[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Tuesday, June 20, 1995
.1530 
[English]
The Chair: I call the meeting to order.
Colleagues, we're reviewing the estimates for SIRC. We'll commence on that exercise shortly.
Following this meeting, the committee will be going in camera to review elements of a report. I'm just reminding you about that. We can then commence in the usual format for estimates.
We have before us, Jacques Courtois, chairman of SIRC, and Maurice Archdeacon, executive director of SIRC.
Mr. Courtois, do you have an opening statement for the committee?
Hon. Jacques Courtois (Chairman, Security Intelligence Review Committee): Just a few comments, Mr. Chairman.
[Translation]
Mr. Chairman, members of the sub-committee, first, may I say that it is a pleasure to appear before you to discuss something other than the Heritage Front affair!
We appear today on main estimates.
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Since I am sure you have a number of questions, I believe that it would be more productive if we were to try to answer those specific questions, rather than to try to anticipate them in a long opening statement.
And so, with your permission Mr. Chairman, I will simply make a few brief points.
[English]
Our budget is diminishing year by year under the constant pressure of the government's deficit reduction program. We're adjusting to this era of austerity by reducing substantially our use of outside consultants for special projects; by foregoing the assistance of an editor in the preparation of our annual report; by using our staff lawyer in more cases to avoid, as much as possible, the expense of outside counsel; by meeting experts in the security intelligence field at our monthly meetings rather than at special symposia; and by reducing travel costs to the absolute minimum consistent with our mandate. We believe that by taking these measures we will retain sufficient resources to cope with the current average complaint case-load while also continuing to review CSIS's activities as required by the CSIS Act.
Should this situation change for the worse so that we feel we can no longer fulfil our core mandate in an effective manner, we will attempt to persuade Treasury Board that we need additional resources. If we are not sufficiently persuasive in that endeavour, we will report back to you in the hope that you may succeed where we have failed.
Now, Mr. Chairman, we are available to answer your questions.
The Chair: Thank you.
Mr. Langlois, ten minutes.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois (Bellechasse): Perhaps we moved away from the Heritage Front case somewhat too quickly.
Mr. Courtois, there were a number of general allegations in the Heritage Front's case, some of which proved right and others not. The case created a sensation, and in some ways, it was a bit like science fiction. In contrast, the issue that we're dealing with today is definitely more concrete.
The Minister for Intergovernmental Affairs has stated that the Parti Québécois was a threat to Canada's security. As chairman of the committee that oversees Canada's intelligence service, what do you intend to do to counter the Canadian Security Intelligence Services' mandate to insure Canada's security, thereby making sure that CSIS does not bow to the minister's demands?
Mr. Courtois: In my opinion, the Parti Québécois does not threathen Canada's national security. Personally, I don't see any need to investigate its activities, certainly not at this stage. As you know, there would have to be illegal acts that threathen security to justify an inquiry, and I don't know of any such acts.
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Courtois, when a minister of the Crown states that the Parti Québécois is a threat to Canada's security, you know just as well as I do that there are provisions in our statutes, particularly within the Criminal Code, that cover such cases, and that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service is there to take all necessary measures to insure Canada's security if it is threathened. Are you telling me that CSIS should not follow the orders of the Privy Council, but should rather consult you if it is in doubt? Do you have the authority to take additional preventive measures?
Mr. Courtois: Your question is based on the assumption that the minister's statements are well founded.
Mr. Langlois: I'm using the minister's statement for the purposes of my question.
Mr. Courtois: Yes, but you may be going too far. This statement does not disturb me a great deal, not to the point of asking for an investigation of the facts.
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If the minister has serious grounds to believe that Canada's security is threathened, I would strongly recommend that he approach us or that he approach CSIS and provide the facts. I'm not aware of any such facts.
Mr. Langlois: At this time, are you able, Mr. Courtois...
[English]
Ms Cohen (Windsor - St. Clair): A point of order, Mr. Chairman. I just came in and I thought I heard Mr. Langlois quote something from Question Period, that Minister Massé had said something about the Bloc and the Parti Québécois being a threat to the security of Canada. That's not what he said. What he said, clearly - and I was there - was that they are a threat to the unity of Canada, which is a very different set of words and a very different sentiment.
The Chair: If I may just jump in here, there may be quite an understandable source of disagreement, at least with 20-20 hindsight, as to what the minister may or may not have said. I assume it was at Question Period today?
Ms Cohen: Yes.
The Chair: Mr. Langlois, you're entitled to your view as to what was said, but you may not have the agreement of all in interpreting what was said. In any event, you're certainly at liberty to pursue your line of questioning, albeit with some sensitivity on the part of some members.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, I certainly understand Ms Barnes' remarks.
[English]
Ms Cohen: Cohen is my name.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: What did I say? I said Barnes. Pardon me, Ms Cohen. I'm used to seeingMs Barnes across the table from me. I'm not referring to the minister's remarks in the House this afternoon, but to the remarks that were reported in this morning's newspapers that are somewhat
[English]
at variance with his previous statement.
[Translation]
So I can see that the minister has made some adjustments. Perhaps he had an opportunity to speak with you in the meantime, Mr. Courtois, because he knew that you would be appearing before us today. Have you had an opportunity to speak with the minister since yesterday?
Mr. Courtois: Not at all.
Mr. Langlois: If you had spoken with him, would you have advised him to set the record straight in the House today?
Mr. Courtois: Mr. Chairman, for goodness sake!
Mr. Gagnon (Bonaventure - Îles-de-la-Madeleine): Mr. Chairman, I thought that the purpose of today's meeting was to review the estimates as tabled with the committee. Unless I'm mistaken, that's the purpose of today's meeting.
[English]
The Chair: We are certainly reviewing the estimates, even though we are deemed already to have reported the estimates to the House. We're following the format because it is useful for us and for Canadians, and hopefully for the agency.
There is quite a wide latitude given in practice to the estimates questioning. I think Mr. Langlois is well within the ambit of questioning, although he'll forgive me for noting that we are perhaps debating an issue that arose out of a Question Period that's only an hour old. It's something that is usually taken up procedurally in the adjournment debate in the House.
In any event, it's Mr. Langlois' ten minutes, and it's certainly a public issue.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, I hope that the points of order will be subtracted from my time. I understand that the member of Bonaventure - Îles-de-la-Madeleine has other interests to serve.
Let me get back to Mr. Courtois. I'd like to ask you about the part of your general mandate that includes taking preventative measures. We know that after the referendum, it will be too late for you. You'll be able to blame everyone and his brother, but if irregularities occur that do not conform to democratic tradition, it will be too late for you to do something. We know how much time it takes to carry out corrective measures successfully.
What guarantees can you give to Quebec sovereignists who have been called a threat to Canada that they will not be investigated, wire-tapped, set-up or framed by CSIS in order to discredit them, in light of what Mr. Massé said yesterday?
Mr. Courtois: That guarantee is in the act. All they have to do is read the act to see that if they do not infringe it, they will not be subject to espionnage, counter-espionnage or surveillance.
.1545
Mr. Langlois: If you notice something, according to the sections of the act that you've referred to so often, you would report it to the Sollicitor General of Canada, not to this committee.
Mr. Courtois: Exactly.
Mr. Langlois: We're at exactly the same point we were at during the first meeting, when the same witness told us in advance that if something happened, he would report it to the executive branch of the Government of Canada, not to parliamentarians.
As a parlamentarian, I think this would be an infringement of our privileges. I already have a motion somewhere that's pending. I think we're going to bring it out and report to the full Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs, so that we can eventually report this matter to the House.
The witnesses from the SIRC literally don't give a hoot about the members of Parliament elected by the people of Canada who are sitting here to defend their interests. The people of Canada don't know what's going on behind closed doors between the SIRC and the Sollicitor General, and we are treated like puppets.
I would advise the witness to take a look at what's showing on CSPAN One and CSPAN Two. He would see that witnesses who give that kind of answer to the American House of Representatives or the American Senate are usually cited for contempt of Congress.
I think that the SIRC really should review the fundamentals of the parliamentary system and learn to show respect it should normally have to the people's elected representatives.
Unfortunately, Mr. Courtois, I have to say that I've never seen your committee show any kind of willingness to co-operate with the Parliament of Canada, whose representatives are here on this sub-committee.
I have no other questions.
Mr. Courtois: If it makes you feel any better, let me tell you that if any facts came to our attention, we would speak to the Sollicitor General about them. Before investigating a political party, I would prefer to have permission from a Sollicitor General who was aware of all the facts.
I didn't say that we would do it automatically, and that the only report made would be to the Sollicitor General. I merely said that we would first contact the Sollicitor General, and that we would be very pleased to investigate, with his permission.
Mr. Langlois: You're saying the same thing as Mr. Robert, who chaired the committee temporarily until you returned. He told us that if he noticed anything, he would report to the Sollicitor General, that he would not inform the people concerned directly, and that if necessary, he would inform the Privy Council Office, therefore the Prime Minister's Office, and then perhaps the Prime Minister's Office could inform the people who were spied upon or who were the victims of any other measure.
But while all this is going on, you wouldn't be able to prevent the unfortunate events that could occur. A few moments ago, when you were answering a question I asked you, you told us that you could intervene once everything was over in order to review, not prevent, such events. Do you have a policy to prevent such things from happening?
Mr. Courtois: We don't start investigations just because of a rumour in the newspapers or on television. When we have serious facts that indicate that our national security is threathened, then, we take action, but we don't bother everyone and carry out an investigation that isn't going to lead to anything, just because of some rumours. We base ourselves on facts, not on rumours.
Mr. Langlois: Do you feel comfortable in your position as chair of the SIRC when a minister of the Crown responsible for Intergovernmental Affairs does not share your viewpoint?
Mr. Courtois: I can't say that, because I don't know exactly what he said.
Mr. Langlois: Do you read the newspapers?
Mr. Courtois: I read them, but I'm not interested in everything they say, because they're not always accurate. So before making any comments, before launching an investigation, I would like to see the minister's statement, not what's reported in the newspapers or by third parties.
Mr. Langlois: So are you saying that you've seen the remarks attributed to the minister and quoted as such in the papers?
Mr. Courtois: Not at all.
Mr. Langlois: Not at all?
Mr. Courtois: No!
Mr. Langlois: Might I suggest that you get today's papers, particularly La Presse, Le Devoir and the Toronto newspapers, to see what the minister said and to then take preventative measures, if necessary?
.1550
If you wait, Mr. Courtois, it will be too late.
Mr. Courtois: I wouldn't want to read the newspapers and jump to conclusions. If the minister said that, I'll see it in Hansard, and then we will be able to advise him. You can read five newspapers and get five different versions. We can't act on that basis, because it's hearsay.
Mr. Langlois: Once the hearsay has been checked and proves to be correct, will you be able to take preventative measures?
Mr. Courtois: If the rumour is true and if there is a threat to national security, we certainly will investigate.
Mr. Langlois: Thank you, Mr. Courtois. That's all.
[English]
Ms Meredith (Surrey - White Rock - South Langley): I must admit I'm becoming somewhat of a cynic. I heard you, Mr. Courtois, say that in order for somebody to be investigated, particularly a political party, as my colleague from the Bloc is concerned about, they would have to commit some illegal acts to be considered a threat to Canada. If you were aware of any facts, you would bring them up with the Solicitor General and with his permission would do an investigation...and you don't start investigations because of the media, because of what you see on television or read in the papers.
Yet I would have to suggest to you that this is precisely what has happened with the Heritage Front report and with the Reform Party. I would like to get into chapter 8 of that report that you have innocuously or innocently entitled ``The Reform Party in a Foreign Country'', when, in essence, that whole chapter is about a CSIS investigation of Preston Manning. In this report you brought in this chapter that had absolutely no relevance to the Heritage Front investigation. You went into great detail as to what went on with this particular incident and yet you failed to leave out some very pertinent information, and probably the most pertinent information: that the whole investigation was on Preston Manning.
Could you perhaps tell us here this afternoon why you put this chapter in and why you left out the fact that Preston Manning was being investigated?
Mr. Courtois: Do you have the actual report? I like to go on text.
Ms Meredith: It's here.
Just to be on record, it's unfortunate that Mr. Robert isn't here to carry on because he was the one who took the lead on this. I hope you are familiar -
Mr. Courtois: He's not here because he now sits on the court of appeal.
Ms Meredith: I'm aware of that, sir.
Mr. Courtois: I'll ask Mr. Archdeacon to answer this question, if I may, Mr. Chairman.
The Chair: Please proceed.
Mr. Maurice Archdeacon (Executive Director, Security Intelligence Review Committee): I would really just be repeating what Monsieur Robert said in the past, that is, that we were asked by Ms Meredith to report on any investigation by CSIS that was not strictly connected to the Heritage Front. In your 169 questions, one of the questions said this. We assumed at the time that you already knew of this investigation and it was confirmed later by some of your later questions, which revealed a knowledge of this investigation.
So we were, we thought, in somewhat of a cleft stick. If we didn't report on this, you would say, as you have in the past, that we don't do a full investigation of everything and that we missed this. If we did report on it, we'd be reporting on something that had to do with Mr. Manning, but which was not an investigation of Mr. Manning. We chose the latter course and decided to put in the report something that you knew already was happening, which was the investigation of this country with regard to the electoral expenses of Mr. Manning.
So we put it in because we answered your question and we determined quite absolutely, as Monsieur Robert said to you on at least three occasions, that CSIS did not at any stage write, try to, or aim to investigate Mr. Manning personally, nor did they do so. In fact, the words right in the targeting authority say that no one suspected that Mr. Manning even knew about this.
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Ms Meredith: I'm sure Mr. Manning didn't know that he was being investigated. Are you trying to tell this committee that there was not a TARC level one investigation opened on Preston Manning?
Mr. Archdeacon: No, I'm not, obviously, because we're repeating discussions we had over several hours earlier. You know very well that I'm not doing so. Someone - and we admitted it was sloppy work, and I'm sure the director of CSIS would admit that - instead of taking the trouble to write on the TARC title ``unknown contributor to Preston Manning's campaign'' just wrote ``Preston Manning''. The text, however, in the TARC report makes it absolutely clear - and you read the text - that Mr. Manning was not being investigated. We can't say it any more than this. It's question asked and answered.
The Chair: Ms Meredith and the witnesses, just for the record, I want to note that we are reviewing factual territory here that was reviewed in relative depth by this committee in camera. I know Ms Meredith will respect the parameters of the in camera procedure. There's still plenty of latitude to continue with this.
Ms Meredith: They're public documents, Mr. Chairman.
The Chair: I'm just noting this for the record and asking us to have due respect for the parameters of the in camera procedure.
Ms Meredith: If you catch me saying something that is not public, I would assume you will renege.
The Chair: Then it will be too late, but please proceed.
Ms Meredith: I would like to put on record, in the public forum, that there is a 4002 form here that Preston Manning's name was on for a period of three months, which is a TARC level investigation. It says, and this is what supports the investigation, or TARC one:
- The activities of this subject of investigation may on reasonable grounds be suspected of
constituting a threat to the security of Canada as defined in -
- It goes on to name paragraph 2(b) of the CSIS Act. That is the authority for this TARC level two.
Are you suggesting this was a mistake?
Ms Meredith: Was it not a mistake when the RCMP secret service burnt down a barn? Was it not a mistake when the RCMP secret service went in to a political party and took a membership list under what I think was called Operation Ham or something? Those were mistakes. If you were investigating the RCMP national security service at that time, would you have just walked away from it because it was a recognized mistake that they made, that they had acknowledged and made changes to?
Mr. Archdeacon: No, that's your definition of a mistake. I don't agree with your definition of that as being a mistake.
Ms Meredith: You don't feel it was a mistake to put a political leader's name on a TARC level one investigation for three months and allow the intelligence officers across this country to do a TARC level one investigation on a political party leader?
Mr. Archdeacon: I do believe it was a mistake. An error means mistake; it was a mistake. I'm just saying that I don't agree that burning barns and stealing membership lists of the PQ could be defined as mistakes as you just defined them.
Ms Meredith: What would you call them?
Mr. Archdeacon: Breaches of the law, breaches of the reasonableness with which that organization should have conducted its investigations.
Ms Meredith: Are you familiar with ministerial directives?
Mr. Archdeacon: I am, yes.
Ms Meredith: Are ministerial directives part of CSIS policy?
Mr. Archdeacon: Yes, ministerial directives are, other than the law itself that was passed by Parliament, the most powerful of the policy directives to CSIS.
Ms Meredith: You would suggest that they're very powerful directions to the members of the agency on how they are to conduct their services.
Mr. Archdeacon: I would, yes.
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Ms Meredith: Are you aware that a ministerial directive went out to the CSIS agency telling them that if there was any investigation into some - and I'm going to read it just so that it's on file. The minister wrote that:
- when CSIS investigated activities involving sensitive institutions, and that the minister defined
these institutions as academic, political, religious, media and trade union fields, he stated that
senior level authorization is required.
Mr. Archdeacon: If it were the investigation of a political party, a deputy director may have the authority, but he would probably refer it to the director before authorizing an investigation into a political party.
If you're making the point, and I shouldn't guess, that this was an investigation of a political party, this is not the case.
Ms Meredith: The ministerial directive also stated that special care is required in regard to investigations that impact on or which appear to impact on the most sensitive institutions of our society. He goes on to say:
- I am primarily thinking in this regard of institutions in the academic, political, religious, media
and trade union fields.
- The minister went on to state that he was directing the director of CSIS personally, or a deputy
director designated by the director in writing, to approve the use by the service of confidential
sources in such investigations.
Mr. Archdeacon: No, I don't.
The Chair: We've come to the end of the ten minute round, so I'll go to Mr. Wappel.
Mr. Wappel (Scarborough West): Good afternoon, gentleman. We are dealing with the estimates. I'd like to talk initially about complaints that SIRC investigated. There's an interesting little paragraph here on page 17, and I quote:
- One complaint dealt with a long-standing human source of the RCMP and then CSIS who
believed he was entitled to additional compensation. The Committee conducted a full
investigation.
Let me ask first where does this one complaint fit in figure 5?
Mr. Courtois: Probably under general complaint.
Mr. Wappel: Of what year?
Mr. Courtois: Probably 1993-94.
Mr. Wappel: Would that have been in your 1993-94 report?
Mr. Courtois: If it was a general complaint, it would be under general complaints, of which there were 45.
Mr. Wappel: What I'm getting at is that I can't recall your 1993-94 report. Was there any specific mention in your 1993-94 report of this case?
Mr. Courtois: Probably no specific mention because it was not a very important case.
Mr. Archdeacon: It is, though. It is case number 6 on page 72 of the 1993-94 report.
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Mr. Wappel: Let's talk about this a bit. ``Identified as a male''...is that accurate? Was this complainant a male?
Mr. Courtois: Well, as to whether it's a male or a female, if it says it's a male, it's a male.
Mr. Wappel: It is a simple question, I hope. Was the complainant a male?
Mr. Courtois: Yes, he was.
Mr. Wappel: Thank you. Was the complainant the same source as is referred to in the Heritage Front affair?
Mr. Courtois: I don't think we can pinpoint it by tying it to a source in the Heritage Front affair, because it would be easy to check the complaints and find out who the source was.
Mr. Wappel: Oh, my gosh! I think it is a legitimate question, though, Mr. Courtois, don't you?
There was a source mentioned in the Heritage Front affair. There is a source mentioned here. I simply ask if it is the same source. Is the complainant in that case still a long-standing human source of CSIS?
Mr. Courtois: No.
Mr. Wappel: What was the result of the investigation of the committee with respect to that complaint?
Mr. Courtois: The complaint was dismissed.
Mr. Wappel: Is there some reason you did not put that in the estimates?
Mr. Courtois: In this year's estimates?
Mr. Wappel: Yes. The reason I am asking is, you made a specific comment about a specific case, so you felt it important enough to bring to the public's attention, yet there is no indication whatever of what happened as a result of your full investigation. We now know the result of your full investigation was that the complaint was dismissed, and I simply want to know why that fact was not put in the estimates.
Mr. Courtois: Our report says the committee decided that the complainant was treated ethically and fairly in terms of compensation and of severance payments. The committee also concluded that the complainant had no right to additional compensation.
Mr. Wappel: All right. That's the 1993-94 report you're referring to.
Mr. Courtois: Correct.
Mr. Wappel: My question was, was there some reason why a statement such as ``the complaint was dismissed'' was not included in the brief summary you have in the estimates? That's what I am asking, not about the 1993-94 report.
On page 17 of the estimates, you indicate presumably the importance of this case because you have brought it to our attention again. The committee conducted a full investigation, and you leave it there. I wonder why an additional sentence saying the complaint was dismissed was not put in.
Mr. Archdeacon: May I answer that question?
Mr. Wappel: Yes, sure.
Mr. Archdeacon: I wrote it. It is just bad writing, Mr. Wappel.
Mr. Wappel: I don't know that it is necessarily bad writing. There might be a reason.
Mr. Archdeacon: We had already made it public, and this was such an unusual complaint in comparison to our normal group that we thought the public might be interested that we do that sort of thing. So we put it in because it was unusual and it was in fact a rather interesting case.
I know we don't say very much, and you have to be a reader and not a writer to realize what is wrong with it. I should have said the case was dismissed or something further. We had already said that, and we weren't keeping it secret. It was public in our annual report.
Mr. Wappel: Okay, thank you. On page 16, you talk about investigating the grounds on which a ministerial report was made. Can you give us details about that?
Mr. Courtois: I will ask Mr. Archdeacon.
Mr. Archdeacon: Oddly enough, Parliament, when it wrote the CSIS Act, included organized crime, deportation for reasons of being associated with organized crime, in the mandate of SIRC. Occasionally - I think this is our third case - we have had to deal with a request for deportation, which must be signed by two ministers and which is then by law, again by act of Parliament, sent to SIRC. SIRC is then required by law to look into it.
So we did exactly what the law requires us to do. It was a long and complex case, and I think it will be next in the federal courts. The person involved had a rather huge legal team. It took us quite a long time.
Mr. Wappel: What section of the act are we dealing with in this sort of matter?
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Mr. Archdeacon: I think it is in the Immigration Act, Mr. Wappel.
Mr. Wappel: Could you refresh the committee's memory on what it basically says. Is it a full-blown hearing at which the complainant's counsel are entitled to find out from the ministers why they thought certain things and on what basis they acted?
Particularly if it is organized crime, presumably there would be very sensitive material coming out. What happens at a hearing? Is it in camera, first of all?
Mr. Archdeacon: Parts of it, as with a security clearance hearing, are in camera and parts are in open court, as it were. It's not a court; it's quasi-judicial.
So the RCMP in this particular instance had a number of very secret witnesses - for one of whom they didn't even want it known that there was a witness dealing with that subject. The person involved has been incarcerated this whole time, and the subjects of his alleged crimes, and in one case he has already been convicted or is guilty, were murder, manslaughter, extortion, beatings - all work of organized crime. So it was quite a dangerous situation for witnesses who were testifying as to what he did.
Mr. Wappel: So a person is convicted - I presume you mean in another country, or here?
Mr. Archdeacon: Here, in a Canadian court.
Mr. Wappel: A person was convicted in a Canadian court of murder and organized crime-related activities?
Mr. Archdeacon: Manslaughter.
Mr. Wappel: Manslaughter and other organized crime-related activities, or just manslaughter?
Mr. Archdeacon: No, he was not convicted of other organized crime activities.
Mr. Wappel: Just manslaughter, and as a result presumably of that, two ministers decided they would issue an order deporting this person. Is that correct?
Mr. Archdeacon: Not because of the manslaughter conviction, I don't believe - I would have to go back and look at the ministerial report, which was very carefully written - but it is based upon the fact of association and continuing association with organized crime for a person who, although living in this country, is not a citizen of this country.
Mr. Wappel: Right, and such a report is automatically reviewed by SIRC, or does somebody have to ask for it?
Mr. Archdeacon: No, the ministers must send the report to SIRC, and SIRC must deal with it and make a recommendation to the Governor in Council, which SIRC has done.
Mr. Wappel: The subject of the report must be given the opportunity to examine witnesses and everything else? How does it work?
Mr. Archdeacon: The law doesn't specify. We try to do it according to all the rules of natural justice and previous court decisions so as to avoid someone that the country feels should not be resident here getting away with something mainly because we have done it badly. So we try to do it as well as we can.
Mr. Wappel: You said that this took quite some time. What kind of resources did you devote to this particular case?
Mr. Archdeacon: Quite a lot. One of our research officers was allocated to this case, which we rarely do, and Mr. Robert spent a lot of time working on it.
Mr. Wappel: The end result was that the report was sustained, and the report presumably ordered the deportation of this person.
Mr. Archdeacon: Well, the way it works is that this committee is required to make a conclusion - not a recommendation, just come to a conclusion - and then to send its analysis of the facts plus its conclusion to the Governor in Council, which we did.
This committee has no power of decision. Only the Governor in Council has the power of decision, which I believe has now happened. I think the Governor in Council has decided on this case now.
Mr. Wappel: Mr. Archdeacon, I did not choose my words carefully enough for you, and I should know better than that. What I meant was, was your conclusion that the report was correct in -
Mr. Archdeacon: Oh, I beg your pardon. I didn't mean to narrowly interpret what you....
Mr. Wappel: I just want to know what the conclusion of the report was. Did it sustain the ministers' decision to deport the gentleman?
Mr. Archdeacon: Our report concluded...it doesn't sustain the ministers' recommendation report per se -
Mr. Wappel: Strike the word ``sustain''.
Mr. Archdeacon: - but it did say that this person fell under the provisions of the Immigration Act, which would allow a certificate to be issued saying that his deportation should not be given any mitigating effect by personal relationships by other than the facts of the case.
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Mr. Wappel: I am sorry, Mr. Chairman, forgive me. Just so that I am clear on this, SIRC's understanding of the legislation is that when two ministers sign such a report under the Immigration Act, SIRC must review it to see if everything was done according to law. Is that correct? Is that what the law requires?
Mr. Archdeacon: No, it also requires SIRC to look at the facts of the case.
Mr. Wappel: So SIRC looked at the law, SIRC looked at the facts, and SIRC decided that everything was done according to the law and that there was nothing unusual in the facts of the case to suggest a course of action other than that which the two ministers propose to pursue.
Mr. Archdeacon: Yes, you put it better than I did.
Mr. Wappel: Is the person still here?
Mr. Archdeacon: The person is still here.
Mr. Wappel: How long has all this been going on?
Mr. Archdeacon: From our point of view, it has been going on for nine months, and the next stage, of course, as I think a lot of Canadians know, is probably also going to be lengthy because there are so many appeals allowed in the courts.
Mr. Wappel: That is under the Immigration Act?
Mr. Archdeacon: Yes.
Mr. Wappel: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chair: Mr. Langlois, five minutes.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Courtois, I'd like to get back to the question of guarantees to be sure that we understand each other correctly.
Right now, given your knowledge of CSIS files, what assurance can you give me regarding the present and the past and what guarantee can you give me about the future? Can you assure me that neither Mr. Lucien Bouchard, nor the Bloc Québécois, nor any Bloc Québécois MP, nor myself, nor the Premier of Quebec, nor any members of his Cabinet, nor any member of the National Assembly of Quebec, nor Mr. Mario Dumont, nor any person currently identified as part of the movement for change in Quebec, are currently under investigation by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service?
What's the most recent information you have been able to check on this subject? When does it go back to?
Mr. Courtois: There is a rule according to which we never state whether someone is under investigation or not. If someone asked us whether they were under investigation and we answered no, it would be a relief. If we said yes, it could prejudice our investigation.
I cannot guarantee that they are not under surveillance, but what I'm saying, and you're perhaps in a better position than me to know this, is that if they have done nothing illegal or harmful to the security of Canada, they are not under investigation.
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Courtois, do you realize the impact of the first part of your statement, which is quite serious. You're not in a position to confirm or deny that the Honourable Lucien Bouchard, a member of the Privy Council of Canada, is not under investigation by CSIS or by the chairman of SIRC. What you're telling me has quite serious consequences, Mr. Courtois.
Mr. Courtois: Not at all. I know the answer, but I cannot reveal it to you.
Mr. Langlois: I'll put my question to you again: Is the Honourable Lucien Bouchard under investigation by CSIS, to your personal knowledge, or has he been in the past?
Mr. Courtois: I cannot answer you. We can never answer a question like that because if the person was under investigation this could give him some indication that could prejudice our investigation. We cannot say no and we cannot say yes. That's basically it.
Mr. Langlois: You're hiding behind the seal of the confessional.
Mr. Courtois: Not at all.
Mr. Langlois: You're from the school of Leon XIII or Benoît XV.
Mr. Courtois: I'm not familiar with all these Popes and their school of thought. I leave that up to you.
Mr. Langlois: You're probably creating a new one. Under your current pontificate,Mr. Courtois...
Mr. Courtois: Do you want my blessing?
Mr. Langlois: Not necessarily your blessing, but I'm asking you to answer my question, Mr. Courtois. Is Mr. Lucien Bouchard, member of Parliament for Lac-Saint-Jean, member of the Privy Council of Canada, currently under investigation by CSIS, to your personal knowledge, of has he been in the past?
Mr. Courtois: I cannot answer this question, whether it concerns Mr. Bouchard, the Prime Minister, or anyone else.
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, I would ask you to order the witness to answer.
.1620
[English]
The Chair: I think, Mr. Langlois, you understand the difficulty that Monsieur Courtois has in answering the question. You could - any one of us could - go through a list of ordinary Canadians and ask Monsieur Courtois whether or not, to the best of his knowledge or SIRC's knowledge, CSIS was conducting an investigation.
He would love to say no all of the time, but there is a chance that you might hit a hot button at some point, and he would not be able to answer no. He would have to say he was sorry he could not answer, having already answered no to all of the other people.
With a view to not getting into that structural box, into that difficult situation, I think the prudent course is simply not to get into a guessing game about who is or who is not being investigated at a particular point in time.
He might wish to respond that under section 2 of the act, the activities of any particular party in the House of Commons, insofar as they consist of legitimate political ``advocacy...or dissent'', do not constitute threats to the security of Canada, and that it would therefore be inappropriate to presume that any political activities such as they are now would constitute a threat and would therefore be worthy of investigation by CSIS.
I'm sure Monsieur Courtois would love to answer your question in the negative, but I.... If Monsieur Courtois would like to tell the committee that none of the leaders of the recognized parties in the House of Commons are being investigated by CSIS at the present time, that would probably suffice too. I'll leave it to him if he can help us out on that one.
Mr. Courtois: I have no intention of answering a question that would violate the rules that are reasonable, long-established and understood by most people.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, I'm tabling a motion that the committee adjourn until tomorrow at 9:30 a.m. and that the witness be called again at 9:30 a.m. to explain why he should not be found guilty of contempt of Parliament.
[English]
The Chair: At this point in time, I would ask you, Mr. Langlois, to be very specific about the question you wish to have answered. You may wish to ask it again so that it's very clear and considered.
Then you may wish to prepare a motion for us that we would.... It's up to colleagues when and how we would take it up. It might be taken up now with consent, or colleagues may wish to rely on the 24-hour notice requirement the justice committee generally requires.
Your five minutes have expired, and if there is not an answer, then we would move to another questioner. So you may wish to clarify that for me.
Mr. Langlois, we could come back to you. You could ask the question again, if you wish, and you wouldn't be prejudiced. We could move to another questioner now. Would that be -
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: You want me to ask the same question, Mr. Chairman?
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. Langlois: My question was the following. Mr. Courtois, can you confirm that Mr. Lucien Bouchard, member of Parliament for Lac-Saint-Jean, leader of the Bloc Québécois and member of the Privy Council of Canada, is not currently under investigation by the Security Intelligence Review Committee and, to your knowledge, has not been under investigation by CSIS in the past?
Mr. Courtois: Mr. Langlois, I cannot answer your question.
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, would you like me to repeat my motion? I will come back to it later. I will put it in writing.
.1625
[English]
The Chair: You may wish to work on that now.
We'll move to another questioner on the government side. Ms Cohen.
Ms Cohen: Thank you. Mr. Courtois, thank you for coming today. I want to move from the realm of conspiracy theory to some more practical things in the estimates.
At page 6 of your part III expenditure plan, SIRC talks about projects for 1995-96, including a review of activities of friendly intelligence services in Canada. I think I know what friendly intelligence services are, but can you outline that for us or define that for me?
Mr. Courtois: An intelligence service would be an agency of a foreign government. In this case, it is a friendly government.
Ms Cohen: All right. So it means activities in Canada - if there were any - of the CIA or of British intelligence or of a country we're friendly with.
Mr. Courtois: Yes.
Ms Cohen: Has this project started?
Mr. Courtois: Yes.
Ms Cohen: Can you say how long you expect it to take and when it will be completed?
Mr. Courtois: I think it would be fair to say that it will probably be completed by the end of July, if not sooner.
Ms Cohen: Thank you. Would a report like this be part of an annual report or would it be a section 54 report to the Solicitor General? When you pull that together, in what vehicle will you report it?
Mr. Courtois: It could be in the annual report. I hope it can be in the annual report, because that's more public. It can be a section 54 report if the committee so decides.
Ms Cohen: Is it fair to say you haven't made that decision at this point?
Mr. Courtois: Yes, because the report's not completed.
Ms Cohen: So you don't launch into one of these investigations with a preconceived notion of how you're ultimately going to report it.
Mr. Courtois: No.
Ms Cohen: Okay. Do you have any terms of reference for the project? If you do, have you defined those and are they in writing or kept track of somewhere?
Mr. Courtois: The purpose is to find out whether the foreign services may be friendly and whether they operate in accordance with the law and the guidelines, that is, with the knowledge and the cooperation of CSIS.
Ms Cohen: Has this investigation been undertaken in a general sense because you do this every few years, or out of a general sort of interest, or is it being undertaken because of specific complaints or specific incidents?
Mr. Courtois: It is the general procedure. We have to investigate those things.
Ms Cohen: How often would you investigate the activities of friendly intelligence services in Canada?
Mr. Courtois: I don't think we can do it all in one year. Mr. Archdeacon tells me it's the first time we are taking a complete look at what's been done in the last few years.
Ms Cohen: I don't want to call it random, but it's a -
Mr. Courtois: It's not triggered by any unpleasant event.
Ms Cohen: Okay. Now, I want to ask the same sort of set of questions. Again, on page 6 of the expenditure plan, you're talking about an audit of section 16, the foreign intelligence investigations by CSIS, and about a review of information obtained from the Communications Security Establishment by CSIS. Have you started these reviews?
Mr. Courtois: Yes.
Ms Cohen: When do you anticipate completing them?
Mr. Courtois: Again, I would say the end of July is a safe date.
Ms Cohen: Is this part of ongoing review activity that you've undertaken in the past or does it result from any specific concerns at this point?
Mr. Courtois: It's part of an ongoing review.
Ms Cohen: Would you do this every year, Mr. Courtois?
Mr. Courtois: Yes.
Ms Cohen: Will this be part of the annual report or have you made that decision yet?
Mr. Courtois: Again, in a very summary way it might be in the annual report or it may be the subject of the section 54 report.
Ms Cohen: What are the terms of reference for this review?
.1630
Mr. Courtois: I'd like to see what we can do about that because I don't have them before me. I'd like to see whether they can be released or not. I think we'll review them and disclose what we can.
Ms Meredith: I am sitting here almost in disbelief. You are refusing to either confirm or deny that the leader of the Bloc has been under any investigation or is under any investigation, yet you spent almost 10 minutes of my previous round assuring me, this committee, and Canadians that Preston Manning, the leader of the Reform Party, was not investigated. Either you can confirm it or you can't.
Mr. Courtois: You're twisting things around, if I may say. What we denied was that there was a TARC investigation of Preston Manning, because it had been reported and created a false impression and we wanted to clear his name. What we said to you was that particular file was misnamed or mislabelled.
Ms Meredith: How can you say that Mr. Manning was not given a TARC level? The 4002 form is under Preston Manning's name and was under his name as a TARC level one investigation for three months. The error was not noticed and it wasn't changed until three months after the investigation was over. How can you sit there and say there wasn't a TARC one investigation on Preston Manning?
I'd like to move on and bring it into tune with the estimates. This report on the Heritage Front cost the taxpayers $200,000 and it boggles my mind, to put it quite mildly, that this report leaves out key ingredients. We're going through what little bits of information we were able to get from CSIS on Preston Manning's file. You chose to leave some of the key information out of your report.
I want to go into one of the items. You mentioned that the investigation started because some informant suggested that Mr. Manning was going to have a contribution from some foreign government. The investigator said this individual was of unknown quality, both self-serving and very opportunistic, particularly if it benefited himself. Three weeks later the same individual came back with more information and approached the investigator. Then you included remarks and quoted this investigator as saying:
- if it was shown that the foreign government indeed contributed as much as $45,000 to
Manning's campaign, CSIS could in time attempt to make the argument that the foreign
government was unduly influencing Canadian politics;
A year later you opened a TARC one level investigation. There's nothing else on the file that carried on from the suggestion by the analyst that it was a theory that couldn't be supported, but you opened a TARC one investigation on Preston Manning. How in God's name did you come to that kind of conclusion when there was nothing to support it, to all of a sudden open a TARC one investigation on a leader of a political party?
I want to correct something I said earlier when I kind of jumped ahead a few years. That ministerial directive referring to educational institutions and political parties was in place at that time or very shortly thereafter. The person who had to make the decision to okay that TARC one level investigation must have known that the minister at the time said that political parties were a no-no. Could you tell me how in God's name you went from having nothing to support this kind of allegation to a TARC one level investigation?
Mr. Courtois: I guess we didn't make ourselves clear enough. There was no TARC one file opened against Mr. Manning.
Ms Meredith: Have you seen the file?
.1635
Mr. Courtois: There was a file entitled ``Ernest Manning''. It was misnamed.
Ms Meredith: It was Preston Manning.
Mr. Courtois: Preston, Ernest, well.
Ms Meredith: It was entitled ``Preston Manning'' for the three months the investigation was on.
Mr. Courtois: No, it was not.
Ms Meredith: It was, sir.
Mr. Courtois: It was under that misname, but it was not on him.
Ms Meredith: I don't care whether it was named Joe Blow. The file's name was Preston Manning and it was under Preston Manning's name that there was a TARC level one investigation. You can go to your policy manual and see that a TARC one investigation allows for any investigator anywhere in Canada to do a TARC level one investigation on the subject on that file.
Mr. Courtois: I wish I could satisfy you and say we had a TARC one investigation on Mr. Manning, but we didn't.
Ms Meredith: Then who was the TARC investigation on if it was not Preston Manning?
Mr. Courtois: It was possibly on the actions of a foreign government.
Ms Meredith: But it wasn't the action of a foreign government on that file; it was Preston Manning's name. When the intelligence officer in Halifax pulled up Preston Manning's name, he was given a TARC one level to do an investigation, not on some unknown person who belonged to some kind of a foreign government. It was Preston Manning's name on that TARC one file.
Mr. Courtois: If you insist, people will finally believe you. It was not.
Ms Meredith: How can you assure my colleague from the Bloc when I have documents to show you there was a TARC one level on a political leader of a political party? His name was on a TARC one level file and you sit there and say, ``It's okay, ma'am; it's fine for a political leader to be on a TARC one.'' You're trying to assure the Bloc member this is okay. No wonder he's concerned.
Mr. Courtois: You are saying the same thing in two different ways. You are saying ``How can you assure me there was no TARC investigation on Mr. Manning?'' and then you say his name was on the TARC one file. Those are two completely different things. That's what I'm trying to tell you.
Ms Meredith: How can it be two completely different things? The file is under Preston Manning. I can't believe this.
Mr. Archdeacon: We've gone through this on a number of occasions with Mr. Robert. Mr. Robert told Ms Meredith in the clearest of terms that it is some time since we have paid attention simply to form and not to substance. The fact is at the moment you're looking at the form - I understand your point - and saying the form of that 4002 gave the impression, because the name Preston Manning was there, that the TARC was on Preston Manning. That is the form of it.
The substance of it is in the text. Canadian jurisprudence now looks at not just the form but the substance. The text made it quite clear that the investigation was of a foreign country possibly making a major contribution to an election campaign. In fact, it wasn't to elect Mr. Manning that they were thinking of. It wouldn't have mattered who was standing in Yellowhead; they wanted to defeat Joe Clark.
We also made another report. I don't know if you forgot or you're consciously doing this, but you also said the source who was considered to be self-serving -
Ms Meredith: Unreliable.
Mr. Archdeacon: - and unreliable was not considered to be a sufficient basis for a TARC or an investigation in the first instance. You know that very well because I've told you personally twice. You said it twice last time around and when you said it the second time I told you, ``If you're going to repeat the same allegations, I'm going to have to repeat the same response''. So I'll repeat it for the third time. The response is that between those two events very reliable information from a foreign agency was provided to this country that made it absolutely clear that a considerable sum of money had been allocated by that foreign government to be used specifically in the Canadian election campaign, and you know that.
Ms Meredith: So you're telling me -
The Chair: Ms Meredith, I know how much you want to get in the last word here, but we're over your time -
Ms Meredith: Well, I think he's making allegations that I've misled.
I have one question they have not answered, and that's why did they leave out in their SIRC report one line that undermined their premise of supporting -
The Chair: You have mentioned that line. You've put it on the record.
Ms Meredith: Can they not answer me?
Mr. Archdeacon: The answer is the investigation was not commenced on the basis of that, so it didn't make any difference. There wasn't any investigation on the basis of that source information. There just wasn't. They said no.
.1640
The Chair: Period.
Ms Cohen.
Ms Cohen: I understand, Mr. Courtois, your health is strong now.
Mr. Courtois: Thank you very much.
Ms Cohen: I should have said in the opening that we're glad to see you back. I know this isn't the first time you've been back before our committee. I was remiss in not mentioning that.
I also understand that with the appointment of Mr. Justice Robert to the court of appeal for the province of Quebec we have a new appointee to the SIRC board, Mrs. Gauthier.
Mr. Courtois: Mrs. Gauthier, who served on the SIRC board before.
Ms Cohen: Yes. I just wanted to make sure with you, and for the record, that at no time was there a lack of a quorum on SIRC after -
Mr. Courtois: Oh, no, because SIRC can have as few as three members.
Ms Cohen: Yes. So what has been the lowest number of members on SIRC since October 1993?
Mr. Courtois: Four; just since the departure of Mr. Robert.
Ms Cohen: When Mr. Robert left SIRC to go to the court of appeal, were you feeling well and able to continue in your role as chair?
Mr. Courtois: Yes.
Ms Cohen: And all the other members of SIRC, save and except, obviously, for Mr. Robert, were fully functioning members of SIRC?
Mr. Courtois: Oh, yes, they're healthy, and I hope will continue that way for many years.
Ms Cohen: Would it be fair to say they're also still interested in their job and demonstrating interest in and working hard at their job?
Mr. Courtois: Very interested and working as hard as is required of them.
Ms Cohen: Finally, about Mrs. Gauthier, you've already mentioned that she is, I would suggest to you, one of the most experienced Canadians in this area in the country.
Mr. Courtois: I believe she had served for seven years already. She started in 1984.
Ms Cohen: Has she required any special training in order to get up to speed?
Mr. Courtois: No.
Ms Cohen: Is she participating fully as well?
Mr. Courtois: She was appointed last week. We had one meeting the next day that she could not attend. We have no regular meeting in July. She will attend our meeting in August.
Ms Cohen: At page 6 of your expenditure plan you say in 1995 to 1996 you're going to look at any new directions issued to CSIS by the Solicitor General. Is this a normal function? On an ongoing basis, would you do this each year?
Mr. Courtois: We look every year.... It's an ongoing practice.
Ms Cohen: Do you get any advance notice of ministerial directions, or are you consulted on them?
Mr. Courtois: No, not at all. It's after the fact.
Ms Cohen: So it's always an ex post facto review?
Mr. Courtois: Exactly.
Ms Cohen: Do you apply any defined criteria in evaluating the impact and effectiveness of these directives?
Mr. Courtois: I'd like to ask Mr. Archdeacon, who has more first-hand knowledge of that.
Mr. Archdeacon: Ms Cohen, we don't have any sort of principles by which they are measured, because they deal with such a variety of subjects and often they're really one-off sorts of things. You would never see anything else in that particular area, such as dealing with sources and sensitive institutions.
So we check for practicality and whether the policy coming down from the minister actually meets the lacunae we had seen earlier. Quite often, although we don't suggest ministerial direction, we do suggest they be changed or something be added. Sometimes we make comments on annual reports, or on section 54 reports, and lo and behold a ministerial direction comes out.
So we check from that point of view, and in the region we check with the handlers, the investigators; all the people there. We find out what effect that direction has had on the way they actually act, whether it's just a theoretical thing or it actually affects the way they act in the field. If it does, then presumably it's met its purpose.
Ms Cohen: So if CSIS had a concern about policy directives from the minister they were uncomfortable with, they could use you as a vehicle to discuss that...as well as going back to the minister.
Mr. Archdeacon: They could if we agreed with them, yes. That's a creative thought. They haven't done that, but they could.
.1645
Ms Cohen: That's my next question. You're saving me some time here.
Can you tell me, have you been critical in the past of directions the minister has given? Have you ever urged that they be changed? Have the various ministers responded?
Mr. Archdeacon: Yes, we have and the ministers have responded. In fact, I understand the present minister is responding now to the Heritage Front report, but that hasn't been done yet.
Ms Cohen: Those are all my questions. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
The Chair: Mr. Langlois.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Courtois, last December, when the SIRC appeared before the committee, I asked whether the Reform Party and its leader, Preston Manning, had been investigated. The same question was asked by Ms Meredith and by my colleagues. We were told that no political party in Canada is investigated.
We got the same response in answer to questions put to the Sollicitor General in the House. The Sollicitor General said that no political party represented in the House of Commons was investigated.
In the January 27 letter sent to this committee, we learned that, in fact, there was a file titled ``Preston Manning'', which was renamed LNU-FNU. Later on, the name of the file was dropped to indicate that it did not concern Mr. Manning but rather a foreign country, perhaps South Africa. This is my own extrapolation, but a foreign country was involved.
On the one hand, you confirm that Mr. Manning is not involved and on the other, you are unable to assure me that Mr. Bouchard is not currently being targeted or that he has not been targeted in the past.
It seems to me you have a double standard, which does not reassure me either about your activities in connection with the Reform Party of Canada and Mr. Manning, or about your activities at the moment in connection with Lucien Bouchard, the leader of the Bloc Québécois or with members of the Bloc Québécois.
Mr. Courtois: You are talking about two completely different things. You asked me ifMr. Bouchard had been investigated, and I said that I could not answer you.
Then you talk about an investigation on Mr. Manning. I tell you the file you referred to was not an investigation of Mr. Manning. I am not saying there were not other investigations. There may well have been, but I cannot tell you whether there were or not. The file you referred to was not and is not an investigation of Mr. Manning. I have said it in French and in English. I do not know what I can add to it.
Mr. Langlois: If we stuck a ``Lada'' label on a Cadillac, neither the size of the car nor its horse power would be changed. We can call it what we like: a file entitled ``Preston Manning'' probably does not concern Atlantic salmon. It is my impression that in this matter...
Mr. Courtois: In that case, perhaps.
Mr. Langlois: In that case, we are not talking about Atlantic salmon. Rather, it's tainted tuna.
Mr. Courtois: We were talking about things other than Preston Manning. I don't how many times I can say the same thing to you. I am running out of words.
Mr. Langlois: That makes no sense, Mr. Courtois.
Mr. Courtois: It's because you do not understand. If you do not want to understand,Mr. Langlois, I cannot force you to.
Mr. Langlois: You have a file entitled ``Jacques Courtois'' and you say that the file deals with the Fredericton Junior A team. There are limits as to how far people can be fooled.
Mr. Courtois: I told Ms Meredith this and I tell you the same thing. If you do not want to understand...
Mr. Langlois: You can assure me that there is no discussion of Preston Manning, on the one hand, but you are unable to assure me that no one is eavesdropping on Mr. Bouchard.
Mr. Courtois: No. Be fair and listen to me. If you want to talk about Preston Manning, I did not say that he was not being investigated; I said that this file was not an investigation of him.
Mr. Langlois: I will ask my question again. Can you assure us that Preston Manning is not currently being investigated by SIRC or that he was not investigated in the past?
Mr. Courtois: No.
Mr. Langlois: Ah, now I have an answer.
Mr. Courtois: It all depends on how you ask the question. I tell you that the file Ms Meredith is referring to was not an investigation of Mr. Manning.
Mr. Langlois: Decoding your question - it seems we need a decoder now that we operate the world of the electronic highway - I take it that Mr. Manning may well be the subject of an electronic investigation or have been the subject of one in the past, regardless of the file we have been given.
They have been doing a snow-job on us for months trying to get us to believe that there had been no eavesdropping on or infiltration of the Reform Party.
.1650
We are being dished out the same stuff, we are hearing the same thing about the leader of the Bloc Québécois, a member of the Privy Council and one of your colleagues on the Privy Council.
Mr. Courtois: I would go so far as to say that what you have just added is in bad faith. You are putting words in my mouth. You say this was done as a snow-job. This is not what we discussed at all. You know what we discussed. We discussed a specific file bearing the name ``Preston Manning'', which dealt with another matter. In all fairness to Mr. Manning, we said that it did not deal with an investigation of him.
Mr. Langlois: So this file had nothing to do with an investigation of Mr. Manning. This means that by digging a bit further, we might find a file on Preston Manning. You are not able to deny this. You say you cannot answer. Is that what you are saying?
Mr. Courtois: I said I would not answer when someone asked me if an individual was being investigated by the SIRC.
Mr. Langlois: One thing is clear today. We can conclude that we have reason to think thatMr. Manning and Mr. Bouchard are currently being investigated by the SIRC, and you cannot deny it.
Mr. Courtois: If you want to go on living in your imaginary world, go right ahead. But this is not what I said at all.
Mr. Langlois: We're not talking about Astérix, Tintin or some other comic strip character. I am talking about the leader of the official Opposition in the House of Commons and of the leader of the third party in the House of Commons. I am not talking about imaginary characters.
Mr. Courtois: What are you asking about them?
Mr. Langlois: I am asking whether, to your personal knowledge, Mr. Manning, the Reform Party, Mr. Lucien Bouchard and the Bloc Québécois are currently being investigated by the SIRC or have been investigated.
Mr. Courtois: I have told you I cannot answer this question.
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, I table my motion.
[English]
The Chair: That's fine.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: I move that the sub-committee adjourn until tomorrow morning at 9:30 a.m. and that the witness, Jacques Courtois, be recalled at that time to justify why he should not be found guilty of contempt of Parliament because of his categorical refusal to answer questions put to him with respect to the SIRC's present or past surveillance of Lucien Bouchard, member for Lac-Saint-Jean, a member of the Privy Council of Canada and leader of the official Opposition, and of Preston Manning, leader of the Reform Party of Canada.
[English]
The Chair: I have heard the motion. I should indicate, Mr. Langlois, that there are reasons why I might rule it out of order, at least for the time being: number one, absence of notice; number two, incorporation of a resolution referring to contempt.
This is a matter for the House and not the committee. The committee, of course, in this circumstance, if we were to proceed, would report the failure to answer to the House and request...at that point, allege contempt.
I'm not going to say anything. I'm just going to ask if colleagues would like to intervene at this point. Mr. Wappel.
Mr. Wappel: I would simply like to know, Mr. Chairman, if the motion is in order. I believe we have to have notice.
The Chair: The clerk informs me that the subcommittee does not have a notice requirement because we have not adopted the same rule as the parent committee.
Mr. Wappel: So the motion is in order in terms of time. Is the motion in order in terms of words?
The Chair: In my view, I would find that the motion is not in order because of the way it characterizes contempt, and it is not in order for this committee to find contempt.
Here we are back into form and substance. The substance of the motion is something that colleagues may wish to talk about. I'm going to rule that the motion is out of order, certainly in its form.
Mr. Wappel: Then that's the end of it. Mr. Chairman, I'm ready to ask questions on the estimates.
The Chair: Okay.
Mr. Wappel: Thank you.
.1655
On page 7 of the estimates, we see the financial requirements of SIRC. In your opening comments, Monsieur Courtois, you said that the budget is diminishing year by year, yet we see that the budget has in fact increased by $6,000. I think that's accurate. I wonder if you could explain why it is that the budget increased by $6,000 at a time when you're saying that the budget is diminishing year by year.
While you're explaining that, could you explain the meaning of the phrase ``an increase of $50,000 to replace translation envelope''? It's about as ambiguous a sentence as I've ever heard.
Mr. Courtois: The increase is due to this. First of all, there was a decrease of $36,000 related to the budget reduction exercise of previous years. There was a decrease of $8,000 related to the salary increment freeze. But there was an increase of $50,000 to replace the translation envelope. Heretofore all our translation was contributed by the government and we did not have to pay anything for it. They cut that service out and we now have to contract out, and it costs us about $50,000 per year for translation.
Mr. Wappel: Which you have been given by the government.
Mr. Courtois: No, they used to give us the service -
Mr. Wappel: It's part of your estimates.
Mr. Courtois: You have the estimate of $1,415,000 against $1,409,000.
Mr. Wappel: Right.
Mr. Courtois: That's the $6,000 difference.
Mr. Wappel: Yes. So in fact your budget has gone up, not down.
Mr. Courtois: In fact our expenses have gone up, because a service we got for free we now have to pay for.
Mr. Wappel: I'm sorry. I'll try to be clearer. The estimates to be provided by the government, by the people of Canada, for 1995-96 for SIRC, which we presumably have already approved -
Mr. Courtois: That's right.
Mr. Wappel: So we're now talking after the fact, since we voted on this. We have already approved $1,415,000 for 1995-96 for SIRC.
Last year, I take it, we approved $1,409,000. So we in fact are approving $6,000 more than we approved last year. That seems to me, no matter how you cut the cake, to be an increase in budget.
Mr. Courtois: The $1,409,000 was a forecast. The increase of $6,000 is due to the additional expense of $50,000.
Mr. Wappel: I understand that, but -
Mr. Archdeacon: I would add, Mr. Wappel, that up until now we've been getting approximately $51,000 worth of translation services free, and that money has been allocated by Parliament to the Privy Council Office, where they paid for the translation rather than us. We just sent stuff to the Privy Council Office and they translated it.
So in fact we've had that $51,000 in our budget all the way along, just as we have $193,000 rent that we don't pay to Public Works because we get it free. If they suddenly decided we would pay for it rather than Public Works, that $193,000 would appear in our estimates. But it wouldn't be an increase in money to us because we would pay it out again.
In fact, the Privy Council Office now has $51,000 less than it used to have for translation services that it then provided to us for free, and they count that money in our estimates. In practical fact, the amount we have for spending on our operations is $44,000 less than it was the previous year. We still use the same translation and the money is now in our budget rather than in the Privy Council general budget. But in fact that $50,000 should be counted in last year's as well. If the same situation had applied last year, our budget last year would have been $1,459,000, and the year before it would have been $50,000 more, and so on.
Mr. Wappel: The bottom line then is that you are operating with $44,000 less than you did last year.
Mr. Archdeacon: Exactly.
Mr. Wappel: That's what I want to get at.
Now, on a couple of terms, on page 6 you say that there will be an annual review of exchanges of information with domestic agencies. What is a domestic agency?
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Mr. Courtois: It's everything in Canada, all government agencies.
Mr. Wappel: It's federal, provincial and municipal. Would that include police forces and things of that nature?
Mr. Courtois: Yes.
Mr. Wappel: Ms Cohen was talking about reviewing the operations of friendly intelligence services. That review is ongoing and is expected to be completed shortly.
Can you tell us what friendly intelligence services you are reviewing?
Mr. Courtois: No.
Mr. Wappel: Why not?
Mr. Courtois: First, I don't think it would serve any useful purpose. Second, if the press anywhere said we're investigating the intelligence service of country A, B or C, those countries might take exception to that.
Mr. Wappel: I don't think SIRC is investigating. You're reviewing the activities of friendly intelligence services.
Mr. Courtois: I think they would think it's an unfriendly gesture to declare that we're reviewing their operations in Canada.
Mr. Wappel: On the other hand, you could argue it's kind of nice because at least we identified them as friendly.
Mr. Courtois: I'll call on you to explain it to them.
Mr. Wappel: What is a friendly intelligence service as opposed to an unfriendly one? Can you give us an example of an unfriendly intelligence service?
Mr. Courtois: I would say Britain is a friendly one and Cuba is an unfriendly one.
Mr. Wappel: To your knowledge, have any friendly intelligence services carried out improper activities in Canada?
Mr. Courtois: I don't believe so.
Mr. Wappel: Mr. Chairman, we heard a lot during the last Parliament about the Mossad and Mr. Ostrovsky. We had some hearings about that. There were quite a few allegations made at that time. I blurted out the name of a friendly intelligence service there. Is there anything along those lines? Are there any allegations being made by people?
Mr. Courtois: Primarily we want to know that they're not here incognito operating covertly. We want to make sure that they're in contact with CSIS and that they do everything in cooperation with CSIS.
To answer your first question, I haven't heard anything derogatory about Mossad.
Mr. Wappel: Here's my final question, Mr. Chairman. You were just getting into this. What is the law and what is the policy vis-à-vis the activities of friendly agencies within Canada?
Mr. Courtois: I don't think there's any law. The policy is that they have to cooperate with CSIS.
Mr. Wappel: So somebody has to know they're here -
Mr. Courtois: That's right.
Mr. Wappel: - somebody has to know what they're doing -
Mr. Courtois: Right.
Mr. Wappel: - and presumably they have to be given permission to do that by the appropriate authorities here in Canada.
Mr. Courtois: That's right.
Mr. Wappel: And it would be considered severely unfriendly if a friendly service was operating an intelligence service -
Mr. Courtois: Covertly.
Mr. Wappel: - covertly in Canada.
Mr. Courtois: Right. Definitely.
Mr. Wappel: Thank you.
The Chair: Ms Meredith for five minutes.
Ms Meredith: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to go back to something Mr. Archdeacon threw at me before my five minutes ran out. That was that I had asked the same question twice, that you'd answered me twice, and that you were going to give me the same answer the third time.
As much as I appreciate the fact that those questions were asked in camera, I'm going to go back to a press conference held on December 16, when a similar type of question was asked of Mr. Robert. He was asked whether or not the foreign government was contributing or whether there was any evidence or any suggestion that the foreign government was contributing to any other political party.
Can you answer that question that Mr. Robert answered on December 16? Was it suggested that any other political parties were receiving contributions from foreign governments?
Mr. Archdeacon: Do you mind if I rely on my memory? I remember that there was an implication involving the foreign government with a number of other MPs in other parties. I think the number was 24. There was no indication from the rather large file on this foreign government that there was any movement of money towards those people. It was that some people were being paid to try to influence those people, not by giving them money, but by talking to them.
.1705
So there was no precise knowledge of what those MPs did or of who said what to them. There was considerable knowledge only about what was being planned for other people to say to them and about what those other people were being paid to say to them. Those were the 24 people.
There was far more money available than $75,000. A little over a quarter of a million dollars was transferred to this country to be used in the election campaign. The only place identified where there was a possibility of money being used - but only $45,000 - or where it was in the atmosphere was a possible donation to the campaign against a particular enemy of that country, and that was Joe Clark.
Ms Meredith: So we have it out on the table that there were 24 members of Parliament this foreign government was attempting to influence.
Mr. Archdeacon: That's a rough number.
Ms Meredith: And yet, out of the blue, for some reason, an investigation is done on the leader of a party that at that time hadn't run in any election and that had no power and no influence. An investigation was opened for that individual and not for the members of Parliament who were also considered to be influenced by this foreign government. Are there any files on anybody else?
Mr. Archdeacon: Your own words make it sound silly. You're quite right, it is silly to suggest that there was no investigation of Mr. Manning. He wasn't a member of Parliament and had no influence anywhere. At that time Mr. Manning was important because he happened to be running in Yellowhead. If Joe Blow had been running in Yellowhead, that thing would have been titled Joe Blow. It was an unfortunate error. I know you want to construct an edifice of that error, but it's not possible to do it.
Ms Meredith: The point is that in fact there were 24 members of Parliament who were able to influence government policy who were not investigated and whose names did not, in error, end up in a file for consideration of other options. Was this leader of a political party, who was running in a constituency in Alberta, a threat?
Mr. Archdeacon: No. You make it sound so silly.
Ms Meredith: No. Excuse me. Let me finish. I have the floor.
Mr. Archdeacon: It would be silly.
Ms Meredith: So a file was opened in his name on unreliable information. A file was opened on this individual who was merely the leader of a party, who was considered to be a threat to the party in power, who was not a member of Parliament, and who had no influence in government policy. There is no mention in this file of the reliable source or of the information of the reliable source you have suggested was the factor that caused the file to be opened. There's absolutely no information in this file on that reliable source. Now, if that information was so pertinent to opening the file, why is it not in this document? Why is there no information in this document to support that?
Mr. Archdeacon: In fact, it's because I shouldn't have mentioned it in the first place, but I've told you about it and so there it is.
Ms Meredith: The point is that the information has absolutely nothing to do with Mr. Manning. It has to do with 24 other people who were in the position to influence government policy.
Mr. Archdeacon: No, not at all. I don't know where you get that from. I didn't say that at all. I said the information that came in was that a considerable amount of money had been sent to Canada for the agents of that foreign country to use in the electoral campaign in this country.
Ms Meredith: Okay. We have that unreliable source telling somebody that $45,000 - and this came after a second meeting - was going to Mr. Manning. It's interesting that after the file was closed and after the investigation was over, I was led to believe by comments that was the end of it. Yet I've got a document here dated September 12, 1990, which is a considerable time after the file was closed, which says, and it's the only thing still left in print and that hasn't been deleted:
- Regarding the funding of Preston MANNING's election campaign, we have not yet been
successful in acquiring this information. Please be assured our delay in this matter does not
reflect a disinterest but rather the reality of limited resources.
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There's another document from September 7. All I see here, from this blacked-out thing, is item number 5, which says:
- is HQ/Ottawa Region in any better position to comment on the unknown source of funding to
MANNING's electoral campaign.
Mr. Archdeacon: I assume you're making an allegation that it was done illegally because there wasn't a TARC one. As you know, at that point the investigation was entitled ``First name unknown, last name unknown, unknown contributor to Preston Manning's campaign''. So the title was very different at that point.
So you can't be talking about investigating Preston Manning at that point because you have the new title, and your whole point has been that it was the old title.
Ms Meredith: The title was attached to a file that was closed -
The Chair: Ms Meredith.
Ms Meredith: - three months after the investigation was over. The investigation was over.
The Chair: You're well over your time, and I was hoping to let our witness complete the answer, then move to another question.
Have we finished the answer? Mr. Courtois? Mr. Archdeacon? You say yes.
Back to Ms Cohen for five minutes.
Ms Cohen: At the bottom of page 1 of the program outlook document, you say that a major aspect of resource management for SIRC is the ability to undertake major projects as they arise.
As an example of that, you talk about the Heritage Front affair, which you say had an estimated total cost of over $200,000. When you have something like the Heritage Front affair - and maybe we'll just use that investigation as the example - what kind of impact does that investigation have on the overall functions SIRC would normally have been carrying out?
Does it take up time? Does it take up money? What happens to the rest of your functions in such a small agency?
Mr. Courtois: The $200,000 is mostly salaries of the staff involved. There are costs for translation, photocopying and printing, but the bulk of it is $200,000.
Ms Cohen: We would have spent that anyway because those people would be there. Right?
Mr. Courtois: They were paid anyway. That's right. We did not neglect complaints. We think complaints are a very important factor in our functions, but certain research activities and certain additional work was delayed or was pushed forward.
Ms Cohen: So you have to reprioritize. It's such a small agency. You don't have thousands of people working for you so -
Mr. Courtois: Fourteen.
Ms Cohen: - in such a small agency, does the advent of something that reaches crisis proportions, in the sense that it's there, it's on the front page and it has to be dealt with today, cause big organizational problems for you, or can you work around it and still get all of your other work done?
Mr. Courtois: Not particularly. As I said, we did stop certain investigations and certain work that was not of an urgent matter. We gave priority to the more urgent matters like complaints. They were not affected at all.
Ms Cohen: Okay. In the program outlook document at page 2, you talk about making use of seminars to obtain advice from outside experts and that sort of thing. Are these seminars for your board members or for your staff?
Mr. Courtois: No. These were seminars with outsiders, with people from academe, and with specialists in intelligence matters. We would organize a seminar here. Certain members would attend. It was not compulsory. We wanted to get a view of what was going on in the outside world.
But it was expensive. We had to rent a room and provide meals and travel expenses. Now we try to simplify it by having one-to-one meetings. When we have a monthly meeting, if we have a luncheon, we invite one of them and discuss those points.
.1715
Ms Cohen: Are you satisfied, though, that members of SIRC are still able to obtain the outside information if it's more general; educational information you need -
Mr. Courtois: As of now, yes.
Ms Cohen: On page 4 of the program outlook document you talk about doing more of the work in relation to investigations of complaints and hearings in-house. You say you're not using outside counsel as much. You use pre-hearing meetings to focus issues to be dealt with at your hearings. Has all of this worked without taking away from your ability to do your job?
Mr. Courtois: Yes...and while you're on that document, if you go back one page, you'll see that our budget estimates seem to be way over what they are. It's not millions in the margin, it's thousands.
Ms Cohen: Thank you.
I'm concerned to know whether you think at this point changing your practices is having any impact on your thoroughness or your efficiency.
Mr. Courtois: No.
Ms Cohen: So you think you're still able to produce results without -
Mr. Courtois: Without being unduly affected, yes.
Ms Cohen: What about complainants who come to you? Are you receiving any complaints about the timeliness of your investigations?
Mr. Courtois: We have some. The delay can be not only because of us. Somebody sends us a complaint. They have to send it to SIRC, get a reply from SIRC; then we get it. Then some people are difficult to reach, witnesses and so on. There may have been some who were a bit unduly delayed, but not really.
The Chair: If colleagues don't mind, I have one question. It doesn't relate directly to any of the subject-matters discussed here.
As SIRC will be aware, the House of Commons and the government have decided to create an oversight mechanism for the Communications Security Establishment. At present they are reviewing options. One of the options would be to have SIRC undertake that responsibility. There are some very good reasons why it might. There are some reasons why it might not. I take a particular interest in the subject area myself. I'm wondering whether SIRC itself has touched on the issue at all at the staff level, as to whether or not it might be a suitable body to undertake oversight of CSE in addition to its oversight role of CSIS and its role on the complaint procedures.
Mr. Courtois: Would that involve an increased budget?
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. Courtois: I won't make commitments unless we get it.
The Chair: I raise it as more than a question of academic interest. If you have looked at it, I'd be interested in your views now, for the record. If you have not looked at it, perhaps you might, for the benefit of the Solicitor General and the government, if they have an interest in looking into it. If you don't, I'll certainly send you something I've prepared on the subject.
Mr. Courtois: Mr. Chairman, we have discussed it informally from time to time. It obviously comes up. I think from the staff point of view the best-qualified person would be Mr. Archdeacon.
The Chair: I would note before you answer that I think it came up in a recommendation in about 1990. There was some reference to that.
Anyway, please proceed.
Mr. Archdeacon: That's right, Mr. Chairman.
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One of the advantages of having somebody else do it is there will be a good deal of interest in the secrets, etc., of CSE, and there'll be another target out there for the media and for anybody else who.... It distracts attention from us a little. We would have some company out there. We're very alone at the moment. Everybody attacks us. The government tells us we should on no account reveal secrets. Everybody says we are asking everybody to accept everything on faith. So it's quite a difficult slot to be in. If there were another group of people out there, then that would be nice company.
I think we would need a very small increase in our budget. From what I know of CSE - and this is my own personal experience in the past - I don't think we would need more than two people. But I wouldn't want to be held to that. We might even need just one. We would have to look into it.
We certainly have no desire to build an empire. I'm sure we would cooperate with whomever does it. Between us, we would cover all the gaps and cracks. It could be done as well by someone else. I think it would be more costly by someone else, but that's the only disadvantage.
The Chair: You think you might be able to do it for an extra $250,000?
Mr. Archdeacon: Less than that, Mr. Chairman.
The Chair: That's my view. Thank you.
Mr. Langlois.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, I would like to introduce a motion.
I move that the sub-committee submit a report to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs to ask that committee to report to the House of Commons the fact the the witness, Mr. Jacques Courtois, has refused in a marked and systematic way to answer specific questions regarding the surveillance by the CSIS of Mr. Lucien Bouchard, leader of the official opposition, and ofMr. Preston Manning, leader of the Reform Party of Canada, and their respective political parties.
[English]
The Chair: Colleagues, you've heard the motion. I don't have prima facie reason to rule it out of order. Our witnesses are still here. Could I suggest we complete our work with the witnesses - it'll probably be fairly soon - and then deal with the motion? Is that acceptable?
Mr. Langlois, we'll certainly come back to this as soon as we can wrap up our questioning, which should be fairly soon.
Ms Meredith: I want to get something on record, Mr. Chair. I just want to give a brief summary of the past ten months from a Reform Party perspective. It may seem we take this whole Heritage Front report personally, and we do.
We have been provided with evidence that the Security Intelligence Service violated their own policy in their investigations of groups that had contact with the Reform Party. In its review of the Heritage Front affair, the Security Intelligence Review Committee has misled us as a parliamentary subcommittee and by extension the Canadian people. They withheld vital information from us and ignored information that was inconsistent with their theories. When faced with questions they could not answer, they quickly hid behind the need for national security.
SIRC calls itself the eyes and ears of Parliament and the Canadian people. I think a more appropriate analogy would be ``see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil''. While we expected the arrogance of the political hacks appointed to the committee, I was somewhat distressed to see that same attitude filtered down to the bureaucracy.
I'm specifically addressing comments made by Mr. Archdeacon at the December 16 press conference. For a civil servant to mock a political leader, as Mr. Archdeacon did when he stated that Mr. Manning likely believed in Loch Ness monsters, is completely inappropriate. It is indicative of the arrogance and contempt in which SIRC holds the Reform Party and the entire parliamentary system.
If CSIS and SIRC had pointed out the errors of their ways and assured us that measures had been taken to prevent such lapses from occurring in the future, I don't think we would have had any complaint. But they seem to think there is nothing that needs correcting, and this really troubles me.
They continue to deny that CSIS investigated Manning or the Reform Party, yet CSIS has an extremely accurate history of the Reform Party and its report shows that CSIS monitored the Reform Party right from the very founding assembly through its investigation of Paul Fromm in 1987 and 1988. In 1989 and 1990 we had the TARC investigation of Mr. Manning. In 1991 to 1993 we had CSIS investigating the Heritage Front, and by extension the activities of the Reform Party.
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As a result of the manner in which SIRC has handled this entire issue, the Reform Party of Canada is forced to withdraw any and all support for the Security Intelligence Review Committee.
This Parliament is now faced with a situation where only one of three official parties in the House of Commons has any faith in SIRC. Their entire existence therefore becomes redundant, since the government already has the inspector general to monitor CSIS on its behalf.
It is the opinion of the Reform Party that since SIRC has lost the tripartisan confidence of this House, it has no alternative but to resign. Measures should be taken through the summer to have the national security subcommittee assume the role of Parliament's watchdog of CSIS.
I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for giving me the opportunity to suggest that $1.5 million could be better spent elsewhere.
Mr. Courtois: Just for the record, I take the strongest objection to the statement byMs Meredith that the committee misled the Reform Party or anybody else. As for her other comments, they speak for themselves.
The Chair: You certainly have an opportunity to respond to that statement by Ms Meredith. I'm sure it was in the form of a question.
I guess that is your reply.
That being the case, then, colleagues, we can thank our witnesses for appearing. We will then continue publicly with the motion by Mr. Langlois.
We will continue with the public business of Mr. Langlois, with his motion. When we've completed that, we will deal with the item of business I described earlier.
Mr. Langlois, at this point, if there are no other procedural interventions on the part of colleagues, you are free to put your case for the motion.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Do you want me to read the motion again, Mr. Chairman?
[English]
The Chair: Would colleagues like the motion reread by Mr. Langlois?
Yes, please reread it.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: I'll read it very slowly to make it easier for the interpretors and I will give it to the clerk.
I move that the sub-committee report to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs and ask that committee to report to the House of Commons the fact that a witness, Mr. Jacques Courtois, has refused, in a marked and systematic way, to answer specific questions regardingthe surveillance by the CSIS of Mr. Lucien Bouchard, leader of the official Opposition, and ofMr. Preston Manning, leader of the Reform Party of Canada, and their respective political parties.
I don't think that a long debate will be necessary on this motion because the credibility of the sub-committee is at stake. We must show that we are not puppets.
On various occasions during our public hearings, witnesses have refused to answer our questions, sometimes acting in an arrogant way and some other times, just wearing a smug smile. When they were pushed into a corner, the situation was always the same. They became evasive or just plain refused to answer - and I'm not referring to hypothetical questions, but to very specific ones.
Today, I have put the same questions regarding Mr. Bouchard at least six times and I repeatedly have asked the same questions regarding Mr. Manning; the witness, as has been the case since early September, has had the same attitude.
Were we not to report what has been happening here to the Standing Committee, the credibility of this sub-committee would be seriously compromised and, in the future, witnesses could answer anything to us with impunity, knowing fully that no action will be taken against them.
.1730
[English]
Mr. Wappel: As so often seems be the case in my life, the most exciting things seem to happen when I go to the washroom. I apparently missed this little episode here in the brief time I was indisposed.
I gather, from subsequent questions and your comments, it was asked whether Mr. Bouchard was under investigation by CSIS, either in the past or the present. I assume all of this has arisen from that.
Of course I have not had an opportunity to examine the CSIS Act with a view to looking at that question. I was kind of interested in your comments and how, by the process of elimination, one could determine exactly who was being investigated by simply asking the question and being told ``no, no, no'', until you got to somebody who would say he or she couldn't answer that. Of course, the answer would obviously then be yes.
I'm not inclined to support the motion. I'm certainly not one of those who likes to see anybody hide behind a technicality. I've had my differences with SIRC on its interpretation, for example, of a section 54 report - who it has to be released to and that sort of thing. I'm just looking for a solution, since this committee won't work if we get partisan or overly partisan for overly long.
I'm just wondering if over the course of the summer it might not be appropriate to have a look at the legalities of a question such as that; whether we feel as a committee it would be a breach of the CSIS Act, in which case the question should not properly have been put. If it's a proper question, then we could indicate that view to SIRC and ask for its legal reasons why it does not propose to go along with our views. Then both sides would have to report back to the full justice committee and have an open debate thereon.
As the motion stands at the present time, I would not want to prejudge what might end up being an improper question because it breaches the CSIS Act.
Ms Meredith: I think the problem we have to deal with, and certainly the Solicitor General is going to have to deal with, is how a committee such as this, which is supposed to be the watchdog for Parliament, can continue its job when it does not have the confidence of two out of the three parties that make up Parliament. It does not have the confidence of the Bloc and the Reform parties. How can it continue to function as the eyes and ears of Parliament? It's impossible for it to do its job, and somebody has to address that.
Perhaps this motion is not the way to address that, but we cannot continue operating over the next two or three years under this kind of system where the committee does not have the confidence of two out of the three major parties in Parliament. If we don't deal with it in this motion, how are we going to present that issue to the Solicitor General so he can deal with it?
Mrs. Cowling (Dauphin - Swan River): It seems to me we've known for a long time on this committee that we could ultimately come up against a question that we as a group felt we needed or wanted the answer to that wouldn't be answered. We've discussed the procedure and we've discussed how to deal with it. Once the issue has partisan overtones it becomes very difficult to deal with it as a group. It's very serious. The question itself is not, in my view, as serious as the mechanism of what we're about to undertake, so I would like to do that very carefully.
It seems to me we have three alternatives. One is to accept Mr. Wappel's suggestion. Another is to just have the vote on this question. I guess those are the only two alternatives. I was going to suggest as a third one that we just refer the issue to the justice committee and let it deal with it. But it would then have to deal from transcripts and that sort of thing. Ultimately, someone or a group of us would have to tell the justice committee what our view of this is.
.1735
I don't know. We're biting off a lot if it's for the sake of partisan pleasure here.
Ms Meredith: I think it goes far deeper than partisan pleasure. How can you have a group - of which we're a part - that's a watchdog of Parliament with no confidence in the agency? It's as simple as that. This can continue year after year.
Mr. Wappel: First of all, we have a very specific motion in front of us that we have to deal with. We either vote on it or come up with some compromise.
To answer Ms Meredith, the apparent lack of confidence of the Reform Party in SIRC arises directly out of the Heritage Front affair. We will be dealing with the Heritage Front affair. We will be making a report. By way of either consensus or minority, Ms Meredith and the Reform Party can put their issues directly into that report, which I have no doubt the Solicitor General and the bureaucrats will read and consider. Whether they accept it or not is another matter.
I think there is definitely a vehicle whereby the two opposition parties can bring their concerns forward to the Solicitor General, CSIS, SIRC and Parliament. That is indeed a larger question than what flows from the motion.
Perhaps we could look to the chair for some guidance. I don't really see any way out of this, other than by voting on the motion, or perhaps dealing with it the way I suggested, with whatever other modifications others would like to put.
The Chair: I'd like to add a couple of things for information. Number one, most of you may recall that SIRC itself has requested a legal opinion on the subject of its obligation to answer questions put to it in Parliament. It indicated to us some weeks ago that it would be ready by June 1995. I didn't put the question to it today and none of you put the question either. But that opinion would be forthcoming.
The Clerk of the Committee: The end of June, I think.
The Chair: In any event, that is precisely the issue on which they have requested advice from counsel.
It's an issue we have put to SIRC, through your chair, previously in very bold terms, and I know we've discussed it among ourselves. When the times comes to put a question that we must have an answer to, hopefully we'll all be together on it. So that opinion's coming, and I think it would be best if we waited and hopefully have that opinion shared with us. It is not under an obligation to share the opinion. It has indicated to us it will share with us the opinion it receives from its counsel. So that's coming down the pipeline fairly soon.
Secondly, the justice committee itself, as I understand the agenda for this month, will not be meeting again for quite a significant period of time; probably not until September 18. So there doesn't appear to be a need to rush this particular motion through to get it to the justice committee this week. Our time for doing that has passed.
Last but not least, getting back to form and substance, the substance of this is easily addressed using other options and we can talk about that informally later. In other words, the issue of whether or not the leader or leaders of parties in Parliament are ensnared in some particular CSIS investigation, whether it is foreign-influenced, Mexico and Canada, Argentina or any country, whether they may have been somehow involved in an investigation.... I think that can be addressed using other options. It doesn't have to be done on the floor of the committee. I'd like to think that SIRC and CSIS and the leaders of the parties in the House could get that organized themselves.
.1740
That I think deals with the substance.
There's the other lingering issue about compellability to answer questions to this committee. I suggest that this latter issue of form, of SIRC or anybody answering questions, be put over until we have a chance to consider it fully given all of the other input that's out there.
We have parliamentary counsel input, which all of you have read. We have the CSIS Act, section 18 and other sections, including the Privy Council oath that SIRC members have taken. We have other general parliamentary law. We have the views of the Speaker, the views of the previous House management committee, taken up on a privilege motion in the last Parliament, etc. We have a lot of material that ideally should form part of our collective consideration when we take up a motion dealing with compellability. I would commend to the committee that we not attempt to move this quickly to the justice committee without doing our homework and without having considered all of the issues, including the opinion that's still in the pipeline with SIRC.
I would like to see the matter tabled. I'm not afraid to deal with it. I don't want to walk away from the form part of it, the matter of compellability. We know that we'll have to cross that bridge some time. I'm suggesting that the matter be tabled, or members may wish to vote on it.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, through you, I would like to tell my colleague, Mr. Wappel, that personally, I do not trust SIRC, especially because of the report it tabled on the Heritage Front. At first, SIRC did not seem to reflect the membership of the 35th Parliament. There is no one on this committee who was appointed on the recommendation of the leader of the official Opposition.
In fact, until very recently, most of the committee members had been appointed on the recommendation of the then Prime Minister, Mr. Mulroney, which raised some doubts as to their credibility.
My original fears were confirmed during our hearings. The witnesses who appeared before us were somewhat contemptuous and knew full well that once a little time had passed, they would be finished with us for two months and they would be left alone. I think they used us, as unassuming individuals, to flout Parliament's authority.
This is not just about the Heritage Front or another particular issue. It is the Security Committee's general attitude toward parliamentarians. I practiced law for a few years and I must say that if they were to appear as witnesses on the witness stand, a judge would have deemed them hostile witnesses long ago and they probably would have been sent to the basement to think for a few hours before coming back later to explain themselves.
The chairman was extremely tolerant. I think that is one of his many qualities. I hope you do not mind if I do not list all of them. I fully agree with the approach suggested by our chairman andMr. Wappel.
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I feel we have reached a point where it would be useless to pursue any activity without first determining where our authority starts and where it ends.
The chairman spoke earlier about the legal opinions we are expecting from the Security Committee. A few months ago, we heard the legal opinion of our Parliamentary council on Parliament's authority to demand answers it felt entitled to. There are clearly two differing opinions, and I would like to point out to you that it is a very serious matter when members of a committee, the Security Committee, which is there first and foremost to serve Parliament, seek legal advice to avoid answering questions from that same Parliament. There is widespread disquiet in this country, Mr. Chairman: this country's servants, people who were appointed to do so and who are under oath to do so, refuse to co-operate with us, as though we were their enemies.
It is clear that no bridge has been built over the past few months. Many olive branches were held out, but virtually none were grabbed.
If you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Wappel and my colleagues, had a more comprehensive approach - and you gave us a good idea of discussion topics for the Justice and Legal Affairs Committe - I could support a motion that does not necessarily have to be tabled today, but that could be debated and be agreeable to most of us. That could be our first priority when we resume our work, and we could start afresh and leave our political partisanship aside. This is a politically-charged issue, not a partisan one, but a political one, Mr. Chairman, if we are to determine the extent of our parliamentary authority here in Canada.
If my colleagues agree, I shall withdraw my motion if it is understood that we could work more informally on a joint motion which would enable us to continue this discussion.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you. That's probably a good move here. I hope the clerk will take note of this and ensure that this particular instance of non-answer will be included in our future discussions, because there have been previous instances where we didn't have answers.
I neglected to mention - this may be cause for rejoicing, perhaps for tears - the Department of Justice has also waded into the issue. It is about to release a comprehensive report or study of that very issue as well.
All of this has come from I guess the work of the last two or three years. The deputy minister had signalled this in a memorandum I read only a couple of weeks ago. I anticipate that will be available in due course.
Ms Meredith: Point of clarification. The Department of Justice is doing a review on this matter on behalf of the government rather than on behalf of Parliament?
The Chair: Yes, the Department of Justice is government.
Ms Meredith: Just to make it clear.
The Chair: I believe they are undertaking it on their own initiative. The deputy minister of justice had appeared before the standing joint committee on scrutiny of regulations to deal with a matter not unrelated to this. Evolving out of that discussion...I'm certainly not privy to what ensued in the Department of Justice, but the note I saw a week or two ago indicates it probably came from that discussion.
That's probably a good thing.
Have we finished with this, Ms Cohen?
Ms Cohen: No, you're being just a little too subtle for me. I don't know what you're talking about right now. Are you saying George Thomson, deputy minister of justice, has, as a result of work with the committee on scrutiny and regulations, decided to get an opinion on the powers that Parliament has to force somebody to answer questions when that somebody has a Privy Council oath? Is that what you're saying?
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The Chair: No. You're very close, but the counsel connection I can't corroborate. All I know is that the deputy minister appeared before the committee on a matter related to the compellability of counsel before parliamentary committees. Related to that was the compellability of everybody else, including civil servants.
Ms Cohen: Whose counsel?
The Chair: This would be Department of Justice counsel to government agencies and ministers.
Ms Cohen: I'm just trying to figure it out.
The Chair: If this will assist you in understanding -
Ms Cohen: Tell me what the problem is.
The Chair: - a lawyer with the Department of Justice seconded to a ministry began acting in the shoes, not of a lawyer but an administrator, a public servant, and was doing work that would be non-counsel work and began dealing with the committee. The committee at some point wanted to hear from this person. The lawyer wrote back and said, ``I can't talk to you, there's a solicitor-client privilege''. The committee said something such as, ``Like hell, you've been dealing with us as a public servant; we want the answers''.
So the lawyer was summoned and the deputy minister of justice came with him. The difficulties were resolved satisfactorily. The answers were given and the problem was resolved, but at the same time as the deputy minister came, we in the committee also saw a memorandum prepared by the Privy Council that was directed to public servants and purported to give them advice on when they should or should not answer questions in Parliament. At the same time, the parliamentary counsel provided an opinion to the standing joint committee on the same issue of compellability. While the matter at the standing joint committee was dealt with satisfactorily, the Department of Justice has moved into this other phase of study, and their report, I gather, is going to be made available fairly soon.
Ms Cohen: Why don't we just ask every lawyer in Canada for an opinion and we can compare them?
The Chair: The point to be made is that it's an issue that has not been satisfactorily resolved here in Parliament.
Ms Cohen: What if they get legal aid?
The Chair: Now, we as a committee, of course, will have to make a decision, as will the justice committee. It's inevitable; some committee is going to have to take the lead on this and settle some of these issues.
This matter is tabled for us, and we can now go in camera and touch on the other business items. It's getting a little late.
[Translation]
Mr. Langlois: Mr. Chairman, before sitting in camera, I would like to apologize to Mrs. Cohen, whom I inadvertently called Mrs. Barnes at the beginning of our meeting.
I would just like to say that I think my colleagues, Mrs. Cohen and Mrs. Barnes, are both excellent and very competent parlamentarians and jurists. Mistaking one for the other in no way diminishes the high esteem I hold both of them in.
I hope Mrs. Cohen accepts my apology. I probably made the mistake in the heat of the moment.
[English]
The Chair: I hope they're both flattered, as opposed to the opposite.
We'll then adjourn this public part of the meeting now.
[Proceedings continue in camera]