There was a moment after the tragedies in October of 2014 when Canadians were looking forward to a good discussion, analysis, and debate about our national security architecture. I think people recognized at that time, in the light of those tragedies, that things needed to be improved, strengthened, and changed. At the same time, they wanted to make sure that their rights and freedoms were being properly respected and safeguarded, along with the open, generous nature of the country.
Unfortunately, that consultation did not happen at the time. I think the legislation that was presented, which turned out to be Bill C-51, could have been much improved had an opportunity been given to Canadians of all different views and perspectives to contribute to the process. We're going to provide that opportunity through this consultation, which will begin almost immediately and continue through the balance of this year.
The pieces of it would involve the cross-border relationship with the United States, which we have discussed, and the legislation that will be coming forward to strengthen our border arrangements, both to make those arrangements more secure and more efficient from an economic point of view.
The architecture will include the new committee of parliamentarians, which will provide a new level of review and scrutiny that has never been there before. Every other country in the western world has a vehicle of that kind. We don't. We're going to add that to make sure of two things, that we are being effective in keeping Canadians safe, and that we are safeguarding their rights and values.
We will have a new national office on community outreach to try to identify potentially vulnerable and risky situations in advance and to have the means and the wherewithal to intervene before tragedies occur. That's the new office on outreach and counter radicalization.
We will be beginning an initiative on cybersecurity. Canada's cyber policy was first established in 2010, but a lot has changed since then, and we need to bring that up to date.
Then we will make the specific amendments to Bill C-51 that I referred to, and we will ask Canadians this key question—that's the minimum we will do to make sure that rights and freedoms are properly respected—what else in the architecture do Canadians want to see changed?