Fixing the security laws

Of all the legislation the Conservatives brought in during Stephen Harper’s long watch, the draconian Anti-Terrorism Act was arguably the most offensive. It has been widely denounced as an affront to Canada’s Charter of Rights — an example of surveillance-state overreach that gives the security services far more power than they reasonably need to combat terror.

At the same time, the Tories have fiercely resisted calls to give Parliament a strong role making sure that our police, spies and border agents respect the law as they wield their new powers.

It’s good news, then, that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is pushing ahead with plans to bring Parliament into the picture, and to repeal the law’s worst elements. Fixes can’t come too soon.

Parliamentary oversight: Trudeau recently named Liberal MP David McGuinty to play a “leadership role” on a new committee of MPs the government intends to set up to review security-related issues. While the Conservatives are predictably crying foul — saying MPs and security experts weren’t consulted and faulting Trudeau for not letting the new panel elect its own chair — he deserves credit for getting a move on this file.

Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale and McGuinty were in Britain this week looking at its approach. Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee is composed of MPs from the three main parties and members of the House of Lords. It reports directly to Parliament and has a budget of about $2.7 million and a support staff of 13.

The panel provides active “oversight,” not just retrospective “review,” and reports on Britain’s domestic security service, its foreign spies, its signals intelligence and other intelligence- and counter terrorismrelated work of both the government and police. It can look into policy, administration, spending and operational activities, question ministers, review highly classified material and conduct investigations. This democratic oversight gives British citizens a modicum of confidence that security operations are necessary, measured and lawful. The United States, Australia and New Zealand have similar panels.

As the Star has long argued, it’s past time Canada had a watchdog of its own. McGuinty has the credentials to get such a committee up and running. What its exact remit will be, and how it operates, are issues of substance that can be decided after broader consultation with MPs, security experts and the public, as the Conservatives demand. But it’s rich to hear the Tories, who have opposed a panel from the get-go, object on procedural grounds.

It’s good news that Justin Trudeau is pushing ahead with plans to repeal the Anti-Terrorism Act’s worst elements

Fixing the Anti-Terrorism Act: Harper’s signature law is so fatally flawed that the fixes must be more than cosmetic. Trudeau has rightly promised to consult widely with Canadians on striking a better balance between security and civil rights. While the Liberals unwisely choose to vote for the law, they are alert to its “problematic” aspects and intend to rescind them. Now they must deliver.

As a welcome first step, the government plans to roll back an appalling measure that effectively conscripts judges to authorize Canada’s spies to violate the Charter of Rights and other laws. This brings the Charter into jeopardy, undermines the rule of law and subverts the role of judges as guardians of the nation’s rights.

The government also intends to tighten information-sharing by security agencies to better protect citizens’ privacy and safety.

Goodale is reviewing Canada’s no-fly regulations after complaints that children are being held up at airports.

And the Liberals are open to having Parliament review the act after three years, and to impose sunset clauses on some provisions.

How far the new government will roll back the act’s most odious aspects remains to be seen. But it has moral support from former prime ministers, former Supreme Court justices, the Canadian Bar Association and civil libertarians. All regard it as assault on cherished rights. Public opinion, once supportive, has also soured. That gives the Liberals licence to address other concerns as well. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association and others contend that the law overreaches at every stage: By defining threats to the “security of Canada” so broadly that it risks snaring all kinds of activists or dissidents; by letting police detain people on the thin belief that a crime “may” occur; and by making it easier to detain people on security certificates by letting officials withhold information from the special advocates who defend them.

After a shaky start, the Trudeau team appears intent on striking a better balance between security and civil liberties. For that, they deserve to be commended. As the Star has written before, we don’t have to be a police state to be a secure one.