Thank you.
I echo my colleagues' remarks on both sides in thanking everyone here, the staff, and of course the chair for bringing in—it's still questionable—either pork or turkey tonight. We'll find out tomorrow who's sick and who's not. Those who ate vegetarian might be doing very well tomorrow and the rest of us sick.
On a more serious note, the reason that we find ourselves here on Bill C-51 is the recent events that have happened around the world, including here in Canada. We have had incidents of terror back on October 22. All of us in this room were impacted by that. We witnessed the video that was released by the RCMP, or a portion of that video. For those who didn't fully believe what we're facing I think that video spoke for itself. I know I had great difficulties watching that video and reading the printed text that was provided.
With regard to the legislation there were five distinct parts to this bill, each one unique and separate from the others. There were legislative gaps that were clearly identified by our national security agencies, and we heard testimony to that effect. This bill clearly addressed those legislative gaps. We brought in on this side witnesses dealing with law enforcement, intelligence gathering, experts in terrorism-related issues, and every single one of those witnesses talked about how the threat is real, it has evolved, and it's growing.
Of those credible witnesses who we brought in some of them had more than 30 years experience in these areas. All of those individuals indicated how much this bill is needed. The measures contained within it related to information sharing are absolutely crucial. There were amendments to the Criminal Code to reduce the threat level so that they can actually be able to use some of these amendments, or these Criminal Code sections, and of course the added powers to CSIS. We had one witness say that they couldn't believe this was not already the case.
Having said that, we also heard from witnesses—actually on some of the same committee meetings—who sat here as witnesses and indicated that this bill had absolutely nothing to do with terrorism, that it was simply there to instill fear and target groups. It's absolutely not the case.
As the government we brought forward amendments to really explicitly say that this bill does not target protestors, which was already implied in the legislation and which we have been reinforcing and reminding opposition members on every single day. I have personally gone on panels to say that this bill does not target protest. So I'm hoping that the amendments that came forward today, the testimony that we had from the experts that clearly indicated what the information sharing was about, can put those fears to rest.
It's really unfortunate, Mr. Chair, that throughout this process there's been misinformation about this bill. Hopefully, it's not been intentional. I think today some of those misconceptions were clarified by the witnesses, and I really thank you for that testimony and for being here. I'm hoping that it will put to rest some of the concerns that may be out there that are not necessarily legitimate concerns. In fact, we actually had a witness say it was very unhelpful for this process when at the fact of this bill is the national security of this country, the safety and security of Canadians, and providing the tools necessary to our national security agencies to better protect both of those things.
So on closing I would just like to thank you, Mr. Chair, and committee members on all sides of the House, and especially all of the staff and the witnesses who were here with us throughout this entire process.
Thank you.