As one of the first witnesses invited to testify as part of the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security (SECU)’s study on the management of the Canada-United States border, Mark Weber was categorical: While the government’s commitment to hire an additional 1,000 border services officers is a ‘strong start’ towards reinforcing our border infrastructure, more is needed.
“Canada must invest in the people who protect our frontline. We need to allow our frontline border officers to fulfill their full legal mandate, we need to invest in CBSA’s training infrastructure to ensure we can continue to meet future challenges head-on both at and away from the frontline, and we need a border services agency that is equipped to properly manage itself so it can better manage the border” told the CIU National President to the Committee.
Answering questions from Committee members, Mark Weber also stressed the need for those 1,000 officers to be fully trained frontline officers, raising concerns that the Agency might seek to download important duties on newly created FB-01 positions, who would end up doing the work of full-fledged FB-03 frontline officers.
An ‘un-Canadian’ way of treating accommodated officers
The National President also took time to bring the Committee’s attention to CBSA’s decision to perform a blanket review of accommodation agreements across the country, which appears to be designed to push out trained officers who, while they cannot carry firearms, bring valuable law enforcement experience.
“[CBSA is] telling them ‘you’re going to self demote or we’re going to show you the door’. In many instances these are people who’ve injured themselves on the job” explained Mark Weber, adding that the Agency was essentially signaling that employees were ‘a slip or fall away’ from their employer pushing them out. “It’s a horrendous way to treat people. I would almost say it’s un-Canadian.”
See selected clips below. A full recording of the Committee proceedings can be viewed here (with interpretation language options).
