Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to join my colleagues and share a few remarks on Bill C-70, a bill that I have become intimately familiar with over the last couple of weeks, given that I am a member of the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security.
Of course, that committee was seized with this bill last week, where we had meetings over four days, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday of last week, with extended hours so that we could hear from witnesses, because of a programming motion from the House. I think that programming motion, and the fact that we have seen all parties in this place, usually a pretty partisan environment, put those differences aside to come together, I think underscores how important this legislation is and the realization from all political parties that this is a moment in time in Canadian history when we must meet the challenge united and with a clear purpose, because the threat is certainly there.
To put it into context, last week, of course, the report from NSICOP, the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, landed with the force of a bomb and, of course, has been dominating the news cycle ever since. I will not talk about the allegations toward members of Parliament in that report. I think the other parts of the report that are especially pertinent to tonight's debate are the fact that NSICOP has found, through its briefings with intelligence officials, that our intelligence community feels that our foreign adversaries regard Canada as a “low-risk, high reward” place in which to operate and pursue their strategic objectives. There are a number of reasons for this. That same report was also quite scathing of the Liberal government's response to the dire circumstances surrounding foreign interference: too little, too late.
That aside, we are at this moment and we do have Bill C-70 before us. It is important to understand that the bill has some pretty consequential amendments to existing statutes while also setting up a stand-alone law.
It is important to remember that when we are talking about foreign interference, it can be broadly separated into the interference or influence that we see publicly, coming not only from our adversaries but also from our allies, and the malicious and very pernicious aspect of foreign interference, which is the parts that happen in a clandestine way, the parts that are deceptive and underhanded, where adversaries are trying to use all tools at their disposal to influence how our democracy functions, sometimes to cause chaos, sometimes to pursue strategic objectives. It really depends on the circumstances and the country involved.
While we have had a slow response from the Liberal government, it is also very clear that our outdated national security laws are not up to the challenge of meeting that threat as they are currently written. I have used the phrase a couple of times over the last few days, as well as today, that essentially many of our laws were created in an analog era and that we need to bring them up to speed to meet the threat in what is a digital era. That is a big part of what Bill C-70 does.
What is in Bill C-70? The bill is divided into four parts. Part 1 deals with amendments to the CSIS Act. Many of those are in response to a pretty scathing report from NSIRA, which showed that CSIS has regularly broken its own statute's legislative guidelines in how it handles datasets. Again, when that law was crafted, back in 1984, the most advanced piece of technology in people's offices was probably a fax machine. We are a far cry from those days.
I think the other really consequential amendment to the CSIS Act is that it is now going to equip CSIS with the ability to share information with other interested parties, with parties that have a need to know some of this information. Under current laws, CSIS is very constrained in how it can share information. Again, if we are going to counter this threat with the seriousness it deserves, we need to equip our agencies with the tools that allow them to share this information.
Part 2 is also a very consequential update to the Security of Information Act. This part of the bill is really targeting the deceptive, clandestine nature of foreign interference. We all know that violations of any provision of the Security of Information Act come with hefty penalties, and in the bill before us, they are also there, because it underscores, again, how serious a nature these offences are. So, there are offences now for any foreign principals who are using violence, intimidation or threats to pursue strategic interests at the direction of, or in association with, a foreign principal, and there are hefty penalties going after anyone who is trying to influence governmental or legislative processes. Those are all spelled out in the Security of Information Act. Again, this is the part of the bill that is designed to go after the foreign interference that is not publicly known about, that is not going to be affected by the registry, which comes later on in the bill.
In part 4, there are also important updates to the Canada Evidence Act to really try to streamline the process. Evidence is often of a very sensitive nature and, again, we have heard a lot over the last two weeks of the gulf that exists between intelligence and evidence. However, when intelligence gets to a point where it can be used as evidence, we still need to handle it in a very secure way, and in a way that does not expose where our sources are, because, of course, that is of national interest to our country.
However, part 4, I think, is probably the part that has gotten the most attention in the bill. It would set up a registry so that we would have more accountability and transparency. It would be country agnostic, an important part to underline in this, so that even people who are working on the direction of, or in association with, friends and allies of Canada would still have to register if they are communicating with elected officials and if they are trying to influence some type of governmental process. It involves elected officials at the federal, provincial and municipal levels, and also with indigenous governments and organizations.
It is an important part, and I think the country agnostic feature of the bill is also important. Canadians definitely have an interest in how our adversaries are behaving here on Canadian soil. We would like to see those persons registered, but we might also have a very legitimate interest to see how our friends and allies are operating here on Canadian soil, because we would be deluding ourselves if we did not think that our friends and allies, in some way or another, are trying to influence how Canada makes its decisions, which has been a part of statecraft ever since there were states.
In the brief time that I have left, I realize that there still are concerns out there from some members of the community. I highlighted earlier the National Council of Canadian Muslims that has concerns about some of the aspects of the bill that are not very well defined. However, in my opinion, the bill does achieve a balancing act. Again, because of how dire the situation is with foreign interference, we need to meet this moment with a strong legislative response. I think that this is us, in the House of Commons, and later on in the Senate, but the Parliament of Canada as a whole, giving notice to our adversaries that their activities are now on our radar. We are aware of what they have been doing in Canada for quite some time now, and we are going to meet that challenge with a challenge of our own. This is really putting our cards on the table and showing people that we are serious about meeting this.
I am happy that there was a pretty collaborative effort at committee with amendments. The Bloc did not get all of the amendments that it wanted passed, neither did the NDP, but that is the way democracy works at committee. However, all in all, I am quite happy with the product that has been reported back to the House. I am glad to see that the House has come together to see the bill passed through by the end of tomorrow. I hope that the Senate will take the bill under way with the seriousness that it deserves.