Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced that Nathalie Drouin will become his next National Security and Intelligence Adviser (NSIA).
Ms. Drouin currently serves as deputy clerk of the Privy Council, the prime minister’s department, and will remain in that role. Ms. Drouin has diplomas in law and business administration, and she has spent most of her public service career in legal affairs.
Before joining the Privy Council Office, she served as deputy minister of justice and deputy attorney general from 2017 to 2021.
Ms. Drouin replaces Ms. Thomas, who had taken the role in early 2022 after several officials had served as NSIA in an interim capacity.
Ms. Thomas started her functions on Jan. 11, 2022, a few days before the Freedom Convoy descended on Ottawa to protest vaccine mandates and other COVID-19 restrictions. The government invoked the Emergencies Act to clear the protest.
As a result, a public inquiry was held as required by law, and both Ms. Thomas and Ms. Drouin testified in the hearings phase.
Ms. Thomas said that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) Act, used to define threats in the Emergencies Act, was too narrow and that a broader definition of national security should be used to declare a public order emergency.
Meanwhile, Ms. Drouin said the emergency had been declared on the grounds of section 2c of the CSIS Act, which refers to threats or the use of acts of serious violence for ideological reasons. CSIS itself had determined that the cross-country protests had not fallen within that definition.
With another public inquiry ongoing, this time on the matter of foreign interference, Ms. Drouin is likely to be involved again and this time in a more prominent role.