Public Safety committee  In the province of British Columbia, the integrated program has a representative from a law enforcement agency in British Columbia embedded within the RCMP federal witness protection program offices. There is no limitation, I believe, to the number of officers from B.C. who can participate in it.

Public Safety committee  Decisions relative to identity, for instance, as per your question, are a cooperative effort with the protected people, under the guidance of the witness protection coordinators, who may be able to steer them in an appropriate direction. The end game of witness protection is to provide the necessary framework around the folks coming into this program to give them an opportunity to succeed in the program and hopefully to integrate back into society in as short a period of time as possible.

Public Safety committee  Yes. I suppose anything.

Public Safety committee  Certainly the military police have a certain capacity to conduct investigations. I think another component might be perhaps certain individuals who are at risk as a result of their assistance provided to the Canadian Forces in some of their international operations, perhaps.

Public Safety committee  Very early on in the investigation, investigators will look at all the different aspects of the investigation. If they plan, for instance, to use persons who they know will ultimately end up testifying and they anticipate a threat—and that is based on a threat assessment. The threat assessment will dictate what measures may be considered to provide these individuals with protection.

Public Safety committee  That's typically not done.

Public Safety committee  There's always consideration for that, yes.

Public Safety committee  No.

Public Safety committee  I think, just to build on what Assistant Commissioner Shean said, part of the process going forward, and also responding to the recommendations that came out of SECU in 2008 and Air India in 2010, has resulted in the federal program taking a much closer look at the cultural impact of coming into witness protection programs.

Public Safety committee  There are two elements related to the training, sir. One element deals with the administrative component of the program. The federal witness protection program is a very heavy administrative initiative. The other component deals more with the operational perspective. From an operational perspective, in terms of the enhanced training we're providing, we're spending much more time now dedicating training time to enhancing communication skills of our coordinators and to better understanding the methodologies we're currently using, including the introduction and the role that the psychologists play in the admissions and the program outreach capabilities.

Public Safety committee  There are a number of protocols. Ones that would be appropriate to probably discuss here right now, for instance, would be all of the protocols surrounding the admissions process, how the organization has made significant structural shifts to ensure the independence of the decision-making process relative to witness protection.

Public Safety committee  It's between 800 and 1,000.

Public Safety committee  Yes, sir.

Public Safety committee  No. The numbers that have been provided by the assistant commissioner directly reflect the costs the RCMP has incurred.

Public Safety committee  No, the other agencies—as I think the assistant commissioner said earlier—pay for what's in the protection agreement. So the numbers that Assistant Commissioner Shean just made reference to are RCMP costs. Those do not include the costs, for instance, associated with a Winnipeg city police case.