Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Some witnesses may have said the things that the parliamentary secretary.... Most did not say those things, and most did not imply that the bill granted law enforcement powers to CSIS. In fact, the concerns are based on the positive statement in the bill that says CSIS can do anything, with only three exceptions.
So I am happy to see this amendment, which will certainly clarify the point of law enforcement powers. But it does skip over the main concern, which is about doing anything other than murder people, violate their sexual integrity, or interfere with the courts. That's a very broad grant of power. What's missing there, which was of concern to people, is the ability to detain persons or transfer persons to the custody of another.
I am moving a subamendment to add, at the end of the government's amendment, following the words “law enforcement power”, the following:
or power to detain any person or transfer any person to another state.
I have copies of that, which can be distributed in both official languages.
So if the government is serious in bringing forth this amendment and trying to clarify those extreme comments, this will very clearly state that detention, which is not arrest—it's a different thing in law—would not be a power of CSIS, and that whether inside or outside Canada, CSIS would have no power to detain someone, and after that detention, to transfer them to another person or state.
If these are indeed ridiculous claims and extreme claims, we can deal with them right now by adopting the subamendment, which would make clear that CSIS would not have those powers.