Public Safety Committee on Feb. 26th, 2024

[Mark Weber, National President, Customs and Immigration Union]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Chair, members of the committee, as the national president of the union that represents CBSA personnel, including the border officers who work at marine ports, I'm glad to once again have the opportunity to appear before you. I hope to be of some assistance as part of your study on the growing problem of car thefts in Canada. Border officers are rarely consulted by senior agency officials, and I'm thankful to be here today to represent the hard-working women and men of the front line.

I'll be pretty brief. Anyone who's paid attention to the media in the last decade will know that the issue of stolen cars being exported through marine ports is not new. Unsurprisingly, the emphasis has often been on the border aspect of the issue, yet marine ports where stolen vehicles are sent to be exported are the last step in the process. More needs to be done to prevent vehicles from being stolen or reaching the port in the first place, and we are glad to see that this seems to be the consensus that emerged from the recent summit on car thefts.

Regarding the border itself, in the last few weeks we've seen both the federal government and official opposition propose a number of solutions, some of which are to be commended, considering the fairly unreliable nature of the inspection system that's currently available to our officers. However, at the end of the day, no effort was made to find out from the officers who work on the front line what was required to facilitate their examinations. Had anyone asked the question, they would have been told that a lack of space is the primary factor impacting the volume of examinations that we can perform at the port of Montreal. While the union provided a short, last-minute brief prior to the summit on car thefts highlighting this, it's unclear if this has been taken into consideration by the minister, as we were not involved or asked to participate in the summit.

This is yet another example of what the Customs and Immigration Union has been flagging for a long time, that solutions to border problems must involve the officers who perform work at the border on a daily basis. Once again, we're seeing solutions either proposed by people who have never done the work or adopted under the advisement of individuals who have never done the work. This is truly unique within the realm of law enforcement, because senior officials in most other law enforcement agencies and organizations have at least some level of frontline experience. This is rarely—close to never—the case at the CBSA, the result being an unparalleled disconnect between the upper echelon and the front line.

In closing, I want to insist on the fact that all of this is not a new problem and that more could have been done much earlier on. While the issue of exported stolen vehicles does not rest solely on the shoulders of the CBSA, we should not be surprised that the agency is somewhat out of breath, given past policy decisions under the Conservative government's deficit reduction action plan back in 2014, where we saw our personnel slashed by about 1,100 officers, from which we're still trying to recover.

Under the current government, things haven't been much better. Little has been done to actively address this deficit in personnel, with the focus being instead on misguided ventures such as ArriveCAN, highlighting what can only be described as a desire to turn our borders into a grocery store self-serve checkout.

Ultimately, investment in personnel and people is paramount to the process. Even where personnel issues may not be the primary factor, such as at the port of Montreal, the ability of the agency to protect Canadians and adapt to new challenges rests on a properly staffed front line.

I thank you, and I look forward to your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Heath MacDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Weber.

We're going to move right into our first round of questioning.

Up first for six minutes is Mr. Shipley, please.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to all the witnesses for being here today.

I'd like to ask my first question of both chiefs who are here virtually.

Recently my Conservative colleague MP Hoback introduced Bill C-379, which would implement tougher penalties for repeat car thieves across Canada by bringing in a mandatory minimum of three years in jail for those who have stolen a motor vehicle three times.

Do you think this legislation, if implemented, would assist your officers in putting and keeping repeat car thieves behind bars?

[D/Chief Robert Johnson]

I'll answer that first, if you don't mind, Nick.

I can tell you from our experience here in Toronto as well as from the statistics coming out of the provincial carjacking task force that almost 50% of those involved who we've apprehended are repeat offenders. Of them, about a third are young offenders. Clearly, there is an issue with folks being charged and arrested again and again for the same offence, so I think, in my opinion, that would help.

[D/Chief Nick Milinovich]

I will maybe just echo that. I do believe that consideration of legislative changes, such as how often a person is able to commit an offence, will make a difference.

I think that we need to be considerate about how we apply that, but the reality is that a large percentage of our carjackings are committed by people who have existing violent criminal records. That's definitely something that identifies itself as an opportunity to begin addressing.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you for that.

This question will be for Mr. Weber.

Last week you stated that the $60 million that was used for the ArriveCAN app could have been used to hire 600 border agents. Meanwhile, we know that over the last eight years the current government has added only approximately 25 frontline officers to the CBSA.

Can you speak to what kind of message this sends to your hard-working CBSA officers, when the government is willing to squander $60 million on an app while we currently have a shortage of border agents?

[Mark Weber]

Thank you for the question.

I think it sends a very negative message.

What we're seeing overall is an overreliance on technologies, like ArriveCAN, as you mentioned. We have PIK machines at airports. There are other technologies for which the focus seems to be replacing officers and automating our border, rather than helping officers interdict.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you for that.

I'll go back to Deputy Chief Johnson.

In your opening remarks, you mentioned a “spike in auto thefts” over the last few years and an “epidemic in this country”. Those are some of your words. You mentioned that there were 1,300 offenders. I'm not sure if it was you or the other chief that mentioned about repeat offenders.

Could you just mention what's really driving this? Why is it increasing so much?

[D/Chief Robert Johnson]

Since 2018, there have been 1,300 offenders and over 5,000 charges.

To your previous question and to Deputy Chief Milinovich's comments around folks that get involved in these types of offences, like I said earlier, almost 50% are repeat offenders, specifically with car theft or carjacking but also other violent offences. We are seeing that demographic.

As I also mentioned, about a third of that 50% are repeat young offenders.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you.

You mentioned that we really need a return to a sense of safety in communities.

Do you feel that if we get some of these repeat offenders off the streets, we would get back to a sense of safety in our communities?

[D/Chief Robert Johnson]

That's one component.

There are some other strategies that I think we should look at, which have been mentioned already this afternoon.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you.

Deputy Chief Milinovich, you mentioned in your opening remarks, too, that we need “tougher sanctions”.

Would you like to expand on what exactly you mean by tougher sanctions?

[D/Chief Nick Milinovich]

Yes, I believe we need to consider what is available to us in terms of enforcement and the legislation.

Generally speaking, you're going to find people that are charged with possession of stolen property over $5,000 or theft over $5,000. These are the most common charges in auto theft, but they don't reflect the risk and the injury that it's causing to our communities.

What I would advocate for is, and in conversations with Crowns we always hear, that there should be federal legislation very similar to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, which would take some of those same concepts and legislate them very similarly to the way we do with illegal drugs.

The importation and exportation of stolen property or stolen autos, if federally legislated, would then have that jurisdiction attached to it. It would make it easier for the police sector to pursue and investigate that and really pursue the people responsible for it. That's the organized crime element behind it, which is benefiting from this issue.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

Thank you to the two deputies. I'm going to go back to Mr. Weber.

Mr. Weber, at a recent committee appearance, you mentioned that, as of 2019, only one-millionth of all rail cargo was effectively being examined by the CBSA and that your operational abilities in the rail field are virtually non-existent.

Can you discuss how this lack of operational ability impacts our ability to address the auto theft crisis?

[Mark Weber]

Thank you.

It affects it greatly. You don't know what you're not catching when you don't look. We effectively don't look at rail at all, so if you're asking me to tell you exactly how much is coming in, we really don't know because it's not a mode that we're looking into.

When we're looking at exports at the port of Montreal, for example, it's the same kind of situation. There's a very small percentage we could actually look at.

[Doug Shipley, Conservative, Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte, ON]

To all the witnesses today, thank you for being here.

[The Chair, Liberal, Heath MacDonald]

Thank you.

We're going to move on to Mr. Gaheer, please, for six minutes.

[Iqwinder Gaheer, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for appearing before the committee. My questions are for the Peel police.

Deputy, it's nice to see you.

First of all, I obviously want to extend a big thank you to the Peel police for all the service they provide to the community.

I'll turn to the topic of auto theft. This is testimony from you, Deputy. Vehicle thefts in Peel have increased 118% over the last five years. In most regions, I think it's a double-digit increase, but in Peel it's a triple-digit increase.

Broken down by Mississauga's 11 wards.... Ward 5, which is actually home to Pearson airport, overlaps largely with my riding of Mississauga—Malton. This region saw the most auto thefts by far in 2023, with 1,030. Ward 5 accounted for 42.2% of all auto thefts that occurred in Mississauga. This is one ward of 11. The remaining 10 wards saw fewer than 200 auto thefts. There's really a focus in my region of Mississauga—Malton, unfortunately.

In your testimony and in some of your answers, you talked about the organized crime angle. One of my questions is about this. There's definitely been a recruitment of youth and young adults into organized crime to do these crimes. Youth accounted for 21 of the 49 people facing charges in 2023. This is actually a quote from you.

What is the Peel police doing to target this?

[D/Chief Nick Milinovich]

This is why an approach that's not linear is important.

We're aware of the fact that some of our youth are being targeted by organized crime groups that would like to take advantage of the vulnerabilities in youth. We're engaging service providers, looking for opportunities to intervene before a youth decides to get involved in carjacking, and pulling the community around and making sure that the investigative projects we are doing are considerate of the fact that we need to engage the right organizations and the right people to support our youth, who are maybe lacking some of that support, which makes them vulnerable to organized crime. Those are just a few examples in terms of the social development, the preventative piece and how we're approaching our youth.

However, it's also really important that we balance that with the need to understand that there is an element in our community that is willing to be incredibly violent and has demonstrated the behaviour to do that. We had a carjacking this year in which an international student lost their life. That was associated with and attached to a young person. It's shocking.

What we're doing is balancing our strategy and trying to apply it in the most appropriate places. Save people when we can, but unfortunately, there are circumstances when it's travelled too far.

[Iqwinder Gaheer, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

Data from Peel Regional Police shows that, on average, more than one car is stolen from a parking garage at Toronto Pearson airport every single day. From January to November 2023, the airport reported 410 vehicles stolen from its garages. We know that, unfortunately, Pearson airport has become a hub for this kind of stuff.

What is Peel police doing to work with the CBSA, or with the Greater Toronto Airports Authority and other partners, to ensure that Pearson doesn't remain this kind of hub?

[D/Chief Nick Milinovich]

We're continuing to work with the GTAA. As I mentioned, we've expanded our commercial auto crime unit, and it's going to be focusing very heavily on Pearson.

I'll provide you with some other stats. Last year, over 7,000 vehicles were taken. That's almost one per hour. Not on certain days, 1.5 vehicles are stolen from our region per hour. It's definitely one of the areas that we're paying attention to and that we're making sure we invest our thoughts and efforts in it.

One of the other witnesses mentioned intermodal rail. We have a rail yard here in Peel. That, again, is another gap. Our police service doesn't have jurisdiction. The CN police doesn't have jurisdiction to do inspections for criminal activity. The only people who have jurisdiction are in the CBSA, and that's federally legislated. We're advocating on behalf of that intermodal because we believe it's the pathway or the corridor to the Montreal port for us.

[Iqwinder Gaheer, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

We also recently announced $28 million to increase the CBSA's capacity to detect and search containers for stolen vehicles and to further enhance its ability to collaborate with local police forces. We also know the RCMP has started a national coordination and support team that's been established to work with local police departments.

Has that been helpful so far? Do you find it needs tweaking, or is that coordination helping?

[D/Chief Nick Milinovich]

Definitely. Every tool we get that supplements our current efforts is helpful. The RCMP has been terrific. They're great partners, and I know they're interested in beginning to coordinate our efforts on a national level. In terms of additional funding and resourcing...and this is why I chose it as one of the few things I wanted to focus on.

We need to make sure we adequately staff our ports and ask them to do the things that would reflect the pressures we're experiencing. Very clearly right now, one of the issues we're experiencing—not just in Peel but across the country—is the export of stolen autos. We're encouraged by those investments and those dollars. We are looking forward to seeing them go directly to where they can help.

[Iqwinder Gaheer, Liberal, Mississauga—Malton, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Heath MacDonald]

Thank you, Mr. Gaheer.

We're now going to move on to Ms. Michaud, for six minutes, please.