Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. It's an honour to be here to present to the committee.
My background in border security dates from the time I was in Washington as ambassador from 2000 to 2005. I lived through the tragedy of 9/11 and the efforts to mitigate the problems along the border with the smart border accord of December 2001. Then I lived there through to the beginning of the security and prosperity partnership of North America, which is a trilateral arrangement to look at trade and border security issues that prevail today.
I recently worked with the Canadian International Council to publish a study in November called A New Bridge for Old Allies, which looks at the whole border issue from a security, trade, and regulatory perspective. My remarks will be based somewhat on that study, but I will try to go a bit further.
My purpose today is to look at the policy framework of border security management. I will start with four premises. The first premise is that Canadian and U.S. security interests, ranging from terrorist attack and criminal activity to food and product safety problems, are highly interdependent and intertwined. Geography makes Canada and the United States partners in security self-interest.
My second premise is that the economies of Canada and the United States are highly interdependent. We often think that Canada is dependent on the United States, but the United States has a high degree of dependence on Canada, not just in the manufacturing sector but in energy and other areas of their economic well-being. It's not often acknowledged but it's certainly present. It's a little bit like when you're denied oxygen. We haven't denied oxygen very often to the United States, so there isn't a real recognition of the degree to which they are dependent on Canada economically. Canada is the largest trading partner of 37 states of the union, for example.
The third premise is that the security of Canada and the United States--not to speak of our common prosperity in the global economy--can best be achieved through cooperative, not competitive, border management. In other words, we have to work with the U.S. and the U.S. has to work with us to come up with a common goal, objective, and result, which is border security. We can't operate in isolation.
The fourth premise is that the border really has changed since 9/11, and it will not revert to its state prior to 9/11 in the foreseeable future, if ever. So many of us have had the experience of growing up in a border town. I have, and in my time you had to be 21 years of age to get a drink in Ontario and it was 18 in Buffalo. So I'd go across to Buffalo to get a drink as a young man. It's not as easy anymore, and those days aren't going to return for quite some time. I think we have to acknowledge that and move on to make the border work better.
So the objective is to establish an efficient border to facilitate legitimate traffic while enabling Canada-U.S. security.
I would argue that there are basically four elements or pillars enshrined in the smart border accord of 2001 that remain valid. They should act as a platform for our border security management as we move forward. In fact, if we can follow those principles, we may be able to avoid some of this generic political discussion on the invidious comparison between the United States' southern border, Mexico, and the United States' northern border, Canada. That's a dialogue that doesn't lead anywhere and will actually harm us in the United States.
So the first element, I suggest--and these are obvious ones--is risk management. It's extraordinarily important to work with the United States to develop or establish similar criteria that can determine the differing levels of risk. Then we can agree with the United States that Chrysler--if it still exists in several months--as it crosses the border represents a certain low level of risk and we can deal with it in a comparatively low-level way. But the battered up old heap of a truck that comes across for the first time requires a higher level of intrusiveness and represents a higher level of risk. So critical to this is implementing similar measures to deal with agreed levels of risk, and working with the United States on that.
I think what makes that an attractive proposition is if we contrast the Canadian and the Mexican borders. The Mexican border has a different type of risk to the United States. The Mexican border is a smaller border, but its challenge is the number of undocumented individuals, the hundreds of thousands per year, who cross that border. The Americans are dealing with that risk in a slightly different way from the risk they perceive in the northern border. In the southern border they are much more intrusive, they have many more agents, and they're building fences. I see that as somewhat of an unhappy thing to do, but that's what they're doing.
They can't do that on the northern border. Our border is three times as long as the Mexican border. The risk isn't so much people streaming across the border. The threat to the United States is the huge expanse of that border. So what are they doing on the northern border? They're using Predator drones. They're using drones and sidebar radar and infrared to deal with that threat. That to me is a different method to deal with a different type of risk. This shouldn't be a problem for us. But that's the issue.
It seems to me that we can get away from these comparisons between northern and southern borders if we recognize that the risks are different and they should be dealt with in a different way, and then we agree with the United States on what those measures might be.
The second element I would say that's very relevant these days in border security management is developing information technologies so that that can enable risk management techniques. Use technology in order to deal with low risk. The obvious example is transponders on trucks that can then send forward what the inventory is, where the truck is at any given time, where the truck has stopped, whether it has been opened, and whether its weight has changed. There are all sorts of interventions on the truck as it progresses towards the border and so on. Then, obviously, it goes through FAST lanes, which allow it to go through more quickly. A VACUS machine--these big gamma ray machines--is another example of where a container truck can go through at six kilometres an hour and its contents can be inspected without any agent having to go inside, and it can move through quite quickly.
The critical point here in information technologies is that Canada and the United States develop the same technologies, that they are compatible, that they can be read and used equally on both sides of the border, and that we don't have disjunctive technologies. I think that's extraordinarily important.
The third element in border security management that I think is very important to emphasize—and it's something that Monsieur Rhéaume talked a bit about—is information sharing, the importance of good, close information between the border service agencies on both sides to deal with risks of perceived threats before they reach the border and outside North America. There is no question that Canada has certain intelligence assets or diplomatic assets in parts of the world where the United States doesn't have as strong a representation, and vice versa. To the extent that we can share information and intelligence, while preserving human rights and private security--and that's obviously an area that's sensitive--to the extent that we can anticipate the threat as it arrives in North America or before it reaches the border, this lightens up the degree of security actually at the border, which then lightens up the delays that are going across the border.
The fourth area that we should be looking at in border security management—again, Monsieur Rhéaume mentioned it—is increased border resources. That's personnel in terms of assisting in the inspections, but it also relates to infrastructure. It relates to better plazas, roads going back from the border that have dedicated lanes for the faster, approved trucks that go through, so there's not jamming up as one approaches the border. Here again, I think the critical point is that this has to be complementary with the United States; this has to be a cooperative effort with the United States. We cannot afford to build bridges to nowhere; we cannot afford to build infrastructure to nowhere.
It seems to me that would mean close collaboration with the United States on training, secondments, and facilities with respect to border services, and as we go forward and develop our infrastructure, on the United States' side their stimulus program and infrastructure, and, for Canada, the program that's been around for quite some time, the gateways program--from the continental gateway to the Pacific gateway, etc.
I'll conclude by saying that it seems to me that policy-makers must acknowledge that there has been a shift in the security paradigm since 9/11. Failure to move forward to minimize the obstacles to the flow of legitimate trade can only cause our border to thicken further. Critical to that is working very closely with the United States as we plan our joint security across the border.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.