44th Parl. 1st Sess.
June 4, 2024 10:00AM
- Jun/4/24 1:25:20 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives never apologize for their mistakes. Their consistent message is to say it is someone else's problem. It is at the core of Conservatives to never take accountability for what they have done. Conservatives never take accountability for the fact that they failed Canadians so many times. They never take into account that they have played a role in the economy that so many Canadians are now falling behind in. It always has to be someone else's problem. However, when we catch them red-handed, when we see that during their time in government they allowed big corporations to fix the price of bread, we have to demand accountability. Worse yet, they also paid $2.35 billion in handouts to those same companies, so they are working for them.
That is why the Conservatives never apologized. They are the same ones who made the problem.
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- Jun/4/24 2:28:17 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we obviously thank the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians for its work. We take interference very seriously. That is why we are taking all necessary steps to protect Canadians from the threat of foreign interference.
We established oversight and accountability bodies. We set up a public inquiry. We introduced new legislation that provides for a foreign influence transparency registry that makes foreign interference a serious crime and allows CSIS to share information with all levels of government, businesses, researchers and more.
We will continue to be there to protect Canadians.
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- Jun/4/24 3:22:52 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, one of the most interesting things that took place yesterday on the Hill is that the NDP leader appeared at committee on Competition Act legislation he has tabled that would create greater accountability against corporate greed. He was attacked by the Conservatives, without asking him good questions, and on top of that, the Liberals seemed indifferent to it.
I would ask the member if he could explain the Liberals' position with regard to increasing accountability on the Competition Act and ensuring that Canadians are not going to be gouged because of systemic problems that have been put in place and have been supported by successive Conservative governments and Liberal governments that have left Canada isolated when it comes to protecting consumers.
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- Jun/4/24 6:59:15 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I find it a bit odd to hear my Conservative colleagues talk about transparency. That is not really a concept that we have seen them apply in the past.
I would like the minister to tell us about important measures. This bill talks about transparency and accountability. I think it is important to hear what the minister, who is very eloquent and obviously very familiar with the sector, has to say about this. Canadians who are watching at home this evening will be interested to know what measures are set out in this bill to promote transparency and accountability.
I am sure that the minister can tell Canadians this evening why this bill is good for the future of our country.
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- Jun/4/24 7:00:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, our colleague, the Minister of Innovation, rightly raised an important issue. In his parliamentary or ministerial work, my colleague is someone who is very focused on the type of critical question he just asked.
I think that the very fact that the commission will regularly release reports will reassure Canadians as to the importance of this aspect of civilian review, which will apply to the CBSA for the first time and which will be strengthened in the case of the RCMP.
I completely agree with the Minister of Innovation as to the importance of reassuring Canadians that we have put in place appropriate measures to guarantee not only their safety but also the accountability of our national security agencies.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for the shout-out; the chair of the mighty OGGO is here to witness this.
I am very pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-20, which would establish a public complaints and review commission for the Canada Border Services Agency and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Both the RCMP and the CBSA are critical organizations that protect the security of Canadians. While carrying out their mandates, employees of both organizations are quite literally on the front lines.
The employees work around the clock to ensure Canada's security each and every day, and to achieve this mammoth task, they are entrusted with significant powers. Among others, these powers include the ability to use force, to search and to detain individuals. They are essential to the safety and security of the public. That said, equally essential is the need for independent review of these activities to ensure that the RCMP and the CBSA are transparent, and accountable to the population they serve and to Parliament.
The adoption of Bill C-20 would provide for increased accountability and transparency of the RCMP and the CBSA. This would be done through the establishment of an enhanced mechanism for independent review of these organizations. The RCMP already has an external review body in the form of the Civilian Review and Complaints Commission, CRCC. Bill C-20 would build on the CRCC through the establishment of the public complaints and review commission, PCRC.
The PCRC would serve as the external review body for the RCMP, but would have enhanced power to fulfill this mandate. The bill would, at long last, also provide for independent review for the CBSA, which currently does not have an independent review mechanism. It would do so by giving the PCRC an additional mandate to serve as the review body for the CBSA. The PCRC would do that using the existing knowledge, processes and expertise of the CRCC, and expand them to include the CBSA.
We have been talking about evidence-based steps to get here since 2015. We established the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians that reviews the work of national security and intelligence agencies. As part of that consultation, we examined how well existing oversight and review bodies function. We also sought answers about what sort of independent review would be needed for agencies that do not currently have an independent review, such as the CBSA.
As we know, effective civilian review is central to the rule of law and maintaining public confidence and trust. Bill C-20 embodies that concept. It would respond to a long-lasting need for independent review of the CBSA and improve RCMP review. It seeks to ensure that both the RCMP and the CBSA continue the work to transform their culture, and to enhance transparency and accountability, as well as equity, diversity and inclusivity.
Bill C-20 would provide an avenue to ensure the public is able to have its complaints about the conduct and level of service of RCMP and CBSA employees reviewed by an external body. It would also provide an avenue to identify and investigate systemic issues within Canadian law enforcement.
Today, I wish to concentrate on how this bill would help us as parliamentarians contribute to enhanced accountability and transparency of the RCMP and the CBSA. Bill C-20 does that through the establishment of a series of additional and enhanced reporting requirements, and accountability measures for the PCRC, the RCMP and the CBSA. These measures would ensure that parliamentarians in both chambers are equipped to monitor the state of the complaint and review process, and to hold the Minister of Public Safety to account in relation to complaints and systemic review.
Bill C-20 would do so by enhancing PCRC recommendation-making powers of the PCRC, as well as establishing annual reporting requirements for the RCMP and the CBSA. By clearly showing parliamentarians which PCRC recommendations have and have not been implemented by the RCMP and the CBSA, this would strengthen the accountability to Parliament of the minister, and through the minister, of the RCMP's and CBSA's deputy heads.
As mentioned by my colleagues, the bill would also establish defined timelines to ensure swift responses and decisions throughout the review process. These include codified timelines for the RCMP and the CBSA to respond to PCRC reports, systemic review and recommendations. The PCRC would receive the information it needs promptly and include it in its annual report to Parliament.
The bill would also equip Parliament with an ability to identify allegations of systemic racism and other systemic discrimination in policing by requiring the PCRC to collect and publish demographic and race-based data on complainants. Stakeholders, including police chiefs, have long called for such information to be collected as it is essential to the development of responses to systemic issues in the criminal justice system.
Bill C-20 would also establish a statutory framework for CBSA responses to serious incidents currently provided for in an internal policy only, so that the PCRC would be informed on the nature and responses to serious incidents involving the CBSA, such as death in custody. This would take place through a requirement for the PCRC to report on the number, types and outcomes of serious incidents as part of its annual reporting.
For the first time, parliamentarians and the Canadian public would be informed of serious incidents that involve CBSA officers, including incidents involving immigration and detainees. The PCRC would retrieve this information through requirements for the CBSA to notify and provide information to the PCRC when serious incidents take place and permit the PCRC to send an observer to assess the impartiality of the CBSA's investigations.
Through enhanced reporting to Parliament, Bill C-20 would help to ensure our border services and national law enforcement agencies remain world class and are worthy of the trust of Canadians.
On this note, I also want to thank the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security for its important study of the bill. Its amendments have served to reinforce the reporting requirements I just noted. Among others, I would want to highlight a government-introduced amendment that would set the time period allowed for the PCRC to submit its annual report to Parliament. The extension of this timeline would give the PCRC sufficient time to analyze the annual reports of the RCMP and the CBSA and give the commission the ability to comment on these reports as part of its own annual reporting to Parliament.
SECU also made an amendment that would ensure the PCRC would include the number of complainants it refers to NSIRA in its annual report. This would give parliamentarians and the Canadian public a look into how the work of these two reviewing bodies intertwine. I encourage all members to join me in supporting Bill C-20 today.
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- Jun/4/24 8:43:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is no secret when it comes to law enforcement in the country that there is a disturbing pattern that is particularly identified by those who suffer discrimination, whether it is indigenous or Black Canadians, at a disproportionate rate. We know this from several reports, including Auditor General reports.
So many indigenous organizations have called for a particular level of reform that would include indigenous persons in the actual accountability mechanisms. Can the member speak about whether or not the government would be not just consulting indigenous people in this work, but actually moving to find ways to directly incorporate indigenous ways of knowing, indigenous principles, in oversight and accountability mechanisms here?
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- Jun/4/24 9:30:44 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a bittersweet moment for me to rise on this important legislation.
It is not a secret that in indigenous communities particularly there is a need for accountability when it comes to the dramatic actions of the RCMP and its direct negligence of its purpose to ensure peace and security for so many, which oftentimes fails indigenous people.
The most important piece to this legislation in the minds of many indigenous people is the aspect that would replace the existing Civilian Review and Complaints Commission, or the CRCC, for the RCMP and establish a new stand-alone and independent commission. This is an incredible testament to the immense work of indigenous people and advocates, including that of the missing and murdered indigenous women and girls inquiry, which had its five-year anniversary just yesterday. Its report was blunt in its assessment, stating, “The RCMP have not proven to Canada that they are capable of holding themselves to account”.
This opportunity has been a long time coming, and I am very honoured to rise to speak to this issue, but also to highlight the stories of survivors who have had to endure pain and suffering inflicted upon them by the RCMP. It is my hope that, through this legislation and the implementation of this independent review committee, we would see the systemic change that is so desperately required for the victims who have had the immense courage to come forward. Members can imagine being attacked by a police officer, then overcoming the immense difficulty of telling that story, to oftentimes be met with a recommendation that goes nowhere. The report is put on a shelf, gathers dust and more pain grows. When we see no action or accountability for those who do harm, it creates an injustice. That injustice, in turn, creates a massive failure not only of policy-makers, but also of society.
In a 2013, a Human Rights Watch report entitled, “Those Who Take Us Away”, examined 10 towns across the north of British Columbia and documented numerous reports of RCMP officers violently assaulting indigenous women and girls, or arresting them when they called for help. I ask members to imagine that for a moment: calling out for help and being met with an arrest. These reports included attacks by police dogs, strip searches by male RCMP members, violent punches and attacks, and the use of pepper spray and tasers, which eventually injured them during these arrests. I would remind members that these were people who were calling the RCMP for help. Particularly disturbing are the numerous accounts of rape and sexual assault by RCMP members. In response to an investigation into this, women reported that officers had told them “no one will believe you”.
It was not that long ago in Manitoba where we saw a terrible instance of a police officer by the name of Officer Theriault, who took an indigenous woman out of a cell to “pursue a personal relationship”. His supervisor, in turn, mentioned how wrong it was, but insisted that the officer could do “whatever the [eff]” he wanted with her. This is simply unacceptable.
The time for the RCMP to do what they want in an unfettered fashion is over. I am very honoured and pleased to know that my colleague from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford has done the work necessary to make what has been a very difficult journey for so many, particularly indigenous women, possible. I also thank members of all parties, the Bloc Québécois, the Conservative Party and, of course, the Liberals for what I hope to be unanimous support for this bill.
However, I want to mention how important it is to recognize one of the calls for justice brought forward by the national inquiry. Call for justice no. 9.1 is “to acknowledge that the historical and current relationship between Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people and the justice system has been largely defined by colonialism, racism, bias, discrimination, and fundamental cultural and societal differences.”
Canada is a young country. We are still reeling from the effects and the ongoing participation of colonization by institutions that were built to do just that. The RCMP was first founded as a paramilitary group in recognition of the paramilitary group created in Ireland to attack the Irish people. It was replicated here in North America as a way to clear the plains when Sir John A. Macdonald so infamously wanted to bind this country together with two bands of steel, albeit bloody ones.
The RCMP, formerly known as the North-West Mounted Police, was charged with the very difficult, but also sad, job to displace so many people, and they used the immense tools of genocide to do it. We know this from accounts of survivors, particularly a member of the Métis community, a famous elder known as Maria Campbell. It is very difficult for me to mention this story because she is quite a revered elder and someone many Métis people and many indigenous people across the Prairies look up to. She revealed just a few years ago that she was forced by her publisher to edit out her recounting of being raped by an RCMP officer at the age of 14. He had simply dragged her into the bedroom of her own house, where a few RCMP members had come to hassle the family about alleged poaching.
It is very clear: RCMP sexual abuse of indigenous women and girls is an open and well-known secret across indigenous communities, still today. Even a 2014 Public Safety Canada report acknowledged this problem, when one service organization reported that the police “either rape you or arrest you. The cause is racism and discrimination.”
These are the stories of indigenous women who have long stewarded our nation. They are proud women who carry our stories, our languages and our traditions for thousands of years in this place. To be met with such violence and indignity is a shame and one that must be rectified. Albeit, this bill would do a very small part, but a necessary part, in making that a reality.
In my home province of Alberta, just a few months ago, in the small community of St. Paul, where my niece goes to school, a 33-year-old constable with the RCMP detachment, stationed in the northeast community, was arrested and charged with child sexual exploitation offences. He was suspended with pay.
This is not justice. This is not the kind of Canada that so many labour for. This is not the kind of Canada that so many people do everything they possibly can for their children to be raised in a safe environment, knowing that these atrocities continue and it could be them next. It scares me.
I should mention that it is not every day that this chamber is unanimous in support for doing what is right, but I am so pleased to know that today it is. I am proud to know that New Democrats will be voting in favour of this bill to bring in a much-needed level of civilian accountability and to bring justice to the many victims who deserve it.
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- Jun/4/24 9:43:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is true that Canada has undertaken an illicit program to dehumanize indigenous people. When one dehumanizes a population, it quickly becomes relevant and real that the population then suffers qualities of not being human, such as lack of clean water, lack of housing, lack of infrastructure and, ultimately, eventually, outright attacks on and negligence of the people themselves, in this case women.
We see across the globe that, in conflicts, women often face the brunt, the full force, of a violent regime that seeks to take away their individual autonomy, their individual rights and their humanity. When we remove humanity and our quality of being human, and we no longer see them as such, it becomes okay to harm them. It becomes okay to not hold those perpetrators accountable, and then it becomes normalized.
What we are seeing in Canada, particularly for indigenous women, is a crisis that deserves true accountability and deserves true work to see justice done.
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- Jun/4/24 11:19:55 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, in my speech, I talked about accountability and responsibility. I can tell members there is no accountability in this budget to the Canadians who might be affected by the government's legislation. The government is going to increase taxation on Canadians, but it has not identified exactly who those Canadians are.
All those Canadians are calling their financial advisers and their accountants. They are saying they are not sure if they are captured by this, and the accountants do not know either, because the government will not tell them. It is a serious oversight of the government to put forward legislation to increase taxes without clearly delineating exactly who is going to be affected.
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- Jun/5/24 12:18:07 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the parliamentary secretary addressed the question of ministerial accountability for these scandals. I want to drill down on that.
We have had ministers come to committee. They have not always been forthcoming, and there are many ministers we still need to hear from. However, when we have had ministers at committee, they have always tried to present their role in government as that of a passive bystander, a painting on the wall or a potted plant that is there and that hears things, but it is not actually responsible for anything that happens.
I have asked these questions over a series of procurement ministers, various ministers responsible for CBSA. What did they do? Were they briefed about the problems? Were they briefed about the abuses? I understand that ministers do not take every little individual decision, but as these issues were being raised publicly in Parliament and committee, did they issue directives? Did they take action? The answer is always no. They received briefings. They expected other people to solve the problems.
When will they take responsibility?
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- Jun/5/24 12:19:11 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, this is coming from a member who worked for Stephen Harper, who sold a bill of goods to Canadians in 2011. He told Canadians that the F-35 project would cost $10 billion, and later, we found out from the Auditor General that it would cost $25 billion. I am not going to take lessons from this guy. He does not know anything about accountability.
If someone broke the law, they will face the full consequences of the law. It is not the member who has the power to condemn these people. The RCMP will get involved, and let the process be the process.
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