Evidence of meeting #89 for Public Safety and National Security in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was c-59.
A video is available from Parliament.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Nathaniel Erskine-Smith Liberal Beaches—East York, ON
I put it to both of you, the expectation ought to be that the same powers and authorities should be granted to the new super-SIRC committee and the new commissioner. Is that fair?
9:30 a.m.
Prof. Stephanie Carvin
I would say that's the case, and if you believe that's not the case, I would try to make sure that it is to your satisfaction.
9:30 a.m.
Secretary General, Amnesty International Canada
We would totally agree with that. One of the problems we've seen in the past has been the unevenness of the powers and mandate of various review bodies. That leads to confusion and it certainly means that the ability to coordinate review across agencies, which is, of course, one of the things we're really looking for in this new approach, gets hampered.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Nathaniel Erskine-Smith Liberal Beaches—East York, ON
Mr. Neve, you had raised some concerns about the Secure Air Travel Act, about the failure of a “robust redress mechanism”. I think those were your words. Special advocates in other contexts have been a useful solution and they were recommended by this committee. I'll start with you, but put it to both of you. Do you think a special advocate system, which is missing in this legislation, would be a useful fix for the Secure Air Travel Act?
9:30 a.m.
Secretary General, Amnesty International Canada
It would be a useful contribution, but it would not be the fix. There's so much more beyond it that is needed, but it is of concern and we, and others, have certainly highlighted that it's peculiar to us actually that here we have an area where once again there are concerns about secrecy and withholding of evidence and there is a mechanism that exists and it's not being used at all. But it needs to go much further than that in ensuring the proper robust redress system we need is developed.
9:30 a.m.
Prof. Stephanie Carvin
I would defer to Alex's comments.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Nathaniel Erskine-Smith Liberal Beaches—East York, ON
Okay.
We rename SCISA to SCIDA. There are a few other changes, though. I sit on the privacy committee and we had a more fulsome report on that specific point of information sharing. The government did provide a response and there are some changes, more substantive changes beyond a title change, in the new SCIDA. One is the definition. I don't know if either of you have comments on the new definition and whether it's sufficient to meet the concerns that were raised in the course of the national security review.
9:30 a.m.
Secretary General, Amnesty International Canada
Do you mean the new definition of threats to security?
9:30 a.m.
Secretary General, Amnesty International Canada
No, we're still concerned. We think it is still overly broad and it stands in contrast to definitions that are used in the CSIS Act, for instance. There is a number of ways in which that definition and how it interplays with other provisions leaves open the possibility that people will be subject to information-sharing processes simply because they've been involved in protest and advocacy in a context where it perhaps connects up with opposition to critical infrastructure like pipelines, etc. That area of concern, which was of course a very serious problem in Bill C-51, in our view, has not been wholly addressed.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Nathaniel Erskine-Smith Liberal Beaches—East York, ON
There is an amendment that “significant or widespread” has been added in relation to undermining core infrastructure and other things. That hopefully gets away from certain protests.
There are a couple of other changes. There's a debate about the disclosure threshold of relevance versus necessity. Certainly this committee and the ethics committee recommended a necessity threshold in accordance with the Privacy Commissioner. We don't see that in this bill, but we do see an increase, I think, from relevance to “contribute to the exercise of the recipient institution”.
Is that adequate in your view, Ms. Carvin or Mr. Neve?
9:35 a.m.
Liberal
9:35 a.m.
Prof. Stephanie Carvin
I have a general comment. Do you have something specific?
9:35 a.m.
Secretary General, Amnesty International Canada
Obviously we would always support the stronger protections from a human rights perspective.
9:35 a.m.
Liberal
9:35 a.m.
Secretary General, Amnesty International Canada
Exactly. “Necessity” offers better protection.
9:35 a.m.
Liberal
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to both of you for being here today.
I'm going to focus on you for a couple of minutes, Dr. Carvin, if I could. Specifically, your past as a strategic analyst with CSIS intrigues me a bit. As you know, there are several oversight groups created or adjusted in the new bill. What pitfalls might you see in effectively communicating intelligence and threats with the new structure?
9:35 a.m.
Prof. Stephanie Carvin
Are you referring to the SCISA-SCIDA changes?
9:35 a.m.
Prof. Stephanie Carvin
If anything, I actually thought the definition was probably widened in the current legislation as it stands. There was actually a limitation in C-51. I know I keep referring to Craig, but we podcast a lot, so we're kind of melding into one. First it was the chapeau piece, and that actually was taken away, so if anything, actually the ability to share information is technically broader under this legislation, which I think some people have concerns with.
But I agree that we absolutely, fundamentally have to protect information sharing, so if reforms are made, we have to bear this in mind. It's not just important for terrorism. Usually the classic example of passports is used—trying to stop someone with a passport from leaving the country—but also the Investment Canada Act, the ability to share information under that, is absolutely essential to our national security.
As it stands, I don't see major changes in this bill, but if reforms are coming from this committee, I think that should be kept in mind.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB
Thank you.
Again from your experience, how do you think the front-line security staff would respond to and see the changes we just talked about?
9:35 a.m.
Prof. Stephanie Carvin
My view is that they actually want clear guidelines. They want to know where they can step and where they can't step. The reason is that they want cover in a sense that they want to know that where they're actually operating is in the correct legal area. Providing them that, which I believe this legislation does, while of course leaving important things like datasets up to more review in oversight rather than a specific legislated guidance, is the correct approach to take.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Glen Motz Conservative Medicine Hat—Cardston—Warner, AB
Okay.
You spoke in your statements at the front end about the security reports, the documents, the threat analysis, and threat assessments that have been done. Can you give us some pros and cons of the current threat analysis documents and how experts in the community can make use of them differently with C-59?
