Randall Garrison

[An Act to establish the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, September 27th, 2016]

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?

[Public Safety, September 27th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians still overwhelmingly oppose Bill C-51, and the Liberals promised a major rollback, even though they voted for this Conservative legislation. Yesterday, I introduced a bill that would repeal each and every section of Bill C-51. If the Liberals want to keep any part of that bill, I invite them to make their case here in the House. However, today the Privacy Commissioner criticized the government for not doing enough to review the impacts of Bill C-51 on democratic and privacy rights.

Will the Liberal government implement all of the Privacy Commissioner's recommendations, or will it support my bill to repeal Bill C-51?

[Anti-terrorism Act, 2015, September 26th, 2016]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-303, An Act respecting the repeal of the Acts enacted by the Anti-terrorism Act, 2015 and amending or repealing certain provisions enacted by that Act.

Mr. Speaker, today I am introducing a private member's bill that would repeal all aspects of Bill C-51, a bill in force for more than a year now, which still manages to infringe our civil liberties without making us safer.

This private member's bill is about doing away with the overly broad definition of national security contained in Bill C-51 that allows surveillance of those engaged in legitimate defence of their rights, including aboriginal people and environmentalists. It is about restoring the fundamental principles of Canadian privacy law. It is about doing away with the powers Bill C-51 gave to CSIS to act illegally in secret without oversight. It is about eliminating the prohibition on free speech contained in the new broad definition of supporting terrorism in the Criminal Code. It is about restoring the previous standard that required reasonable grounds for police action in national security, instead of the grounds of mere suspicion as contained in Bill C-51.

We are putting forward our proposal today for what to do about the infringement of civil liberties in Bill C-51, and we await the government's putting a specific proposal forward.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 19th, 2016]

With regard to human rights concerns in the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) of China and in Tibetan areas of China including in Sichuan, Qinghai, Yunnan, and Gansu: (a) how many requests have been made by Canadian officials and diplomats for access to the TAR and Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Qinghai, Yunnan, and Gansu since 2008, and of those requests, how many were (i) rejected by the Government of China and on what basis, (ii) accepted, and on what dates did Canadian officials and diplomats visit Tibet or Tibetan areas since 2008, (iii) accepted and what restrictions, if any, were imposed by Chinese authorities on these visits; (b) of the requests made by Canadian officials and diplomats for access to the TAR and Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Qinghai, Yunnan, and Gansu since 2008, how many were made for the explicit purpose of monitoring or investigating reports about human rights violations and, of those requests, how many were (i) rejected by the Government of China and on what basis, (ii) accepted, on what dates did Canadian officials and diplomats visit Tibet or Tibetan areas for human rights-related purposes since 2008, (iii) accepted and what restrictions, if any, were imposed by Chinese authorities during those visits; and (c) how many visas to visit Canada have been requested by Chinese or Tibetan officials and diplomats representing the TAR or Tibetan areas of China since 2008 and, of those, how many were (i) rejected by the Government of Canada, (ii) accepted, on what dates did Chinese or Tibetan officials and diplomats representing the TAR or Tibetan areas of China visit Canada, (iii) accepted and what restrictions, if any, were imposed by Canadian authorities during those visits?

[National Defence, June 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, everyone agrees we need to replace the CF-18s. However, sole-sourced procurement is costly, bad for accountability and often ends up taking even longer to deliver the equipment we need.

In opposition, the Liberals complained about the Conservatives when they sole-sourced procurement for the F-35s. Instead, they promised Canadians an open, transparent competition to replace the CF-18s.

Why are the Liberals now doing an about-face, breaking their promise, and behaving just as badly as the Conservatives on procuring fighter jets?

[National Defence, June 6th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, during the campaign, the Liberals said that they would not purchase the F-35, but right after being elected, they said maybe yes, maybe no. Now it looks like they may have already decided on another fighter jet, but still without the promised open and transparent competition. In fact, it looks like the Liberal government is running procurement as an inside job, just like the Conservatives. Why have they abandoned an open tender process to replace our aging CF-18s, and when will they put in place a procurement system that can actually deliver the equipment our military needs?

[Public Service Labour Relations Act, May 30th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, that is probably one of the more absurd comments I have heard on the decisions.

The Supreme Court did not require the House of Commons to legislate. It said that existing law, both for Bill C-14 and Bill C-7, was unconstitutional, and if the House of Commons would like to legislate something else, this was the deadline by which it must do it. The Supreme Court suspended its judgment to a date to allow the House of Commons, if it so chose, to pass legislation, very much the same as what happened with the abortion legislation in Canada. When the Supreme Court ruled that abortion violated the security of the person, it gave a period of time for Parliament to act. Parliament tried twice to act and failed to pass any legislation. The world did not end, but the Supreme Court decision was implemented.

That is exactly what would happen on Bill C-14 and Bill C-7. The Supreme Court does not instruct Parliament to do anything. It gave us the opportunity to say that if we felt there were regimes or restrictions that would meet the constitution that we would like to put it place, we had this much time to do it.

I do agree with the member that the Conservatives wasted a lot of that time. However, the present government has wasted a lot of time calling all different kinds of bills instead of dealing expeditiously with those on which it feels it has a deadline.

[Public Service Labour Relations Act, May 30th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, earlier in a response to one of the hon. member's speeches, I trucked out what I called blue herrings, raising issues about unions and policing that really nobody shared. I have never met a rank and file police officer who is worried about being intimidated over the question of a union, and all of the police forces have unions.

It is one thing to deny the existence of unions or their value, but it is another thing to gut collective bargaining, as the government is doing in Bill C-7. To me, those are equally difficult to accept.

[Public Service Labour Relations Act, May 30th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie for his work on a day-to-day basis in the House as an effective voice for working people.

His question gives me an opportunity to say again what I think has happened in Bill C-14 and again in Bill C-7. I do not know where the Liberals get these restrictions they have introduced in both bills. I think Bills C-14 and C-7 alike are headed to litigation.

Rather than solving the problem and getting on with the business of the country, we will be sending people back into the courts on both of these bills. I do not understand why the recommendations in Bill C-14 were not those of the special committee. In Bill C-7, I do not know who made these recommendations. There is no evidence about why things like staffing and harassment were excluded from collective bargaining. I do not know where this idea came from, but I certainly doubt that it is constitutional.

[Public Service Labour Relations Act, May 30th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Cariboo—Prince George is one of the new members whose comments and contributions I have learned to respect in the House. He raises a very good point.

Having a union is not necessarily something that always increases costs. Given the context the government has given with respect to the RCMP, which is essentially a budget cut, it is not enough money to keep up with the increasing costs. We know that it is not enough money to backfill all of those empty positions that have been sitting there, unfortunately under the previous Conservative government.

However, the process of collective bargaining can also lead to more effective and efficient policing, which is less costly for those communities. When rank and file RCMP officers on the west shore were calling to have those positions filled, the municipalities were passing resolutions saying that they knew they would have to pay more but they needed to fill those positions to keep their communities safe.

Therefore, I recognize the challenge of increasing policing costs for municipalities as I sat on a municipal council after the police board. However, having a union can also promote efficiency and effectiveness as well.