Evidence of meeting #103 for Public Safety and National Security in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was container.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Commander, Section head, Service de police de la Ville de Montréal
Obviously, this situation is of concern to us. On the other hand, as Mr. Patenaude said, the work we must do has many facets. Manufacturers are partly responsible, but the responsibility must be shared by all partners.
Liberal
Peter Schiefke Liberal Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
Thank you.
Monsieur Lamy online, do you think cars are just easier to steal now? It's costing your industry billions of dollars, and that is being transferred along to Canadians.
Senior Vice-President, Personal Lines, Canadian Operations, Intact Insurance
Definitely. I'll echo what Mr. Patenaude was saying. It is a multi-faceted issue and it needs a whole-of-society approach, but clearly manufacturers have their part to do.
The motor vehicle safety regulations were last updated in 2007 with tough protection standards from 1998. Obviously, cars are not made the same way today as in 1998. To us, that's an important part.
Liberal
Peter Schiefke Liberal Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
Thank you, Monsieur Lamy. I appreciate that very much.
My honourable colleague Mr. MacGregor, in a previous meeting, spoke about technology and the fact that we have, on our phones, verification. I have to do three things for my phone to be able to recognize me, particularly my parliamentary phone.
Would it be helpful to you and your members, who have to deal with these car thefts, for the cars themselves to have multifactor identification? Instead of just having a key, which you can offset by buying something on Amazon for $100, perhaps they should have the screen used as a keypad or other technology.
Would that be helpful and free up resources that you could better put somewhere else in tackling crime? What are your thoughts?
Michel Patenaude
Absolutely. That would definitely be helpful. It's another tool we'd have in our toolset, but, as we've seen in the past, organized crime has adapted to what we've put forward. We have to keep—
Commander, Section head, Service de police de la Ville de Montréal
As Mr. Patenaude said, and we agree, technology can always be circumvented. However, the main obstacle thieves now have to overcome is to get inside the vehicles, not to connect to the OBD system. It is easier to steal a vehicle today than it was 10 years ago.
Liberal
Senior Vice-President, Personal Lines, Canadian Operations, Intact Insurance
I'm not an expert in car security, but what we see in our data is a big gap between manufacturers, so clearly some know how to protect and some don't. Raising the bar for everyone is part of the solution.
Liberal
Peter Schiefke Liberal Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, I know I'm out of time, but given the testimony we've just heard here, perhaps it would be good for us to invite the presidents of the car manufacturers like GM, Toyota, Volkswagen and Chrysler to join us here in committee to perhaps respond to some questions about what they're doing to make cars harder to steal.
Thank you.
Liberal
Bloc
Kristina Michaud Bloc Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Witnesses, thank you very much for being with us.
We have already heard from quite a few people as part of our study. Yet we find that people are pretty quick to blame others. You have heard from representatives of the Montreal Port Authority, who testified before you. They said that these crimes did not occur at the Port of Montreal and that they were perpetrated before and after the vehicle being there. That statement may be defensible, but I think a certain amount of responsibility has to be assumed here. The manufacturers say that the problem is not the car, but the thief. That said, everyone is trying to work together, and the partnerships sought in this project are a very good idea. Also, we are seeing results, which is encouraging.
Mr. Desmarais, you mentioned that criminal organizations were involved in this. You can see that since you fight the same type of organizations in other domains. We know that car theft is used to fund other criminal activities. It is not necessarily easier for you, but since you are already involved in this kind work, you could help arrest the thieves, put them behind bars and return the vehicles to the owners. After all, you may be the most important partners. I am glad you are here.
I liked my colleague's question earlier about how, once you arrest someone, you can trace them back to the source. The people from the Montreal Port Authority and the Canada Border Services Agency seemed to be saying that they did not have that information.
Suppose you are able to recover a vehicle from a container. How is it possible to trace it back to the source, even though I know you cannot divulge investigative secrets? Earlier, I tried to get the Montreal Port Authority representatives to tell me the process that is followed from the moment someone with a business decides to put goods for export into a container, which is already sealed when you arrive. When you go back through all these steps, do you come across any bigger networks? How does it all work?
We can see that these actions are producing results, at least I think so, but can both of you provide us with more details on this?
Michel Patenaude
As I said earlier, the structure of organizations involved in vehicle theft is complex. There are different roles. Thieves are in the field and are now younger. There are also customers, exporters and overseas buyers. The aim is certainly to attack all levels of organizations, from the lowest to the highest, as well as internationally. That's why it's important to work together.
Every time a vehicle is seized or we get information, intelligence is very important to go further in the investigation. That is key to coordinating our investigations. It is essential to have the right information, to analyze it and use it in real time to coordinate and direct our investigations. So it is important to have the information about the carrier and the exporter, and consolidate it to see the different patterns at play and to target our investigations.
Commander, Section head, Service de police de la Ville de Montréal
Much has been said, but I would add that, on our side too, intelligence is very important. Between police agencies, I do not necessarily see a problem. On the other hand, with partners such as the Canada Border Services Agency, we sometimes have to fill out certain documents to obtain this information, which can slow down certain investigations where we should be acting quickly. It is crucial that information flows easily between agencies.
Bloc
Kristina Michaud Bloc Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC
Thank you.
Before opening a container at the port, for example, you need a warrant. So you must have reasonable grounds to believe that a crime was committed. Does that also slow things down? I understand that a warrant is usually necessary to conduct a search, but might there be a better way of doing things?
Do time constraints sometimes mean that you have to let some things go because perhaps you did not have time to get a search warrant? Do you sometimes suspect there are stolen vehicles in a container but do not conduct a search because you think it's not up to you? How does all of that work?
Commander, Section head, Service de police de la Ville de Montréal
The various police services do their work, with legal authorization. There is no problem with that: We state what the ongoing investigation is and open the containers together. On the other hand, if the police officers working at the port—whether they are from the Sûreté du Québec, Montreal city police, or other police services—were to have additional powers to open containers, that would certainly facilitate matters.
Bloc
Kristina Michaud Bloc Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC
Okay, that's interesting.
According to Mr. Pierre Brochet, the president of Quebec's association of chiefs of police, the ADPQ, the security screening process for people working at the port could be transferred to the police. It was noted earlier that Transport Canada is responsible for that, but that there might be some flaws in the process. What do you think? Are your hands full or do you think that is a good idea?
Michel Patenaude
That is certainly an issue we have heard about, and a potential solution. There is a division within the Sûreté du Québec that does security screening of certain people. So that is a possibility.
On the other hand, if we need to focus on alleviating the crisis, I'm not sure that would have the greatest impact in the short term. In my opinion, we need to go after the rings, process the information received quickly, and work hand in hand with our public and private partners to identify the criminal organizations that are orchestrating things from start to finish.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Heath MacDonald
Thank you, Ms. Michaud.
We'll move to Mr. MacGregor, please, for six minutes.
NDP
Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC
Thank you very much, Chair.
Thank you to all of our witnesses for offering your expertise.
I am interested in deterrence, in wanting to make thieves afraid of being caught. In my home province of British Columbia, in the early 2000s we had remarkable success with the bait car program. It drove down auto thefts significantly. In fact, some of the most wanted car thieves were apprehended in such a way. In fact, I can remember the Province of B.C., in partnership with the various police forces, directly warning criminal organizations. They spent money on television advertisements. There were posters. There were even videos, from inside the car, showing the moment when the car thief realized they had been caught. I remember that they would show images of different cars at different locations, and say, “One of these cars is a police bait car, but you don't know which one.”
I would just like to hear about your respective jurisdiction's experience with the use of bait cars. What level of success have you seen? Do you see value in putting more resources into it? Can you expand on that, please?
Commander, Section head, Service de police de la Ville de Montréal
Bait cars are indeed a good investigation technique. On the other hand, our focus is the organized rings. When bait cars are used, no particular group is targeted. So we lose some time with that kind of investigation. That said, it is also an excellent solution. For my part, I would focus more on targeting the theft and export rings.
Michel Patenaude
I would echo the same thing. We're really concentrating right now on looking at the networks that are exporting and that are hiring and recruiting young adults to do these crimes. We're really looking at dismantling that. I think bait cars solve part of the problem, but not the bigger problem that we're looking at.