Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to Bill C-3, which deals with security certificates.
Mr. Speaker, I look forward to sharing my time with the member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek.
I have to say that I already was very concerned about the legislation that is now before the House. If we just take a moment to remember, it is legislation that aims and purports to fix flawed legislation that was struck down by the Supreme Court for some very good reasons. Now what we have is flawed legislation to replace the flawed legislation.
The legislation that has now been introduced by the Conservatives has been left really until the last minute. I think they are hoping that some kind of fearmongering and trying to muster public opinion will actually put pressure on members of this House to cave to the notion that we should cut debate short and we should just ram it through without critiquing it, which is actually what the parliamentary secretary proposed a little while ago, I have to say to my surprise and horror.
When I heard the comments that he was making in his defence of this flawed legislation, I just could not believe that members of this House, and probably he is representative of his colleagues, have learned absolutely nothing from the very problematic situations that have been created. Frankly, to be honest, many of them were created by the previous Liberal government, but in the instance of security certificates, these have been in place for a very long time.
What has come to light is that when people are placed under suspicion of possibly having engaged in some kind of terrorist activity, a great many fears flood to the fore and people seem quite prepared to say, “Let us just trample on human rights. Let us suspend civil liberties. Let us throw due process on to the scrap heap. Let us be satisfied that we are going to make some mistakes”. Without due process we will never know for sure. We will just entrap some people who may be completely innocent, and we will never have a way of knowing whether that is the case, because those people will have virtually no rights whatsoever to due process under the law.
I have had many occasions over the last several years since 9/11 to recall the prophetic, profound warnings of a very courageous member of the U.S. Congress who stated that in the attempt to defeat terrorism, let us not become the evil we deplore.
I consider that it is succumbing to evil, that it is embodying evil to say that we do not owe the same kind of due process to every single human being who comes before our courts, to ensure that they are not wrongly convicted, and to ensure that any conviction takes place in a court of law with due process and not based on rumours, suspicions, prejudices, Islamophobia, or any other form of hatred. I consider that it is all the more reason for us to take even more time to be cautious about what kind of legislation we put in place.
My colleague from Surrey North, the public security critic in the NDP caucus, has very aptly cited the instance of Maher Arar and the courageous battle that was conducted to clear him of exactly the kinds of prejudices, presumptions and condemnation. He was placed under suspicion, not through security certificates but through the unbelievable events that resulted in his being spirited away from Canada because of information that was wrongly provided by Canadian authorities to American authorities, and in turn American authorities were prepared to send him off to Syria to be tortured.
It seems to me that it is a particularly appropriate time for us to take a few moments to think about the honour that was bestowed on Maher Arar and Monia Mazigh last night at a very well-attended event addressed by a previous ambassador of Canada who gave distinguished service to the United Nations. What it recognized is that all of us are indebted to the courageous struggle that Monia Mazigh engaged in to bring her husband home. Calmly, clearly, simply, but profoundly, she asked for her husband Maher Arar to be returned home to Canada, to be returned home to his family, and to be returned home to justice.
Let me say again that this did not happen under the security certificates. Effectively, he was tried and convicted in the court of public opinion and was treated without due process, even by the authorities, and perhaps especially by the authorities in this climate. I remember how infuriated I was when cabinet ministers in the previous Liberal government were prepared to ask me if I was not worried that if he was found to be a terrorist I would be tarnishing my own reputation. My reaction was that this will never be allowed to be a fear as long as I live and breathe when someone is placed under suspicion without the benefit of due process.
Let us take a few minutes to think calmly about what it is that we are discussing here today. I am trying to be calm, but I feel very provoked by the comments made by some members in the House over the last while. Those comments show that nothing has been learned from the horrible events that have been visited on the lives of too many people because of the suspension of due process. That goes to the heart of what our Supreme Court exists to do. It exists to ensure due process and to strike down the law when it finds that due process is not assured.
I know that there will be some argument made about the fact that some other countries have now put this kind of system in place, such as New Zealand and the U.K., but there are already serious indications of how flawed the so-called reformed legislation is when it comes to the treatment of people placed under suspicion of terrorism. Let us be very clear. No society has ever been made safer by trashing due process of law.
I have only a couple of minutes left. I want to say once again what has already been said by many of my colleagues and by the member for Surrey North, who has done a superb job in addressing the very heart of this matter, and that is that this legislation is flawed for a number of reasons. Some of those reasons I have already explained, such as the suspension of due process, but also, ironically, for those fearmongers who keep trying to dredge up absolute horror for the public, the irony is that security certificates do not punish people who are plotting terrorist acts.
The fact of the matter is that our criminal legislation should be dealing with this problem. That is the way in which we should be dealing with any handling of suspected terrorists.
I plead with all members to pay careful attention to the fundamental principles that are at stake in this instance. Let us be clear that any society which tries to become more secure by trashing human rights and civil liberties is likely to end up being both less secure and having a lot less freedom for all of its citizens.