Public Safety Committee on Nov. 7th, 2012

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

They have the same kind of agreements that we have. I realize these questions are rhetorical and the answers are obvious, which makes me wonder why some of the questions before were asked. I just wanted to clarify that.

More specifically, you talked about identifying information of interest for retention based on potential enforcement action or whatever. Who makes that decision on what information is retained? Is that CBSA? Is it another law enforcement agency? Who makes that decision that allows you to retain that information for a longer period?

[Sharon McKeen]

It's actually entrenched in our regulations. We have the ability to do that.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Okay. So it's the CBSA folks themselves.

[Sharon McKeen]

We do have a treaty in place with the European Union, and the commitments are actually outlined. The 43 commitments that I alluded to earlier are in the 2006 agreement with the European Union.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

So there are fairly specific guidelines about the kind of information that can be retained, and why, and so on.

[Sharon McKeen]

It's very specific.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

Okay. Good.

On the privacy, there was some discussion about making a judgment call on protecting somebody's privacy. Who makes that call? Is that the CBSA agent who is dealing with it on the spot, or is that, again, by protocol, by pre-authorized circumstances kind of thing?

[Sharon McKeen]

We have privacy safeguards in place. It's very controlled. The systems are accessible only by authorized officials. It's very clear in the 43 commitments what CBSA is going to do with the information—where we're going to place it, who is going to access it, how long we're going to retain it, when we begin to depersonalize it, the reason we're accessing it.

The reason we're using it is related to terrorism only. We're not looking at that information and analyzing somebody for driving under the influence, for example. It's for the specific purpose of combatting terrorism and terrorism-related crimes, and transnational crimes specifically.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

For my last question, the answer may seem obvious, but it is important for the record.

Could you outline the potential consequences if we don't pass these amendments?

[Sharon McKeen]

If we don't get the information early, we're not able to mitigate threats before they arrive on Canadian soil.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

This may seem like a bit of a silly question, and it may be, but would we have caught the underwear bomber or the shoe bomber under the current two systems?

[Sharon McKeen]

We may or may not have. I know that a tip came in from his father. When did the tip come in? If we had the information earlier....

I mean, we're talking timelines. It's possible.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

The point is that it's all about having information as early as possible.

[Sharon McKeen]

Absolutely. The more we know, the better armed we are.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Edmonton Centre, AB]

I rest my case.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much, Mr. Hawn.

Mr. Rafferty, you have final say on this.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

In any kind of sharing and gathering of information, there's bound to be incorrect information that is input or comes from somewhere, whatever the case may be. With this amendment, how can Canadian citizens—if they get flagged, for example—ensure that the right information is there? Is there a mechanism for people to say, “Oh, wait a minute now; I shouldn't be flagged”?

I will tell you why I ask that. I am regularly flagged at the airport. Now, it's probably because I ask questions like this in committee—

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

—but there's obviously a bad boy with the same name as I have somewhere. At least that's all I can assume.

For a regular, ordinary Canadian citizen, if they get flagged or stopped, what recourse do they have to sort out what's happening?

[Sharon McKeen]

Well, I see two aspects of your question. Anybody can be referred at any time for any reason. It doesn't mean you are a higher-risk or lower-risk individual. That's one aspect.

Is there anything you can do? Not really. We reserve the right to question anybody coming to Canada. Again, it's public security.

If you are concerned about what type of information was transmitted to Canada for your flight coming to Canada, and any API/PNR, anybody can go on the CBSA website and access their own API/PNR data at any time. There is a form. You can make the request.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

So you can make a request and you can also ensure that there are changes made, if things are incorrect.

[Sharon McKeen]

It depends, right? If the information is factually incorrect, you can request a correction and we'll evaluate it.

The reason I say this is that, you know, you could have maybe divorced and you don't want to see your husband's name or your wife's name on your information, and you ask to have that taken off. We wouldn't, because it was factually correct.

I use that as an example. We need to evaluate the request for correction or notation as it comes in.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

You gave us the timelines on when the information becomes inactive. I know you have agreements with other countries. How do you ensure the other countries' information also becomes inactive in the same timeframe that it would in CBSA files?

[Sharon McKeen]

Are you asking if CBSA checks other countries' retention periods?

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Well, how do you ensure that the information you're passing along gets deleted or whatever when the timeframe is up?