Is Bill C-51 bad for Canadian business?

In a recently published letter in the National Post, 60 business leaders have predicted dire consequences for Canada’s democracy and “business climate” should Bill C-51 be passed into law (‘C-51 is bad for business,’ April 21). It is just the latest iteration of a critique that has been hurled against successive pieces of anti-terrorism legislation since 9/11 warning of such tribulations. But Canada’s democracy is hardly feeble. It has remained intact despite the passage of those bills and it seems unlikely now to succumb to rupture from C-51.

But the recent missive has added something new to the mix. The economy. The authors warn that fearful investors, supposedly spooked by the “reputation” of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), might be deterred from doing business in Canada due to “commonplace” censorship; possible mistakes on the no-fly list; “open ended” covert activities and other projected malefactions facilitated by C-51. They conclude that the government must scrap this “reckless, dangerous and ineffective legislation.”

The argument that C-51 could significantly impact Canada’s economy seems far fetched. It would require a near perfect storm of the sometimes hypothetical or apocalyptic predictions regarding C-51, which to the mind of this author, seems improbable.

But even so, this argument is perplexing. Why would the grim new order in the post-C-51 Canada foreseen by these signatories, be bad for Canadian business? After all, the international business community has never demurred from pursuing opportunities with the most oppressive of regimes. And the democratically challenged Canada they envision would certainly not fare worse in attracting investment than, let’s say, Saudi Arabia, Russia or China.

These regimes are besieged by investors despite their deplorable records on human rights. If investors have not been dissuaded by the likes of Saudi Arabia’s mukhabarat or Iran’s IRGC, it seems unlikely that a dread of CSIS would impede these same intrepid entrepreneurs from pursuing billions of dollars in Canadian profits. So there seems to be reason for optimism about foreign investment in a post-C-51 Canada.

Furthermore, even if investors did become queasy, they will likely find themselves struck by similar nausea in other Western countries — including those they hail from. Because C-51 is reflective of similar measures already enacted in many other democracies, which in some cases have gone further than Canada’s proposed law. Both the U.K. and Australia for instance have taken more aggressive steps regarding Internet service providers (ISPs) and the removal of terrorist materials. And as noted by Kim Carlson of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and a critic of C-51, Canada’s proposal would have more safeguards than those two countries.

Similarly, C-51’s provisions regarding the “advocacy of terrorism” are milder in various respects to statutes prohibiting the “glorification of terror” in Britain and France. And as for the new muscularity afforded CSIS, virtually all of our allies have already given their respective intelligence bodies these types of powers. Even countries like Norway and Finland, not noted for their aggressive posturing on security issues, have provided their agencies with similar mandates. Therefore, even if this predicted “climate change” would come to pass, it will be a global phenomenon and Canada should remain competitive with other democracies contending with the same “environmental” obstacles.

But even if one were to grant all the projections posited in this recent letter, its unqualified opposition to C-51 still seems terribly shortsighted. No sector stands more to lose financially from terrorism than the business community. Since 9/11 the targeting of this sector has been a strategic terrorist imperative.

The assaults on the World Trade Center; the slaughter in India’s business centre Mumbai; the thwarted plans of the Toronto 18 (which included an attack on Toronto’s business district); and the attacks on Kenyan malls, to name a few, were designed, not only to kill, but to target countries by under- mining their economies. Put plainly by Osama Bin Laden, “The enemy can be defeated by attacking its economic centre.” This tenet was evidenced just recently by threats from Somali terrorists — not against synagogues, churches or MPs — but against malls in England, the U.S. and Canada.

The consequences of terrorism therefore are not restricted to rubble and funerals. Terrorism and its related enterprises cost Canada tens of billions of dollars yearly while the global economy has expended and lost trillions. And if perchance some Canadian businesses can absorb these costs with minimal consequence, they would likely fare less well in the wake of a significant domestic terrorist incident even a fraction in magnitude of those mentioned above. The implications, as noted by the terrorist who recently threatened our malls, “one could only imagine.”

To assume otherwise is another example of commentary within a country that has never experienced the human and financial aftershock of a major terrorist calamity on its soil. And perhaps it explains the pervasive underestimation of the terrorist threat in much of the critique; the summary dismissal of C-51 as essentially useless; and the disregard of counter-terrorism experts and other sober notables like former Supreme Court Justice John Major, who believe these measures are essential tools in the fight against terrorism.

But terrorism is in fact a distinct category of threat recognized by Canadian courts as a “crime unto itself … that has no equal.” And what the 9/11 Commission referred to as a “failure of imagination” can no longer be countenanced. Many economies and industries small and large have been savaged by terrorist onslaughts and it should not require imagination to realize that we are vulnerable to far more than the very limited exploits of “lone wolves.”

The tools in C-51 therefore deserve more tempered consideration by critics given the risk and perhaps the probability that Canada will not escape the attacks seen in other countries. For while legislation can always be revisited at a later date, no act of parliament can reconstitute lives shattered by a terrorist attack. Too many Canadians are already living examples of just how true that is.

The tools in C-51 deserve a more tempered consideration by critics, given the risk that Canada will not escape the attacks seen elsewhere