At the centre of the news about a terrorist attack this week, there was, in a curious way, the Prime Minister.
Less than four hours after Martin Couture-Rouleau attacked two soldiers in a Quebec hit-and-run on Monday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper stood up in the Commons, answered a planted question and revealed that this was suspected terrorism.
Suddenly, the Prime Minister was a central character in the story of a terrorism incident.
A day later, the incident slipped into the political and policy debate at an extraordinary pace – all before the police had even described what kind of terrorism is suspected.
In the Commons on Tuesday, Mr. Harper, in response to a question about preventing other such cases, replied that the government is already planning to give spy agency CSIS additional powers. That legislation is expected later this week.
And NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair suggested Mr. Harper rushed to reveal "unconfirmed" information about the case in the Commons for political reasons. Later, he told reporters the Prime Minister used charged rhetoric before revealing facts: "He evokes our values, our democratic system and even civilization itself in his responses," Mr. Mulcair said.
The Prime Minister's response was simple: He wanted the news out there right away. An aide said there is concern about Islamic State terrorists, and people have been told to be vigilant, so he wanted to share information quickly.
Many applaud that – including journalists used to dealing with hyper-cautious police spokespersons. And in other countries, it would not be unusual: The White House press office has given briefings about high-profile national-security cases.
But the way the public learned about this case was unusual for this country: It came through politicians, rather than police. That is not how Canadians learned about the Toronto 18 or Via Rail plot. Those were detailed by the RCMP. The senior civil servants who advise the Prime Minister would surely, if asked, suggest he leave the breaking news to the police.
Instead, backbench Conservative MP Randy Hoback rose in Question Period on Monday to ask Mr. Harper a planted question – citing "unconfirmed reports of a possible terror attack," although at the time there were none. It was Mr. Harper who revealed it might be terrorism. His office later spoke of a radicalized individual known to authorities.
That caught Quebec's provincial police off guard. And it was a day before they and the RCMP held a press conference to describe the case.
By then, it was already mixed into the policy debate about fighting the Islamic State abroad and thwarting terrorism at home. The government cited the need to face the threat of extremists who go abroad to fight for jihadi causes then return, trained, to plot attacks here. Mr. Harper's government has cited that as a reason for a military mission against the Islamic State; Defence Minister Rob Nicholson and Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird repeated that on Tuesday.
But it appears that this is not that kind of case. The RCMP stepped in when Mr. Couture-Rouleau made plans to go abroad, but after speaking with him they determined that he did not intend to fight. There is no sign he was part of a cell. "I would suspect that it's going to be called terrorism, but it's isolated," Carleton University terrorism expert Jez Littlewood said.
It's more like the "homegrown terrorism" commonly talked about four or five years ago, Mr. Littlewood said, perhaps inspired by the ideology of the Islamic State, just as others were inspired by al-Qaeda, but not directly affiliated. He too, was surprised that the Prime Minister, not the police, broke the news – he said he suspects that it is not entirely unrelated to the government's desire to win support for its legislation expanding CSIS powers.
Mr. Harper's aides insist that is not true. But even so, the case is already moving to the centre of political debate.
Campbell Clark