Mr. Chair, thank you so much for allowing me to speak to this point.
As someone who has a top secret security clearance and is perhaps more aware of the legislative framework around security of information, I feel duty bound to say that this motion would be very inappropriate and in fact would be calling on people who have access to top secret security information to break the law.
I know that can't be Mr. Lloyd's intention, but the Security of Information Act, which used to be called the Official Secrets Act, requires that information that is collected and has a top secret security designation not be made public. There are many reasons for this, including that we could be risking the lives of intelligence assets of the Government of Canada; these are people—real, live human beings—unknown to us around the world who help Canadian security agencies and the RCMP collect information.
Even the publication of the numbers of people involved can help a hostile foreign power work backward by inference and figure out that if Canadians know about that, they can only have obtained it from this source, and then that source's life could be in danger, so it's very important that all....
I agree with the intention of Mr. MacGregor's motion. It's very important. I really do urge Mr. Poilievre, as a friend and a colleague, to ask for his top secret security clearance to clear the air. It must be done.
However, that is another matter altogether from saying that the names should be made public. To do that is to urge colleagues to break the law and, perhaps even worse, place Canadian intelligence assets at risk.
I think the amendment might come back to the committee after the committee and all members have had briefings on this point, not from me but from our intelligence apparatus—the people at CSIS, the people who handle security within the Privy Council Office, the RCMP and so on—so that everybody around this committee table is fully informed that releasing the names is a non-starter and a threat to Canadian security and can actually jeopardize lives.
Thank you.