Public Safety Committee on June 4th, 2026

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

Hello everyone. Thank you for being here.

I call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 41 of the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security of the House of Commons.

Pursuant to the order of reference from the House made on April 20, 2026, and the motion adopted in committee on April 30, 2026, the committee is meeting for its study of Bill C‑22, an act respecting lawful access.

I'd like to start by saying a few words to remind committee members about the process for the clause-by-clause consideration of bills.

As the name indicates, this is an examination of all clauses in the order in which they appear in the bill. As chair, I will call each clause one by one and each clause may be subject to debate before it is put to a vote.

If there are amendments to the clause in question, I'll recognize the member proposing it, who may briefly explain it, if they wish. Amendments will be considered in the order in which they appear in the package of documents that each member received from the clerk. Each amendment bears an identification number in the top right corner, which indicates the party that proposed it. During the debate on an amendment, members may also propose subamendments.

Amendments must be properly drafted in a legal sense and must also be procedurally admissible. The chair may be called upon to rule amendments inadmissible if they go against three key elements. First, an amendment may be deemed inadmissible if it goes against the principle of the bill or, second, if it is beyond the scope of the bill, given that the principle and scope of the bill were both adopted by the House when it agreed to the bill at second reading. Third, an amendment may also be deemed inadmissible if it infringes on the financial initiative of the Crown.

I thank the members for their attention and wish everyone a very productive clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C‑22.

Now, I want to introduce and welcome the witnesses.

We have with us, from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, Ramzi Nashef, director general, policy, planning and accountability, as well as Juanita M.

From the Department of Justice, we have with us Kimberly Gibner, deputy assistant deputy minister, and Normand Wong, acting general counsel.

From the Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, we have Richard Bilodeau, acting senior assistant deputy minister, Shannon Hiegel, director general, and Fenton Ho, director, intelligence policy.

Lastly, we also have with us from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, C/Supt Richard Burchill.

On that note, we can start the clause-by-clause consideration of the bill.

Pursuant to Standing Order 75(1), consideration of Clause 1, the short title, is postponed.

We will go to clause 2.

(Clause 2 agreed to)

(On clause 3)

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

In terms of clause 3, amendment NDP‑1 is deemed moved pursuant to the committee's routine motion that the committee adopted on June 19, 2025.

Ms. Kwan, do you wish to speak to amendment NDP‑1?

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and thank you for allowing me to present the NDP amendments on Bill C-22.

Relating to clause 3 and our amendment, I'll note that this is the government's second attempt at lawful access, after widespread outcry about Bill C-2, which the government was forced to abandon. Here we are again.

Some of the legal community's and civil society's concerns about part 1 were addressed, but I think it still misses the mark. With respect to the issue, I note that the Canadian Chamber of Commerce has raised concerns on behalf of its members with respect to the scope of and access to computer data. There are a number of legal experts, lawyers, scholars and business leaders alike who have raised these concerns as well.

To that end, this amendment would strike language permitting access to data “available to” a device, to ensure that warrants remain targeted and avoid broad or general searches of remote data. That's the element of the amendment I'm proposing.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

Thank you, Ms. Kwan.

I now turn the floor over to Mr. Caputo, who would like to speak.

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC]

Thank you very much.

Do we have all the briefs that were submitted translated, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

All the available briefs have been submitted, yes.

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC]

To be clear, because this is clause-by-clause, when I say that.... Various organizations and groups have submitted briefs to the committee. Have all those briefs been distributed? If a brief came in, do we have it now?

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

Briefs were submitted yesterday. I would not be surprised if briefs were submitted today as well. There may be briefs submitted tomorrow. It is not possible for all briefs to be distributed immediately because translation needs to apply.

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC]

That's fair. I understand that. I'm not expecting a brief that came in yesterday to be translated by today.

I think it is fair that we know what briefs remain outstanding and what briefs don't. In other words, if a brief was submitted on Monday, hypothetically, do we have it today? If we're going through clause-by-clause and there were submissions made by stakeholders, we should know whether we have those submissions.

I hope I'm being clear in what I'm asking for.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

That's a fair question. The honest answer is that for this committee, as well as other committees, briefs follow the usual procedure. As we discussed last time, the House of Commons has resources that are necessarily limited. Things are allocated on the basis of the time they are submitted and the speed with which they can be translated.

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC]

I understand that.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Parkland, AB]

I have a point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

Go ahead, Mr. Lloyd.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Parkland, AB]

Would it be a good practice for us to get a list of outstanding briefs? I understand they might not be translated in time, but it would be good to get a list of the names of the briefs and who they're from. Would that be something reasonable for the chair and the clerk to provide to committee members?

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

I can check that with the clerk.

I also need to check that with the other clerks—the usual procedures followed by other committees. We want this committee to follow not only the usual practice but also the best practice expected by the House of Commons.

[Dane Lloyd, Conservative, Parkland, AB]

To continue on that point of order, Mr. Chair, I assume it is the best practice that committee members receive all the information necessary when reviewing a bill, especially during clause-by-clause.

I hope you will direct the clerk to expeditiously provide a list of outstanding briefs to our committee as soon as possible. I'm surprised we don't have them now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

The clerk obviously wants to do his best. As I said, he will need to be assisted by other staff in the broader House of Commons.

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola, BC]

I don't mean to belabour this, and I'm not trying to throw any shade at the clerk. I don't know how you would translate that, but I'm certainly not attempting to do that. We should know when we are going to have that information. We're about to embark on the first amendment. I don't want to hear a stakeholder say, “I have a point to make on the amendment, and I submitted a brief last Friday. That brief wasn't available, and now you are on the second NDP amendment.”

This is pretty serious. This is the federal legislature and we are dealing with a very contentious bill, with multiple motions on notice. I don't think it's unreasonable for us to know what information remains outstanding before we undertake scrutinizing and potentially changing this bill. A stakeholder may have proposed alternative wording, but we don't even know if they did so. If they did that yesterday, it's not a problem. I get that. If they did that last week or even Monday, however, I think we need to know whether it's outstanding. That's my position.

Mr. Chair, I can't tell you how to do your job. I can only give an exhortation. My exhortation is that we have the most fulsome information possible, and that information becomes possible with more information. I'll leave it at that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

I think you have been very clear, MP Caputo. Thank you for that.

Ms. DeBellefeuille, do you want to say something?

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon, QC]

I do not wish to speak in relation to the point of order but about the amendment, rather.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jean-Yves Duclos]

Yes, you may speak about that, since you are next on the list.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon, QC]

Okay.

I have some questions for the officials so I can better understand the amendment. I think they're targeted more towards representatives from the Department of Justice.

If we were to adopt this amendment, would there not be a risk that evidence could be destroyed? Could law enforcement request a telewarrant for other devices once on site?

We have questions about the fact that evidence could be destroyed. I'm not sure whether you're able to answer my questions in detail.

[Normand Wong, Acting General Counsel, Policy Sector, Department of Justice]

Thank you for the question.

I think there is a risk that information will be destroyed. This articulation of the authority to search computer data and other data accessible to a computer system has been in the Criminal Code since 1997. The effect of this amendment, if passed, would be that it would actually make the job of police harder, which, I think, goes against the objective of the bill. They currently use this power routinely. In the Internet age, with cloud computing and other distributed networks, this is a very important tool for police to have.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon, QC]

I will rephrase my question to make sure I understand.

The idea is the following. Let's say, for instance, that police officers go to a home to seize a cellphone, for example, but are surprised to see another device of interest that they did not expect to see in that home. Clause 3 in the bill, as it now stands, would allow them to seize that device even though it was not originally targeted. As I understand it, the amendment would have the effect of restricting the seizure, so that police officers could seize only a device that was originally targeted. Did I understand correctly?

[Normand Wong]

Yes.

There are several ways that police can obtain evidence in a legal manner—I think you described some of them, and some of them are articulated in the amendments here—under a warrant. When they're in a premises, under a warrant, they can also seize other things that they think are associated with the crime, which I think you were talking about: other digital devices or other computers that are there.

These amendments are trying to treat all those digital devices the same. Under the current regime, because it wasn't designed for the seizure of computers, digital devices and the data on them, there's differential treatment in how those are seized, and that's not really sustainable in law. What this is trying to do is to ensure that, no matter how these devices come into lawful police possession, they're all treated the same. This is a tool that police can use to examine the data that's on those devices.

With regard to the amendment in question, the “available to” doesn't really have to do with this. This has to do with cursory searches or when police are actually examining the data and have the ability to go to a link where there are cloud services. They have the ability to search that data as well.