Safer Witnesses Act

This enactment amends the Witness Protection Program Act to, among other things, (a) provide for the designation of a provincial or municipal witness protection program so that certain provisions of that Act apply to such a program; (b) authorize the Commissioner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to coordinate, at the request of an official of a designated provincial or municipal program, the activities of federal departments, agencies and services in order to facilitate a change of identity for persons admitted to the designated program; (c) add prohibitions on the disclosure of information relating to persons admitted to designated provincial and municipal programs, to the means and methods by which witnesses are protected and to persons who provide or assist in providing protection; (d) specify the circumstances under which disclosure of protected information is nevertheless permitted; (e) exempt a person from any liability or other punishment for stating that they do not provide or assist in providing protection to witnesses or that they do not know that a person is protected under a witness protection program; (f) expand the categories of witnesses who may be admitted to the federal Witness Protection Program to include persons who assist federal departments, agencies or services that have a national security, national defence or public safety mandate and who may require protection as a result; (g) allow witnesses in the federal Witness Protection Program to end their protection voluntarily; (h) extend the period during which protection may, in an emergency, be provided to a person who has not been admitted to the federal Witness Protection Program; and (i) make a consequential amendment to another Act.