Debates of April 23rd, 2013

Combating Terrorism Act

[Marc-André Morin, NDP, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like the hon. member to talk about something that has not really been explored.

In most cases—such as Boston and many other examples—the perpetrators of the attacks had already been identified by the police as radicals. Could the answer simply be to provide more resources in order to conduct investigations in those countries and make sure that the people identified as radicals are not dangerous? I think that would solve the problem. It is all well and good to provide tools to the police, but you do not give someone a hammer to kill a fly on a window.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague's question brings me back to one of the major points in my speech. One of the major things that is lacking in the debate about this legislation is the question of resources. Why do police agencies miss people who have been identified as radicals? Probably because they have too much work to do to devote the necessary resources to identifying those who could be potential threats.

As we saw in the case of the Boston Marathon, the police were given virtually unlimited resources in a short period of time and using traditional enforcement investigation methods, basic police tactics not extreme laws which threaten people's rights, they were able to produce results in very short order.

Rather than creating this law which would threaten basic liberties, we need to turn our attention toward providing resources to the police and our security agencies so they can get the job done.

[Djaouida Sellah, NDP, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, like a number of my colleagues, I will start by denouncing the reasons behind debating this bill today.

Bill S-7, the Combating Terrorism Act, could have been brought back to the House quite a while ago. If the government really believed that this bill was vital to the safety of Canadians, it could have decided to debate it a long time ago. If the government truly believes that this bill is vital and it did not put it on the agenda until yesterday, then it is negligent.

However, I do not think that is the case. I really think the government decided to take advantage of recent events in order to muster public opinion. That is also what the editorial team of The Globe and Mail thinks.

Let us be clear. Like all my NDP colleagues and all my colleagues in the House, I condemn terrorism. To quote the former secretary-general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, “terrorist acts are never justified, no matter what considerations may be invoked.” I condemn the Boston bombing and I condemned the September 11 attacks. I condemn the bombings that take place throughout the world every day. I want to take this opportunity to commend all the law enforcement officers who in any way participated in the investigation that led to yesterday's arrests. Well done.

Many of my loved ones have been affected by terrorism. Whether it was because of the Algerian war or the Islamic Army in the 1990s, my loved ones have lived in fear. I have learned one thing from this: it is always civilians who pay the price for such senseless violence.

I also had the experience of being in a place where bombs were dropped when I worked as a medical volunteer for the Red Crescent during the first Gulf War, and so I know the effects and dangers of terrorism. I am therefore proud to stand in the House and oppose this bill.

I am opposed to this bill for many reasons. The first, but by no means the least of these, is that I believe in the rule of law. This bill, as it currently stands, violates the most fundamental civil liberties and human rights. I want to prevent attacks on Canada, but I also want to prevent the arbitrary arrests and the abuse we see in police states.

In Canada, we already have laws that punish crimes of terror and give law enforcement officers the tools they need to protect national security. In this morning's edition of Le Devoir, there is a great quote by Nathalie Des Rosiers, general counsel of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. In reference to the case of Canadians involved in the hostage situation at the In Amenas gas plant in Algeria, she said:

If the police had had any evidence, they would have done something. There are many provisions in the Criminal Code under which these individuals could have been arrested.

Denis Barrette, a spokesperson for the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group, made a similar speech in 2011. He said:

We know as well that these provisions could, as we see it, be abused. I am thinking here of the Air India case. We believe that Canadians will be better served and better protected under the usual provisions of the Criminal Code, rather than others that are completely unnecessary. Reliance on arbitrary powers and a lower standard of evidence can never replace good, effective police work.

The NDP wants to strike a balance between safety and people's rights and freedoms. We proposed numerous amendments to the bill in order to strike that balance. The government rejected them all. However, I found them to be quite reasonable.

The committee members would have had plenty of choice if they had wanted to pass even one amendment as a sign of goodwill, which they obviously did not do, because my colleagues proposed 18 amendments. I would like to mention a few of the amendments so that Canadians can judge for themselves just how stubborn this Conservative government is, how obsessed it is with always being right and how it believes itself to be infallible.

Here are a few of them: ask the Security Intelligence Review Committee to look at the possibility of an inter-agency co-operation protocol to ensure that it would be effective and that rights protected by law would be respected, and have that protocol in place before the leaving the country offences could come into effect; establish the right to state-funded legal aid if a person had to attend an investigative hearing; add a comprehensive review of the government's implementation of the Arar commission's recommendations with regard to accountability and oversight mechanisms, with particular attention to oversight and activities among agencies; and include the advice of the Canadian Human Rights Commission on the racial discrimination and profiling issues surrounding Bill S-7.

Really? I thought it was impossible to be against virtue. These are just a few examples of the amendments put forward by the NDP, but to no avail. The members of this government rejected them all, one by one. I would also like to point out that neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals even bothered to propose any amendments to this bill.

Many of the measures in this bill were suggested in 2001 following the September 11 attacks. These measures expired in 2007, so they have not been in force for the past five years, and when they were in force, they were used a grand total of zero times. Zero, zéro, sifr, none, nada, never.

I would like to quote something former CSIS director Reid Morden said in 2010 about some of these measures:

I confess I never thought that they should have been introduced in the first place and that they slipped in, in the kind of scrambling around that the government did after 9/11.

He added:

Police and security forces have perfectly sufficient powers to do their jobs. They don't need more powers.

We in the NDP will continue to fight to achieve a balance between personal rights and freedoms and people's safety. We believe that the provisions included in this bill provide no additional protection to anyone in this country. I would remind hon. members that this bill is in its present form because the government refused the 18 amendments we proposed in committee in order to strike a balance between safety and rights and freedoms. Accordingly, I cannot support this bill.

Furthermore, this bill leaves out some of the additional protections that were included in the 2001 legislation. An editorial published in today's Ottawa Citizen entitled “No need for new laws” shares many of our concerns. To quote that article:

The idea that the state can arrest and detain someone who has not done anything criminal runs counter to the fundamental values of our society.

For all these reasons, I will oppose this bill and I will vote against it with pride and with my head held high.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I think the member realizes that the first job of any government is to keep Canadians safe from those who wish to harm us. International terrorism is going to continue to be a threat in the foreseeable future. Bill S-7 would provide law enforcement and national security agencies with further means to anticipate and respond effectively to terrorism.

That is what I want to ask her about, anticipation, because the bill would assist law enforcement in disrupting terrorist attacks by compelling suspects to appear before a court in advance of a suspected terrorist attack. Once the attack occurs, there is nothing we can do about it. This would create new offences for leaving or attempting to leave Canada for the purpose of committing a terrorist offence.

Does the member think these new initiatives are a good idea, and if not, what does she suggest we put in place to stop terrorist attacks before they occur? If there are any other ideas she has, I would like to hear them.

[Djaouida Sellah, NDP, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague opposite, who is a fellow member of the Standing Committee on Health, which runs smoothly.

Unfortunately, I do not agree with this bill. The NDP believes that Canada must give serious consideration to the issue of terrorism while maintaining the rights and freedoms of all Canadians.

This bill is not the right response to the threat of terrorism. It would reintroduce measures that, in the past, have proven to be unwarranted and ineffective.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this bill is a sad reminder that police forces are needed to combat terrorists.

How can the government claim that it wants to combat terrorism with legislation when the budgets of counter-terrorism organizations are being slashed? There was a subsidy to help municipal police combat street gangs and stop recruiters from getting young people involved in terrorist organizations. That subsidy has disappeared.

How can we fight terrorism when the only tools we have are laws that take away our rights and the tools police need to fight terrorism?

[Djaouida Sellah, NDP, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question. I truly understand how he feels about this bill.

We know that this Conservative government is slashing budgets everywhere, including the budgets for community police services.

How can we expect community police, or other enforcement services, to do their job properly if they do not have the required means? We know very well that satellites and sophisticated devices are not the way to collect reliable information.

We have to provide the tools and the means, even if only to those in the field, to detect any activity that could result in a terrorist act.

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher, QC]

Mr. Speaker, does my colleague agree that many people familiar with the issue support the NDP's position that, so far, most of our legislation has been able to control the situation and that it is sufficiently clear?

[Djaouida Sellah, NDP, Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague and riding neighbour.

As I just mentioned, many important people support our position, including Denis Barrette, a spokesperson for the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group; Ihsaan Gardee, the executive director of the Canadian Council on American Islamic Relations; Ziyaad Mia, the chair of the Advocacy and Research Committee of the Canadian Muslim Lawyers Association; Carmen Cheung, a lawyer for the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association; and Nathalie Des Rosiers, the general counsel for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. All of these people agree with us.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the objective of this bill deserves to be examined, and we must look at what has happened in the past.

In his book On War, Von Clausewitz defined war as “an act of violence to compel our opponent to fulfill our will”. What is the will of terrorists? It is quite simple. They want to force us to give up our rights, our freedom of press and our democratic right to elect our leaders. That is their objective. Our response must be to reinforce those values and absolutely not to abandon them. That is the issue here.

This situation makes me think of a chicken farmer who witnesses his chickens being killed by a fox and decides to punish the chickens instead of going after the fox. We must combat terrorism. Our best weapon to do so—the strongest and most reliable weapon—is democracy.

We have a police force that is organized and able to democratically defend our society against acts of terrorism. It is perfectly able to do so. Canada has not yet experienced any acts of terrorism because our police forces have been able to prevent them from happening with our existing legislation. Democracy is precisely what we are talking about today.

Winston Churchill once said that democracy is the worst form of government—except for all the others. This means that there are no others. This is our system and we must defend it. We value democracy and we abhor terrorism.

It is a devious, treacherous adversary, and when it attacks, Canada must respond appropriately. We arrest terrorists and judge them based on our laws, not theirs.

This situation is particularly controversial. As we know, the legislation expired six years ago, in 2007. For the past six years, it has not been in force and it has never been used since 2001. There was not one investigative hearing or any situation in which authorities needed to resort to recognizance with conditions. This speaks volumes about the effectiveness of this bill.

I have the sinking feeling that this bill is being used because certain things in the media have created a sense of insecurity among the population. It is very troubling to know that some young people were recruited in the Toronto area to participate in terrorist activities in Algeria. It is also troubling to find out that people who were in Canada were preparing to commit a terrorist attack against a VIA Rail passenger train. That is pure terror.

It is only normal for people to be afraid. What is not normal, however, is to see a government that feeds this fear and uses it to give itself additional powers that work against the population. It is abusing its own population because terrorism exists. That is what terrorism is. Using people's natural sense of terror to give oneself additional powers that take away people's rights is also a form of terrorism.

The parliamentary secretary talked about the NDP amendment concerning people who have served in a foreign army that is illegally occupying another country. One of the objectives of this bill is to prohibit people from leaving Canada to serve in a foreign organization.

Consider the following three examples. A young Syrian returns to his country of origin to serve in the Syrian army against the rebels. Is that young man a terrorist?

A young Canadian does his Israeli military service in the occupied territories. Is that young man a terrorist? A young Somali returns home to participate in a religious war against the people he calls infidels. Is that young man a terrorist?

Terrorism will not be defined by the acts committed, but by the people targeted by these acts. Are the perpetrators considered to be insignificant? They may or may not commit these acts. We will use our judgment and our international values to establish who is and who is not a terrorist. However, all three will do exactly the same thing—use violence to force people to obey their orders. That situation requires clarification, something that this legislation does not and will not provide, because that is not what the Conservatives want.

The NDP is opposed to this bill for good reason. It is an ineffective piece of legislation. It does not target terrorism; it targets the civil rights of Canadians. Once again, the Conservatives are using a dualist turn: if you are not with us, you are against us. That is from a speech by George W. Bush, the loser. The government has adopted a loser as its model. That says a lot about this government, which is an assortment of losers, people who cut police budgets, withdraw into themselves and believe that all other countries are enemies with which they must not speak, instead of fighting terrorism effectively by increasing police resources and entering into international agreements for the exchange of information. The government is telling us that we have no choice and that we have to sacrifice our rights so that they have the means to fight terrorists. Fortunately, our police do not need this government. Our police manage to carry on without this government, which hinders them by taking away the resources they need and access to information.

Bill S-7 therefore violates civil liberties and human rights, particularly the right to remain silent and the right to not be imprisoned without a fair trial. According to the spirit of those rights, the weight of the state should never be used against an individual to force him to testify against himself. Yet here we are with Bill S-7. There is a reason why, in 2001, the first version of the bill had a sunset clause. It was a protection to ensure that the violation of our rights would not lead to the definitive loss of our rights. In 2007, the act fell into disuse. I can guarantee you that terrorists were not roaming the streets spreading terror the next morning. We did not have that problem in 2007.

There is an imbalance between security and the fundamental rights violated under this legislation. There is the case of Mr. Arar, who was deported to Syria where he was tortured. That is the epitome of stupidity. Everyone agreed, and unfortunately, we have not learned our lesson. We had nothing to gain from sending that man to be tortured. He was not a terrorist. As the parliamentary secretary himself admitted, the problem is that this piece of legislation is so broad that it can be applied to people who are not suspected of terrorism in the slightest.

The NDP is against terrorism. We are so opposed to terrorism that we are against the Conservatives. They are the ones who create false fears and blow them out of proportion to punish Canadians for having rights and using them.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to my hon. colleague's speech. I think all of us share the anger and frustration about people who would abuse our country and put people's lives at risk and, in doing so, undermine basic protections and freedoms that all Canadians enjoy. Certainly, we want to ensure that, when people are caught, the full weight of the law is thrown against them.

However, I think what we are looking at here is this undermining of basic rights that make us the democracy we are.

We know that the Liberal Party brought in two very controversial motions in 2001, taking away the basic right of people to protect themselves in court, by forcing them to give testimony against themselves and also by holding people without charge.

The Liberals knew this was so contentious that they brought in a sunset clause. However, now, they are hiding behind the Conservatives and supporting getting rid of that sunset clause and bringing the legislation back.

Bill S-7 would be a law of general application, so it would affect minors as well as adults. There would be no differentiation in the people who could be held: friends, relatives, anybody related to someone who is supposedly suspected but not charged. It would include children. Both the Conservatives and the Liberals refuse to amend the act to clarify that people under the age of 17 or 18 would not be detained in this same measure.

I would like to ask my hon. colleague why, given that Canada has signed specific UN conventions on protecting children, this huge breach of basic rights for children would be allowed in what the Conservatives have called their desire to have the wide sweep of powers to go after anyone they want.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this bill has only one objective, and it has nothing to do with observing the age difference between a minor and an adult or the difference between a Canadian citizen and a foreign national. It has only one objective, which is to bring in an unfortunately partisan policy.

The Conservatives want to appear to be the champions of anti-terrorism. They knowingly introduced this bill at a time when people in Boston were victims of an act of terrorism and when Canadian authorities were uncovering terrorist plots. There is a reason we are talking about this bill today.

The government wants to come off as the guardians of Canada. That is not the case. They are not good guardians for Canada. The good guardians are the ones who stopped the terrorists, certainly not the people over there who create obstacles by cutting funding and prohibiting the authorities from accessing internationally relevant information. The government violates all of our own most fundamental laws.

At what point will we see children being sent to prison for what the Conservatives arbitrarily consider to be an act of terrorism?

[Matthew Kellway, NDP, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the bill and the context in which we are debating it are full of contradictions. We are here debating that the government is asking for extraordinary measures, when the day before it seemed that ordinary measures, the measures that currently exist, were sufficient to ensure Canadians are protected from terrorist acts.

One of the other contradictions we are faced with is that, again, the government is asking for extraordinary measures at the same time that it is implementing cuts to the enforcement agencies that are there to protect Canadian interests and lives. I look to, for example, cuts of $143 million to CBSA that would affect 325 front-line border crossing guards across the country.

I wonder if the member would comment on that particular contradiction.

[Alain Giguère, NDP, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, effectively combatting terrorism requires competent, qualified police officers who receive the support they need from the government and effective legislation.

They are responsible for defending democracy, and they are very good at doing so. This government is only looking for publicity. Its only objective is to make itself look good by claiming to be combatting terrorism.

Less work will get done, at the borders, at airport security and in the field, because of the Conservatives' budget cuts.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise on the matter of Bill S-7, legislation that proposes a number of amendments to Canada's anti-terrorism regime, including provisions respecting the re-enactment of preventive arrests and investigative hearings. As members will know, these provisions expired in 2007 and have, on numerous occasions, been the subject of my remarks in the House and in writings of mine over the years, dating back to the tabling of the original Anti-terrorism Act, Bill C-36 in 2001.

It perhaps goes without saying that this debate began in the period following the horrific events of 9/11, which was characterized at the time as a period when the whole world was changed. Back then the Liberal government of the day introduced provisions for preventive arrests and investigative hearings as components of the larger Anti-terrorism Act. Soon after Bill C-36 in the House in its original form was tabled, I rose in the House and expressed some 10 civil libertarian concerns with respect to that projected draft of the Anti-terrorism Act, including the provisions relating to preventive detention and investigative hearings. I elaborated on these matters in a series of articles and recommended that the provisions be sunsetted after three years, later extended to five years, pending comprehensive parliamentary review, and the government agreed. With that as well as the majority of my other concerns being addressed, some eight out of the ten, I ended up supporting the legislation.

Regrettably, by 2007, when the provisions were scheduled to sunset pending a parliamentary motion to extend them, the House and special Senate committees had not yet completed their studies of the Anti-terrorism Act due to repeated delays including the dissolution of Parliament in 2004 and 2006. Nevertheless, the Conservative government went ahead with proposing the extension of the provisions without taking the views of these parliamentary committees into account, leaving House members with little insight into the experience of the provisions in effect. The result was a highly politicized and partisan debate, rife with what I could only describe at the time as bumper-sticker slogans and smears instead of a debate on the merits of the policy, a policy with which reasonable people can and do reasonably disagree. Indeed, I regretted the references made by ministers of the Crown at the time that somehow our party was soft on terrorism for simply wanting to debate these provisions, especially considering that it was a Liberal government that introduced the Anti-terrorism Act in the first place.

With Bill S-7 now stipulating that preventive arrest and investigative hearings be once again subject to a five-year sunset clause, I offer my support today with the expectation that if enacted, parliamentary committees will be given the opportunity and resources necessary to undertake full review of the provisions in question during the next trial period and well in advance of any debate to extend it once again. Indeed, any decision made by Parliament that affects the security and rights of all Canadians must be reasoned, thoughtful, evidence-based and not rushed as a matter of political expediency.

The critical issue here is one of principled balance. We must, on the one hand, seek to combat terrorism and keep Canadians safe from terrorist threats and attacks, while at the same time protecting our individual freedoms as enshrined in the charter. These are not, however, mutually exclusive objectives. Indeed, an appropriate and effective anti-terrorism strategy must view security and rights not as concepts in conflict, not as a zero sum game, but as values that are inextricably linked.

Let me articulate a number of basic principles in this regard. First, terrorism itself must be seen as being, in effect, an assault on the security of a democracy like Canada and an assault on our fundamental rights such as the right to life, liberty and security of the person. Accordingly, anti-terrorism law and policy may be said to constitute the promotion and protection of the security of democracy and fundamental human rights in the most profound sense. At the same time, however, the implementation and enforcement of such anti-terrorism law must always comport with the rule of law, must always adhere to the principles of the charter. Torture, for example, must never be allowed to be used and must always comport as well with our international legal obligations.

The second and related principle is that we are not simply talking here about a domestic criminal justice model. We are talking about is an international criminal justice model. We are not talking, as the courts and others have said, of the ordinary criminal. We are talking about the transnational terrorist threat.

This brings me to a third principle, which the Supreme Court has itself enunciated, namely the contextual principle; that we cannot view these issues in the abstract but we must view them in terms of the realities as they have unfolded in this regard. Also, we must appreciate that Canadian anti-terrorism law is inextricably bound with the international criminal justice system and the invocation and application of international law treaties, the invocation of general principles of law recognized by the community of nations. For example, section 11(g) of the charter on this point says that retroactivity shall not avail when the crimes are those that run afoul of “the general principles of law recognized by the community of nations”. Therefore, in this regard, it recognizes that the international criminal justice model departs sometimes from the domestic model.

UN Security mandates must also be taken into account, bilateral and multilateral agreements and so forth. In particular, Security Council resolution 1373, enacted following 9/11, mandates that all states take “additional measures to prevent and suppress, in their territories through all lawful means, the financing and preparation of any acts of terrorism”. These standards must be met by our anti-terrorism legislation, if for no other reason than that we cannot have the appropriate or factual understanding of the dynamics involved in our domestic counterterrorism measures if we view them in a vacuum, if we view them as abstracted from the global circumstances and precedents or if we view them, as the Supreme Court has said, out of context without resort to an appreciation of the contextual principle.

However, beyond the abstract in that regard, let us be clear. The threat of transnational terrorism is real and Canada is not unaffected by it, as the recent events, whether they be in Boston or the aborted terrorist attack now in Canada, indicate. Indeed, Canadians have been implicated in terrorist attacks abroad as recently as last month in Algeria, last year in Bulgaria and just two days ago with regard to an arrest in Bulgaria. This is precisely why Bill S-7 also makes it a crime to leave or attempt to leave Canada to participate in terrorist activities. Moreover, Canadians have been killed in terrorist attacks, tragically in the case of 9/11 but also thereafter.

Accordingly, our commitment to civil liberties must always be consistent with regard to the protection of human rights as a whole, and we must take the necessary concrete and decisive actions to prevent terrorist attacks. In the words of two former Supreme Court justices, the Hon. Frank Iacobucci and the Hon. Louise Arbour, who also spent several years as the UN Commissioner for Human Rights, the Constitution is not a suicide pact and “[t]he challenge for democracies in the battle against terrorism is not whether to respond, but rather how to do so”.

Preventive arrests and investigative hearings can be effective, limited and lawful counterterrorism measures. Indeed, the Supreme Court, in the matter of investigative hearings has held them to be constitutional, stating that they do not violate an individual's charter rights against self-incrimination, as evidence derived from such hearings cannot be used against the person except in perjury prosecutions. Moreover, the provisions are not otherwise unknown in Canadian law, and similar provisions already exist in the Coroners Act and the Inquiries Act, and I can go on.

In the matter of preventive arrests, these too are not a new invocation of principle and policy. Preventive arrests are effectively the invocation of a peace bond process set forth in section 810 of the Criminal Code, which has been used to protect against criminal violence such as domestic violence, sexual violence and organized crime, and now extends them to suspected terrorist activities.

In addition, preventive arrests and investigative hearings as set forth in Bill S-7 seek to respect Canadians' individual and collective rights through safeguards and principles of transparency. In this regard, it is important to appreciate that there are three safeguards in the bill, and I was involved with respect to the initiation of these safeguards. Reference has been made to the safeguards, and we must appreciate that there is an executive requirement for the consent of the Attorney General and therefore objective oversight in that regard. With parliamentary oversight and the requirements for annual reports from both federal ministers concerned and with Bill S-7, they must not only detail how often the provisions are used, but also make a case for why they should be extended.

Furthermore, there is judicial oversight with respect to investigative hearings, and in the event of an arrest, the individual must be brought before a judge, typically within 24 hours, contrasting with the situation that is in the United States or with the situation in the United Kingdom and the like.

Notwithstanding these safeguards, I understand why some members, maybe even from all parties, remain uncomfortable with the proposed measures. They are indeed extraordinary provisions, though extraordinary provisions to combat extraordinary threats.

I do not, however, share the view offered by some in the House that because the provisions, and we heard this again in debate, were seldom used, in effect they are somehow unnecessary now. In fact, their lack of use can equally demonstrate that they are not abused, that they are truly measures of last—

[The Deputy Speaker]

I am afraid the member's time has more than expired.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to my hon. colleague. While I agreed with some of his analysis, I disagreed with other parts. I would like to question him on it.

I really felt that what the member said about terrorism being an assault on the fundamental democratic rights and freedoms of any society was completely accurate. Therefore, it is then equally incumbent upon us to ensure that in our response we do not give up fundamental basic rights.

I note he was concerned about the need for a sunset clause with the two very provocative amendments or positions that were brought forward under the Anti-terrorism Act following 9/11, which was arrest without charge and the special investigative hearings. Canadians were very concerned, and that is why they wanted a sunset clause.

He said that we needed it to be evidence-based, but it was not used. These were extraordinary powers.

We went through these hearings. The Liberal Party put zero amendments forward. My hon. colleague has an extraordinary background in issues of human rights and law. I am surprised, because I have heard members of the Liberal Party say that it is not a perfect bill, but they are willing to accept it.

When legislation is brought forth, it is incumbent upon all of us to ensure that all efforts are made to ensure the legal rights that Canadians have enjoyed for this century and more are not undermined.

Does he believe that we should go through an endless round of sunset clauses? If it is evidence-based and it was not used, why is this being brought back now?

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as I said, the fact that they had not been used does not mean that they may not yet be needed. In fact, it may demonstrate they were not abused. They may yet still need it.

In terms of the Supreme Court's contextual principle, we must appreciate the contextual environment in which the transnational terrorist threat operates.

I would remind the hon. member, and I suspect he knows, that if one takes a comparative perspective here, we have a situation where, in the United States, simply by designating a suspected terrorist an enemy combatant, he or she can be indefinitely detained. Detention in the United Kingdom has been extended from 6 days to 18 days. We are talking about a requirement to bring a person before judge within 24 hours. As I said, there is an inventory of safeguards at the executive level, at the legislative level, at the judicial level and through other commissioners, such as the Privacy Commissioner and the like.

While this is an imperfect approach, nonetheless it was something that was supported after there was review of these provisions by parliamentary committees in the House and in the Senate. It is not as if we did not have any review or appreciation of these principles as well.

I do agree that we need to do more on these matter. For example, members in the House need to have more information in the matter of intelligence gathering, which my colleague from Lac-Saint-Louis recommended. Our government re-established a parliamentary committee to provide oversight with respect to intelligence gathering, and here, too, to invoke more principles of transparency in that regard.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to ensure I understand from the comments by the member for Mount Royal that the Liberals are hoping to support this bill and are hoping that the Conservatives are going to then have some parliamentary reviews and oversight, as just mentioned. How likely does the member really believe that is, given the government has used closure on debate a record number of times? Currently, right now, the Conservatives are attacking their own leader.

It is a very naive approach to assume that the Conservatives will later on review this bill. How can the member believe that is going to be possible?

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am saying that the approach is what I would call the principle of least injustice. In other words, bearing all the facts and circumstances that are known to us, for now these provisions can be helpful, may be necessary and a parliamentary review is mandated. I trust it will take place, and we may have a better appreciation at that time as to how to go forward.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to speak on behalf of my constituents from Surrey North. I am speaking today about Bill S-7, the proposal to reintroduce anti-terrorism measures, which were previously sunsetted in the Anti-terrorism Act.

Bill S-7 has been shamefully promoted in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings. The government is exploiting public fear in order to push through its agenda. It is appalling to attempt to use the mourning and pain of the American people to push through legislation that is blatantly confiscating our human rights and civil liberties.

Bill S-7 is not about preventing terrorism. We already have a comprehensive justice system and enough legislation to protect Canadians from acts of terrorism, as well as a variety of capable institutions to facilitate these laws. Rather, this bill fundamentally attacks our rights and freedoms.

Bill S-7 is a reintroduction of the sunsetted clauses of the Anti-terrorism Act, which were also designed in the wake of an instrumental and horrifying event: the terrorist acts of September 11, 2001. The clauses introduced in the Anti-terrorism Act were given a sunset period, which has expired at this point. These clauses include the allowance of investigative hearings and preventive detention, as well as the permission for judges to publicly disclose information about a trial or the persons being tried. Even at first glance, it is obvious that there are major violations of human rights and civil liberties at stake.

The term “human rights” is often tossed around vaguely as an abstract concept. However, the key to this discussion is in exploring what human rights are. The codification of human rights emerged during the 18th century with the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the American Declaration of Independence. These documents were designed to limit what a state could do to its citizens.

Human rights essentially prescribe what liberties a citizen has within his or her own state and the duties that the state has to its citizens. States have an obligation to respect, protect and fulfill the human rights of their citizens. This is not a duty that our government should be taking lightly. We have made international commitments that confirm our dedication to protecting our citizens from human rights violations.

In 1976, Canada ratified the UN International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Under this human rights treaty, the government has an obligation to protect the liberty of people within its borders. This explicitly means nobody should be subject to arbitrary arrest or detention.

Interestingly, in the discussions at the public safety committee, it was discovered that the wording of Bill S-7 allowed for the arrest of people who were not suspected of terrorist activities. In further consultations with parliamentary secretaries, it was confirmed that this was the intention of the government. It is the government's intention to expose every Canadian to this preventive detention, not only those who could potentially cause acts of terrorism. Imagine the resources and cost of arresting or detaining anybody, regardless of whether there is any cause to believe people may engage in criminal activity.

The original purpose of the Anti-terrorism Act was to update Canadian legislation. In order to respond to the United Nations Security Council standards, we must consider that Canada must also adhere to international standards of human rights. Of course, terrorism itself has a direct impact on human rights that Canadians enjoy. It especially violates the principle of life, liberty and security of a person.

Media rhetoric describes terrorism as the opposite of freedom. Although they are not simply binary concepts, if freedom and terrorism are somewhat polarized, then how can we describe the limitations on freedom that the government is proposing?

The preamble to the UN ICCPR states:

—the ideal of free human beings enjoying civil and political freedom and freedom from fear and want can only be achieved if conditions are created whereby everyone may enjoy [human rights]...

Does Bill S-7 propose conditions where everyone can enjoy their human rights? It seems to be the opposite case. The Conservative government is exploiting fear to confiscate our freedoms and rights.

Nobody in this House is debating that terrorism should not be addressed. Terrorism is a horrific problem that attacks the heart of national pride and undermines state stability. The events at the Boston Marathon last week were horrific, and I stand with my colleagues as we condemn these attacks and offer our deepest sympathies and best wishes to the victims and families.

Bill S-7 presents us with a very contentious issue. There is a delicate balance between national security and individual human rights. However, this is a balance that Canada has already found. Our Criminal Code already offers the necessary provisions for investigating those who are involved in terrorist activities and those who could be potential terrorist threats to national safety. The proposed clauses in Bill S-7 have been proven unnecessary and ineffective in the past. They have only been invoked once in a situation described as a complete and sad “fiasco” by lawyers and human rights advocates alike.

Rather than investing in a procedure that creates fiascos, the government should be investing in our institutions that have proven themselves capable, like the RCMP. Just yesterday, the RCMP announced it had stopped a plan of terrorism within our borders. There are two suspects in custody right now. The RCMP was able to handle the situation without the aid of the clauses in Bill S-7. RCMP members were effective, timely and able to perform their jobs without compromising the human rights of Canadians.

We are thankful for the work of the RCMP and we need to recognize that work. We should be investing in supporting these institutions that are able to work effectively within the current sphere of the Canadian justice system.

There are valuable tools that should have been introduced in the anti-terrorism act, which would have been influential in combatting terrorism while upholding the integrity of Canadian values of liberty and rights. We should be promoting inter-agency co-operation to reflect the multi-faceted nature of terrorism—

[The Deputy Speaker]

The hon. member for Kingston and the Islands has a point of order.

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think that we are below quorum. I think this hon. member deserves more people listening to his speech in the chamber here.

[The Deputy Speaker]

I do not think that is a point of order or that there is anything the Chair can do to encourage more people to come in.

There is now quorum in the House.

The hon. member can continue.

[Jasbir Sandhu, NDP, Surrey North, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my Conservative colleagues who finally rushed into the House. They often talk about terrorism and how they would protect Canadian human rights and invest in the RCMP and other agencies, yet they do not want to participate in this debate. That is very sad.

There are many valuable tools that should have been introduced into the Anti-terrorism Act, which would have been influential toward combatting terrorism while upholding the integrity of Canadian values of liberty and rights. We should be promoting inter-agency co-operation to reflect the multi-faceted nature of terrorism and address the source of terrorist activities. Efforts against terrorist activities should be performed without discrimination of any kind. The government should be transparent in its dealings with terrorist activities, and we should be able to hold them accountable for their actions. These do not seem like unreasonable requests, yet when they were proposed in committee by the NDP, they were determined to be beyond the scope of the bill.

We cannot sit here and watch the fundamental rights of our citizens being taken away by the Conservative government. Even the United Nations, which requested that states align their legislation with Security Council standards, has established that human rights are integral to combatting terrorism, stating: “Respect for human rights and the rule of law must be the bedrock of the global fight against terrorism.”

The government has an obligation to all Canadian citizens, to all within Canadian borders and to the international community and the international bodies that govern our human rights. The government must respect our current freedoms, protect our rights as well as our security, and fulfill its obligations to Canadians by investing in effective counter-terrorism strategies.