By Arthur Weinreb
Thursday, March 29, 2007
On Tuesday, the Senate issued a report on Canada's security – the third such report in about a week. Contrary to the commonly held perception, the august Upper Chamber, where politicians and other assorted political hacks go to die are not only awake but working hard. There must be some truth to the rumour that a Stephen Harper majority government would abolish the chamber or even worse, force all the Honourables to run (or hobble) for election.
A major recommendation of the latest report is that Canadian residents who are returning home be allowed to bring in $2,000 worth of goods duty free. The current limits are $750 for a trip of 7 days or longer and $400 for those between 48 hours and 7 days. The latter figure was doubled in the federal budget that Parliament just passed this week. The report recommends that the limit be raised to $2,000 by 2010.
The rationale for the increase is that people who arrive at a port of entry having exceeded their limits appear nervous. Border guards are trained to spot such nervousness and then end up conducting lengthy searches of those people and their vehicles. As Sen. Colin Kenny so aptly put it, "They're not smuggling guns or drugs; they're smuggling that sweater for Aunt Betty." The time that is spent searching and otherwise investigating shoppers who smuggle would be better spent examining criminals and potential terrorists.
It is interesting to see if the government will adopt these recommendations. Increasing the duty free limit will be a boon to foreign economies while losses would be incurred by Canadian manufacturers and retailers. Whether or not the government implements this proposal or something similar to it will determine whether the phrase "the government's main duty is to protect its citizens" is really a guiding government principle or just some nice sounding words to be thrown out during an election campaign.
Another aspect of the report dealt with "border running". The Senators on the committee reported that during a six month period last year, 459 cars ran through the border without stopping; 217 of which managed to successfully enter Canada. What was troubling was the reaction of the office of the Public Security Minister, Stockwell Day. The Minister's spokeswoman, Melisa Leclerc characterized the report as "partisan shenanigans".
Certainly partisan politics can never be fully removed from anything that politicians get involved in. But the safety of Canadians and the security of the country are too important to be reduced to this type of partisan bickering. Sure the Liberals on the committee took shots at the Conservative government even though they also blamed the previous government for deficiencies on the border. It's what Liberals do. Their entire purpose in life is to blame Stephen Harper and the Conservatives for not doing in 13 months what they failed to do in the 13 years that they were previously in power. Does government daycare and Kyoto ring a bell?
There will always be differences in political philosophies between the two major parties. By voting against the extension of anti-terrorism measures, the Dion-led Liberals have shown that they are more concerned about the human rights of those who would destroy us than they are about protecting Canadians. But the only question that should be raised by the report's statistics of how many cars blew past border guards is "is it true"? And if it is, how do we fix it?
The recommendations of the Senate committee make sense. They or similar proposals should be implemented. Characterizing the report as "partisan shenanigans" does nothing to help secure the safety of Canadians.
And even in these days of the doom and gloom of climate change, the security of the country really is the major function of government.
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