Evidence of meeting #12 for Public Safety and National Security in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was c-8.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
How many armed officers do you have looking for these individuals?
President, Canada Border Services Agency
I'm going to expand it a bit. We have 1,000 inland enforcement officers who deal with IRPA, so they may be in our detention facilities, they may be doing IRB hearings or they may be doing removals. Approximately 500 people are doing removals. They may occasionally do a hearing. They may be dealing with somebody in detention. You're pinning me down to one number, when we have quite a dynamic workforce, but I can say approximately half of those people are dealing with removals, and they're supported by administrative help who deal with the files so that they can do the going out and finding people.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
You're telling me that on a daily basis, or day-to-day, there are approximately 500 people in CBSA who are armed and looking for these fugitives. Is that accurate?
President, Canada Border Services Agency
I'm going to say approximately, because there is a lot going on in our inland enforcement, but they relate to individuals who are in Canada who perhaps should not be here, who are in Canada and might pose a risk to Canadians and are in detention, or who are having their IRB hearing, at which our officers will be representing the minister if we have concerns.
November 6th, 2025 / 12:10 p.m.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
My information is that in the GTA there are approximately only 55 people who are armed, and about 10 are on the street daily, looking for people who are on warrant. Would you dispute that number?
Conservative
President, Canada Border Services Agency
—precision around those being armed, I am going to have to come back to you, because we have CBSA officers who may not be armed but who will be helping to execute removals. I'll come back to you with a breakdown.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
Minister, do you know much money has been spent?
Let me just really drill down. I'll just ask the minister first, and Ms. O'Gorman can help.
How many dogs have been trained as drug sniffer dogs in the CBSA?
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood—Rouge Park, ON
I'm going off recollection. I will say between 65 and 75.
President, Canada Border Services Agency
We'll come back with a breakdown. We have drug detector dogs and currency dogs, and we have food, plant and animal dogs.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
How many dogs have been trained to track fentanyl?
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood—Rouge Park, ON
Again, that's a new area, Mr. Caputo, so we're at the early stages of that training. We will be enhancing that over the coming months.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
Again, when it comes to the number, I don't want to know whether we're early; I want a number.
How many dogs have been trained to track fentanyl, please?
Liberal
Conservative
President, Canada Border Services Agency
We're doing that right now. It's quite a new area. I believe that the Americans were forerunners. We are working with them, but we're also working with allies.
Fentanyl, as you can appreciate, is a highly toxic substance, and there weren't many inert, sufficiently similar goods that we had to train our dogs. Again, we can come back—
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
I'm not trying to cut you off, but I'll be very direct. Have any dogs completed the training to track fentanyl for the CBSA?
President, Canada Border Services Agency
I'm not sure if they've been completely trained.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
Okay, so we may have no dogs. The U.S. has dogs to track fentanyl, I assume.
I'm not sure if anybody at the RCMP can tell us whether there are dogs to track fentanyl, but what I'm hearing is that we don't know. It sounds like there might be zero dogs tracking fentanyl at this time, even though the problem of fentanyl trafficking has been at the feet of this government, and it beckoned the response of Bill C-2 and Bill C-12.
Do we have any dogs that know how to track fentanyl at the CBSA?
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood—Rouge Park, ON
If I may answer this, Mr. Caputo, we were at the Five Eyes in the U.K. back in September, and there was a demonstration of dogs that are now trained with fentanyl, so they do have a number of dogs. The other five countries are in the process of doing the training.
Conservative
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Guildwood—Rouge Park, ON
At this point, we are working towards ensuring that we have dogs that can detect fentanyl.
Conservative
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jean-Yves Duclos
Thank you, Mr. Caputo.
Ms. Acan, you have the floor for six minutes