Evidence of meeting #17 for Public Safety and National Security in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was information.
A recording is available from Parliament.
10 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Garry Breitkreuz
No. The practice at this committee is to give all MPs one opportunity before anybody gets a second, unless someone from your party chooses to give their spot to you.
10 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Garry Breitkreuz
You do not get a turn now until we go through the entire rotation and come back to the NDP.
Go ahead, Mr. Zed.
10 a.m.
Liberal
Paul Zed Liberal Saint John, NB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Elcock, Mr. Judd, first of all, I want to say that I'm substituting today for Irwin Cotler, who unfortunately is unable to be here. He was anxious to remind both of you gentlemen of the difficulty of the job you do--and I'm sure you have had some challenges--but also to underscore the importance of public confidence in the CSIS organization.
As a former chair of this committee, I understand the difficulties and challenges you have. My question is pretty simple. Do you believe that any of the activities or actions of CSIS in any way contributed to Mr. Arar's unfortunate and illegal removal from this country and his torture? I would like both of you gentlemen to answer that question.
10 a.m.
Liberal
Paul Zed Liberal Saint John, NB
Then if you don't think that your organization contributed in any way, what's all the fuss about? Why are we, as members of Parliament, concerned about what CSIS might or might not have known? What did Justice O'Connor have? What about all the things Justice O'Connor said about certain activities of CSIS? Was it just a dream?
10 a.m.
Former Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS)
Mr. Chairman, from what I'm aware of what Mr. Justice O'Connor said--and it is frankly only from the newspapers, as I have not read the report--my understanding of his comments is that they don't actually go to the question asked about the removal of Mr. Arar from the United States. He wasn't actually removed from Canada; he was removed from the United States.
10 a.m.
Liberal
Paul Zed Liberal Saint John, NB
Let's stop playing lawyer and let's start dealing with public confidence. I think that's really what's critical here, gentlemen. I think one of the things you're detecting from members of Parliament, of all parties, is the frustration that CSIS is sticking its head in the sand and not appreciating the importance of having public confidence in a system that demands that the rule of law in our country be followed.
You had the opportunity to correct the record on information. That didn't happen. My colleague Ms. McDonough referenced the one voice of the RCMP. You haven't dealt with that. You failed to apologize to a Canadian citizen after your sister agency, the RCMP, basically said they're sorry. Just some basic public confidence is required here, gentlemen.
That's a question.
10 a.m.
Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service
Let me try to answer.
As Mr. Justice O'Connor concluded in his report, officials of CSIS--the organization and anyone in it--did not provide any information to any foreign government about Mr. Arar. The information provided to the United States was provided by the RCMP. Going back to Mr. Brown's question, I think Mr. Justice O'Connor also concluded that the information the RCMP compiled in the course of its work was based on the RCMP investigation, not necessarily on anything that we had done or not done.
I recognize very much the issue you're getting at of public confidence in an institution such as ours. But I do think that a reading of Justice O'Connor's report would certainly endorse what I've just said. I would also recognize, as I recognized in my opening statement, that he criticizes CSIS on several matters, which I responded to in my opening statement, including the torture assessment and the single-voice letter and the issue of leaks. At the end of the day, we are unfortunately in the position, regrettably, in many instances, of being bound by issues of national security confidences that put limitations on what we can say publicly.
10:05 a.m.
Liberal
Paul Zed Liberal Saint John, NB
I just want to ask if this could be put on the record, and then he could respond to the committee at some future point.
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Garry Breitkreuz
We still have fifty minutes left, so I don't think that will be a problem.
Mr. Hawn, for five minutes.
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
Laurie Hawn Conservative Edmonton Centre, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thanks for being here, gentlemen. I know it's Halloween and some people may be inclined to hunt witches on Halloween, but that's not what I'm trying to do.
However, I do have to say, Mr. Elcock, that I do find it curious that the head of CSIS would not be curious about the period between October 2003 and September 2006. Mr. Zaccardelli spoke to us here about some things that were obviously bubbling up in the public eye and within the purview of CSIS, the RCMP, and whatever goes on in that world.
Mr. Judd, you mentioned that CSIS is the most reviewed intelligence service in the world, and that Canadians have a habit of navel-gazing and so on. I understand that, but is it a strength or is it a weakness?
10:05 a.m.
Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service
I would say it is generally a strength in some respects, partly because of the recognition by employees of our organization that virtually anything and everything they do is subject to third-party review over the course of the year. That has the effect of generating perhaps a high level of due diligence and caution in how the organization works.
That's not to say the organization is mistake-free. It's an organization of human beings who can err from time to time, but I think the experience over the last 22 years of its existence has been that the review mechanisms—whether it's the Security Intelligence Review Committee, the Inspector General's office, or various other review mechanisms that exist in respect of CSIS, as they do with respect to any other member of the federal government—have been such as to make it an organization that is adaptive over time to the identification of shortcomings and taking steps to try to rectify those for future action.
On the whole, I think it has been a positive for the organization; and going back to an earlier question, it would hopefully have some impact in terms of public confidence that the organization is functioning as it should, in accordance with directives in law.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
Laurie Hawn Conservative Edmonton Centre, AB
If there's a failure in public confidence, is it a failure of confidence in CSIS for the work or the review that has gone on, or is it a failure in what's done with the information that the reviewers, the overseers, have made of that information?
10:10 a.m.
Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service
Quite candidly, one of the issues that you face in managing organizations such as ours is that it's very circumscribed in what it can and cannot say publicly. That's a real handicap, quite frankly, because in many instances our protection of national security confidences is actually to our detriment in terms of what the organization has done or has not done.
It's a normal human reaction, certainly in most democratic societies, to be suspicious of organizations that deal with secrets, because secrets make people uncomfortable. As well, people occasionally get nervous in terms of dealing with issues of national security, because they can be uncomfortable issues and do raise dilemmas of various sorts.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
Laurie Hawn Conservative Edmonton Centre, AB
There has been some suggestion that there be a committee of parliamentarians who would oversee matters of national security. Would public confidence be enhanced with an all-party committee such as that, one that would oversee CSIS, RCMP, National Defence, and all that kind of stuff, much like what happens in the U.S? Do you think that would be a good thing? What are your views on the possibility of that kind of committee?
10:10 a.m.
Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service
I would hope it would have a positive impact on public confidence. As you know, most western intelligence services do have some form of parliamentary or congressional legislative review. Personally, I think there would be some benefit to having that in terms of, at a minimum, developing a better understanding on the part of parliamentarians as to what organizations such as ours do or don't do, how they do it, and so on, so that the level of conversancy with these matters is better understood. The fact that elected representatives of the people are so informed I would hope would have a positive impact on public confidence as well.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Garry Breitkreuz
We'll get back to you in the next round.
We're going on to our final round now, beginning with Mr. Chan, for five minutes, please.
10:10 a.m.
Liberal
Raymond Chan Liberal Richmond, BC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Elcock and Mr. Judd, for coming to the committee. I just want to share some of my feelings about this issue, and hopefully we can work together to solve some of the issues.
Canada is a country of immigrants. Many of us come from some rude states and have seen human rights abuses to our forefathers or our relatives or are witnesses to such abuses. This is why it is so important for those of us who came to Canada, who came for the protection of human rights, to understand what's going on in this issue.
First, for the years I've been in Canada, I've really appreciated the work of CSIS. During the days when I was a human rights activist, CSIS was very much on alert to the things we faced. They were helpful in giving me and my colleagues confidence in this country.
Now I want to get into the questions.
We expect CSIS to protect Canadian citizens. We talk about sharing information with the States, so this is a question to Mr. Elcock particularly. After the deportation of Mr. Arar to Syria by the U.S. government, I would have expected that the Americans would have shared voluntarily with CSIS what additional information it was that they had on Mr. Arar that led them to make the decision to deport him to Syria. If they didn't do it voluntarily, I would have expected CSIS to ask for that information in order to protect our citizens. Have you asked, or have we asked?
10:15 a.m.
Former Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS)
At the time, we expressed interest in having more information, but we were not provided additional information.
10:15 a.m.
Liberal
Raymond Chan Liberal Richmond, BC
It makes me feel a bit more comfortable that you did ask for that information.
I have a question for you, Mr. Judd. You talk about how CSIS will be much more careful about information from countries with poor human rights records. From what I have read in the newspapers for the last few years, since 9/11, the Americans have carried out torture, have detained citizens—up to about 20,000, and most of them innocent—without legal process, have secret jails around the world, and continue to not eliminate using some form of torture on persons of interest. Would you classify the United States as a country with a poor human rights record?
