Canadian Civil Liberties vs. Public Security: Post Crisis, Have the Terrorists Won?

One of the goals of security is to protect something that is valuable to an individual, a business, or an entity without taking away key attributes for survival. Just like a business creates policy to protect its business functions, a government creates laws to make sure its citizens can continue their way of life. The Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act represents a good example of an act that upholds citizens' right to privacy. This is legislation created to protect the citizens. The legislation was undertaken in a responsible manner that balanced the needs of the citizens against the needs of business. During the October Crisis, the Canadian government suspended civil liberties in order to face down a threat. The end result of that predicament was a country that continued with what the society deemed important. The proposed Canadian Anti-terrorism Bill, Bill C-36, proposes to protect our way of life but at the cost of permanently eliminating some of the important fundamentals of our society, our civil liberties. The focus of security should be in protecting our civil liberties as well as public safety