Public Safety Committee on June 17th, 2019

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

With regard to the housekeeping issues, if you could get them to us....

[Michelaine Lahaie]

Sure.

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

It's just that we have to go through this today or Wednesday.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

With that, we're going to have to suspend and go off to vote.

I'm hoping that our witnesses can stay while we go exercise our democratic franchise.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

We are back and we have quorum.

I think it's Mr. Dubé who has seven minutes.

Subject to what colleagues might say, my suggestion would be that we go for 20 minutes. Does that sound reasonable? Then we'll move to clause-by-clause consideration after that.

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Okay.

Mr. Dubé, go ahead for seven minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Sauvé, I hope that you'll forgive me, but I have few questions that I think you can answer.

First, I want to take this opportunity to congratulate you for everything that you're doing. I know that things haven't been easy in recent years, but I think that it's a step in the right direction. It was something that needed to be done a long time ago. The people who have been following the debate know that this is about establishing fair representation for the men and women in uniform in the RCMP. Keep up the good work.

My questions pertain to some aspects of the commission's current operations and how the bill can change or affect this.

The proposed subclause 18(2) on page 8 of the bill states as follows:

(2) In order to conduct a review on its own initiative, the Commission

(a) must be satisfied that sufficient resources exist ...

(b) must have taken reasonable steps to verify that no other review or inquiry has been undertaken ...

I'll address the reasonable steps described in paragraph (b). Let's start with paragraph (a), which concerns resources.

Take the case of an incident reported by the media. As a result, the complaint becomes a matter of public interest. If you don't have an adequate budget, you must make the handling of complaints a priority, even if the situation is high profile. Unless the president or the minister requests an investigation, you'll be limited by your budget capacity. That's basically what it means.

Is that correct?

[Michelaine Lahaie]

Yes, Mr. Dubé, that's correct. We're certainly limited by our budgetary and human resources.

I should also point out that this part concerns what we call reviews, but reviews of specific activities. We're talking about cases involving a systemic issue that we decide to investigate. We're talking about these cases, rather than the normal complaints that we receive from the general public.

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

That's fine.

In terms of paragraph (b), not only in the context of the proposed subclause 18(2), but in general, Mr. Graham spoke earlier about the risk of stepping on the other agency's toes. That's interesting. As part of our study of Bill C-59, we met with representatives of your commission. Forgive me, I don't remember whether the information came from you or other representatives, but we were told that there was no issue with regard to the RCMP, since the functions weren't national security functions. However, during the presentations and debate on Bill C-59, some people pointed out that, in the case of the Canada Border Services Agency, the issue still concerned national security, given that we're talking about border integrity.

Are you concerned that, in terms of the agency, it may be more difficult to determine what falls under the different oversight mechanisms for national security issues? For example, in the case of the committee created by Bill C-59 or the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, there's a clearer and more obvious distinction with respect to the RCMP.

[Michelaine Lahaie]

I think that it may sometimes be difficult to make the distinction. However, I can tell you that we currently have a very good relationship with the Security Intelligence Review Committee and with what will become the National Security and Intelligence Review Agency. We often talk to these people. I think that we would be able to determine which agency should handle the complaint.

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

As long as good relationships are maintained, this shouldn't cause any issues in terms of the work.

[Michelaine Lahaie]

Indeed.

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

Good.

My next question concerns American customs officials. I think that it's important, because ordinary mortals, if you'll allow me to use that expression, don't always have a clear idea of who's responsible. Since the passage of Bill C-23, there has been increased use of pre-clearance, particularly during land crossings and at airports

Do you anticipate any complaints regarding how American officials treat Canadian citizens? Have you established a mechanism to deal with this? Will you pass on complaints to another agency? Will you raise public awareness? Will your approach include several components?

[Michelaine Lahaie]

The approach will include several components. We'll undoubtedly receive complaints regarding American officials.

At this time, we sometimes receive complaints regarding officers other than Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers. With respect to the RCMP, we have a no wrong door policy. Under this policy, if we receive a complaint regarding a Toronto police officer, for example, we can send it to the provincial agency for processing. We share the information.

We'll certainly start building relationships with the Americans so that we can pass on these types of complaints to them.

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

I apologize for hurrying, but my time is running out.

During pre-clearance, the Americans operate on Canadian soil. Do you play any type of role if an incident that leads to a complaint takes place on Canadian soil, for example at a Canadian airport?

[Michelaine Lahaie]

I don't think so, but this issue should be addressed.

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

That's fine.

I have one last question.

On page 25, the proposed subclause 51(1) refers to the response of the president of the agency. Is this mechanism similar to the current mechanism of the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP, whereby a written response is provided and, if no further action is taken, the reasons are also provided in writing? Forgive me for not knowing the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act by heart. Perhaps I should know it. Is it the same as the mechanism that currently exists in this legislation?

[Michelaine Lahaie]

Yes, we're currently using the same mechanism.

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

Okay, thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you, Mr. Dubé.

I understand there are no questions from the government side. Are there any further questions from the opposition side?

Mr. Eglinski, go ahead for five minutes.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you.

I'd like to thank you for coming out today and for presenting. I'm very pleased to be able to support Bill C-98, but I do have a couple of a misconceptions, which I've had for a number of years, regarding the similar situation you had with the RCMP.

Under “Powers of Commission in Relation to Complaints”, with regard to the powers in proposed section 44, you were talking about service standards for the RCMP and certain guidelines. You can compel a person to come before you and administer an oath, etc. If a member of the border security were involved in a criminal case, say for an alleged assault or something like that or for excessive force, would you require them to do that before the criminal trial, or would it be set over until after the criminal trial so that they could defend their actions? Would the evidence they gave your organization under oath be able to be used against them in a criminal trial?

[Michelaine Lahaie]

I'll address the second part of your question first. Any information provided to us under oath by an individual we've compelled to come to speak to us cannot be used against them. Anything they're admitting personally cannot be used in any of our reports, so that information cannot be used against them.

The first part of your question is about a situation we deal with fairly often, that in which the courts are engaged in something about which we've received a public complaint. Generally, we tend to put those public complaints in abeyance while we wait to see what the courts are going to say, because oftentimes the courts will provide some form of direction or there'll be something in a decision.

[Jim Eglinski, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

That's the question I had. There is a kind of abeyance there because there is a conflict.

I have a second part for you, and I'd like you to answer fairly quickly if you could, because I do have another question.

I was there when you guys first started with the RCMP public complaints commission. There was a bit of resentment on the part of members of the RCMP with regard to trust, and I think there was a little resentment the other way; both of us kind of didn't trust each other. But as time went by—not a very long time—a trust was built up from us having worked very closely together. I would think you'd find the same thing moving into this new era. Are you going to set up a bit of an education program for the members of the Canada Border Services Agency so they understand really what you're about? There is going to be that little bit of suspicion on their side, so I wonder if you have a plan for educating them.

[Michelaine Lahaie]

Right now we are working on a plan to educate them. That is part of our intention, to educate them as well as the Canadian public on the process.