Debates of Sept. 27th, 2016

National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Madam Speaker, this strikes me, frankly, as an opportunity to vent against the Prime Minister's Office, something that my friend and his colleagues have not been able to do for 10 years. I hope you are enjoying your newly found freedom.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I remind the members to put their questions to the Chair.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Madam Speaker, my question is quite simple. I am not sure if the member is opposed to parliamentary oversight. If he is not, why did my friend's government not pass legislation it preferred, rather than waiting until now to criticize us when the opportunity has been put before the House?

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Madam Speaker, the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore knows full well that the committee proposed in Bill C-22 would not provide parliamentary oversight. All it would be is an all-party caucus. It would not have the tools to provide true oversight and report back to us here in Parliament. We want to have parliamentary oversight and want it to work in a responsible manner. Those are some of the apprehensions that we had as a government. I can see, based on this bill, that those apprehensions continue with the PMO today, because it would control the committee.

If those apprehensions exist, the Liberals should not have promised in the last election campaign that they would provide parliamentary oversight, because they are not doing that. What they would do is provide more vetting and control by the PMO over anything this committee would do and over a number of parliamentarians who, in this process, would give up the immunity and privilege guaranteed to them by the House if it were done as a parliamentary committee.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his excellent speech.

One of the concerns I have is the loopholes in this bill preventing the committee from having the oversight powers it needs. For example, I am thinking about paragraph 8(b), wherein if a minister's department were under investigation, the minister could claim that it was an issue of national security and the committee would then not be able to look into it. Certainly with parliamentarians, we have a degree of integrity and confidentiality. That is one of the exemptions that I see. Could the member talk about some of the other exemptions?

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Madam Speaker, my colleague from Sarnia—Lambton makes a great point. Why would we call it the “national security and intelligence committee” when any minister could determine that a review would be injurious to national security and that we could not therefore look at it? The hypocrisy in this legislation is beyond the pale.

The seven exemptions that would go beyond that include the committee's not being entitled to information that has confidence of the Queen's Privy Council, because no one on the committee would be sworn in as a member of the Privy Council. The committee members are just going to take an oath under the Security of Information Act. They would not be able to get information respecting ongoing defence intelligence gathering for national security. The list goes on. There are seven exemptions in total, and the Prime Minister or ministers could always hide under the veil of national security, and the members would not be entitled to see those matters even though they were the national security and intelligence committee.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

Order. It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Nanaimo—Ladysmith, Status of Women; the hon. member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie, Child Care; the hon. member for Vancouver East, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness]

Madam Speaker, although Bill C-22 falls under the purview of the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, who is responsible for the machinery of government, I am pleased to have the opportunity to take part in this debate.

Might I just, for the information of the hon. gentleman from Selkirk who has just spoken, inform him that the description of the appropriate committee he put on the record in the last half hour or so bears very little resemblance to the advice given by his own critic in a letter sent to me on March 1, 2016. The member for Durham recommended a committee under a majority controlled by the government, nominated by the Prime Minister and appointed by Governor in Council. That was the advice the critic offered, so the description the hon. gentleman just put on the record in the House seems to be at odds with that of his own critic.

In the last election we laid out a clear agenda with respect to Canada's national security framework. It included these specific elements: first, stronger scrutiny of security and intelligence activity through a new committee consisting of parliamentarians; second, a new initiative on community outreach and counter-radicalization; third, faithful compliance with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms; fourth, full protection for the right to protest; fifth, clarity with respect to warrants; sixth, conscientious treatment of appeals about no-fly lists; seventh, a more precise definition of the term “propaganda”; eighth, a full review of all terrorism-related legislation after three years; and finally, genuine consultation with Canadians to help identify any other steps that should be taken to achieve two simultaneous objectives, ensuring that all security agencies and police forces are being effective at keeping Canadians safe and, at the same time, safeguarding our rights and freedoms and the open, inclusive, democratic character of our country—in other words, the qualities that make Canada Canada.

Bill C-22 is the cornerstone of that agenda. It fulfills our single most important commitment to Canadians. The legislation will establish a national security and intelligence committee of parliamentarians, and it will give those parliamentarians from all official parties extraordinary access to classified information so they can scrutinize all the security and intelligence operations of the Government of Canada.

As distinguished Professor Wesley Wark has said, the creation of this committee and the passage of this legislation is long overdue. Virtually every other country in the western world, including all of our Five Eyes allies—the U.S., the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand—have had a body of this kind for a good many years. Canada, therefore, has been the anomaly.

Over a decade ago, in 2003, the Auditor General identified significant shortcomings in Parliament's ability to scrutinize the activities of Canada's security and intelligence agencies. The following year, a joint House-Senate committee recommended the creation of a parliamentary body to fill that gap.

In 2005, the then Minister of Public Safety, the Hon. Anne McLellan, sought to address the problem by introducing a bill that is very similar to the one we are debating today. Unfortunately, when a different government was elected in 2006, the proposal was dropped.

Since that time, private members' bills to institute parliamentary scrutiny of national security and intelligence agencies have been repeatedly introduced, including by the former member for Scarborough—Rouge River, Derek Lee, and the current members for Malpeque and Vancouver Quadra. Former Senators Hugh Segal and Roméo Dallaire also brought forward legislation to this effect in the other place.

That is all in addition to a report by the House public safety committee in 2009, calling again for the adoption of Anne McLellan's bill or something very similar to it, as well as inquiries by Justices Frank Iacobucci and Dennis O'Connor, both of which highlighted the need for greater accountability of our national security and intelligence agencies.

In the wake of the terrorism tragedies in October 2014 at Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu and here in Ottawa, there came another opportunity to correct this major deficiency in Canada's national security framework. The whole country shared the grief of those sorry days. We were leaning on each other, on all sides, in this House. There was a clear sense that our security, intelligence, and anti-terrorism laws needed to be revisited and strengthened, and there was a palpable will, on all sides, to work together to get it right, because these are difficult questions. Getting it right would include strengthening scrutiny, review, and oversight of the process.

In the words of a large group of eminent Canadians, including four former prime ministers, who wrote in an open letter at that time, “Canada needs independent oversight and effective review...more than ever”. However, the government of that day resisted that argument, and the opportunity for collaboration and co-operation across the floor quickly evaporated.

That is why a central commitment in our platform last year was to deliver stronger national security oversight, which included the creation of an all-party committee to monitor and oversee the operations of every government department and agency with national security responsibilities.

With Bill C-22, we are keeping that promise.

The national security and intelligence committee of parliamentarians would be made up of nine members, including the chair. Two of the members would be senators. The other seven would be members of Parliament. No more than four would be from the government caucus. Ministers and parliamentary secretaries would not be eligible to sit on the committee. The law would require consultation with the Senate before senators were named, and consultation with the leaders of opposition parties before the appointment of opposition MPs.

The committee would have a broad mandate to examine the legislative, regulatory, administrative, and financial framework for national security and intelligence as well as any activity related to national security and intelligence carried out anywhere within the federal government.

There are nearly 20 departments and agencies within the Government of Canada that have some kind of security function, from the RCMP and CSIS to the Canada Border Services Agency, National Defence, Transport, Foreign Affairs, and many others. This committee would be able to look at all of them.

On its own initiative, the committee would be empowered to follow its investigations wherever they led, which means that it would get a full picture of what the government was doing in national security and intelligence matters. This would be in contrast to several of the Canadian committee's counterparts elsewhere in the world, where mandates are strictly limited to reviewing the activities of a particular agency or agencies or to examining general structures but not particular operations.

In fact, because of the wide-ranging scope of the committee's mandate, one of Canada's foremost experts in national security law, Professor Craig Forcese, has declared that this committee of parliamentarians in Canada would be a stronger body than its equivalents in either the U.K. or Australia.

Indeed, Bill C-22 would transform Canada from being a laggard to being a leader when it comes to parliamentary scrutiny of national security and intelligence activities.

To make certain that the nine parliamentarians on the committee could be as effective as possible, the legislation would also establish a secretariat to help them fulfill their mandate. The secretariat, made up of capable and knowledgeable individuals, would handle the research and administrative tasks necessary to ensure that the committee's work and the work products of the committee were of the highest possible quality and that the committee had the resources and the expertise it needed to get the job done.

The committee might also draw upon the help and expertise of existing review bodies, such as the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission for the RCMP, the Security Intelligence Review Committee for CSIS, and others, and seek information from them, as appropriate.

The bill directs the committee and existing review bodies to work in close collaboration. I expect that by design and through experience, they would relate to each other in a way that would complement each other's efforts and ultimately produce for Canadians significant value-added and greater confidence in the activities of the respective agencies.

The committee would be required to prepare at least one annual report. There could be others. It could also prepare special reports as it saw fit. In other words, it would be able to report on whatever it wanted and whenever it wanted. Obviously, because of the nature of information related to national security and intelligence, not everything the committee looked into could be made public.

However, on this point, I would like to take a moment to discuss the recourse available to committee members should they uncover something they find truly problematic but that their oath of confidentiality prohibits them from disclosing.

Classified information must remain classified. However, without getting into specifics, committee members would command a great deal of attention and put a great deal of pressure on the government of the day if they were to tell Parliament and the public that there was something going on within the realm of security and intelligence activities that they believed was improper. The committee would be able to outline the problem in detail in its report to the prime minister, and the prime minister would be accountable to Canadians. Subsequently, the committee would be able to tell Canadians whether the problem had been adequately addressed, and the pressure would not go away until the committee gave the all-clear. That public pressure would be a powerful tool, and only a committee of parliamentarians could bring it to bear.

Finally, all of these aspects of the committee's operations would be reassessed five years after Bill C-22 came into force. The bill would require Parliament to conduct a review at that time to ensure that the committee was functioning effectively and to make recommendations about how to further advance its work.

We have included this statutory review in the legislation, because there will undoubtedly be lessons learned in the first years of the committee's existence, and we want to guarantee that there will be an opportunity for those lessons to be seriously considered and for any appropriate changes to be made as a result.

The goal is for Canada to have a national security framework that makes us a world leader in both effectiveness and accountability. The legislation before us today is an important step in that direction.

In our consultations with other countries that have had practical experience over the last many years with this concept, like the United Kingdom, for example, we heard repeatedly that it would be wise and prudent to move at this new initiative in a deliberate and measured manner, learning as we go, and to be prepared to accommodate further changes over time.

It is critical to earn trust on all sides: from the public, and after all, the public interest is what this committee would be designed to protect; and from the security and intelligence agencies that would be scrutinized.

Let me emphasize once again our two core objectives for national security for this new committee and indeed for all of our other initiatives in this domain. Number one, we need to ensure that all of our agencies are being effective in keeping Canadians safe. Number two, in lockstep with that, we need to equally ensure that Canadian rights and freedoms are safeguarded along with equality and the character of our democratic way of life.

Building that trust with the agencies and the public, all around, is crucial. That is why we are proposing a mandate for the committee that is not siloed to a few named agencies, as other countries do, but rather is a mandate that reaches across the full scope of government. Unlike other review bodies and other countries, this Canadian committee of parliamentarians would be able to follow the evidence wherever it leads.

In addition to looking at events and activities retroactively, this committee would also be able to examine ongoing activities, a unique power, subject only to basic, reasonable safeguards for classified information.

Again, please recall the full context of our national security agenda. The anchor piece would be the committee of parliamentarians that would be providing a brand new type and level of scrutiny and review, plus a new initiative, funded in the last budget, for community outreach and counter-radicalization, plus full compliance with the Charter of Rights, plus full protection of the basic right to civil protest, plus clarity about warrants, plus action to remedy issues with no-fly lists, plus a more precise definition of “propaganda”, plus a full review of terrorism legislation after three years, plus the first ever inclusive consultations with Canadians, parliamentarians, subject-matter experts, and the general public about other measures they deem appropriate, beyond the ones I have mentioned, and necessary to keep Canadians safe and to safeguard our rights and freedoms.

Already in the consultations we have undertaken we have received more than 7,000 submissions online, which indicates a considerable appetite to be involved and engaged.

In light of a report issued just today by the Privacy Commissioner, let me make one point about our national security consultations very clear: This is not a narrow exercise. All Canadians, including the Privacy Commissioner, can raise and pursue any issue they want to pursue under the rubric of national security and intelligence operations. The discussion paper we published a few weeks ago is not a statement of government policy. It is intended to provoke discussion and debate to get Canadians involved and engaged, and it is doing exactly that.

After we hear from Canadians, we will be able to put forward the appropriate changes in law or procedure that reflect the recommendations we have received.

I will look forward to hearing the full scope of what the Privacy Commissioner has to say about any and all dimensions of our national security architecture. Indeed, I understand that he may be appearing before the House security committee on this topic just next week to present his views on the national security framework. His ongoing input, advice, and oversight are important to me and to the government, just as we want to hear from all Canadians, an opportunity they have never had before.

Parliament has rightly been called the grand inquest of the nation. For too long, however, Canada's Parliament has been prevented from fulfilling that particular role in matters of national security and intelligence. Yet these are matters that concern the fundamental freedoms of Canadians, and they are quite literally matters of life and death. Parliamentarians, the people's chosen representatives, must be at the heart of our system of national security accountability, and at long last, Bill C-22 will make it so.

Before I close, allow me to pause for just a moment to recognize the tremendous work done by the brave women and men of our law enforcement and national security agencies, which they demonstrate on a regular basis. That was the case, in particular, in Strathroy, Ontario, this summer. They were exemplary professionals. The security agency plus at least four different police forces worked seamlessly and effectively, and they prevented a much larger tragedy. I know that we are all exceedingly proud of them and are grateful for their service.

I trust that hon. members in all parties understand the gravity of the issues we are dealing with and will approach not only the committee itself but the upcoming legislative process to establish it with the seriousness this topic warrants. I will be looking forward to good, useful, practical advice.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Durham, ON]

Madam Speaker, we all have pride in our security agencies but I am a little disappointed in the minister responsible for them today, first for not introducing debate on the bill, and second, for having the gall to reference my letter to him in debate, my letter which was the first of two written in collaboration with the NDP to talk about this. The minister refused all meetings. He also refused meetings with some of the leading experts he quoted in his speech to get this right. My letter said a Privy Council appointment and the oaths ascribed to that should be part of this committee if the committee was going to see real information.

The government has so many exceptions to Bill C-22 that this committee would just be window dressing. We want to see amendments, as does the NDP, so that we can make this work from a political basis and for our practical security needs.

I would remind the minister that when he was involved as House leader in the Milliken decision with respect to Afghan detainee documents, he demanded such disclosure of information to members of Parliament. Now he is denying that same disclosure. Which member is it? Is it the member for Regina—Wascana now or the member for Wascana in 2010 whose words in this place should ring true? I would like the member to square that circle.

I would also like the minister to say why he voted Motion No. 431 for the election of chairs and now refuses to allow a chair to be elected? Why does he now not seem to respect the privilege outlined in the Speaker Milliken decision? He is talking about earning trust, yet he denied the ability to work with the opposition to get this right.

We hope this debate is an opportunity for the minister to listen and make the amendments needed.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Madam Speaker, on the member's first point about the sponsorship of the legislation, I am sure he will recognize that the legislation, because it would create a committee that will fit within the machinery of government, is the prerogative of the government House leader. On the very front page of the bill, it indicates that the government House leader is the sponsor of the bill. Under the rules of the House, it is only that minister who can give the introductory speech and if that minister does not give the introductory speech, he or she is not in a position to cede their position to anybody else. It is appropriate parliamentary procedure for the sponsor of a bill responsible for the machinery of government to give the opening speech, not that it matters a heck of a lot because I have the opportunity to participate in this debate, as all members of Parliament do.

I was glad to receive the honourable gentleman's letter in March. He now seems to be aggrieved that I have accepted a number of his recommendations. He cannot have it both ways. He offered a number of suggestions and many of them are reflected in Bill C-22.

I look forward to the committee work on the legislation, which will drill down into the details of various sections. If members of the opposition parties wish to provide further advice, we will be anxious to hear it. We will also be anxious to hear from subject matter experts and from Canadians who also need to have their input paid attention to.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Madam Speaker, I was quite surprised to hear the minister describe the centrepiece of Liberal national security policy as this piece of legislation. Canadians are under the impression that the centrepiece of the Liberal national security policy would be fixing Bill C-51, which they promised to do in the campaign. It is important to have oversight and review but what the Liberals made front and centre during the campaign was to fix the problematic elements of Bill C-51.

My specific question deals with the Privacy Commissioner's report. With all due respect, the minister has mis-characterized his concerns about the consultation process. The Privacy Commissioner did not say it is impossible to raise concerns about privacy. He said he was disappointed that the government did not make privacy issues a part of the consultation process.

I would like to know what the minister intends to do now to correct that oversight in the consultation process, because Bill C-51 raises serious concerns about our privacy rights in Canada. How was that not included in the consultation he is doing?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Madam Speaker, it is included. The entire national security architecture and framework for the Government of Canada is the subject matter of this consultation. All Canadians are invited to make whatever representations they may wish to make about any dimension or aspect of the national security framework. Nothing is excluded.

The Privacy Commissioner has mentioned the subject matter that he wishes to drill down into in great detail and we will be anxious to hear what he has to say. Other Canadians have said they want to talk in detail about the whole process of peace bonds because that obviously is an issue that gained some prominence during the course of the summer, particularly in the wake of the tragic events in Strathroy. That is a subject that other Canadians will want to debate as well.

Other Canadians have said the committee of parliamentarians is a good idea, but we also need to fill some other gaps in the architecture such as, for example, the ability to have some supervision and oversight specifically with respect to CBSA. That is another topic that Canadians are raising.

The discussion paper opens the general subject matter and begins the debate, but other Canadians will have a great many other things they want to raise and that is perfectly and completely and legitimately a part of the process. We are very anxious to hear what Canadians are going to say. Over 7,000 have already participated.

[John McKay, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence]

Madam Speaker, the subject matters that the committee will be studying are by definition notoriously secret. Indeed some witnesses may come before the committee who feel compelled either by convention or the oaths that they have sworn that they cannot disclose to the committee material that the committee deems to be appropriate.

What will be the powers of the committee to compel a witness to speak before the committee? Further, when the committee feels that it has not received a full version of the truth, what will be the powers of the committee to sanction that particular witness?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Madam Speaker, the mandate of the committee laid out particularly in section 8, makes it very clear that the committee members can pursue any activity carried out by a department and look at any matter relating to national security. It is a very broad power. If they are not getting the co-operation from officials or representatives that they think they need to have, then the committee will make that determination and the chair of the committee should approach either the responsible minister or the Prime Minister to demand the satisfaction that the chair and members of the committee would deem to be appropriate.

This is a process that is going to depend on very vigorous participation by the committee members. The task that they are taking on is extraordinary and certainly unique in Canadian experience. They will have powers that no other group of parliamentarians has ever had before. The responsibility is onerous. I fully expect they will pursue their duties in a very vigorous, aggressive way, and if they are not receiving the co-operation that they think they deserve, then they should tell the Prime Minister and he will be accountable for making sure they get the co-operation.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford.

I rise today in support of Bill C-22 at second reading. This should not be a surprise to anyone in the House, because New Democrats from the beginning of these debates about national security have always argued that effective oversight of our national security agencies is necessary in a free and democratic society.

We also know that independent and effective oversight is essential to ensuring that the government fulfills both its responsibilities: a responsibility to protect our civil liberties, and the responsibility to keep us safe. Just as all of us also cherish our civil liberties, none of us in the House doubts that the threat posed by terrorism is very real.

Therefore, I will begin my discussion of Bill C-22 today with what I am sure many members will find is a long preamble, both about my concerns about Bill C-22 being part of a larger government strategy to avoid action on fixing Bill C-51, now the Anti-terrorism Act, and about why the passage of Bill C-51 makes effective oversight even more crucial. I will then conclude with some remarks on why I fear that Bill C-22 will not provide the effective and independent oversight we need without significant amendments.

Bluntly stated, I fear the Liberals will use the passage of Bill C-22 as an excuse to avoid action on Bill C-51. The Liberals promised during the election that they would introduce a bill that would address their concerns regarding Bill C-51. They said they were voting for the bill at the time, but that it had problematic elements. Once again today, the minister listed about 10 things that he finds problematic in Bill C-51.

I appreciate the relisting of those concerns, but here we are one year later and the Liberals have failed to put any specific proposals before the House other than Bill C-22, which is only one aspect of the national security concerns, although the minister says that it is the centrepiece. Again, I would submit that the centrepiece really ought to be fulfilling the election promises to fix Bill C-51.

When the minister talks about his consultation, he skips over what I think is an important fact. What the Liberals said they would do was introduce a bill to amend Bill C-51 and then conduct consultations. In fact, what they have done is turned their promised changes into a list of things to discuss as part of a broad general consultation on national security.

Therefore, we have proposed the repeal of Bill C-51, as this is the quickest and simplest way to restore our rights. We know that Bill C-51 tramples our civil liberties without doing anything to make us safer.

We know that both the Liberals and the Conservatives have bought into the idea that national security requires a balance between our freedoms and safety, and that somehow we can purchase security by giving up some of our rights. New Democrats believe that the responsibility of the government is to protect both our rights and our security, at one and the same time. It is a difficult task, but one that we must undertake in a democratic society.

If the Liberals really believe parts of Bill C-51 should be kept as they are, then it is up to them to tell us in the House which parts and why. New Democrats would be happy to work with the Liberals to help defend the rights of Canadians by repealing, or at minimum, amending Bill C-51.

In the meantime, as these debates have gone on, the federal government, whether Liberal or Conservative, has failed to provide any additional resources for those things we know to be the most effective in fighting terrorism: effective investigation and enforcement, and de-radicalization programs.

During the hearings on Bill C-51 in the public safety committee, we heard from the RCMP commissioner and the director of CSIS about having insufficient resources to meet national security challenges, yet there have been no real increases in spending for CSIS, the RCMP, or the CBSA by either the Conservatives or the Liberals since 2012. De-radicalization programs still are not functioning at the community level, despite all the promises and despite some good preparatory work. They are still not out there running on the ground. If we are going to fight the threat of terrorism, we need to focus our resources on de-radicalization and on the traditional intelligence and enforcement work that have served us relatively well so far.

With all of this in mind, New Democrats have called for the repeal of Bill C-51. New Democrats have always believed that the Anti-terrorism Act is in fundamental conflict with our civil liberties, and that these infringements on our civil liberties do nothing to make us safer. This is why we voted against the bill at the beginning. In fact, the overall impact of Bill C-51 is to cast a net so wide that it may actually prevent enforcement authorities from focusing on what are in fact the very real threats to our safety.

This point was reaffirmed by several witnesses in the public safety committee when we had the discussion of Bill C-51, including the former head of national security for the Toronto Police Service. He said that when we were looking for a needle in the haystack, the last thing we needed was more hay.

A bill that requires collecting vast amounts of information on people who pose no threat at all, which is ordinary Canadians, and collecting information on those who are engaged in legitimate dissent may in fact make us less safe by providing too much hay to the enforcement authorities.

Indeed, the Anti-terrorism Act is being challenged in the courts in a case filed by the Canadian Civil Liberties Association jointly with Canadian Journalists for Free Expression. This case was filed just a month after the bill's passage. However, the backlog in our courts means that a decision from the Supreme Court on the constitutionality of Bill C-51 will not come for at least another three years. That is cold comfort to those whose rights may be breached in the interim. That is why independent and effective oversight becomes so crucial while Bill C-51 remains in force.

Bill C-51 has now been in place for more than a year without any additional oversight and without the Liberals' promised report to the House of Commons by the CSIS director on the use of its new powers. At this point, we are left with no evidence whatsoever to support the contention that Bill C-51 has done anything to make us safer. If that evidence exists, it should be presented in the House.

The reason Bill C-22 and having effective oversight of our national security agencies is so important is precisely because of the threats to civil liberties posed by Bill C-51. Let me talk about those briefly.

First, the definition of national security in Bill C-51 is so broad that it potentially captures many forms of legitimate dissent. First nations leaders and environmental activists in particular are concerned that they can be subject to surveillance and even disruption of their activities as a result of the broadening of the definition of national security in Bill C-51 to include the economic security of Canada and to include critical infrastructure, read pipelines. Only “lawful” dissent would be explicitly protected. Good luck to those who inadvertently violate a court injunction or trespass as part of a demonstration or other action in defence of aboriginal and treaty rights or in the fight against climate change.

Second, Bill C-51 conflicts with the fundamental principles of Canadian privacy law by allowing the widespread sharing of personal information with other departments and even foreign states. We have always lived in Canada with the assurance that information collected by the government in Canada will only be used for the purposes for which it has been collected, and that it will stay in Canada. Bill C-51 has changed all that, and those are the concerns the Privacy Commissioner was raising in his report today. Those are the concerns that he asserts, quite correctly I believe, are not raised in the government's discussion paper.

The third challenge to our civil liberties are the new powers that were given to CSIS to act illegally and in secret without any additional oversight. CSIS is prohibited only from using murder, sexual assault, and interference with the justice system as tactics. This hardly fits with the idea of a democratic society and rule of law that most Canadians hold dear. If, and only if, CSIS sees it as necessary, then it can seek a warrant from the courts to violate charter rights. I am sure this provision will be found unconstitutional.

This provision gives CSIS and the courts a role in deciding when it is okay to limit charter rights, and that is a power that constitutionally belongs to this Parliament and only this Parliament. It is not the purview of CSIS to decide what are reasonable limits on free expression, and it is not even the purview of the courts to decide that. The courts have left that to legislation passed in Parliament, and rightly so.

The fourth threat to our civil liberties is the creation of this new broad criminal offence of supporting terrorism “in general”. This lacks the element of intent that is normally required for a criminal offence. We do not impose criminal penalties in Canada unless harm was intended. This therefore infringes on rights to free speech in terms of things like fair comment by journalists who might wish to cite writings by someone advocating terrorism as part of their investigation. It interferes with the rights of authors of fiction, of satirists, and with all kinds of people who have legitimate reasons to make statements about terrorism in general with absolutely no intention of inspiring terrorist acts, but they will fall under the purview of this new definition.

The fifth threat is that Bill C-51 lowers the standard applied to police action in national security cases in several different parts of the bill, from reasonable grounds based on evidence to mere suspicion. I find this disturbing in light of Canada's record of the detention of literally thousands of Canadians in times of crisis who were later found to have committed no offence whatsoever. This includes Japanese Canadians, Ukrainian Canadians, German Canadians, and Italian Canadians in World War II, and even Quebeckers in the 1970s.

Although there are more, I will deal with the no-fly list. Bill C-51 expanded the no-fly list to include all persons posing threats to this broader definition of national security. It did so without fixing the underlying problems in the list. This list still results in many Canadians being denied the right to travel in error because their name is similar to someone else's. It even has resulted in multiple instances of children being denied the right to fly. The list needs to remain focused on those who threaten aviation. What Bill C-51 has done again is to expand that list to include everyone who might be a threat to national security.

This is another example of the needle in the haystack and providing way too much hay to be dealt with at the airport. Therefore, we need to keep the focus on those who actually threaten our flights. All of the outstanding problems with the no-fly list could have been fixed by regulation. However, that task has been made much more difficult by expanding the list and using the new broader definition of national security.

Turning to the bill before us very quickly, I think there are some gaps here. We find a bill that is clearly necessary but I would argue is fundamentally flawed. We need a truly independent committee that would report to the House of Commons and not the Prime Minister. This would affect the confidence the public can place in the committee's reports. At minimum, there needs to be limits placed on the power of the Prime Minister to sensor and redact committee reports.

A truly independent oversight committee should also elect its own chair. Instead, the bill proposes that the Prime Minister choose the chair, and indeed the Prime Minister has already designated a chair for the committee before it has even been constituted. This means that the chair owes his job to the Prime Minister and not his fellow members of the committee. Electing a chair is a practice of our allies in all the other jurisdictions.

If I can just take—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

Order, please. I am sorry, but the time is up. Perhaps the member would be able to incorporate what is left of his speech into the question and answer period.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Spadina—Fort York.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister (Intergovernmental Affairs)]

Madam Speaker, the member's participation in this debate, in the previous session and now, is one of engaged and intelligent comment, and I listened very seriously to it.

My concern is twofold. The first is that you do recognize that the previous budget that we just passed—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

Order, please. I would remind the member to address the questions to the Chair.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is my first time in the new Parliament. I apologize.

Budget 2015 actually built a budget and engaged in the de-radicalization process, even before reforms were being presented. That work is ongoing. You have acknowledged that. I would also like your comments on the fact that we are consulting with Canadians to make sure that we do not—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

Please address the comments to the Chair and not to the member.

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Spadina—Fort York, ON]

Madam Speaker, we are consulting with Canadians to make sure that we do not just focus solely on Bill C-51 but in fact address all of the security issues to ensure that when we come forward with legislation it embraces the full scope of what needs to be fixed to get the proper laws in place around public safety and protecting charter rights. The member is aware that consultation is under way, I hope the House understands that, and I would like to see a comment reflecting the importance of that consultation.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Madam Speaker, certainly I acknowledge that the consultation is going on. My concern is that it is an excuse for inaction. Certainly, Bill C-22 is a crucial bill but is no substitute for action to fix or repeal Bill C-51. Oversight is not a burden. Good oversight will help build public trust and ensure that our security services are more effective in a dangerous and changing world.

Canadians expect a watchdog that is both independent and has teeth. Bill C-22 needs to be amended to ensure that this committee has full access to classified information, adequate resources, and the power to share its findings with Canadians in an informative and transparent manner, subject to justifiable limits.

The government will have to work hard to earn the trust of Canadians after failing to deal with the question of changing Bill C-51, and to rebuild that trust we need a strong, independent, and effective oversight committee.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Madam Speaker, we in the official opposition still disagree with respect to Bill C-51. We are reassured that the government, since the election and some of the promises it made in that campaign, has come to see the virtues in Bill C-51.

However, that aside for the moment, to your very logical points with regard to the legislation before us, we agree it is legislation which is fundamentally flawed. I noticed you were just getting to pointing out—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I would remind the member to address the question to the Chair. Members have been here long enough to know that.

[Peter Kent, Conservative, Thornhill, ON]

Madam Speaker, it seemed that my colleague was just getting to some rather important flaws that he saw in the legislation and I wonder if he could expand upon those.