Mr. Chair and members of the committee, I am pleased to be invited back to appear before this committee to continue the discussions on matters related to Bill S-7, the combating terrorism act, and to have another opportunity to talk about the role and mandate of the Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre, or as we call it, ITAC.
Mr. Chair, my opening remarks from the November 21 hearing of this committee are a matter of record. However, I would like to underline some points that I think are worth mentioning again.
ITAC was created in the wake of the events of 9/11 as an organization that would bridge some of the institutional gaps in the Government of Canada following a realization about the need for greater cooperation and information sharing. This sentiment was echoed in the United States, as mentioned in the 9/11 commission report.
Like CSIS, the Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre—or ITAC—is not a law enforcement organization. I want to clarify that ITAC has no independent ability to collect intelligence. Unlike CSIS, we have no intelligence officers in the field.
The primary objective of ITAC is rather to provide comprehensive and timely terrorist threat assessments to all federal departments and organizations and to all other levels of government with security responsibilities.
Our workforce is made up of analysts seconded from across government, thereby representing a wide variety of skill sets and knowledge bases.
As such, ITAC threat assessments use intelligence and information from various sources and employ various methods. Turning to the threats themselves, I would simply reiterate that the most serious terrorist threat to Canada remains that of violent Islamist extremism. Specifically, al Qaeda and its affiliates continue to represent the greatest threat from this perspective. That said, it should be noted that violent extremist elements can be found in a multiplicity of ideologies, religions, or groups.
Mr. Chair, this concludes my remarks.