Bill C-51 protest at Canada Place

For the griff

“What does democracy look like?” screamed Sioban Vipond, the secretary for the Alberta Federation of Labour, as she raised a fist to the sky.
 

“This is what democracy looks like!” the crowd screamed back.
 

Several hundred people turned out for the Edmonton protest starting at Canada Place on March 14, part of a  nationwide rally against Bill C-51, the Anti-Terrorism Act. The national day of action drew out thousands of people across Canada in 46 cities and was carried out peacefully.
 

Bill C-51 is the Harper government’s response to recent attacks on military personnel and Parliament by criminals influenced by ISIS propaganda videos. Since these two incidents, the Harper government said the new powers granted to the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) are necessary.
 

However, opponents of the bill — which include Amnesty International, Federal Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien, B.C. Premier Christy Clark, former Prime Ministers Joe Clark, Jean Chretien, Paul Martin and John Turner, the Mohawk Council of Kahnawà:ke, five former Supreme Court justices, over 100 law professors, as well as Green Party Leader Elizabeth May and Opposition Leader Thomas Mulcair of the NDP — have complained the bill does not provide Canadians with enough oversight of the new powers CSIS would wield, and are greatly concerned by the vague definition of what “terrorism” is in the bill. Protesters are concerned that the provisions would be used to target activists. They want the bill overhauled and properly debated – a request that the Harper government has been resistant to.
 

“This bill is truly a threat,” explained Craig Scott, the NDP critic for Democratic Reform, who spoke at the Edmonton rally. “Not just to constitutional rights, not just to the rule of law, but also to our very democracy because you have to remember that this bill is a massive deepening and expansion of the surveillance state.”
 

The bill makes a large number of changes to the workings of government departments, which will now be able to share information with each other, including with Revenue Canada. 
 

“Information could be shared between 17 government departments, and this includes a long, open-ended list — it can be added to by the cabinet at will,” Scott pointed out. “Terrorism is only one of eight areas in which information can be shared. They have not included in that sharing circle the review bodies of any of the security agencies.”
 

Other changes include the ability of CSIS to limit the travel of suspected terrorists. Opponents point out that this provision already exists and that Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, the Parliament shooter, only opted to attack Parliament after being denied a passport due to concerns he was going to join ISIS. 

Other major changes include the criminalization of inciting violence online, such as with a Twitter or Facebook account, and the enabling of CSIS to be more active in its investigations. Currently, CSIS is only able to operate in an intelligence-gathering capacity; it is unable to make decisions on what to do with intelligence.