Madam Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the debate on Bill C-36. It is an important bill which will be going before the justice committee. Canadians will be comforted to know that it is a very important bill and that it will undergo rigorous scrutiny by the House, both at second reading and in committee. Representatives from all parties will have an opportunity to address witnesses, including the minister, departmental staff and anybody else they feel has relevant information, because the bill is an omnibus bill and touches a number of important aspects related to terrorism.
Many members have already put on the record a number of the provisions of the anti-terrorism bill. I will leave it at that. There were a couple of aspects though that I did want to deal with. It is important that the definition of terrorism or terrorist activity is understood in the context in which the bill deals with it.
Terrorist activity is defined as an offence under one of the 10 UN anti-terrorism conventions or protocols as defined in another jurisdiction or where for political, religious or ideological purposes one threatens the public or national security by killing, seriously harming or endangering a person, causing substantial property damage that is likely to seriously harm people, or by interfering with or disrupting an essential service, facility or system.
It is very important that we are focusing on and dealing with terrorism. The definition is crafted to make it clear that disrupting an essential service is not a terrorist activity. There has been some concern about whether or not this application would be too broad. It is not a terrorist activity if it occurs during a lawful protest at a work site or is not intended to cause serious harm to persons. There is within the definition this clear focus on truly defined terrorist activities.
The bill was introduced yesterday. Constitutional experts will be looking at charter issues and criminal lawyers will be looking at a number of the subtleties.
Two issues have come up that I thought would be of interest to dwell on. One is called the preventive arrest, which Canadians should know about. We are talking about individual rights and freedoms and the extent to which these things would be appropriate, given the circumstances of September 11 and the challenge that free and democratic countries face now.
Preventive arrest is a process whereby something similar to a grand jury would allow people, where there was a suspected or alleged risk of terrorist activity, to be taken into custody. During this process they would be subject to the rules of perjury. In other words, if they lied or it was shown that they had lied in their responses, they could be subject to the laws relating to perjury. They would not be able not to answer questions in that hearing. If they did not answer, like in any other judicial proceeding they would be held in contempt according to contempt laws.
Interestingly enough in this process nothing that they would say could be used against them in the event that they were ultimately charged. It is a separate process. It is a new instrument that I wanted Canadians to be aware of.
As a result of a preventive arrest, the outcome could be that the people would simply be released because the judge was satisfied. They could also be charged as a result of the information developed by the investigation. They could even be released with certain conditions, similar to a peace bond situation. This is mutual and Canadians would want to inform themselves and watch the development of this issue.
The second one I thought was interesting is a process called the investigative hearing. This is something similar to a process whereby people would receive a subpoena to appear before a hearing in which they would be asked certain questions related to their activities. This may lead to other things. However it is another tool which would help to achieve the objectives of the bill to allow those who are responsible for detecting and preventing terrorist activities from occurring to be able to deter terrorist activity.
The bill contains a number of other aspects. Members have very eloquently described the extension of wiretap provisions and the impact on other jurisdictions, police forces and provincial integration.
In looking at this issue I thought about the ongoing process and discussions of the post-September 11 attacks. It has to do with the allegation by some that Canada is a haven for terrorists. This is a very serious allegation and a very serious indictment and Canada should strongly respond to the myth of that statement.
This act will be one of the tools we can use to dispel that myth. It would be quite legitimate to suggest that if Canada did not have an effective anti-terrorism piece of legislation comparable to the legislation in place in other jurisdictions such as the United States, Great Britain or elsewhere it would be the weakest link. Canada would in fact become that haven. It is very important for us to know what is going on internationally to make sure that the provisions under this act work and work in the same realm of effectiveness we see in other jurisdictions.
I want to finish off with something that concerned me a bit today. There was a speech on the bill by the Leader of the Opposition in the House. As usual, the discussion always seems to slip into immigration and refugee issues. We talk about new Canadians and how we will toughen up the Immigration Act because of criminals coming into Canada or what will we do about it.
No issue has been stressed more by the Prime Minister, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and members of our caucus than the importance of understanding this is not a war against Afghanistan. There are terrorists who happen to be in Afghanistan. We cannot let this become a cultural or a religious bias. I do not think anyone in Canada would say that anyone of Afghani background should be suspected of being a terrorist.
I remind Canadians of what the Prime Minister said last night in the debate and today in question period. We have taken every step possible to ensure that the rights and freedoms of Canadians and all those on our soil who are protected by the charter of rights have been fully taken into account. Those rights and freedoms will be unaffected substantively by this legislation.
There is no question that we, as a small country with a baby boomer situation and an aging society, will depend very heavily on the immigration system over the next 20 years to provide us with people to support our population base and our economic base.
We welcome immigrants. We welcome new Canadians to the best country in the world. Those rights and freedoms that the Prime Minister was so instrumental in bringing to Canada are rights and freedoms that we are going to protect as part of this bill.