Public Safety Committee on March 1st, 2018

[John Ossowski]

In terms of us, it's to actually implement the agreement in terms of what we would have to do for all of the training and expansion of pre-clearance into the other modes. Currently, pre-clearance is in air mode, and it has been for over 50 years. This expands it to land, rail, and marine. For us, it's about getting ready for that expansion of how we would pursue pre-clearance opportunities in these other modes.

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

Thank you.

I want to go back to the drafting error that the minister referenced. I didn't get a chance to ask him this question. I'm just wondering if someone is able to explain to me what, legally, the threshold of “likely” would entail and how that's defined, currently, in law.

[Charles Lowson, Assistant Director, Collection, Canadian Security Intelligence Service]

Thank you for your question. I am going to answer in English if you don't mind.

CSIS needs to be equipped to respond to any urgent threat with all of the tools that we have at our disposal. Ensuring that the proposed verify word legislation is responsive to exigent circumstances is paramount.

In the draft bill, exigency is clearly defined to include preserving the life or safety of an individual or to acquire perishable intelligence of significant value.

On the matter of any possible amendments, I would defer to the minister in this committee, this is appropriately a matter for parliament to decide.

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

I'm just wondering, so, no one can tell me, then, because the minister made those comments about the word “likely.”

[Malcolm Brown]

Let me take a stab at it. It's a little outside the scope of today's conversation, but we'll try and be as constructive and helpful...

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Mr. Dubé is right, the minister brought it in, so...

[Malcolm Brown]

He did raise it. No, no, I'm fully aware.

There are other elements of the CSIS Act that talk about the likely threshold. In the drafting of the provisions around exigent circumstances—I think I'm getting this right—“will” was used in error. It likely is used elsewhere in the CSIS Act, and for similar circumstances.

So I think it's a well-understood threshold. We can provide more information to the committee to explain the difference between the “will” and the “likely” thresholds. The problem is that if it stays at the “will” threshold, it's impossible to use, because “will” requires 100% certainty, as the minister described.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you, Mr. Dubé.

I think...

[Malcolm Brown]

[inaudible] helpful to provide additional information.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Yes, I think we do want to go back on that. That is probably far more significant than the member's necessarily appreciate at this time.

With that, I see that Mr. Picard is back. Welcome.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

You have seven minutes, please.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

I'm sorry about the delay. I got stuck with a number of Canadians—very interested Canadians with microphones.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

My first question is for the witnesses from Correctional Service Canada.

I know that the prison farms program was axed a few years ago. Could you briefly explain the reasoning behind that decision?

Could you also tell us about the program's benefits, given that the program is going to be reinstated?

[Anne Kelly]

Thank you for your question.

Over the course of a strategic review that took place several years ago, we looked at our programs and activities. A decision was made at that time to shut down the farms. As the minister has announced, however, those farms will be brought back into operation.

For us, it means we'll be able to keep offenders productively occupied. They are going to learn some of the soft skills, like getting up and having a routine during the day, and it's going to be good for their rehabilitation. Those are transferable skills when they get into the community. There's going to be on-the-job training.

It was just announced in the budget, so CSC has to work with the Department of Finance and Treasury Board to get the details of the funding and the impact on its day-to-day operations.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

As you mentioned, this project has very positive effects on individual advancement in general. Is the plan to reopen only one project, or is the idea to have that project be the precursor of a series of projects? There has been more than one farm in the past.

[Anne Kelly]

There were farms in three regions, if I remember correctly, but the project will be carried out in Ontario for the time being.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

In the short or the medium term, the plan is not to use the first Ontario project to launch others. Right now, the focus is on the project in Ontario, right?

[Anne Kelly]

That's right. We are focusing on Ontario for the time being.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

Thank you.

I have another question, which is for the RCMP representatives and concerns the integrity program.

I will sort of follow up on my colleagues' comments on the recent immigration incident. A lot of resources had to be mobilized, given the change in the level of emergency. Of course, there is a terrorist emergency, although the threat level has not really increased in a number of years. In fact, that level has been at B since 2014, which is average. The fact remains that the incident required a significant mobilization of resources.

What is the main objective of that integrity review? Is it to assess the relevance of programs or, rather, to better define the distribution of our resources?

[D/Commr Daniel Dubeau]

That's a very good question.

As the minister said, the review covered everything—so programs, staff, and so on. It covered the way the RCMP can play its role of a federal police force.

The full review was on the full scale of all our programs in the organization, the best way of going about it, and even questions about what we should be in, what we should be doing as an organization.

On the federal piece with the integrity money that you see here, that is to allow us to continue doing certain activities while we're developing our full departmental review submission for our minister to take forward in the fall.

What you're seeing in the supplementary estimates (C) are things like this. There's money going towards our recruiting, our force generation. That's so we can hire more police officers to fill some of our vacancies, so we can release our seasoned police officers over to the federal duties where they should be. That's a full review now that's ongoing, with a response to come in the fall to the government.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

Will there be an impact on the training provided in Regina and on the way officers are trained? The RCMP's reputation is excellent abroad in terms of the quality of training and its officers' flexibility. In fact, that has been its best quality. Since its officers are well-trained and flexible, they move around a lot. So there is a lack of consistency, permanency and experience within a unit.

How are you dealing with that new challenge?

[D/Commr Daniel Dubeau]

That's a very good question. I think the deputy commissioner, Gilles Michaud, has talked to you.

The RCMP's challenge is to figure out how to perform its role of a federal police force.

When I'm talking about how we're going to do federal policing in the future I'm saying federal policing members in the future may not all be police officers. You're going to see a blend of different civilian employees working with us, and the public servants working with us, because the world has changed so dramatically. You see cybercrime and cyberterrorism, and you see all of that going virtual. We have to have a new force generation model.

That's exactly what we're looking at, at what is the right blend. We have great training at Depot. We have world-class training, I would say. But we may look at training in other places, too, such that you get some of the basics at Depot, but maybe there will be some direct entries, if we're looking for somebody who has a certain skill set, right into our organization. How can we train them up quickly, from a federal perspective, so as to allow them to deploy onto investigations? We're open to everything, and that is something that Gilles Michaud is leading on our behalf. It started under Commissioner Paulson, and right now is the time to really develop that model.

[Michel Picard, Liberal, Montarville, QC]

Thank you.