Liberal MP Jennifer O’Connell on Tuesday blamed former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative cabinet for a suspected terror plot foiled three weeks ago. O’Connell told the Commons Public Safety Committee it was Harper who compromised national security, per Blacklock's Reporter. “We look forward to having these meetings so Conservatives can truly appreciate their cuts have consequences to our national security and the safety of our communities,” said MP O’Connell, parliamentary secretary for public safety. She did not elaborate.MPs on Tuesday voted to investigate how two suspected terrorists, Ahmed Eldidi and his adult son Mostafa of Scarborough, ON, entered Canada despite alleged ties to terrorist groups. The pair were arrested by the RCMP July 28 for plotting a “serious, violent attack” in Toronto.“I am very pleased to see the Conservatives finally realize that their cuts have consequences,” said O’Connell.“Previously under the Harper government when they cut more than 1,000 Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) employees, at the time the president of the Customs and Immigration Union said, quote, ‘There will be little and in some cases potentially no investigating or surveillance being done to keep these criminals out of the country and out of our communities.’”“This is precisely why we have been making reinvestments to staff up the CBSA cuts,” said O’Connell.“It is exactly why we continue to make investments through the budget, through the Fall Economic Statement, which Conservatives vote against.” .Harper in 2012 mandated a 9% cut in the CBSA’s budget over three years. A total of 1,350 jobs were eliminated.“Most of the surplus positions identified are found through streamlining internal services in national headquarters,” mangers wrote in an Access To Information memo at the time. “These are not people staffing through the ports of entry.”Public Accounts and Departmental Results reports show spending on CBSA security programs was also cut after Liberals took office, in the period from 2015 to 2017. Spending on criminal investigations in the period fell from $37.3 million to $32.2 million, a 14% reduction. Spending on “admissibility determination” fell from $186.7 million to $156.4 million, a 16% reduction.Overall staffing at the CBSA in the period from 2015 to 2017 declined from 14,113 full-time employees to 13,707 employees, a reduction of 406.“When I talk about staffing levels, we are short between 2,000 and 3,000 across the country,” Mark Weber, president of the Customs and Immigration Union, testified last February 26 at the public safety committee.“We have ports operating with half the number of officers they had only 10 years ago,” said Weber. “We don’t see those numbers going up.”
