Anti-terror bill: Can government balance security and civil rights?

The debate continues over the scope over the Government’s plans to introduce a bill with new measures on Friday:

The ideological debate is summarized by University of Ottawa national security law expert Craig Forcese.

“A risk-minimizing society would permit mass detentions in the expectation that the minimal increase in public safety from the dragnet would outweigh the massive injury to civil liberties,” he writes.

“A rights-maximizing society, however, would deny the state the power to detain except through conventional criminal proceedings, for which it would impose demanding standards, even at the risk of leaving people free whose intent and capacity are clear but whose terrorist acts lie in the future.”

In a recent statement to the Citizen, Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien said: “Canadians want to be safe, but they also care profoundly about their privacy rights.

“Horrific attacks on innocent people obviously raise concerns about safety. But I was struck by the fact that, immediately after the attacks in Ottawa and in Paris, many people were talking about the importance of also protecting democratic rights such as free speech and privacy.

“Security is essential to maintain democratic rights, but our national security responses to acts of terror must be proportionate and designed in a way that protects the democratic values that are pillars of our Canadian society.”

Anti-terror bill: Can government balance security and civil rights? | Ottawa Citizen.