PATRICK-MURRAY ADMINISTRATION SIGNS PUBLIC SAFETY UNDERSTANDING WITH QUEBEC

Partnership will improve exchange of law enforcement information

BOSTON – Monday, November 12, 2007 – Lieutenant Governor Tim Murray and Secretary of Public Safety and Security Kevin M. Burke today signed an understanding between the Commonwealth and the government of Quebec to enhance security and public safety.

The Lieutenant Governor and Secretary Burke joined Quebec Deputy Premier Nathalie Normandeau and Minister of Public Security Jacques P. Dupuis in Quebec City today at the signing to establish a partnership and cooperative exchange of law enforcement information that is important to both Quebec and the Commonwealth’s public safety priorities.

“I am pleased to be here in Quebec to sign this important public safety understanding with our neighbors,” said Lieutenant Governor Murray. “Coordinating and sharing information with them can only make us safer.”

The understanding publicly expresses the commitment of both Massachusetts and Quebec to share information that allows public safety professionals to operate more effectively. When law enforcement information is requested by one party, the other discloses the information as soon as possible or indicates why it cannot be shared.

“The necessity to share information became vitally important following the attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001,” according to Secretary Burke. “We and Eastern Canada are concerned about public safety internally and at our borders and the signing today symbolizes our being on one accord.”

The Quebec and Massachusetts governments have worked closely on security matters in the past. The understanding signed is one of three such understandings that publicly memorialize both parties’ intention to collaborate in support of public safety. In July 2000, during the 25th annual Conference of the New England Governors and the Eastern Canadian Premiers, both governments expressed their intensions to expand their collaboration in the area of emergency preparedness in the International Emergency Management Assistance Memorandum of Understanding. In September 2003, during the 28th annual Conference, both governments formalized their commitment to share information and intelligence on security, terrorism and organized crime in resolution 28-2.