Helicopter Governments

Part One – Bill C-2

We’ve all heard of helicopter parents, hovering over their little ones to protect them from every scrape and fall. Can governments, sincere in their motive, overprotect their citizens? The Liberal government has introduced Bill C-2 (Strong Borders Act) and Bill C-9 (The Combatting Hate Act) as a solution to the social turmoil in our nation. The bills are reshaping the debate over security, speech, immigration, and community life in Canada. With rising threats at our border and surging hate incidents there is much support, but critics warn of overreach that could freeze protests, expand surveillance, and burden charities and newcomers. Is their effort an overreaction to outside pressure, or a purposeful distraction from other internal issues they aren’t managing?

C-2 focuses on strengthening border security and combating crime. It focuses on adjusting the asylum system, adding tools for law enforcement to combat transnational crime like fentanyl trafficking and auto theft, and enhancing access to digital information from service providers. It also aims to disrupt illicit financing schemes by controlling precursor chemicals for illegal drugs and combatting money laundering. It sounds sincere and mostly harmless for law-abiding Canadians, right?

Over 300 organizations from across Canada joined together to demand the complete withdrawal of Bill C-2 because of the perceived threat on human rights, refugee and migrant rights, and the privacy of residents in Canada. The bill blocks anyone who has been in Canada for one year or more from seeking refugee status, even if their home country has recently become dangerous for their return. This is inconsistent with international humanitarian law. The bill also eliminates any chance from those arriving from the United States in applying for asylum.

Christina Lui, Executive Director of New Hope Community Services Society (housing provider for refugees) says, “Throughout the Bible, God invites His people to treat the vulnerable with respect, care, and radical hospitality. To enshrine into law the deprivation of compassion in the face of significant vulnerability would defy the prayer “on earth as it is in heaven.” To be more Christ-like is to be more open, more empathetic, and more hospitable, especially to those who are facing the worst of human treatment. Bill C-2 does the opposite. It removes protections, and it places the availability of compassionate treatment on an arbitrary timeline. Nowhere does God say that we welcome the foreigner and stranger only when it suits our schedule. The heart of God is for the least of these, let’s make sure our hearts are so aligned.”

The government argues that Canada needs updated tools for real-world harms. Ottawa says that “Canada will not tolerate anyone being made to feel afraid because of who they are, how they worship, or where they gather.” Faith and community groups who have faced bomb threats, vandalism, or blockades have indicated that clear legislation around intimidation and obstruction could help law enforcement intervene quicker.

Despite this stated intent, the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada (EFC) opposes certain aspects of Bill C-2 and C-9, specifically the potential impact on religious freedom and on vulnerable populations. The main concern seems to be the risk added for vulnerable women.

A simple warrant, based only on ‘reasonable suspicion,’ can demand citizens to yield their online data, unencrypted emails, and browsing history. Companies would have blanket immunity for privacy violations when they hand over the personal data of its employees. This bill also aligns Canada with the US CLOUD Act, and the Budapest Cybercrime Convention, ultimately permitting foreign governments to request private data, therefore undermining our constitutional protection and sovereignty.

Bill C-2 also gives mass deportation powers to the Minister of Immigration who can cancel permits for entire groups without due process, including the revocation of permanent residency submissions. Migrants can lose their status with the stroke of a pen. Personal information can now be shared across all levels of government and undocumented workers can be deported without recourse to support. Increased security and surveillance measures undermine the privacy rights of Canadians and leaves newcomers to Canada with an aura of uncertainty hanging over them.

In one motion, the government tried to undermine more than a decade of Canadian privacy-related jurisprudence. The Canadian Council of Refugees issued a statement saying, “The CCR is deeply alarmed by the multiple dangerous precedents that will be set if Bill C-2 becomes law. Under the guise of a bill that claims to make Canada safer, the government is introducing sweeping legislative changes that will seriously weaken refugee rights and are inconsistent with our obligations under the Canadian Charter and International Law. Simply put, the government proposes we deal with possible future increases in refugee claims not by improving and better resourcing our world class system for hearing these claims-but by removing protections altogether.”

Section 4.2 of the Department of Justice Act requires the Justice Minister to prepare a Charter Statement to inform public and parliamentary debate, especially focused on inconsistency with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The statement identifies areas where the bill might engage with the charter and provides justifications for limits the bill may impose on the Charter. Section 1 of the Charter does provide for reasonable limits on rights and freedoms “if the limits are prescribed by law and demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”

For Bill C-2, the examination of the Act, focusing on the security of the border between Canada and the United States, yields a few key findings. The bill engages Section 2(b) of the Charter that guarantees the freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression – including the freedom of the press, media, and other forms of communication. The bill also engages Section 7 of the Charter where we see the protection against the deprivation of life, liberty, and security, unless under the fundamentals of justice. Section 8 is also engaged, since it protects against ‘unreasonable’ searches and seizures. A reasonable expectation of privacy is part of our charter rights. Section 11 guarantees certain rights to persons charged with an offence, if those proceedings are criminal by nature.

After all this review and opposition, the government considered it prudent to split Bill C-2 into two parts. Civil society technologists warned that the original bill bundled “lawful access” provisions enabling warrantless acquisition of certain information ‘voluntarily’ handed over by service providers. The most-criticized surveillance pieces are now removed from C-2 and put in a second bill now labelled as Bill C-12. Bill C-2 and Bill C-12 still wield an impact on vulnerable populations that are out of proportion to the social disturbances among us.

National co-ordinator of the Ottawa-based International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group, Tim McSorley, finds it outrageous that the government has “refused to actually fix anything and have instead just split it [C-2] into two separate bills.”