How SIRC's Report is Organized

The report is organized to reflect the Committee's three chief functions: first, to review CSIS's activities; second, to investigate complaints about the Service that come from any quarter; and third, to act in concert with other parts of the security intelligence governance system both to protect public safety and national security, and to ensure citizens' rights to privacy, civil liberty and freedom from untrammelled government power.

Section 1 summarizes findings made by the Committee arising from detailed review of CSIS's activities over the course of the previous year. Commonly employed acronyms are found in Appendix A. Where relevant, major Committee studies from which the summaries are extracted are cited, with full references found in Appendix B. Key findings and recommendations are summarized in Appendix C.

Section 2 presents summaries of complaint cases on which Committee reports have been issued in the previous year

Section 3 reviews various elements of Canada's security intelligence governance system that informs the legal and policy framework in which CSIS and SIRC carry out their respective mandates.

The format of the report draws a clear distinction between Committee observations, reports and recommendations and the more general background material, which is designed to assist readers in understanding the broader context in which security and intelligence work is carried out. Subjects that the Committee believes will be of background, historical or technical interest to readers are set apart from the main text in shaded insets. They do not reflect Committee opinion or conclusions as such and are intended to be factual in nature.