Public Safety Committee on Nov. 17th, 2016

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

That brings me to my next point. I understand that you're hesitant to comment on why the committee of parliamentarians would not have access to the same information, specifically, but in the end, the proposal you're putting forward of working together, collaborating, is more of a solution that you're proposing as opposed to anything that precludes the committee of parliamentarians from having that full access.

[Michael Doucet]

It's not something necessarily that I'm proposing, other than to state that we're part of the accountability framework.

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

Sir, if I may, I don't mean to belabour this, but from your comments I am a bit concerned as I get the sense that in the end, because the committee of parliamentarians would have less access, I almost understood it as being they would have to wait for the SIRC report that everyone else would see anyway before being able to have the full access that you already have.

[Michael Doucet]

I find it interesting the way you phrased that.

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

I'm just trying to be clear that I'm trying to understand the justification. The government has stated that the need for this prohibition on information for the committee is for operational reasons, etc., but I'm understanding that if you have the unfettered access, then I'm just trying to make the connection of why the committee of parliamentarians can't have the exact same access and still work collaboratively, as you have so well said.

[Michael Doucet]

Certainly. I can't comment on the government's position, as it relates to access for the committee of parliamentarians, but I'd like to go back again to the accountability framework in which there are multiple players that give us and give Canadians a very good view of CSIS's activities and give them some comfort that CSIS is carrying out its activities responsibly, legally, and so on. We're very key to that, as would be the committee of parliamentarians, once again looking across that national security nexus.

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

If we're looking to comfort Canadians and restore confidence in national security agencies, and that's part of the objective of this exercise, you cannot see any reason then for the committee of parliamentarians to not have identical access as SIRC does?

[Michael Doucet]

I didn't say that, and I would phrase it that we want to increase Canadians' confidence in the national security apparatus. As I mentioned earlier, I think that the committee of parliamentarians working with the review bodies would help to increase that level of confidence.

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

I don't want to get into too specific a case, but if we look at Justice Noël's decision and the fact that it went on for 10 years, were there any challenges that were presented to you that made it so that it went on for as long as it did? We appreciate the work you did, because given what happened in front of the court, if it hadn't been for that, we wouldn't have known about it, but what limitations caused it to take so long?

[Michael Doucet]

Thank you for that question. I really like that one.

I speak of the waterfront of CSIS activities, and I speak of an increasing waterfront of activities. They're doing more. They've been given more powers, and they've had an increase in budgets. SIRC, as a review body, has what I would refer to as limited resources to look at that waterfront of activities, and we're very careful and very surgical in what we look at. Every year we have a research plan that outlines what we're looking at, and there are a number of ways in which we determine that and bring it to our committee. If you look at the Justice Noël decision, this was an observation of SIRC and a recommendation that CSIS take a closer look at this and inform the courts. I would say the system worked as it relates to that metadata issue. Now you're speaking to the timelines—

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

That's what I was going to ask. Can we say that it worked if it took 10 years to uncover?

[Michael Doucet]

I wouldn't necessarily say that it took 10 years to uncover. I think it took less than that as we went through our research cycle, as we brought it to committee, as we brought those recommendations to CSIS, and as it was then published in the annual report. There were a lot of activities that happened well before Justice Noël's decision that came out in November.

We could speak to the timeliness. It comes down to a workload thing and, at any given point in time, how much we can look at.

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

Your mandate is to review. Do you believe that if another body, whether yours or another one, had a mandate for oversight, that sort of illegal data collection could have been prevented?

[Michael Doucet]

I wouldn't necessarily guess to that, because at the end of the day we had a disagreement with CSIS. We gave them the recommendation. We thought there was an issue. They did not think there was an issue. They did not follow our recommendation. It turned out that it was an issue.

On the questions of is more oversight good, is more review good, you will have to hit what I would call the sweet spot on the amount of review that is necessary.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Mendicino.

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Doucet, I'm going to start at the end of this and put a question to you. I wonder whether you see a scenario in which the committee of parliamentarians makes a request of CSIS, or through the minister, about an ongoing intelligence or national security activity and then, under the co-operation provisions of Bill C-22, turns to SIRC and says, “We think this might be a good activity for you to do a review on.”

[Michael Doucet]

I see the day when there is an activity there that the committee of parliamentarians wants to look at. I see the scenario where they cannot.

We will be informed of that, and we will decide as an independent agency if we want to look at it or not. We may have looked at it last year. We may already have it in our plans for the following year.

If we are working well with a committee of parliamentarians, and “well” means that we discuss with them in the March time frame and say “here is our review cycle for the next fiscal year and here's what we're looking at”, that's good information for them. They cannot compel us to look at something. They may suggest to us or, if they've been refused information, we'd know that, but as an independent organization, we decide what we want to look at within our review cycle.

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

I was careful in my question to say that they wouldn't direct you to, but that they might suggest that it would be a subject matter for you to study as a result of a request made by the committee of parliamentarians to the minister. The short answer is yes, you do see a day in which the scenario I articulated very briefly would actually come to fruition.

[Michael Doucet]

I see the day when our relationship with the committee of parliamentarians is such that we know what they're doing and they know what we're doing.

I want to be clear on the directing or the compelling. Nobody can direct SIRC on what to do as it relates to our review cycle.

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

That makes perfect sense.

The mandate of SIRC is not defined the same as the mandate of the committee of parliamentarians is under Bill C-22.

[Michael Doucet]

That's correct.

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Would you agree that this provides a plausible explanation or rationale as to why the degrees of access between the committee of parliamentarians and SIRC as it exists today are not the same as well?

[Michael Doucet]

I wouldn't necessarily comment on why the degrees of access are different. If you look at the proposed bill and you look at our enabling legislation, you see that they're absolutely different. Expert review requires powers to carry out review. It requires funding to carry out review. It requires resources to carry out review. It's important that—

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Let's set aside the resources. You do agree that the mandates are defined differently.

[Michael Doucet]

Absolutely.