Public Safety Committee on May 7th, 2015

[Michel Coulombe, Director, Canadian Security Intelligence Service]

As I testified before on Bill C-51, the info sharing act, there's nothing hidden in there that changes the CSIS Act in terms of the types of activities that we can or cannot investigate. In the CSIS Act it's clear that lawful advocacy, protest, and dissent are not something we can investigate unless it's done in the context of using violence. Nothing in Bill C-51 changed that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thanks very much.

Your time is over, Mr. Falk.

Mr. Garrison, you have five minutes.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I have two things I want to try to pursue here in five minutes or less. We'll see if that's possible.

I want to ask Mr. Paulson this, because I believe the allocation for enhancing national security falls largely in his purview, but if I'm wrong, maybe the deputy minister can comment on this.

When you look at the estimates for 2015-16, you see that $18 million is allocated for countering terrorism. Who is eligible to access that money and how will it be used? We met with the Canadian Association of Police Governance, as I know many MPs did, and the police boards at the municipal level, who bear a lot of the front-line work in countering terrorism at the community level. Their question was about whether any of this money is available to them and, if so, how are they going to be able to access that money?

The “countering terrorism” money of almost $300 million the minister refers to is of course over four years. This year, just $18 million is allocated. So who does it go to? Are municipalities eligible for it? If so, how would they access that money?

That's for whichever of you, since we don't know who has the money.

[François Guimont, Deputy Minister, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness]

I'll take a stab at this, Mr. Chair.

Public Safety runs the crime prevention strategy, for which we have a budget allocation of $40 million. As you were asking the question, I was trying to find the actual number.

This envelope exists, and this envelope is for crime prevention. It has sub-elements to it. For instance, there's a sub-element related to the gang-related types of activities and to prevention of crime in youth, and these subcomponents, measured in millions—I don't have the details here, but I will provide them to you—essentially are available for proposals coming forward to be supported and then approved by the minister.

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

But in your table 4.3.1, where it says “Enhancing National Security” and “Countering Terrorism”, there's an $18-million allocation. That's not the crime prevention fund. That seems to be something else. It's not clear who has that money and how it's being allocated.

[Commr Bob Paulson]

If I understand your question properly, that money is coming through the budget in the phased-in of that $300-plus million, right, so to the extent that we in the RCMP are getting some of that money in the first year, recognizing the ramping-up phase, we disburse that to our investigative resources in the field. Our national security approach is built on integrated teams.

That's a long story to say, at least to my understanding, that there's no direct path for municipalities to get that money. That's money we're going to put in these integrated teams, which sometimes members from those municipalities are partnered into. In that sense, it's a very long way round to get money to them.

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

Thanks very much. They were concerned that this was the case: that there was no allocation directly for them. That's not to criticize any additional allocation for the RCMP. We all know that there's a real threat of terrorism and that money is very much needed.

I want to turn to Corrections. Given the report that we received from the Auditor General—and I know that the members on the other side have argued that the Auditor General should appear at the public accounts committee and talk about Corrections—I'd like to talk about that report here in this committee.

Again, looking directly at the main estimates, there's something that is a little confusing to me. It says that the “Correctional Interventions” budget from 2014-15 to 2015-16 will be reduced by $50 million. That, I'm presuming, is the programming that goes on in the correctional institutions. Then the second line there, “Community Supervision”, is being increased by about the same amount of money.

Given the Auditor General's report, which says there's a problem in getting people into community supervision that he thinks needs to be investigated, I don't understand this allocation. If the blockage is in the programming in the prison, then how will we be spending more money in the community? Don't get me wrong: I think spending more money in the community is the right thing to do.

[Don Head, Commissioner, Correctional Service of Canada]

Thank you for the question.

The adjustment you see is actually a technical adjustment. What it is is really a shift in where we account for the spending of resources in relation to psychological services. There's actually no reduction in services. It's an accounting under the sub-activities of the program activity architecture.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

I'm sorry. Your five minutes are over. It goes so quickly, Mr. Garrison.

Mr. Payne, you have five minutes.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

Thanks to the witnesses for coming today.

I'll try to be brief.

My first question goes to Mr. Coulombe, director for CSIS.

There's certainly some additional funding, as I understand it, in the estimates. I know that some of that funding is very delicate as to where you might be spending it, so you won't be able to give us directly where that's going, but I wonder if you could comment on the value and purpose of the roughly $20 million in the 2015-16 estimates.

[Michel Coulombe]

The vast majority of that money you see in the main estimates is actually reprofiling of money for projects that were delayed. The bulk of that $20 million—in fact, close to over $19 million—is reprofiling of money.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

I don't quite understand what that means, but—

[Michel Coulombe]

It's money we have for specific projects, such as infrastructure, for example, that were delayed. We're reprofiling that money to this fiscal year.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you.

My next question goes to Mr. Portelance, director for the CBSA.

Again, they have increased funding in the main estimates. The minister did talk a bit about where some of that funding would be going, but I wonder if you could give us any further detail.

Certainly I understand the strides that are being made on the beyond the border action plan. Could you could update us on that?

[Luc Portelance, President, Canada Border Services Agency]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the question.

The bulk of the money is going to be allocated towards infrastructure technology and projects associated with beyond the border action plan. Some of this is to refurbish major ports of entry. Some will be going to technology at ports of entry, such as the implementation of RFID. Some will be associated to trusted traders programs, where we'll be adding lanes.

The majority of the funding is to enhance our ability not only to secure the border but also to facilitate new technology and new border infrastructure. Significant investments are being made in that area.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you.

Mr. Portelance, the minister also made some comments on the preclearance. I wonder if you have any other information that you'd like to talk about in particular on the U.S. Customs and border officers working in Canada. As I understand it, there's a regime so that Canadians can work on U.S. soil as well. Could you update us on that?

[Luc Portelance]

I think the greatest advantage—certainly for the CBSA—associated with a preclearance agreement is that it paves the way for meeting one of the key commitments of the beyond the border action plan, which is to develop a preclearance operation in Massena, New York. It's a key element of the CBSA's operations. As the U.S. will have the opportunity to establish preclearance operations in Canada, in a reciprocal way the CBSA will also be able to position itself at a key location, which is Massena.

The preclearance agreement was a fundamental element towards paving the way towards achieving that objective, and we're having some good cooperative discussions right now with CBP, our U.S. counterpart, to advance that initiative.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you.

How much time do I have left, Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

You have about a minute, sir.

[LaVar Payne, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

That's perfect.

I'd like to go back to the director of CSIS. Certainly, I have had an opportunity to read the public report on CSIS that was tabled yesterday, and, as I understand it, terrorism continues to be the highest national security threat. I wonder if you could comment on that report.

[Michel Coulombe]

To be brief, I would qualify the terrorism threat at this time as persistent and unparalleled, and the volume of the tempo is something that we haven't seen before. That is happening at a time when the other threat, cyber espionage, is also increasing. It's a very challenging time in terms of the threats that this country faces.

[The Chair, Conservative, Daryl Kramp]

Thank you very much, Mr. Payne. We will now go to Mr. Easter.

You have five minutes, sir.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll turn to Commissioner Paulson again.

Commissioner, I am concerned about the answer that you gave to a government member. You actually suggested that a major TV network might use actors to make the point. I wonder if you might want to rephrase that. I can tell you that since that program was on, I have had a lot of emails, and I called back quite a number of people, and I don't believe these folks are imitating something or not...and I do believe what rank-and-file members feel is a lack of proper body armour in some cases, a lack of weapons in another, and a lack of training that is affecting morale. If it's a money issue, we as a committee need to know about it.

Would you respond to that? I am concerned about that comment you made.

[Commr Bob Paulson]

Okay. Well, I didn't see it, so let me say that first of all. I didn't see the program. Somebody told me that there were people who were representing members who were actors. I don't know, so I probably shouldn't have said that.

What I will say about that is that, look, what I find disturbing is not the members' characterization of the nature of the threat they face and the way in which the organization prepares them to face that threat. That's a fair conversation. We should have it and we do have it every day. What I find troubling is the characterization of the Moncton murders, the use of the Moncton murders, to represent a shortfall and make a leap in analysis that I don't think is supported by the facts. It's a very complex situation.

I think the report we did and the changes that we're bringing as to how the organization is run is a transparent, full, thorough accounting of shortcomings on the organization's part and a plan to fix them. I just didn't think that was a fair characterization of the challenge.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

I'll read you what one individual, an RCMP dispatcher of eight years, said in a letter: “Members and staff have no voices—our jobs are put on the line by speaking up and whistle-blowing...”. They're thanking Global for producing that program. It's—