Public Safety Committee on Nov. 2nd, 2006

[John Brunet]

I believe it's a policy question. I know the minister responded to the report when it was issued. He had some positive comments as well as some concerns about the conclusion. In any case, it's difficult for us to comment on that report.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Do you have another point of order, Mr. Holland?

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

I would like to speak to the same point of order. In my experience with items of this nature, it is possible for officials to offer what they believe to be the minister's position or the government's policy. They could preface it by saying, “I understand the minister's position is”, or “I understand the government's position is”. I don't believe Mr. Cotler was asking for a personal opinion. In the future, it's probably best left to the witnesses to decide whether to answer the questions or not.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Those answers would be on the public record. So if they choose to just refer you to the public record, that would be sufficient, would it not?

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

Precisely, and that's what I'm saying. They can choose how they would answer those questions, but there are ways of them answering the questions without being put in a position of giving their personal opinions, which might be contrary to--

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Do you just want to refer the members to the public record, or do you want to make further comments?

[John Brunet]

I think it is best to refer to the public record, particularly because, at the invitation of the committee, we were under the understanding that it was to talk about the Canada Firearms Centre, as well as the main estimates. We appreciate that there are a lot of serious policy issues within the portfolio, but I don't believe we have the people here today to adequately address that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Thank you. Do you have any other brief comments?

Okay, that completes our first round. Sorry, it does not complete the first round.

Mr. Brown, please go ahead.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

We haven't really talked much about the Arar situation. But we had the commissioner here about a month ago, and since we're dealing with estimates today, maybe you can tell us a little bit about what impact the O'Connor report has had on the RCMP, what's being done, and how that might affect the estimates.

[D/Commr Peter Martin]

Well, the impact of the report, obviously, is significant, of course, and as the commissioner mentioned during his last appearance, we are in the process of implementing the recommendations in the report. But as far as a more detailed answer than that, Mr. Brown, I just don't have the information to provide on that one. Again, I know the commissioner is looking forward to reappearing before the committee, and I would suggest that you put that to him when he does appear.

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

Well, that's really what I was interested in today. I had a great deal of interest, of course, in the arming of the border guards, and we've heard about that.

Maybe our witness might want to comment a little more on this concept of a parliamentary oversight committee. Over the last week, we've had a number of witnesses before the committee--we've been meeting pretty well every day this week--and have heard their different views. We had SIRC here yesterday for their views on a parliamentary oversight committee. How might that work with your various agencies?

[D/Commr Peter Martin]

We currently have a number of oversight activities within the RCMP. As far as the parliamentary oversight committee, again, whatever the government decides, we will cooperate fully with that, obviously. We would welcome any dialogue. Again, this is a pretty big issue, and I think it's probably something you should discuss with the commissioner. I keep going back to it. He's really looking forward to getting back here.

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

I'm sure there are a number of members of the committee who are looking forward to seeing him come back as well.

I guess my concern about the oversight committee is whether you think it might help build more confidence within the public, especially in the RCMP and CSIS.

[D/Commr Peter Martin]

Well, number one, I can't talk about CSIS.

I think there's a fair level of confidence and support in the public for the RCMP today. Recent surveys we have conducted have identified, in a number of areas, that public opinion sits within the 80th and 90th percentile, and those reports are available if you care to look at them. We are always interested in anything that can improve both our performance and the confidence level that the population would have in the organization.

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

Well, I don't disagree that there is a lot of public confidence in your particular agency. However, clearly that took a hit in the last little while with the situation surrounding Arar and Justice O'Connor's report. So I think that's good.

Thank you very much. I will ask these questions of the commissioner when he comes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Thank you.

We'll now go back to Mr. Holland, please.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Perhaps I could ask the individual from the Canada Border Services Agency who came forward earlier to come forward again, because my questions are going to be relating to your area.

The first question has to--

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

I believe you wanted to correct some information. Now that you're back at the table, could you please do that for us, first of all?

Then we'll come back to you on this one. I won't take that out of your time, sir.

So I'd like to ask you if you would please make that comment that you requested.

[Candace Breakwell]

I will, Mr. Chair. Thank you, and I apologize. In answering your question, I said over 5,000 officers will be armed. There are 7,200 uniformed officers in the region and 5,000, roughly--4,800--will be armed at the marine and land sites.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Thank you very much for that clarification. It's very helpful.

We will start your time again, Mr. Holland.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for the clarification.

I'm wondering if we could talk for a minute about the implications on estimates of arming the border officers. The first is with respect to training. I'd be interested in hearing both from the RCMP and from you on this first item.

I've expressed a great deal of concern about the training regime that's been proposed. I call it “training light”, because of the fact that we have RCMP officers who are experts in handling firearms training a small number of border officers, and then those border officers are training other individuals. I have a policy problem with that, but I'm not going to ask you about the policy problem.

What I'm going to ask is whether you can you tell me the cost differential. On a cost basis, what's the difference between having all of those individuals trained by the RCMP and having RCMP officers train a small number of border officers who then go and train other border officers?

[Candace Breakwell]

The cost of the program, for training and support, as I understand it, will be about $58 million. I need to confirm that, but those are the figures I have. The decision to partner with the RCMP to develop initial training involved working with professionals in the training. Maybe Deputy Commissioner Martin would like to add to that. It was to ensure that our trainers had the best quality training in order to implement the training.

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

I don't dispute that. My concern, again, is that I would prefer all of them to receive that level of quality of training rather than only a certain number who would then go and train others.

You explained the cost today of doing “training light”, so what's the cost of doing the full-fledged training, the proper training of all officers by the RCMP? Do you have a sense of what that cost would be?

[Candace Breakwell]

No, I don't.

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

Would Mr. Martin?