# "Spy overseer's office abolished"



## sean m (28 Apr 2012)

http://www.canada.com/overseer+office+abolished/6525714/story.html

The government did away with an office mandated to oversee the activities of Canada's spies Thursday, a move critics say opens the door to abuses of power by the secretive Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

The Office of the Inspector General of CSIS played a key role in ensuring Canada's spies don't break the law, according to Jez Littlewood, director of the Canadian Centre of Intelligence and Security Studies.

"Essentially, the Office of the Inspector General was the eyes and ears of the minister within CSIS," Littlewood said. "So you're getting less accountability."

Until Thursday there were two oversight bodies watching CSIS: the Inspector General and the Security Intelligence Review Committee (SIRC).

Now, only SIRC remains, the change having been executed in the Budget Implementation Act, tabled in Parliament Thursday. The government quietly slipped the change into its omnibus budget bill, and did not publicly announce the abolishment of the Inspector General's office.

Julie Carmichael, a spokeswoman for Public Safety Minister Vic Toews said the office was abolished to save money.

"It will save taxpayers nearly a million dollars per year," she wrote in an email.

Carmichael said civilian oversight of CSIS will actually be strengthened by the move, with SIRC and Public Safety officials picking up the slack.

"By consolidating review functions into a single organization we will provide more effective review," she wrote. "Public Safety Canada will also assume a greater responsibility for providing independent advice to the minister."

Opposition politicians didn't buy it.

NDP public safety critic Randall Garrison said less rigorous oversight may tempt CSIS agents to push the boundaries of the law.

"We have many examples of the kind of things that happen when agencies sometimes get overzealous in what they're doing," he said. "One of the things that constrains their activities is knowing that there's civilian oversight in place that'll do its job and to make sure that they don't get outside the bounds of what is legal and what's appropriate."

Toews has neglected his duty to oversee the spy agency, Garrison said, since he has not appointed a permanent chair to SIRC.

"What we've got here is another example of a minister not taking seriously his oversight responsibilities with CSIS," he said.

Before he became an MP, interim Liberal leader Bob Rae was once a member of SIRC, and said that committee plays a very different role than the inspector. While SIRC takes public complaints and conducts investigations, he said, the inspector general's office was elbow deep in the day-to-day operations of the spies.

"It double checks and triple checks to make sure the processes are being followed and respected. . . . It's hand on," he said. "The inspector general provides a very, very important role in giving the minister and the government a much clearer sense of where the agency is going and what it's doing."

Rae dismissed suggestions that the move would reinforce civilian oversight of CSIS.

"The statement the minister made that this will mean greater accountability is frankly just nonsensical," he said. "It means less accountability."

Back in the 1980s, said Littlewood — of the Canadian Centre of Intelligence and Security Studies — Canada was seen as a world leader in terms of civilian oversight of its spy agency, largely because it had two oversight bodies watching its spies.

This is no longer the case, he said, now that the Inspector General's office has been done away with, and parliamentarians still play only a negligible role in overseeing CSIS.

"We've fallen behind," he said. "Those gaps are well known."

One of the Inspector General's key tasks has been transferred to SIRC. This is an annual certificate, which examines whether CSIS "has done anything that is not authorized by the CSIS Act, has contravened any Ministerial Directions or has involved the unreasonable or unnecessary use of its powers."

Littlewood predicted SIRC will struggle to do all the oversight work itself.

"SIRC is taking on additional responsibilities without a requisite increase in resources," he said. "They're asking the existing small staff at SIRC to do more with less."


----------



## cupper (28 Apr 2012)

And will that $million a year really save us anything?  :


----------



## brihard (28 Apr 2012)

I feel pretty comfortable speculating that in the long run the extra level of oversight is probably cheaper than the potential legal fees to be incurred by the state through errors in judgment if that oversight is not present.


----------



## GAP (28 Apr 2012)

But now there is deniability......


----------



## PuckChaser (28 Apr 2012)

NDP makes it sound like CSIS is just sitting around waiting to break laws...


----------



## cupper (29 Apr 2012)

PuckChaser said:
			
		

> NDP makes it sound like CSIS is just sitting around waiting to break laws...



They are just waiting for the old days when the RCMP security branch used to burn down barns. :nod:


----------



## aesop081 (29 Apr 2012)

cupper said:
			
		

> They are just waiting for the old days when the RCMP security branch used to burn down barns. :nod:



Your attempts at dramatics aside, i'm not convinced that this move is the end of the world. The reduction does not equate to no oversight.


----------



## brihard (29 Apr 2012)

CDN Aviator said:
			
		

> Your attempts at dramatics aside, i'm not convinced that this move is the end of the world. The reduction does not equate to no oversight.



I don't believe anyone is claiming credibly that it is. I find it concerning, however, than an initial internal layer of oversight is being stripped, if for no better reason that I think it likely that it won't ultimately be cost effective. $1m a year is a pittance, and we are talking about an organization that by its very nature is at considerable risk of walking some rather fuzzy lines, and coming under scrutiny because of it. 

I'm all for an effective, secretive national intelligence apparatus. In order for it to faithfully do its job while respecting both the rights and the concerns of Canadians, however, both internal and external control measures are needed, and this seems like an unjustified elimination of one of those. I don't see the juice as being worth the squeeze on this.


----------



## cupper (30 Apr 2012)

CDN Aviator said:
			
		

> Your attempts at dramatics aside, i'm not convinced that this move is the end of the world. The reduction does not equate to no oversight.



Wasn't trying to be dramatic, more of an attempt at humour.

But still, for the $M that we'd be saving, is losing that extra layer of oversight really worth it?


----------



## overseer (30 Oct 2015)

Ninety eight percent of the critics of denying oversight comes from the Communist countries of respective countries, mainly those of CPUSA, CPGB, Communist Party of Canada. (I am a dues paying member of the Communist Party of Canada). These are organizations who usually, by way of acting as agents of influence, cover up for crimes like espionage, treason, rebellion, sedition, etc. taking the case of the Cambridge Five. Snowden can be categorized under the heading as having committed espionage. He should have been an NSA critic in good faith had he not shared the encryption codes of NSA then disputing the fact that only unwarranted intrusions were all his issues. I should have given Snowden the benefit of the doubt until statistics have shown (Philippine Law Journal) that those who insist on oversight were those who cover up for persons accused of crimes against the state like espionage, treason, etc. CSIS easily identified these persons under their employ, interrogated them and admitted that they were employees in bad faith. So there you go, Snowden defenders are the treasonous kind. ;D


----------



## SupersonicMax (31 Oct 2015)

You realize this thread was last active 3 and a half years ago?


----------



## SeaKingTacco (31 Oct 2015)

It is BusConductor.

Time for him, runs on a different scale...


----------



## conman (1 Nov 2015)

Please don't let me be misunderstood. All possible violations are covered by Canadian Criminal law. And there are times that criminal laws tend to be harsher. Foul plays are covered by municipal and federal laws. And most always it is the degenerate mole who commits them. Now that SIRC leadership is always up for grabs to the most influential commie or Cuban mole, then it is always the Canadian or American patriot who gets the boot. Just consider me as example. Out in the cold ala TINKER, TAILOR, SOLDIER, SPY ;D

I tell you a secret. For any time that I get banned here in this forum, China donated 20 thousand dollars to our charity projects. So thank me for banning myself. ;D


----------



## Fishbone Jones (1 Nov 2015)

conman said:
			
		

> Please don't let me be misunderstood. All possible violations are covered by Canadian Criminal law. And there are times that criminal laws tend to be harsher. Foul plays are covered by municipal and federal laws. And most always it is the degenerate mole who commits them. Now that SIRC leadership is always up for grabs to the most influential commie or Cuban mole, then it is always the Canadian or American patriot who gets the boot. Just consider me as example. Out in the cold ala TINKER, TAILOR, SOLDIER, SPY ;D
> 
> I tell you a secret. For any time that I get banned here in this forum, China donated 20 thousand dollars to our charity projects. So thank me for banning myself. ;D



Here's another $20 grand for you.


----------



## andrewmc (7 Nov 2015)

recceguy, I read your signature on Liberals. I agree with them but not all. Some are just misled to be liberals. And they are not socialists like Obama. My company bosses are democratic capitalists. They raise their children the Godly way. They hate abortion unlike Obama does. I am naturalized citizen but one Liberal is bent on having me deported because he just likes to. His son has no respect for immigrants. He swore on me while I was his co-worker. Together with another Chinese spy, his son was always scolded by the manager for behaving irresponsibly in the workplace. They also let me do all the work because, yes, they 'are spoiled.' Wait till this minister of immigration gets to be SIRC chief. I promise you, I am going to be deported for having led CSIS to its successes. That is a promise. Thirty million Canadian dollars is not bad especially from China who has trillions of dollars in savings. ;D The weather in Japan seems nicer. ;D (I won a US lottery citizenship ticket too. Maybe it was through the subtle machinations of FBI that would cause me to be deported) ;D I also always wonder why I am an attraction to Canadian Chinese moles everywhere I go.


----------



## Fishbone Jones (7 Nov 2015)

sigh :facepalm:


----------



## Kirkhill (7 Nov 2015)

recceguy said:
			
		

> sigh :facepalm:


----------

