Madam Speaker, I want to begin my speech with a brief historical overview. In 1946, with the RCMP's increased responsibilities for security, the personnel assigned to security tasks as, for the first time, separated organizationally from the Investigations Directorate and grouped in the Special "I" Branch.
In 1956, the Special "I" Branch was made a directorate within the RCMP, under the command of a deputy commissioner.
In 1969, the Royal Commission on Security recommended the establishment of a civilian security agency. The government rejected this recommendation but announced its intention to give the Special "I" Branch a separate status and to increase its civilian personnel.
Between 1971 and 1974, especially but not exclusively in Quebec, the security service mounted a series of operations, many of which were apparently illegal, in order to neutralize radical and separatist groups.
On March 27, 1975, the federal Cabinet produced a directive governing the security service's activites; this directive remained secret until 1978.
In 1976, a year later, Corporal Samson was tried following an incident unrelated to this affair, but revealed his participation in Operation Bricole in 1972. This operation involved breaking and entering and stealing files, especially on politics in Quebec.
Various events occurred over the years, but let us go to November 29, 1984. The members of SIRC, the Security Intelligence Review Committee, were appointed. The chairman was Ronald Atkey, a former Conservative Cabinet minister, as if by chance.
In February 1985, the federal government's budget estimates showed that CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, had a meagre budget of about $115 million; I say meagre because today its budget exceeds $200 million. This still represents, in the midst of an economic crisis, a considerable amount.
Despite this huge amount coming from the pockets of Canadian and Quebec taxpayers, Parliament only plays a minor role in monitoring the review of CSIS activities. Even reviewing the budget only skims the surface as the CSIS budget amounts, in fact, to a single line in the 1994-95 Estimates. I know from experience that when Mr. Elcock, a senior director of CSIS, appeared before the justice committee I was on, we asked him, to no avail, how these millions of dollars spent on national security were used. We never at any time-the evidence is all around us-received anything even remotely resembling an answer. That is not really surprising since Mr. Elcock has a reputation that probably always precede him.
In this regard, Richard Cléroux, a writer and former reporter with the Toronto-based daily newspaper the Globe and Mail , thinks that Mr. Elcock is very intelligent and plays political hardball. He sees him more as a Jesuit than an Oblate and thinks that he would make a formidable opponent of the independency movement.
What is most important is not that he refuses to answer our questions despite being accountable to taxpayers but that he leads an organization that seems to be above government control, that costs over $200 million a year and whose activities we cannot find out anything about, let alone check. That an organization with millions of dollars at its disposal is beyond our control is rather disquieting. It is troubling for taxpayers and from a national security standpoint. How far can we go in letting people put our money to work and for what reasons?
Talking about CSIS, opinions vary, according to experts. One of the questions we must ask ourselves is this: Could the organizations responsible for our national security with so little monitoring engage in illegal activities? It happened in the past. Let us just say that by asking the question, we are begging the answer to it.
Money can do anything, really. But considering the economic situation, our present state of affairs, and the demographics and the geography of our vast country, could this really happen? Well, yes, it could, but is it likely? Personally, I would say that not only is it likely, it is very likely.
Mr. Jean-Paul Brodeur, a criminology professor at the Université de Montréal, who specializes in intelligence services, among other things, even mentions that the Americans are sometimes taken for a ride, even though they have a much tighter control system than we do, in the form of committees with wide-ranging powers in both houses of Congress.
Who has forgotten the famous Oliver North, who was taking orders from above and literally thumbed his nose at everything else?
Mrs. Lorraine Lagacé, the former Quebec delegate in Ottawa, under Mr. René Lévesque, has some thoughts on this matter. She says that most English Canadians are not interested in looking at legal mechanisms, that what really counts for them is democracy, but that if they must choose between democratic rules and a united Canada, they will always opt for a united Canada.
That is precisely how they see this issue, so, no matter what the RCMP or CSIS says, the mandate of secret services will always be to save Canada before anything else.
CSIS employees, whom we pay more than $200 million per year, are not accountable. These people only have to table some kind of report before a pseudo-monitoring committee made up of political appointees. In fact, that review committee must phone CSIS before going to its offices to look into files, and they do not have access to all files. This is what you call transparency!
The public does have the right to know and we, elected representatives, have the basic duty of providing the information. What is happening with the more than $200 million paid in taxes? CSIS is a monster that nobody can control, not even the government. Consequently, you can imagine what is happening! This is why the Bloc Quebecois is asking for a royal commission of inquiry.