Canada's ports and border crossings are "fertile ground" for terrorists and criminals, according to a new Canadian Senate report on security.

A report, released on Friday by the Senate standing committee on national security and defence, said many port employees have criminal records, and that customs inspectors are understaffed and too dependent on inadequately trained students.
"Clearly this lack of control creates fertile ground for terrorist activity, including covert immigration and potentially the covert importation and shipment of weapons and other agents of mass destruction," the report states.
"The conundrum over security is that although Canada is less a target for terrorists than the United States, if Canada does not provide an adequate level of security at its borders, the United States is likely to take arbitrary measures to ensure continental security," it added.
Among the findings:

• Staff shortages in Vancouver and Halifax, Canada's two largest shipping ports, have led to a reduction in the number of containers inspected and in the size of "rummaging parties" sent aboard vessels to interview crew and conduct searches. Customs officers do not have terminals in their vehicles and have to return to their offices to get information and file reports.

• In Halifax, union representatives testified that neither summer students nor term employees are adequately trained. As a minimum, full-time officers typically receive eight weeks of basic training, with additional two- to four-week programs for more specialized skills. After a training period of just two weeks, however, students are allowed to carry out almost a full range of customs officer duties.

• At the Port of Montreal, police estimate that 15% of stevedores have criminal records, as do 36.3% of "checkers," who go over manifest lists for cargo containers, and fully 54% of the employees of a company with the contract to pick up garbage, do minor repairs and operate the tenders servicing ships moored in open water outside the harbor. The union that supplies dockworkers is closed to outsiders; applicants must be sponsored by current union members, "who are sometimes members of crime families and their friends," the report states.

• The committee heard testimony about inspectors facing threats from criminals, with containers suspended over their vehicles during inspections, or "accidentally" dropped close by.

• Most small and remote border crossing posts have no immigration officer on duty, so a customs officer must handle the job. Fully 60% of customs officers had not received immigration training.

• At the Ambassador Bridge in Windsor, Ont., about one-third of the approximately 7,000 trucks that pass each day are sent for secondary inspection to a site almost 2 kilometers away. Very few are escorted.

The committee urged the government to "get ahead of the curve" and fix security at borders and ports.
"The Americans are completely fixated with security and if we don't move ahead, I'm convinced our trade with the U.S. will diminish considerably and our economy will be in peril," Conservative Senator Michael Meighen said at a press conference on Friday.
The committee called for a full review of security systems at ports, compulsory background checks for employees at major ports, and more inspections of containers.