Among Canadian politicians, the debate over a sweeping new anti-terror bill has focused on parliamentary oversight. Both New Democrat and Liberal MPs say Bill C-51 should be amended to let a committee of parliamentarians, sworn to secrecy, monitor Canada’s intelligence agencies. They note that other countries, such as Britain and the U.S., do this. Implicit in their argument is an assumption that legislative oversight deters powerful security services from engaging in illegal or improper activities. But does it? The evidence is not heartening. In fact, most legislative oversight committees have limited authority. Those with greater powers, such as the U.S. Senate and House intelligence committees have, in many cases, given their imprimatur to dubious security practices.
Thomas Walkom, Toronto Star Feb. 4th 2015
Already, there is almost no oversight of CSIS. The Conservatives recently eliminated the inspector general of CSIS. Few people have even heard of this office.
Currently, CSIS has only the after-the-fact overview by of the Security and Intelligence Review Committee or SIRC. SIRC has no jurisdiction over Communications Security Establishment Canada, the notorious intelligence division which does mass electronic wiretapping. SIRC`s critics say it has been shown at the very least to exclude Parliament and be ”totally ineffective.”
A better description would probably be: ”totally complicit.”
For example, in January of this year, former Tory MP Chuck Strall resigned from the SIRC because it was revealed he was also an Enbridge lobbyist for the Northern Gateway Pipeline.
CSIS apparently works with oil and gas companies like Enbridge to provide strategic information to them about pipeline opponents. To investigate alleged spying on environmental activists last September, SIRC appointed businessman and lawyer
Yves Fortier.
But, as the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association quickly noted, Fortier sat on the board of TransCanada Pipelines — the company behind the Keystone XL project.
Current members SIRC are:
- Frances Lankin (past president of the United Way and NDP cabinet minister under Bob Rae’s government);
- Phillipe Couillard (a Doctor who is the current Liberal Premier of Quebec);
- Denise Loiser (who is also a board member of Enbridge);
- Carol Skeleton (a long-time Reform Party/Conservative Party member and Harper’s former minister of Revenue);
- Deborah Grey (the first elected Reform MP who hired a young Harper as legislative assistant in 1989), appointed to replace Strall as interim chair.
There are also two vacant positions the Conservatives have simply not filled. Before Strall, the chair was long-time Tory supporter
Arthur Porter.
Porter is currently under arrest in Panama for fraud. And not just any fraud — one of the biggest fraud investigations in Canadian history linked to a Montreal P-3 hospital.
From 1977 to 1981 the McDonald Commission investigated the abuse of power by the RCMP, including into the Communist Party of Canada, resulting in creating CSIS. The state investigated abuse of police power and responded by creating a body that extended the abuse!
Increasing civilian oversight of CSIS was a major conclusion of the investigation into the rendition and torture of Maher Arar, which also exonerated him.
It’s time for the dismantlement of the RCMP and CSIS, and community control over police and prisons.
