some sense to define the scope of our undertaking with respect to Maher Arar.

What I'm hearing you say—and I don't have a problem with it—is that you would like to move in two parts. One would be looking at the leaks, with a view to the past and answering some of the questions of how they occurred. I don't have a problem with that. The second part would be dealing with going forward, as the second part of Justice O'Connor's report comes out. I don't have a problem with that.

Dealing specifically with the scope of how leaks occurred and how we're going to find this out, I make two suggestions. One, I think most of the suggested deputants make sense, and we would concur. I would also add the head of the Canadian Security Intelligence Review Committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

I think that Mr. MacKenzie suggested that.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

I'm sorry.

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

No, SIRC is different from CSIS.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Yes, I'm sorry. I was talking, so I didn't know if you had already mentioned it. Okay, the head of SIRC.

The other recommendation would be the deputy minister for public safety and national security. The reason there and the reason why I was bringing the deputy minister up before is that I know the RCMP is conducting its own review into how these leaks occurred, but obviously the ministry that's responsible has the responsibility to get to the bottom of how these leaks occurred. So what actions are being taken by the department to investigate these leaks and try to get to the bottom as well?

Are you suggesting the RCMP public complaints commissioner as well?

[Omar Alghabra, Liberal, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

I think so. The RCMP public complaints commissioner.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Mr. Rosen informs me that on November 1.... Is it SIRC that comes out with a report?

[Philip Rosen, Committee Researcher]

Yes, Mr. Chair.

We've already agreed to hear from SIRC on their annual report on November 1. I'm pretty sure they would be able to answer questions about what they did in relation to the Arar situation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

If I remember, that date is not flexible. Is that right?

[Philip Rosen]

That's right. I've given this explanation a number of times; I'm trying to remember where I've given it.

These are part-timers working for the Security Intelligence Review Committee. They are privy councillors, and they meet as a group three or four times a year in Ottawa. When they're here, their time is tightly scheduled.

After lengthy discussions between your clerk, Louise, and the people at SIRC, we agreed on November 1, which is a Wednesday. Conceiveably, you could ask them questions about the Arar commission inquiry and what they've done.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Okay.

Mr. Hawn.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Fundamentally, I don't dispute talking with these folks. My only concern is, are we redoing the O'Connor commission? Are we going to find out anything more than Justice O'Connor has already reported on?

I'm not sure what value that would have, if all we're doing is rehashing what O'Connor has already done.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Yes, Mr. Holland.