Public Safety Committee on April 24th, 2018

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

What this amendment is asking for is really not any new work at all. It's just the type of work that we're asking for.

[John Davies]

As was said, CSE has been dealing with review as a distinct unit in its agency for the last 20 years to manage oversight and review. It's the same thing with CSIS and with SERC for the last 30 years. They are already conditioned to deal with review. There is certainly more thematic or sectoral reporting implied with Bill C-59 in the amendments, whether that's the LIB-16 reporting link to information sharing with a foreign entity, threat reduction, and so on. It's difficult to speculate what the real cost would be from doing this. They're already used to doing this.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

I asked my questions confusingly and I apologize for that.

Right now, NSIRA is going to be new and the parliamentary committee is going to be new.

[John Davies]

Again, NSIRA is not new for CSE and CSIS in the sense that they already have a review. The new parts of NSIRA are inter-agency review.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

What I'm getting at, Mr. Davies, is that because the committee of parliamentarians is new and some components of this act are going to be new, it would appear as if there's going to be additional work required and there are going to be additional reporting requirements. As a result, you're going to have additional administrative costs. All this amendment is asking for is for an accounting of the additional costs for administrative purposes, so that we can know exactly how much money is spent on the actual work of national security and how much is spent on administrative costs. That's really what this is asking for.

[John Davies]

I understand that.

One comment would be that I think behind this is some concern that if there's so much administrative burden on the agencies, it would affect the normal national security activities. If that was ever apparent, obviously, the committee of parliamentarians or NSIRA would probably want to investigate that more clearly, such as how much of an administrative burden is it that it is actually crowding out normal national security activities. Those two review bodies would be free to investigate that if they wanted.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

Unless the government doesn't want to necessarily release that.

You don't have to answer that. It's just a statement.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

You've been here a couple of years, Mr. Motz.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Chair, I find it dangerous and in bad faith to call the accountability and review requirements an administrative burden. In my opinion, it is instead a burden that comes under our national security. We always say that we must also protect the rights and freedoms of Canadians, and it is in that context that these mechanisms are imposed.

Since I have been a member of this committee, I have noticed that the representatives of the various agencies are always ready to have their activities subjected to more scrutiny. Obviously, we can't expect them to say anything other than that. This is the exercise to regain public confidence, which has been much undermined in recent years.

This amendment worries me. We don't do the opposite, meaning that we don't ask to understand the financial burden imposed on the review agency because of a lack of cooperation from the other side.

We need to be consistent. I think this amendment paves the way for a potential witch hunt, where we look for ways to undermine the credibility of these agencies. I find this extremely problematic, dangerous even. I won't support this amendment.

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

My thoughts on this are from the perspective of what our role is as parliamentarians. We are legislators, first and foremost. Actually, this work that we're doing right now is primarily the reason we got elected in the first place. The second reason, not any less important than this one, is to watch over the expenditures of the taxes that are collected from Canadians. While I can understand there might be some hesitation, and it doesn't look like the government members of the committee are going to be in favour of this amendment, if it's possible, could we get some consensus on this? If we were to add a sunsetting clause to it, we would know after the first couple of years what the actual cost might be of these changes. I think that's responsible governance and I think it's our responsibility as parliamentarians, first and foremost.

I'd be happy to move an amendment to it if I had any indication from my colleagues across the way for a sunset clause. We'll do this for the first three to five years and see what it costs, and then have it sunset automatically in the legislation.

I'm not seeing a lot of interest.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Go ahead, Ms. Dabrusin.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

First of all, I would like to say that I absolutely agree with what Mr. Dubé said. He expressed it well.

I'm not going to add to that, but I think it's a little bit rich for the Conservatives to be very concerned about making sure that the funding is available right now, when in their last mandate, they cut about $1 billion from our security agencies. Let's put that straightforward and down. In fact, under this government, in this Parliament, we have been putting money back in, so it's a bit rich to be taking that position at this point. However, I'm also concerned about having NSIRA well-positioned there, which was one of the most important parts of this act for me, yet as Mr. Dubé points out, this seems to be setting up some framework for undermining their work.

Thank you.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

First of all, I take exception to the suggestion that was just made, because this amendment is about administrative costs. We can put all the money we want into the fluff. It's the actual work on national security that gets done that we want to ensure is properly addressed. This clause does nothing more than separate administrative costs from what is actually involved in the administration of national security.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Mr. Berthold, you have the floor.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I think this amendment is very simple and very easy to understand. When new measures or provisions are put into effect, it's important to know what costs and what repercussions are involved. I don't really understand my colleague's position on this. In recent days, I have heard that border measures have been reduced and slashed everywhere. I must remember that we haven't created problems everywhere, at the borders. If the needs are so serious today, it means that you should perhaps look at your Prime Minister's statements on Twitter. The needs might not be so big.

I know it's not the same issue. I don't mind going back to the past, but you have created different situations that, of course, require different obligations. That's what we are facing now. The act is amended, new measures are adopted, and we want to know how much it will cost. I think it's perfectly legitimate, and Canadians expect this level of transparency. If I remember correctly, you talked about an open and transparent government in your election platform.

This is a transparency measure that is absolutely necessary. Again, I say that I will support my colleague's amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you.

Is there any debate?

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Mr. Chair, I ask for a recorded vote.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Okay. We'll have a recorded vote.

(Amendment negatived: nays 6; yeas 3)

I declare CPC-21 defeated.

Before I ask Mr. Dubé to introduce NDP-44, just take note that we've been at this for something in order of eight hours cumulatively and thus far, we have largely avoided partisanship. I would say to all colleagues that, unless they want this thing to go on for ever—

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

Which it will.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

—we should avoid as much partisanship as possible.

Thank you.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

We just started.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

I don't think we need to go into who started what.

On NDP-44, the floor is yours, Mr. Dubé.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Thank you, Chair. Hopefully, you've given me some good luck to work on here with your comments.

My amendment seeks to remove proposed paragraph 61(c) on page 80, which says:

amending the definition of any term defined in section 2 or subsection 24(5) or 45(3) to respond, directly or indirectly, to any technological change.

I should add that's in the context of regulations. Regulatory power is always a funny thing when we have these debates. It has its place. It can be particularly frustrating, at times, for opposition MPs. We don't necessarily like to see things being put into regulation, although we understand the need for it at times.

However, we have heard numerous times throughout this study that the definitions are already designed in a way to be as nimble as possible with regard to things like technological change. I think that kind of change is far too substantive for it to simply be left up to regulation. I think that—“respond, directly or indirectly, to any technological change”—is crazy, as far as I'm concerned, with all due respect, and apologies for my choice of words.

It could be a very slippery slope. I think that type of change should be one that is legislative and voted on by parliamentarians. We've heard enough testimony from officials, and from experts, and from all sides of this debate, agreeing that if there's one thing that's close to a consensus from folks on both sides of this debate, it's that the definitions are relatively good when they come to addressing the needs of this. I don't think it's appropriate to have it as a regulatory change. I move to remove that proposed paragraph.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you, Mr. Dubé.

I should note that if NDP-44 is adopted, CPC-22 cannot be moved as it tries to amend the same line.

[Glen Motz, Conservative, Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB]

Yes, these two amendments are absolutely identical. Just to expand upon the comments of my NDP colleague, the government has asked Parliament to basically hand over its role to cabinet, in what has traditionally been called the Henry VIII amendment or clause. It takes from Old English that when in a time of crisis, the government takes power over everything. Parliament is and remains the appropriate vetting for any changes to legislation.

We've heard it was written to allow cabinet to make changes quickly. I understand the need to be nimble in this legislation. However, I don't think, as I raised with the minister when he was here, that the purpose of regulations.... Perhaps it's worth discussing what regulations are needed instead of this clause, but we should never be handing over authority to cabinet for what Parliament is responsible for. To be frank, cabinet should never be asking Parliament to do that, to be honest with you. I have a huge problem with this particular clause.

Just to work on the good graces of my Liberal colleagues, they have noticed, probably, we've been very supportive of a number of theirs, and probably will be of a number of theirs coming up. I think this is a reasonable exchange, with the understanding that it could easily still accomplish the goals of Bill C-59 on being nimble when nimbleness is required, yet not take the power or the responsibility away from Parliament and leaving it solely up to cabinet.

Thank you.