Evidence of meeting #59 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 reasonable.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kerry-Lynne Findlay Conservative Delta—Richmond East, BC
Thank you.
In addition to changes to the Criminal Code, this bill would enact some changes to the Canada Evidence Act, and one of them that I don't think we've discussed yet is that it would reduce the duration of an Attorney General certificate, which can be used to prevent disclosure of sensitive government information, from 15 years to 10 years.
Could you explain just what an Attorney General certificate is in this context, and why there's a move to reduce that time?
5:20 p.m.
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
The Attorney General certificate is a certificate signed by the Attorney General of Canada to prevent sensitive government information from being disclosed. Originally I believe it allowed for the duration of that certificate to be 15 years, but because a recommendation was made by one of the parliamentary committees reviewing the Anti-terrorism Act that this period of time be reduced from 15 years to 10 years, that recommendation appears in Bill S-7.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kerry-Lynne Findlay Conservative Delta—Richmond East, BC
Are you familiar with why 10 years seemed sufficient, or why the recommendation came about to make that reduction?
5:20 p.m.
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
It was a reasoned judgment that 10 years would likely, in most cases, be sufficient to protect that information from disclosure.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kerry-Lynne Findlay Conservative Delta—Richmond East, BC
So it's yet another attempt just to make this process that much more transparent, correct?
5:20 p.m.
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
That's right. As I mentioned, it was in response to one of the recommendations made by the parliamentary review of the Anti-terrorism Act.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
Candice Bergen Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
I just wanted to go back to the new offence that's going to be created of leaving Canada for the purpose of committing a terrorism offence. Do these exist in any other countries, or is this new to Canada?
5:20 p.m.
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
If I recall correctly, the U.K. has a specific offence of attending a terrorist training camp anywhere in the world.
5:20 p.m.
Conservative
Candice Bergen Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
So it's similar in that if you leave the U.K. to go to a terrorist camp, that's an offence, whereas this new law being created is focused on leaving Canada for that purpose.
5:20 p.m.
Counsel, Criminal Law Policy Section, Department of Justice
Well, this is probably akin to the U.K. offence in that it's part of an attempt to deal with the issue of youth being radicalized and leaving Canada either to obtain further training somewhere by attending a terrorist training camp or to go to other countries to engage in terrorist activity of some kind.
As has been mentioned, four new terrorism offences are suggested by this bill.
One is the offence of leaving Canada or attempting to leave Canada for the purpose of committing the offence in section 83.18 of the Criminal Code, which is the offence of knowingly participating in or contributing to any activity of a terrorist group for the purpose of enhancing the ability of any terrorist group to commit a terrorist activity.
The second is leaving or attempting to leave Canada for the purpose of knowingly facilitating a terrorist activity.
The third is attempting to leave Canada or leaving Canada for the purpose of committing an indictable offence outside of Canada for the benefit of, in association with, or at the direction of a terrorist group.
The final one is attempting to leave Canada or leaving Canada for the purpose of committing an indictable offence that constitutes, in the particular facts of the case at hand, a terrorist activity. In other words, the indictable offence is one that would fall within the definition of terrorist activity found in section 83.01 of the code.
What these offences do is provide an appropriate punishment for trying to leave Canada in order to commit those various terrorism offences. As I believe the minister mentioned, one of the concerns—certainly it's mentioned as well in the most recent CSIS annual report—is the issue of persons leaving Canada to go elsewhere in order to engage in terrorist activity, such as persons leaving to join al-Shabaab in Somalia. These cases help to focus law enforcement on these particular offences, and hopefully it will have a denunciatory effect in making it clear that Canadians see this conduct as something that should be clearly criminalized, with a suitable punishment.
5:25 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you very much, Mr. Gilmour.
We'll now move back to Mr. Rousseau.
You have the floor for five minutes.
5:25 p.m.
NDP
Jean Rousseau NDP Compton—Stanstead, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you very much, gentlemen, for being here today and for answering our questions. Remember, this is just for us to understand the legislation more. Some of the questions might be seen to be partisan, but they're not. We really want to understand the legislation.
That said, I will ask my questions in French.
Do you think the behaviour seen during the demonstrations at the G8 and G20 summits in Toronto constitutes acts of terrorism?
I will explain why I am asking you this. We need to determine how to decide which groups of people—be they organized or not—can be considered as terrorist groups. I know some people who participate in survival camps in the canyon in Colorado, in the Alps, and sometimes even on Texas ranches with guns. Those are survival camps for all kinds of situations.
How will we distinguish between actual terrorist groups and recreational groups involved in outdoor activities? The groups I mentioned consider what they do as outdoor activities.
5:25 p.m.
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Policy Sector, Department of Justice
Thank you. That's a good point. That's why the safeguards in the bill and in the existing law are so important. Even under the existing law, it is a crime to attend a training camp if the purpose of attending a training camp is to facilitate the capacity of a terrorist group.
It's not an offence to go to a survival camp in Colorado or a survival camp in the Middle East. It's not an offence to go somewhere to learn how to shoot an AK-47. However, if the person is going to learn how to shoot an AK-47 for the express purpose of helping improve the capacity of a terrorist group, that makes it an offence. That's why the offences are actually worded that way. You have to prove that the purpose of receiving training is to enhance the capacity of a terrorist group. It's not just simply that you want to learn how to shoot an AK-47 or you want to be able to have survival skills.
Those are built into the definition of the offences, but that's why the offences also require the consent of the Attorney General before charges are laid. It's not simply a police officer who makes the determination; you have to get the consent of the Attorney General to say that the prosecution or an arrest would be appropriate.
5:25 p.m.
NDP
Jean Rousseau NDP Compton—Stanstead, QC
At the NDP, our concerns always have to do with the repercussions on the charter—including the increase of related complaints, freedom of association, and so on. How much do you think the implementation and enforcement of all the provisions of Bill S-7 will cost taxpayers?
5:25 p.m.
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Policy Sector, Department of Justice
It's hard to say how much it will cost to enforce. It all depends to what extent they are used, so it's a little hypothetical. In terms of whether there will be challenges, we do anticipate that there will be challenges. We believe that there are arguments that would support the constitutional validity of these provisions; we will have our argument in court, and the courts will decide. That's part of the guarantees of our country: we have a judiciary that determines the issues in the end.
5:25 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you, Mr. Rousseau,
I see that our time is just about there. We have just enough time for one question from the chair.
The question that I have is perhaps a hypothetical situation. Let's say there are two countries, country A and country B. Country A has been known to have terrorist activity in the past, and someone is a dual citizen, a Canadian and also a citizen of that country. Perhaps a war would break out between the two countries. We know then that some Canadians would want to go, or would go, or would try to go to serve in that war. Is there any way that going could be deemed as a potential terrorist training?
5:30 p.m.
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Policy Sector, Department of Justice
The definition of terrorism excludes actions by military forces of a country. Under international law, actions by military forces for the benefit of a state are not considered to be terrorist acts, so if people are acting on behalf of a state or on behalf of the armed forces of a country, then those are not considered to be terrorist acts for the purposes of international conventions or the purposes of this law. Therefore, if the person joins an army of another country, that would not be considered to be terrorism.
5:30 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you. Treasonous, perhaps, but not....
All right, thank you very much. Unfortunately our time has ended. We thank the department for coming before our committee today. Thank you for helping us to understand this bill a little better.
The meeting is adjourned.