Evidence of meeting #38 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 data.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
I would respectfully ask that we suspend, and then I'll create my intervention once I've seen the motion in writing. I would like to actually see it in writing, please.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jean-Yves Duclos
We're going to suspend the meeting, but I want to make it clear that at 8:15 p.m., we'll have to conclude the debate because we don't have enough resources to go past 8:15 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jean-Yves Duclos
We're resuming the meeting.
Thank you for your patience. I think everyone received the motion proposed by Mr. Ramsay, in French and English.
Mr. Caputo, the floor is yours.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I thank Mr. Ramsay for the motion, although I think our motion is far superior.
Somebody is going to have to explain some logic to me here. Maybe I missed the boat. When I first raised the issue about officials, I did that in what I believe was good faith. It came about through a private conversation where I said that there are some issues here.
We heard from officials for one hour on this bill. When we heard from officials in the one hour, we had very few answers to the technical aspects of the bill. I will reiterate: What we have heard so far on this bill doesn't relate to the technical aspects. It relates to the philosophical aspects. Ninety per cent of what we've heard relates to the philosophical aspects. Even when we hear from police officials, they say that they really need this because it will help them track down people who do bad things. Well, okay, but we haven't really gotten into the mechanics of it, if we're being honest. We haven't gotten into the mechanics of it as far as how that happens.
I challenged Professor Geist on this. I don't know if anybody remembers. He was here and I asked him about metadata. I asked him what he thought. He said that a year is far too long. He said, “30 days”. I asked him what he'd say to the fact that there might not even be an investigator after 30 days. Mr. Van Laer talked about that. Sometimes you have to get a production order. Sometimes you don't know these things. He said that whatever you do, it has to be evidence-based. That was his response.
Can we say that so far we have figured out what that number should be? We've heard about stuff that's happening elsewhere in the world—in Sweden, it's apparently 10 months, and in Australia, it's apparently two years—and things like that. That is the very reason I think the officials are so vital. We have not gotten into the technical aspects of this, so when we are talking about this, I still think we need to hear from officials a whole lot more.
I'm just going to look at this motion here. The amendment deadline goes to 5:30 on Monday. Yes, we hear from witnesses on Thursday the 28th, but we run into the exact same problem: We have amendments due on Monday, we have officials on Tuesday and then we go to clause-by-clause on Thursday. Why are we hearing from officials after amendments are due?
I'm saying this rhetorically. I'm not expecting an answer. I think I would get no answer anyway.
Mr. Powlowski looks like he's chomping at the bit to give me an answer. He's just mastered this bill in the last 45 minutes or something like that.
I don't mean to make light of this. I take him at his word when he says, “We don't really get this.”
Okay, Ms. Acan really gets the bill.
Conservative
Frank Caputo Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC
I am still processing what is in this bill. As a result, in order to fulfill our obligation as His Majesty's loyal opposition, we should have the right to hear from officials fulsomely before we have to submit amendments. Otherwise, we are essentially going to a glorified clause-by-clause because, in that case, we're going to hear from officials after amendments are in, which we would normally do in a clause-by-clause setting anyway. We're almost postponing the unavoidable. We're not really following a proper process in that.
I reiterate that there has been substantial questioning on this bill, and dare I say, from some people, substantial opposition. We heard today that a lot of people are really in favour of this bill. We have a group that is quite in favour of the bill. We have a group that is quite opposed to the bill. Our job is to try to find some middle ground that puts bad people behind bars and ensures that privacy and charter rights are protected. I think everybody around this table would want to see that. How do we do that when we have amendments that are due before we hear from officials? To me, it is eminently reasonable that we would hear from officials before amendments. I don't understand why we wouldn't do it.
For instance, let's look at part 1, “reasonable grounds to suspect” versus “reasonable grounds to believe”. We heard about the lower threshold from Commissioner Carrique. The only time we actually talked about reasonable grounds to suspect versus reasonable grounds to believe was when I asked the question.
My recollection of reasonable grounds to believe is that a peace officer personally or subjectively believes that an offence has been committed—not suspects—and that the belief is objectively reasonable. That is reasonable grounds to believe, or it was five years ago when I was still practising law.
Liberal
Liberal
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
I want to know when we have to cut off resources for the meeting—
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
—because if we continue this, we will have amendments due tomorrow and clause-by-clause starting on Tuesday. I want to understand what time we would stop this.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jean-Yves Duclos
That's a point of order, which is disguised as a point of information.
I'm not a lawyer, so you would be better than me at describing it, but that's a very fair statement because I was going to make that statement.
We have three minutes before we need to adjourn this meeting.
As MP Housefather has said, if we don't vote on that motion, we have the existing motion, which prevails. That means we're going into clause-by-clause work next Tuesday, June 2, and the deadline for amendments is tomorrow. I'll let you know that because we have a default motion, default agenda, which we have voted on. We have an opportunity now to vote on a different agenda. We need to do this in the next two minutes, now.
Are we ready to vote on that?
Conservative
Conservative
Conservative
Rhonda Kirkland Conservative Oshawa, ON
I have a question. What's Thursday? What would we do in the next meeting?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jean-Yves Duclos
Thursday, we have the minister for one hour on main estimates, and we have two hours of.... We have one hour for the minister and one hour for officials, and then we extend for one more hour with the officials on Bill C-22. The three hours on Thursday will be one with the minister, one with officials on main estimates and the last one on Bill C-22.
Conservative
Rhonda Kirkland Conservative Oshawa, ON
Yes, I want to ask a question, but I also don't want to cede the floor to ask the question. That's what I'm concerned about.
I don't understand at all how this is a solution. I know that Mr. Ramsay said, “Oh, I have a solution: Let's adjourn debate on your motion and let me introduce this beautiful motion, which is the solution to all of our concerns.”
The solution seems to be to leave in place the same scenario, where amendments are due before we have heard from department officials again, and to add an extra two hours for witnesses. Quite frankly, we had 18 witnesses here today. I know that Mr. Caputo said we had 12. We had 18 witnesses here today: 18 people and maybe 12 or 13 organizations. We didn't get to ask them questions.
My concern with this is that we had no time. We don't have any time. This government is just frankly abusing its power, in my opinion, by ramming through legislation without giving the opposition a chance to properly question witnesses so that we can pass a bill that is done right. We want a bill that is done right. We want it.
I'm a little bit blown away. In fact, I'm a lot blown away that we don't want to do our jobs, that we want to limit the amount of time that we're studying this bill and that we just want to go, go, go, to the detriment of Canadians and their privacy and their rights. Quite frankly, I'm baffled that everyone at this table is okay with that. I really am. I don't really understand it at all.
When I first started hearing about this bill and looking at it—
Conservative
Rhonda Kirkland Conservative Oshawa, ON
Okay. I will end with this, then.
Are you interrupting to end the meeting? Is that what you're saying?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jean-Yves Duclos
Yes, because we don't have any resources anymore, meaning that the interpreters and the technical people need to go.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Jean-Yves Duclos
Let me also add another point of information. I can suspend, but it means that we don't have the minister on Thursday. The minister is supposed to come for the main estimates on Thursday. If I suspend the discussion, which is possible, then we lose the minister on Thursday.
I normally adjourn the meeting, which I will do in a second. That means we are going to follow the existing motion setting the agenda, unless there are conversations outside of this meeting in the next hours to adjust it accordingly.
Let me therefore adjourn the meeting and wish everyone a good night.
