Public Safety Committee on Oct. 31st, 2006

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

We understand that, but it's very important for us to know how we can stop this from happening again. We need to get to the bottom of it, and we're having some difficulties, even today.

One thing Commissioner Zaccardelli said was that he found out prior to the report of Judge O'Connor that Mr. Arar was innocent. Did you find out about his innocence before the release of Mr. O'Connor's report? If not, when did you find out?

[Jim Judd]

I think it was at the time of publication of the report of Mr. O'Connor, which I read at some length.

I would remind you that a whole variety of individuals from throughout the federal government, not just CSIS or the RCMP, appeared before Mr. O'Connor in his inquiry. In fact, of all the people in Canada that I know of, Mr. O'Connor and his inquiry staff are the most knowledgeable to be found about the whole case, including who did what.

The fact that Mr. O'Connor comes to certain conclusions or certain findings in his report does not necessarily mean that any one of us knew in advance of publication of the report that those were his conclusions.

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

Mr. Zaccardelli said that his own investigation found him to be innocent prior to the release of the report.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Your time is up now. Can you keep your point of order until the end? How long would it take?

[Paul Zed, Liberal, Saint John, NB]

One minute.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Quickly, then, what is your point of order?

[Paul Zed, Liberal, Saint John, NB]

I have backgrounder questions for CSIS arising from the Arar report prepared by Amnesty International. I only have it in English. I ask that it be deposited with the chair, translated, circulated to the entire committee, and given through our committee to Mr. Judd, who, after having an opportunity to review it, would make a reply to the committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Does the committee consent to this?

[Dave MacKenzie, Conservative, Oxford, ON]

I question the purpose. This committee was not set up to re-examine O'Connor, contrary to what some folks are saying. I'm not sure I understand what importance this would have.

[Paul Zed, Liberal, Saint John, NB]

It's because of the short time. There are a series of questions in this document that would be helpful to the committee in its work. Rather than calling a separate committee meeting for Mr. Judd to come back, it would save time if the committee received the document and sent it to Mr. Judd. He would look at the document and prepare his answers to the questions, which would then become part of the record. I'm just trying to save the committee time. If you want to have another meeting, that's fine.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Mr. Norlock.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

I'm having a hard time understanding this. Mr. O'Connor had an all-encompassing investigative hearing. Absolutely any and every witness who could possibly have added to the Arar case was put in it. We're waiting for his second recommendations.

Amnesty International may well have some concerns, but I can think of any number of agencies who might also have concerns. They would want their questions asked. They would want a crack at Mr. Judd, CSIS, and everybody else. This would be a never-ending thing. It would usurp every other thing the committee does. I fail to see how one organization supersedes all others, why this one is so important that we have to deal with it. I think this committee needs to get on with its job and let Mr. O'Connor finish his.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Let me intervene at this point. This discussion is taking more than one minute. We have witnesses before us. We're going to continue to hear from those witnesses, and we'll deal with this issue at another time. We don't have consent right now—there's a lot of discussion. We need to hear from our witnesses.

Mr. Ménard.

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Generally, torture is used to try to get at the truth. I would like to know your service's position on information obtained by torturing people. Do you set it aside completely and consider it unreliable? Do you think such information can be reliable, but that it must be corroborated by other sources? Or, even though torture is a practice you condemn and do not accept, do you nevertheless think that this is information that you would take into account in building a file?

[Jim Judd]

I can give you a personal view on that. First, leaving aside the moral issues, I would be suspicious of any information that may have been elicited under torture. People subjected to torture might say anything.

Secondly, as I tried to point out earlier, no matter what the providence of information we receive, it would be extraordinary for us to rely on single-source information. We rely wherever possible on multiple corroboration, irrespective of whether the information may have been obtained through torture. I think that tries to respond to your question.

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Are you concerned about finding out whether certain services with which you work throughout the world use torture or not?

[Jim Judd]

It's obviously a concern for us, an issue for us. We have to take account of that in determining what, if anything, we do with such an agency in terms of either giving or accepting information. But as I tried to point out earlier, because a country may have a human rights record does not necessarily mean that anything and everything that comes out of that country is necessarily a product of torture. The information could have emerged from a communications intercept, or had been provided voluntarily, or any number of other factors.

Secondly, bear in mind that for our organization, given our responsibilities on security screening assessments, a lot of the information that flows back and forth is actually very anodyne--Is this individual who is applying for this, that, or the other who they say they are? Did they live here, there or wherever? Were they in fact a graduate of this university or school? And so on. I think sometimes people believe there is perhaps a lot more information regarding threat-related activities by individuals than there may actually be.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Thank you, Mr. Judd.

We'll move to our final questioner, Mr. Brown.

[Gord Brown, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I know we're running out of time, so I'll ask one question of Mr. Judd. Clearly, there's frustration around the table from all sides here, and I've been asking this question of our various witnesses: How would you feel about a national security parliamentary oversight committee?

[Jim Judd]

As I said in response to an earlier question, that's a fairly common practice in western democracies. Personally, I see some benefits in it in terms of developing a better level of knowledge and understanding by members of Parliament of what organizations like ours do and how they do it, in part to address some of the misconceptions that may exist from time to time.

But I think also that national security issues are obviously a subject of normal great interest for governments and for elected officials of the country and that there is something going back to the issue of legitimacy and public confidence that could perhaps be bolstered through that kind of mechanism.

[Gord Brown, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville, ON]

Thank you.That's all.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Thank you very much. Our time is up.

I'd like to remind the committee that we're departing from our normal routine of having meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Tomorrow we will be meeting in Room 237-C in the Centre Block at 3:30 in the afternoon.

Thank you very much to the witnesses.

This meeting stands adjourned.