Public Safety Committee on March 10th, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Mr. Norlock, please.

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

Thank you very much.

Thank you, gentlemen, for coming this morning.

My question is for Mr. Cabana or Mr. Coons. It has to do with the Integrated Threat Assessment Centre. Does your department receive threat assessments from ITAC? If so, do you have any personnel seconded to that unit?

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

We regularly receive threat assessments from ITAC, as does a large number of the intergovernmental community here. Up until recently, we had individuals seconded to ITAC. I don't know whether we still do or not.

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

Could you advise the committee if you do, please?

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

Certainly.

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

What I'd like to know about the assessments is if they are provided to you in a timely manner. Has the information provided by ITAC assisted your agency in investigations? Could you elaborate on that part of it?

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

Unfortunately, I'm afraid that I probably can't give you the details you are looking for. I am not aware of any issues in terms of the timeliness of information from ITAC. Whether the information has been useful to any ongoing investigations, again, I don't have any direct knowledge. I cannot point you to a specific report that was submitted, but I can state that any intelligence provided is beneficial at the end of the day.

Now, we need to remember that ITAC focuses mainly on national security issues.

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

Thank you.

I have been on this committee for a while, which previously studied the Anti-terrorism Act, and we heard that Canada is very much an importer, rather than an exporter, of intelligence. How much information from ITAC assessments, to your knowledge, comes from threat assessments from the U.S., the U.K., New Zealand, or Australia?

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

I'm afraid I wouldn't be able to answer that.

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

You would have no information on how we're improving our intelligence-gathering capabilities? Are you not part of that?

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

If your question is in relation to ITAC, I have no knowledge of the source of the information ITAC is getting for a specific report. I basically see the final product.

If you're speaking of the RCMP's intelligence capabilities, even though this is not in my area of expertise, I am aware, from some of the programs falling within my area, that our focus on gaining greater intelligence is ongoing on a daily basis.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

We'll now go over to the Liberal Party.

Mr. Kania, please.

[Andrew Kania, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

I ended my questioning of you the last time with your giving an answer concerning the Iacobucci and O'Connor reports. You indicated that you had reviewed those reports and had made changes as a result, but there wasn't enough time to provide detail on that.

Whether now or by way of a report you provide to us, could you please give us the exact details of what you've actually done to attempt to remedy the situation in compliance with those recommendations, rather than a generic comment: we looked through it, and everything is fine?

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

Actually it's not an issue of we looked through it and everything is fine. There were adjustments made at the time.

Since you are seeking specifics, my preference would be to return to the committee with a detailed, specific report.

[Andrew Kania, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Thank you very much for that.

You indicated that you're not satisfied with the border security and you never will be. You'll agree with me that in terms of handguns being imported into Canada legally it is a problem, and you're not satisfied with that either. Would you agree with that?

So my question to you would be, first, do you have enough resources to combat the problem? Because I also want to know how we can help you. If it's increased legislation or whatever it may be, you can tell us how we can help you so you can solve this problem. And secondly, I'd like to know from you what else you think you can be doing to help solve this problem.

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

Thank you, Mr. Kania.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

At the very end of the meeting you get that question.

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

It's a loaded question. I would be very surprised, actually, if you had anybody appear in front of your committee who would say--

[Jack Harris, NDP, St. John's East, NL]

You want fewer resources.

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

--that actually we have too many people and we'd like to lose a few hundred. So the offer for additional resources, of course, is always welcome. But I think that resources is one part of the puzzle. And if I go back--

[Andrew Kania, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Can I interrupt you for a second? Maybe what we can do is this as well. I'd like to see if we can come up with some solution to improve the situation. So because you're offering to come back and give us more information on O'Connor-Iacobucci, maybe you can also prepare something and come back and tell us what your proposed solution is and how we might be able to help you solve this problem or improve it.

[A/Commr Mike Cabana]

I could come back and propose solutions. I can do that.

I can speak of probably the key one that I can see right now as a missing component. Again, we're talking about pieces of the puzzle. In terms of our ability to secure the border, one of the big pieces for us that we feel we're missing is a visible presence along the Canada-U.S. border, not a duplication. And this is where it gets very complicated. It's not a duplication of what the U.S. has done through the presence of border patrol, but it's complementary to what is there now. But the piece that's missing is a visible, uniform presence along the border that would be intelligence-led. So we're not talking specifically about a border patrol here; we're talking about the ability to engage the communities that are, as Monsieur Ménard pointed out, on the border, with people who are living there and who know the community and know the individuals who are there, to be able to reach out to them through an enhanced presence. This is, I would say, the primary piece we're missing at this point in time.

[The Chair, Conservative, Garry Breitkreuz]

Do you want to share...?

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

I can keep going.