I'm going to take less than 10 minutes. If I could, I'd just like to make five points.
First, if I were a member of the House—and I'm well aware that I'm not—I would have quite happily voted yea at second reading. I think this bill goes a long way toward simultaneously dealing with security issues and concerns as well as charter and legal rights concerns.
I do say “dealing simultaneously”. People talk about balancing the two. I don't think they need to be balanced. Each is so important that they have to be dealt with as stand-alones and then adjusted as necessary.
I think this is the case because the bill endeavours to respond to one central issue that it should address, and that's the level of threat faced by Canada and its allies. Otherwise, there's no reason to make changes. The only reason we have these agencies and their review capacity is that we're facing a variety of threats in the areas of terrorism, espionage, foreign interference, and cyber-activities.
In these areas, I think it's fair to say that our adversaries remain committed to pursuing their activities against Canada and our allies here and elsewhere. It does not take a great deal of effort, I think, to see how a rebalancing of the world's power relationships is adding considerable instability to the world and offering opportunity to our adversaries, states and non-states alike, and I think we're only beginning to get a grip on cyber-threats. I think the additional authorities proposed in the bill, along with the new arrangements for review, reflect this not-so-brave new world.
I only have one specific concern that I wanted to raise concerning the provisions in the bill that relate to the proposed intelligence commissioner. My concern is not really about the security and rights balance, if I can contradict myself; rather, it's a machinery-of-government or accountability issue. The bill proposes to give the commissioner final say about a number of CSEC and CSIS activities, which in my view should be the responsibility of ministers of the crown and not that of an appointed official. Giving a former judge, however eminent, responsibility for the legality of some activities is one thing—and a good thing—but surely “reasonableness” should be the domain of ministers and of the officials for whom they are responsible.
In practical terms, if something goes wrong in the future, and whether this House or the Senate or a royal commission looks at this issue, it seems to me that the veto proposed to be given to an appointed official will make it too easy for the minister of the day to escape accountability. I say again that this is not a security issue, and I raise this issue because as a concerned Canadian I think we should have considerable respect for the fundamental principle of our unwritten constitution, which is that ministers, not appointed officials, are accountable for delicate and sensitive things.
Under the current arrangements being proposed, you will have the agencies, the public safety department, the Department of Justice, the minister, and then an appointed official, who may or may not know anything about national security, determine in the final analysis whether in these variety of activities they can move forward. Having a former judge as a commissioner to determine legality is fair ball. While it's entirely lawful for Parliament to do this, it seems to me that it is fundamentally changing one of the principles underlying our system of government to give such a fundamental veto to an appointed official.
I'm going to stop there. I have a variety of views on some other parts of the bill. Should you have any questions, I'd be happy to try to answer them.
Thank you, Chairman.