Buried in the Carney government’s new Strong Borders Act (C-2) are measures that have nothing to do with the border—and everything to do with police surveillance and repression.
In addition to making changes to the immigration regime, the bill introduces a series of measures to make it easier for police and secret services to spy on Canadians.
The bill would grant police and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) the authority to obtain user information from Internet service providers without a warrant. Furthermore, it would allow authorities to obtain such information from any service provider, including banks, doctors, therapists, and landlords.
The law will even extend the power of the police and Canada Post to open and read our mail!
More than 300 “civil society groups” have denounced the bill as a threat to privacy. NDP MP Jenny Kwan described these provisions of Bill C-2 as “Big Brother tactics, plain and simple”.
Of course, the Carney government claims that these measures are necessary to fight organized crime, child pornography and other bogeymen. In reality, we can expect the authorities to use these new tools to better repress the left and the labor movement.
It’s no secret that Canadian police forces spy on the public. The RCMP, for example, monitored indigenous activists as part of its brutal crackdown on the Wet’suwet’en movement opposing pipelines in British Columbia.
The pro-Palestinian movement is also subject to state surveillance, with the Ontario Provincial Police suspected of using hacking software to do so.
CSIS has even been caught illegally obtaining the contents of a passport application of someone it was investigating over comments quoted in a news report on a demonstration.
And, contrary to liberal claims, this kind of repressive spying is not a misuse of police powers, but the very role of the police under capitalism. To protect the domination of the rich and powerful, it needs to keep an eye on any internal opposition.
It’s therefore no coincidence that the Carney government wants to increase police powers at this time. Mark Carney’s mandate from the ruling class is to make tough decisions to steady the ship of Canadian capitalism. When workers realize the true nature of Carney’s program — cuts to social services and environmental regulations, increased exploitation of workers, and increased military spending — the anger is likely to explode.
A period of intense class struggle is looming. Anger is rising as more and more people realize that billionaires are getting richer while working people are getting poorer. The Liberals have run out of carrots, and are preparing themselves by picking up sticks.
