Justice committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. I've just been advised by my colleague Mr. Yost, from the Department of Justice, that the clause-by-clause book is being printed as we speak here today. As soon as it's possible, I understand this will be presented to you. I hope that helps.

Justice committee  It's possible the law enforcement agencies outside the RCMP may have direct communications, as they may on any file, to ask for assistance internationally through the connections they have. There is no limit by the DNA data bank over what law enforcement agencies can do with information it has lawfully obtained.

Justice committee  No, there's no requirement that the RCMP communicate what it does to the initial police force. The policy, as I understand it--and perhaps other members of the RCMP can speak to it--is to communicate, immediately upon receipt of a DNA data bank order that, on its face, is defective, with the police force to clarify whether or not there might have been a technical issue that it could clarify, that there was a typo, that there was a problem that the court could correct directly without having to go through this process.

Justice committee  International sharing, as I understand it, is quite small at the moment; it's a one-off. There are two aspects. Individual police forces in Canada can ask for the commissioner to send off specific crime scene stains that it has, and it's submitted to the data bank as a profile. Those profiles can be shared internationally at the request of a police force.

Justice committee  Not that I'm aware of.

Justice committee  None are in the data bank.

Justice committee  None.

Justice committee  It was really a legal issue, not a technical problem. The destruction would just take place entirely, without their being analyzed. The package they received would be destroyed without analysis, and that would be the end of those particular kits.

Justice committee  It would only deal with the records kept by the RCMP and the National DNA Data Bank.

Justice committee  No. The samples are sent entirely to the RCMP, so the bodily substance would be entirely within the control of the RCMP. The legislation requires that the entire sample be sent to the commissioner, and it would therefore be destroyed. So all they would have is a record of an order that they've executed, but that would also be following the criminal record information they may have.

Justice committee  I think the Department of Justice could probably deal with this matter more directly in terms of their analysis of the justification of expanding the DNA regime. But my understanding is that it has been reviewed and that it would withstand scrutiny for charter analysis, that it's reasonable to expand the regime in the way that the committee has put forward, and that current case law that the Supreme Court of Canada has brought down suggests that the regime potentially may be changed in the future.

Justice committee  Perhaps I can respond to that. I think I would suggest to the committee that you look back at the testimony received from witnesses during the consideration of Bill C-13. I was here when you heard from Dr. Chris Maguire of forensic services in the U.K. system. He talked about their experience in concentrating their DNA data bank collection for crime scenes and offenders related to break and enters, robberies, and car thefts.

Justice committee  No, I don't disagree with that, sir.

Justice committee  The DNA Identification Act does not prescribe where crime scene profiles will come from. It simply obliges the commissioner to deal with what he receives for entering into the convicted offender index, and as a matter of policy and as a matter of the amendments to Bill C-13, that analysis would need to be done by the commissioner himself or someone he would contract to.

Justice committee  The only guarantees I could provide you with are those provided by the DNA Identification Act, which makes it a criminal offence for the commissioner or the commissioner's delegates to use DNA information that the agency has in the National DNA Data Bank for any other purpose than what's permitted by the DNA Identification Act.