Public Safety Committee on March 7th, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Good morning, everyone. This is meeting number 75 of the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security, Thursday, March 7, 2013. Today we are continuing our study of Bill C-51, an act to amend Canada's witness protection program.

On our first panel we have, from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police's staff relations representative program, Staff Sergeant Abraham Townsend of the national executive.

Welcome back. It's good to have you again before the committee.

We also have Tom Stamatakis, president of the Canadian Police Association. He is appearing by video conference this morning from Vancouver, British Columbia.

Thank you for getting up bright and early, sir, and appearing before the committee again.

I will first invite our witnesses to make brief opening statements before we proceed to questions by members of Parliament. We will begin with the RCMP.

Mr. Townsend, please.

[Staff Sergeant Abraham Townsend, National Executive, Staff Relations Representative Program, Royal Canadian Mounted Police]

Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Chair, ladies and gentlemen.

We thank you for the opportunity to appear before you this morning. I speak on behalf of the 24,000 regular and civilian members of the RCMP who serve across Canada and internationally, providing their perspective and input.

My name is Abe Townsend. I have 32 years of service. I'm one of two national executives on the staff relations program and have been an elected representative since 2004.

The staff relations program is the non-union labour relations program for all 24,000 members of the RCMP. The program is authorized by law to represent them on all issues affecting the welfare and/or dignity of the members.

During my service, I've lived in four different provinces and two territories. My duties have included uniformed general duty policing, federal policing, and major crime investigation.

On behalf of those I represent, I wish to thank the government for advancing Bill C-51, the safer witnesses act, which will in turn advance the public safety interests of all Canadians. Bill C-51, when it passes into law, will serve to protect not only police officers, but those people the police rely on to carry out their duty to protect.

Policing continues to become more complex. The disclosure protections within this legislation will serve to address a portion of the complexity and some of the risk facing those who serve to protect. I have consulted with the RCMP members whose substantive duties are within the witness protection program. They are encouraged and look forward to Bill C-51 becoming law, as it will enhance their ability to perform their duties on behalf of all Canadians.

Again, thank you. I look forward to replying to any questions the committee may have.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much, Mr. Townsend.

We'll now move out to Vancouver to Mr. Stamatakis.

Welcome again.

[Tom Stamatakis, President, Canadian Police Association]

Good morning, Mr. Chair, and members of the committee. I appreciate the opportunity to appear this morning to discuss Bill C-51, which my organization, the Canadian Police Association, strongly endorses.

I believe this is my sixth or seventh appearance before your committee, so I know that most of you are familiar with the Canadian Police Association. I should note just briefly that I have the privilege of representing over 54,000 front-line police personnel from across Canada, including officers and civilians serving in almost every federal, provincial, and municipal police service in the country.

Organized crime is one of the biggest challenges facing front-line police personnel, and I can't possibly emphasize the term organized nearly enough. Groups that engage in serious criminal offences, particularly drug trafficking, will often go to great lengths to conceal their activities, frequently relying on violence and intimidation to keep associates from cooperating with law enforcement.

Law enforcement often has to rely on witnesses who are putting their own safety, as well as the safety of their families, in jeopardy when they come forward with information that is used to prosecute these dangerous offenders, and this legislation will help provide, and perhaps most importantly, modernize the tools we use to protect these informants.

As police officers, one of the issues we regularly have to deal with is the enforcement of legislation that was written 10, 20, and sometimes even 30 or more years ago and has rarely been kept up to date. This can often be a significant challenge to our members, as criminals are rarely as slow to adapt to modern technology as our laws can sometimes be.

The Witness Protection Act is one of these particular laws. While the act itself is only 17 years old, having come into force in 1996, technology has progressed by leaps and bounds during this time. One of the most important aspects of this legislation, particularly for our members, is around the disclosure of information about people participating in the program, as well as those who provide the protection necessary under this act.

When the act was originally brought into force, it probably made sense that the only information that was protected was the change of name and location. However, in today's information age, that simply isn't sufficient, and I appreciate the steps in this bill that broaden the scope of information that will be protected from disclosure.

Further on that point, the specific changes in this legislation that exempt a person from any liability or punishment for stating that they do not provide or assist in providing protection to witnesses will be a direct benefit to the law enforcement community in Canada that is tasked with these particular responsibilities.

I should also note that the parts of this legislation that deal with extending the authority to designated provincial or municipal protection programs and not just the federal program remind me of some of the testimony I recently gave to this committee around the economics of policing and the need for us to adopt and embrace operational efficiencies in order to deliver the best possible community protection at a reasonable cost to the Canadian taxpayer.

Red tape in this case, where provincial requests had to be filed with the RCMP, then processed accordingly before any changes to the identity or location could be finalized, is precisely where the cost to the system increases. I do believe that this legislation will have an impact on streamlining that work. I can only hope we'll see more of that in future bills.

In conclusion, Mr. Chair, members of the committee, Bill C-51 is an example of legislation that will help better coordinate efforts across various levels of law enforcement, provide better protection to the men and women who serve as police personnel in this country, help our members crack down on organized crime and gang activity, and promote at least some efficiencies in a system that is badly in need of reform. On those levels, the Canadian Police Association supports the adoption of the bill.

I would certainly welcome any questions that you might have.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much, sir.

We'll move into the first round of questioning and we'll go to Ms. Bergen, please, for seven minutes.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Thank you to both of the witnesses for being here.

Mr. Stamatakis, I want to begin with you. You did touch briefly on, and articulated quite well, your challenge in enforcing laws that at many times are old, and 10 or 20 years is old when it comes to new technologies and the way that criminals and, as you said, organized crime conducts itself.

I am wondering if you could just for this committee give us a bit more of an understanding of the threats that your members are under when they are administering and doing investigations themselves and dealing with informants—and informants can be under the witness protection program—but up until this legislation, the disclosure that was not prohibited was really very narrow and just a couple of pieces of information. Could you talk a little bit more about what law enforcement has had to go through up until this point and how they will be better protected? Could you just explain the organized crime aspect of it as well as the information that can be released and can then be a threat to your members?

[Tom Stamatakis]

Typically, and particularly when you're dealing with organized criminal activity, the types of informants that we'd be handling and who would be part of a program like this are obviously people with a significant amount of information. That information, when used successfully to prosecute, can disrupt the activity of organized crime groups, who obviously have a very significant incentive to prevent that from happening.

In today's world, with technology and with everybody possessing some kind of a smartphone, it becomes much easier for information to become available—with Facebook, with Twitter, and with other kinds of activities like that. Just one example is that you have a member who's essentially living a dual life, managing a high-needs informant, having to maintain separate residences, and protecting his or her family.

I just think that expanding the kinds of information that is protected, beyond the change of location or a name, provides that added level of security for our members. Although I don't profess to be an expert in this area, I know from talking with members who are actively involved in this activity that they're quite relieved, actually, to have legislation that better protects them from being dragged into a big mess because of activities they're engaged in order to protect the public.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you for that.

Would you say, then, that your officers are as much under threat as, for example, the informants, the people who are actually involved in organized crime and who then are able to bring information to law enforcement? Are law enforcement and their families as much at risk as the informants themselves?

[Tom Stamatakis]

Yes, absolutely. They can be, because they're often with the informants, particularly during the active stages of any investigation. They're with the informants on a regular basis. The informants are obviously targeted by these organized crime groups, which stand to lose a lot if the cases are successfully prosecuted. They're at as much risk when they are around the informants as the informant is.

Just as important from my perspective and that of our officers, who are often in relationships and are married and have children, is that they need to be assured that for whatever activities they're engaged in, their families are protected from any exposure as a result of their duties in handling an informant in a very serious matter.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Townsend, would you like to comment on that question as well?

[S/Sgt Abraham Townsend]

I can echo Tom's comments. When you look at transnational crime syndicates, you see that the game has been upped, including the protection that our members and all police officers need. That has always existed. I'll just reflect on a quick story. I was talking to my wife about appearing here. We have a 19-year-old son. His first sleepover, at two months of age, was as a result of a bomb threat at my residence that was tied back to an organized crimine group. It's there; it's real.

Any legislation that will enhance the level of disclosure protection for our police officers—and even for those who assist us, including from provincial regulatory bodies whose assistance we need in creating documents and false identities—absolutely.... We are encouraged by this legislation.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you.

How much time do I have, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

You have a minute and a half.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Thank you.

Mr. Townsend, up to this point in provincial programs, when they're working and moving to get someone under the protection program and are trying to get documents, there are a lot of challenges in getting those documents. Can you tell us what kind of impact that has on the people who are coming forward with information and now want to be protected? How does that affect their ability to be protected?

[S/Sgt Abraham Townsend]

My understanding is that in the past there were problems. What this legislation will do with the provincial partner program is that it will make it more seamless, whether it's federally orchestrated protection—and when I say “orchestrated”, I mean at the ground level—or provincially orchestrated. The legislation will make it more seamless. It will just ease the way we integrate our policing efforts.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Are either one of the witnesses aware of just what documents are changed? If somebody is going to be under the witness protection program, do they get new documents all around?

I recently changed my name and I had to get a new driver's licence, health card.... There are so many things that have to be changed, and I don't even know how they would do it, even their just carrying on filing tax returns. It seems like a very daunting process.

[S/Sgt Abraham Townsend]

It's new secure identification. However you would identify yourself now would be securely changed in a comprehensive way.

And Tom mentioned it. In this world of Facebook, there's so much out there in the public domain that the job is becoming harder for those in this program to make these secure changes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you. We're just out of time.

Mr. Garrison.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Thank you very much.

And thank you, of course, to both of our witnesses for appearing today. I think it's very useful for us on the committee to get a more front-line perspective from both of you. I particularly thank to Mr. Stamatakis, as a fellow British Columbian, for getting up so early so often to talk with us.

I'll start with Mr. Townsend.

We've been talking about front-line people who work with witness protection. There must be a number of other people inside the RCMP organization who deal with these cases at an administrative level, perhaps some civilian employees. Can you talk a little bit about who else might also be benefiting from the protections that are offered in this bill?

[S/Sgt Abraham Townsend]

In our national headquarters we have a policy centre function, where they set the policies that are accountable under the legislation. Then out in the field, we have our practitioners in every division in every province, and those practitioners are assisted by actual investigators. It may not be their full-time job as a witness protection practitioner in the field but an additional responsibility.

But when we look at those who are employed in it full-time, over the last few years we've made the training of those people much more robust and comprehensive. As we continue to evolve in policing, this function evolves as well. We've become much more sophisticated. I reflect back on when I was on the major crimes file some 12 years ago now, and the level of sophistication around this function in that last 12 years has increased greatly.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

In terms of preparing new identity documents and assisting in changing location, would most of that be done by uniformed officers or by the civilian staff?

[S/Sgt Abraham Townsend]

That would be done by sworn police officers, but they are assisted, whether a provincial or a federal entity, by other departments. For registered motor vehicles, we don't have access to create a driver's licence. That's where the extended disclosure protection comes in. That person working at registering motor vehicles is not subject to disclosure or threat, or at least at a reduced level.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

I think that's a very useful perspective. I hadn't really grasped that we're talking about extending those protections outside the actual police forces to some of the other public servants who assist. It's easy to see how organized crime would then target them as a way of cracking the identity question.

[S/Sgt Abraham Townsend]

Yes.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Okay. I'm going to turn to Mr. Stamatakis.

You have members who work for municipal police forces and you also represent RCMP officers. On the RCMP website, there's been a statement for quite a long time saying that sometimes smaller police forces find it difficult to make use of the witness protection program because the costs are billed back to those departments. We've been asking a number of people at the actual operations level if they can comment, whether they believe that's an accurate statement and whether it actually has those impacts on investigations.