Mr. Speaker, the Government of Canada is unwavering in its commitment to give our law enforcement and security intelligence agencies the tools they need to safeguard our national security, and to ensure review mechanisms are both transparent and accountable.
There have been a number of calls for enhanced national security review in addition to Justice O’Connor’s policy review. For example, the 2004 Interim Committee of Parliamentarians on National Security and the Senate and House of Commons reviews of the Anti-Terrorism Act, ATA, made recommendations to the government in that regard.
Furthermore, a number of independent reviews have examined the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP, CPC. In addition to Justice O’Connor, the Auditor General of Canada, the Senate Special Committee on the ATA, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Public Accounts, and the Task Force on Governance and Cultural Change in the RCMP have all made recommendations to strengthen the powers of the CPC.
The Government of Canada is carefully examining all of these recommendations, as well as other proposals that have been put forward to enhance the accountability of the RCMP, and is working diligently to determine the most effective review model for Canada’s national security activities generally, and the RCMP specifically.