Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to speak against the Liberal motion before us today.
I grew up at a time when, as a youngster, I played street and ball hockey with my friends in the evening. I knew it was time to go home when the siren at the local fire hall rang at 9 o'clock in the evening and my parents expected me home. I also walked to school in the morning and my parents expected that probably sometime around 4:30 or 5 o'clock, I would again be home for dinner.
Our world has changed. Even in rural Manitoba, where I grew up, we would be hard pressed today to see groups of street-hockey enthusiasts playing late into the evening without parental supervision. Parents drive their children or walk their children to school and pick them up at the end of the day. Our world has changed, and therefore I speak against the Liberal motion before us today.
There is no task more critical for a government than to ensure the safety and security of its law-abiding citizens. Our government has a robust system of agencies and departments that, despite having separate mandates and areas of responsibility, work closely together on issues of national security to protect the safety of Canadians. Securing Canadian life and property requires a multi-partner approach and a clearly defined review structure. Our government recognizes the importance of independent reviews and ensures that Canadians feel confident in their government and know that their best interests are at the forefront.
Today we face complex and shifting threats across the globe, and we must continue to adapt and evolve how we detect, disrupt, and prevent attacks from happening. Indeed, our government's efforts to keep Canadians safe do not stop when they leave the country. We work with our international security partners to protect our citizens abroad. Indeed, Canada has in place a number of national strategies and international agreements that are founded on solid partnerships across all levels of government, non-governmental organizations, business and private sector, and community groups.
Of particular note, Canada's counter-terrorism strategy guides more than 20 federal departments and agencies to better align them to protect, detect, deny, and respond to terrorist threats. Among these federal agencies are the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, CSIS; and the Communications Security Establishment Canada, CSEC. The mandates of these two bodies are established in the CSIS Act and the National Defence Act. They obligate both organizations to carry out their activities in strict adherence to Canadian laws. The statutes that created both CSIS and CSEC also established independent review bodies to provide external arm's-length review of those critical national security functions.
As we have heard in this debate, the Communications Security Establishment Canada plays a very important security and intelligence role, helping to protect Canada and Canadians against foreign-based terrorism, foreign espionage, cyberattacks, terrorism, kidnappings of Canadians abroad, and other serious threats with a significant foreign involvement.
Another critical national security agency I will discuss is the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Governed by the CSIS Act, 1984, the service acts to collect and analyze information and security intelligence from across the country and abroad, and reports to and advises the Government of Canada on national security issues and activities that threaten the security of Canada. Again, this mandate carries great responsibility and implications for Canadians. The responsibility for review of CSIS activities rests primarily with the Security Intelligence Review Committee, or SIRC, which was created under the CSIS Act also in 1984.
The Security Intelligence Review Committee is an independent external review body that reports on the service's operations. To perform its functions, the Security Intelligence Review Committee has access to all information held by the service, with the exception of cabinet confidences. Furthermore, the committee meets with and interviews CSIS staff regularly and formally questions CSIS witnesses in a quasi-judicial complaints process.
The results of Security Intelligence Review Committee reviews and complaints are regularly discussed among members of the CSIS executive, and the service has adopted most of the committee's recommendations over the years.
The SIRC annual report, also tabled in Parliament by the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, plays an important role in providing Parliament and the Canadian public with a broad understanding of CSIS operations.
As members of the House will see, our government takes the security of Canadians very seriously. The fact remains that terrorism is a multi-faceted phenomenon. The national security threat environment has evolved dramatically over the past several decades. Indeed, the terrorist attacks of 9/11 forced a fundamental shift in the way we think about public safety. Moreover, the exponential growth of the Internet has meant another shift in focus to protecting our citizens and interests from sophisticated cyber-criminal activity that threatens our critical infrastructure, economic growth, and public safety.
Canada is well positioned to meet these serious threats because we have a robust national security system in place, one that involves transparency, accountability, and strong checks and balances to keep Canadians safe while protecting their rights and freedoms.
Canadians expect and deserve to live in a country in which their government is working with its allies to create a strong and robust national security system that is ready to prevent, detect, deny, and respond to any type of emergency.
Canadians want to know that their streets and communities are safe. That is why our Conservative government passed the Combating Terrorism Act, which made it a criminal offence to travel overseas to engage in terrorist activity. Shockingly, the NDP opposed this important legislation. That is why we are bringing forward entry and exit information sharing.
The Liberals also continue to vote against any measures that will keep Canadians safe, which should come as no surprise from a party led by someone who said he would not rule out ending mandatory minimum sentences for anyone. Canadians know that only our Conservative government can be trusted to keep them safe from those who wish to harm us.
In a statement by the CSEC Commissioner, the hon. Jean-Pierre Plouffe, on January 30, reported by the CBC, he said the following:
Past commissioners have reviewed CSEC metadata activities and have found them to be in compliance with the law and to be subject to comprehensive and satisfactory measures to protect the privacy of Canadians. CSEC is providing full cooperation to my office in the conduct of another ongoing in-depth review of these activities, which was formally approved in the fall of 2012.
He goes on to say:
...my predecessor issued a statement referring to CSEC metadata activities. Many reviews of CSEC activities conducted by the Commissioner’s office include examination of CSEC use of metadata. For example, we verify how metadata is used by CSEC to target the communications of foreign entities located outside Canada, and we verify how metadata is used by CSEC to limit its assistance to federal law enforcement and security agencies to what is authorized by a court order or warrant.
He added that as commissioner he was independent of the government and CSEC, and as such did not take direction from any minister of the crown or from CSEC. He truly is an independent review individual.
We do not comment on specific CSEC methods, operations, or capabilities. To do so would undermine CSEC's ability to carry out its mandate. It would also be inappropriate to comment on the activities or the capabilities of our allies. That being said, CSEC is prohibited from targeting the communications of persons in Canada or Canadians anywhere under its foreign intelligence and cyber-protection mandates.
CSEC is required to operate within all Canadian laws, including the Privacy Act, which has legislated measures in place to protect the privacy of Canadians. Protecting the privacy of Canadians is the law and CSEC follows the letter and the spirit of the law. As well, CSEC's activities are reviewed by the independent CSEC Commissioner, who has specifically noted CSEC's continued adherence to lawful compliance and genuine concern for protecting the privacy of Canadians. In fact, the CSEC Commissioner praised CSEC's chiefs, who “have spared no effort to instill within CSEC a culture of respect for the law and for the privacy of Canadians”. I can say with pride and confidence that CSEC is truly being watched.
It is rich that Liberals have moved today's motion criticizing CSEC's use of metadata when it was the Liberals who first approved CSEC's metadata collection in 2005.
The chief of CSEC appeared before the Senate committee last night to answer all questions on these allegations, and provided assurances that CSEC was acting within its legal authorities. The independent CSE Commissioner reviews all CSEC activities and has never found CSEC to have acted unlawfully.
I am perplexed as to why a Liberal government that created the Security Intelligence Review Committee and then took the review of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service out of the hands of members of Parliament now wants to create a national security committee of parliamentarians to oversee the two bodies we are speaking about today.
