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NEWS: Public safety committee hearings on G8/G20 underway

The House of Commons standing committee on public safety and national security has begun its five days of hearings on the G8 and G20 summits.

On Monday, the Toronto Sun reported that, “Public Safety Minister Vic Toews deflected questions about costs, arrests and the location of G8 and G20 summits as he was queried by members of Parliament. Toews appeared before the Commons public safety committee to answer questions about the summits but often left opposition MPs frustrated. ‘I hope that you put this question to the responsible police agencies and the Crown attorneys that made these decision,’ Toews said, when asked why 900 of 1,100 people arrested had their charges dropped. ‘You know that they were provincial Crown attorneys under the jurisdiction of the provincial attorney general.’ As for the cost of security for the summits, Toews and Ward Elcock, the former CSIS head advising the government on this issue, told the committee that not all bills have been submitted and the total cost is not known.”

Yesterday, Nathalie Des Rosiers, the general counsel for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, told the committee, “It was a sad weekend for civil liberties in Canada. Space and mobility were redefined, weaponry was redefined, privacy was redefined.” The Toronto Star reports that, “Her testimony followed the firsthand accounts of two young women from Montreal, Jacinthe Poisson and Wissam Mansour, who were both arrested during a mass arrest at a University of Toronto residence on the final day of the summit, June 27.”

In addition to the security review, the House of Commons standing committee on government operations and estimates will soon examine Ottawa’s spending on the two summits. There are already several G20-related reviews under way, including one by the Toronto Police Services Board that will be led by former associate chief justice John Morden and a review by the federal Auditor-General. Other reviews under way include a look at complaints by Ontario’s independent police review director, two reviews of the Ontario governments decision to amend a law prior to the summit to give police added powers (one headed by former Ontario chief justice Roy McMurtry the other by provincial ombudsman Andre Marin) and a review by the provinces Special Investigations Unit into five incidents of serious injury in police custody. Several class-action suits are also under way.

The Toronto Sun report is at http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2010/10/25/15825236.html. The Toronto Star article is at http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/882054–g20-detention-centres-dehumanizing-testimony. And apparently more information will be posted soon to the House of Commons public safety committee web-page at http://www2.parl.gc.ca/CommitteeBusiness/StudyActivityHome.aspx?Cmte=SECU&Language=E&Mode=1&Parl=40&Ses=3&Stac=3353964.