Public Safety committee  Chair and honourable members, I am pleased to appear before this committee on the subject of Bill C-22. I am accompanied by Mr. Bill Galbraith, the executive director of my office. Before I make a few remarks about the bill this committee is examining, and since this is my first

Public Safety committee  The way I see it is that as a CSC commissioner I have my own mandate to focus on, and the committee will have its own mandate to focus on. This is why I stressed in my remarks that complementarity between the two committees is very important, so that this problem of access in the

Public Safety committee  I think you are referring to the exceptions contained in clause 14.

Public Safety committee  We might agree or disagree with those exceptions, but in my view they are not unreasonable, taking into account the bill as a whole, the purpose and scheme of the bill and the entire context. I also believe that another witness who appeared before you previously, Mr. Atkey, comme

Public Safety committee  That's a good question, and I guess it's for the government to answer. I suspect, bearing in mind that this is a new committee and that it's the first time parliamentarians will be involved in those matters, that the government wants to go cautiously and slowly. We'll see as thin

Public Safety committee  I must admit that I don't have the list at hand right now to tell you exactly. The border agency, for example, is the first one that comes to mind. I think that agency should be reviewed by somebody. As an example, it could be SIRC, because the work that CSIS does on the one hand

Public Safety committee  If I understand your question correctly.... I'm sorry. Could you repeat that again, just the essence?

Public Safety committee  No, I don't see that at all. As I say, the mandates are different, but they are complementary. I think the important thing, as I said in my opening remarks, is to work together: the committee of parliamentarians on the one hand and the expert review bodies on the other. If we do

Public Safety committee  That's the access with regard to the legal opinions, the client-lawyer privilege.

Public Safety committee  In the bill, if I'm not mistaken, there's a provision whereby if a minister is refusing that type of information he has to give you reasons, the reason why he's not releasing that type of information.

Public Safety committee  It's 8(b)?

Public Safety committee  I don't see why they would do that unless they are in bad faith, and I assume that everybody is acting in good faith unless the contrary is proven to me.

Public Safety committee  Are you talking about a quorum?

Public Safety committee  Clause 17, is it? I notice there is no provision in the bill about a quorum in this committee. It says there are nine members, and clauses 18 and 19, for example, talk about voting, but they don't talk about a quorum. I think there should be a provision saying that the quorum for

Public Safety committee  Part of my mandate is to ensure that CSE activities comply with the law. It goes without saying therefore that if they do not comply, I have to inform the Minister of National Defence, who is responsible for the CSE, as well as the Attorney General of Canada, in accordance with t