Evidence of meeting #44 for Public Safety and National Security in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was terrorist.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Brent Rathgeber Conservative Edmonton—St. Albert, AB
Does the Government Operations Centre run real-time drills?
Director General, National Security Operations Directorate, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
The Government Operations Centre runs constantly. It's 24/7 to begin with, but it constantly runs exercises and is part of exercises, running drills. For example, with regard to the air incident protocol, which is a protocol for the government to respond to air threats, they sometimes run up to two or three drills a week in just exercising—constantly exercising.
As most of us know, in policing, law enforcement, security intelligence, or a military environment, the key to a response is exercise.
Conservative
Conservative
Brent Rathgeber Conservative Edmonton—St. Albert, AB
I want to change directions, to the old issue of cyber security and cyber threats. I briefly perused the document, but I didn't see that mentioned anywhere.
Is the prospect of cyber threats, where a worm or a virus could potentially shut down a power plant or somebody's air traffic control systems, identified in this document or elsewhere? Does Public Safety see cyber security as a real threat to our national security?
Director General, National Security Operations Directorate, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Mr. Chair, the response to that question has to go back to what this strategy is about, and that is countering terrorism, and terrorism in all its forms and threat forms. Cyber security, as a thing in and of itself, is of great concern to Public Safety. In fact, Public Safety is charged with a cyber security strategy and being the critical incident response centre that responds to cyber issues. But it has to be threat-driven, in the sense that we have to have terrorists committing a threat using cyber security—not others doing it.
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you. It's one of those topics that I think this committee is very interested in. It has come up, and yet we know so little about it. We would love to maybe hear more about that a little later on.
In the meantime, we'll move to Mr. Scott, please.
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
I think I can oblige, as I'll ask a couple of questions precisely on that.
I think Mr. Rathgeber is correct. It seems to be little touched upon in the resilience strategy.
In the cyber infrastructure discussion, there's no mention of a bill that the ministry was obviously sponsoring at the same time it was preparing this report, and that's Bill C-30 on Internet surveillance. Now it's called the child predator something or other act, but in fact it covers all crimes and any criminal investigations where there's Internet data relevant to crimes. It's not only about child predators. That's one of the things we've learned in the whole episode.
I have a quick question. Because you're attempting to have a fairly integrated, holistic approach, is Bill C-30 integral to the counter-terrorism strategy set out in this document?
Director General, National Security Operations Directorate, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
The powers that are found in the current draft bill, Bill C-30, are one part of the critical puzzle of all efforts to combat terrorism, keeping in that strict interpretation, yes.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Is there any reason, though, that it wasn't mentioned or there wasn't a stronger reference to cyber security issues in this document? Is it just that it's an early stage of...? I'm just thinking of the holistic interconnection of the....
Director General, National Security Policy, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Yes, I believe there is a reference in the strategy to terrorists' interest in using, say, the Internet as a tool to facilitate attacks. I could be wrong, but as that threat is evolving quickly, it would be something we'd want to note in the next iteration of the threat assessment.
Certainly in the “prevent” pillar and the issue of countering violent extremism, I think a big issue is the use of the Internet and social media as a tool for recruitment, financing, and propaganda use. At least from the policy perspective we're working on, that is something we want to learn more about, and it will figure more prominently in the days ahead, for sure.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
That actually slides into the next point.
There is a reference on page 32 of the document to how, after 9/11, “stronger laws against hate crimes and hate propaganda” were part of the measures taken. Some of us are quite concerned that we're about to see Bill C-304 go through the House, a bill that actually repeals the hate propaganda sections of the Canadian Human Rights Act. It deals with robocalls and Internet websites disseminating hatred.
In the report, white supremacy groups are listed as the kind of issue-based local terrorists that we might be concerned about or groups that might become terrorist. In the whole planning exercise, I wonder whether this bill, Bill C-304, ever came on the radar screen of Public Safety. It's a private member's bill, so it could well be the case that it didn't.
Director General, National Security Policy, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
First of all, there's a bit of a time lag between when these documents are written and when they're actually published. This was released in February, but a good part of it was written last summer and fall, so there's a—
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
The bill was deposited a year ago, though.
You're not aware of it?
Director General, National Security Policy, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
No, I’m not.
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Okay. Thank you.
I have one other point, a matter of clarification.
Do I have a minute, Mr. Chair?
NDP
Craig Scott NDP Toronto—Danforth, ON
Okay, thank you.
On page 9, the top left corner, there's this reference:
Some international terrorist groups have more explicit Canadian connections.... Although the civil war in Sri Lanka has ended, it is important that any surviving elements of the LTTE
—the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam—
are not allowed to rebuild in Canada.... In May 2010, for example...
—a named individual—
an LTTE fundraiser, was convicted of terrorist financing in Canada.
I want to point out that the crimes for which he was convicted in 2010 occurred in 2008, before the end of the war in 2009. Is there any particular reason that this very specific provision made its way into this document, naming a specified individual, a specific terrorist group, with respect to crimes that have nothing to do with the LTTE's resurging after the war? Is this any indication that we think the LTTE is reforming in Canada?
Director General, National Security Policy, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
I think we're going to have to get back to you on that. I imagine it was something to do with the LTTE’s being a listed entity, so we'll have to.... You were looking for a good example here, so let me get back to you on that.