Canada-China Relations Committee on Feb. 6th, 2023

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

If the guidelines were not met, it's certainly my expectation that the funding and the research partnership would not be finalized. That's the whole point of having the guidelines.

Now where that doesn't happen, I think there would need to be a review of the partnership. I and my colleagues, the ministers of health and ISED, are always looking at whether there's a way in which we can enhance the application of the guidelines.

I would put a finer point on it just to clarify, Ms. McPherson. These guidelines are not abstract. They are not theoretical. They are in place and they are being applied.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

I have one last quick question for you before my time runs out.

When you heard the news about these police stations happening in Toronto and Vancouver, did you have conversations with Minister Joly or anyone at Global Affairs Canada?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

We need a brief answer, please, Minister.

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

The short answer is yes. I'm in touch with my colleagues all the time with regard to threats of foreign interference, including on this subject matter.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you very much.

Now we will go to Mr. Chong for five minutes or less.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Thank you.

Minister, CSIS said in its February 2021 briefing note that foreign interference is a serious threat to the security of Canada. It also indicated in that briefing note that “PRC media influence activities in Canada have become normalized” in Chinese-language media outlets operating in Canada.

The government issued order 2022-0183 a year ago, asking the CRTC to review Russia Today's broadcasting licence, which led to the revocation of that licence several weeks later. However, CGTN, China's authoritarian, state-controlled broadcaster, is still operating here, spreading disinformation and propaganda, and violating international human rights laws.

In fact, the Financial Times reported about a year ago that they were airing pretrial confessions of, for example, Simon Cheng, a former employee of the U.K. consulate in Hong Kong. He was tortured to obtain that confession, and that confession was aired on CGTN. As a result, Ofcom, the United Kingdom's equivalent of the CRTC, yanked the broadcaster's licence off their airwaves.

Why hasn't your government done the same, based on the advice from CSIS, based on the advice from Five Eyes intelligence and based on what's going on here in Canada?

Why hasn't your government issued, under section 7 of the Broadcasting Act, an order of general application to a new policy that would remove authoritarian, state-controlled broadcasters off our airwaves?

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Chong, I would begin by sharing your profound concern about the distribution of any kind of disinformation. However, I think, in fairness to you and to the question, this goes beyond disinformation. If a statement was obtained through torture, that would obviously be contrary to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

I would say to you, with regard to decisions that fall within the purview of the CRTC.... As you well know, this is an administrative body that enjoys independence and makes decisions that are based on the merits and the law. As a government, we endeavour to respect the independence of those bodies, rather than to politicize those decisions.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Thank you for that answer, but I note that it was an order from this government—order 2022-0183—that led to the revocation of RT's licence. I would hope it doesn't take a war for the government to change its position on state-controlled, authoritarian broadcasters on public, Crown-owned airwaves, spreading disinformation and violating international human rights law.

I have a second quick question.

Reports indicate that CSIS told your government this past fall that China's consulate in Toronto had targeted 11 candidates in the 2019 election. CSIS also indicated in its briefing notes released to the committee.... As I mentioned before, this foreign interference is a serious threat to the security of Canada. CSIS advised the government in its briefing that, “Canada can make use of a policy that is grounded in transparency and sunlight in order to highlight the point that foreign interference should be exposed to the public”. However, your government, in many respects, hasn't followed this advice.

We have been asking about who the 11 candidates are who were targeted in the 2019 election. We have been asking for specific briefings from intelligence before and during elections. All we get are briefings of general application. Our national campaign team in the last election asked for the specific names of candidates who were targeted. We didn't get them, so we couldn't take action as a political party to stop foreign interference and ensure that our candidates weren't being subject to this.

That's not the case in other countries. For example, last summer, a year ago, MI5 went public with an agent of the PRC in the U.K. Parliament by the name of Christine Lee. She had targeted MPs with hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations. Those names were made public by the Speaker of the House, based on MI5's request.

Why isn't your government doing the same thing for parliamentarians here, so that we can protect ourselves from foreign interference that doesn't rise to the level of a prosecution in law?

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Chong, I am as concerned as you are about protecting the integrity of our elections. I would provide you with two answers.

First, on the specific issue that you raise around the threat that is posed by foreign funding, as I mentioned in my opening remarks, this government has raised the bar when it comes to providing legislative tools to crack down on foreign funding that could potentially compromise candidates and campaigns in a federal election. I would hope that would be something you would applaud as a tool to protect the integrity of our elections.

Secondly, I would clarify, and I take your point about wanting to see transparency, that this is precisely why we created the SITE task force. That is a task force that is made up of the clerk and deputy ministers from a number of portfolios that are directly implicated in the protection of our democratic institutions. Within the protocol around critical incidents during elections, there are thresholds. Those thresholds are assessed and evaluated not by me and you, who are elected officials, which, in my view, would be wholly inappropriate given our vested interest in the outcome of those elections, but rather, by the non-elected, independent, non-partisan professional public service. They make the calls about what can and should be released with regard to any events that implicate foreign interference, and we put our confidence in those officials to make those calls.

That does not mean, I would add, that the elected branch of government is not accountable. We are accountable for those policies that we put into place. That is precisely why the conversation that we are having today at this committee is important. It is not a partisan issue. We do not want to go down the path that we've seen in some other democracies where people start to question our elections. We want to have full faith and confidence in our elections, and that is something that I think we're all united behind.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you, Minister.

We'll go to Mr. Fragiskatos for five minutes or less.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to all of you for being here.

Minister, you spoke a couple of times tonight, first in your opening remarks and then MP Yip raised the matter as well, about a foreign agents registry. In the United States, a registry's been in place since 1938. In Australia, a more recent example, in 2018 it was put in place. I know that you're giving consideration to the matter, and it certainly deserves it. In your considerations, is there something that gives hesitancy or pause regarding the utility of a registry along these lines?

[Marco Mendicino, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

I wouldn't describe it as hesitation, I think we need to be diligent and thoughtful and inclusive when it comes to bringing all Canadians along in the modernization of the tools and the arsenal that we create for our national security and intelligence communities. The reason that is important is, first, there is a historical context when it comes to some communities within this country and their relationship with agencies and the law enforcement community.

That is why we—among other things—are endeavouring to reform those institutions. I want to commend the agency heads at the table and all of the agencies within my portfolio for their leadership. They recognize that, to deal with the threats to national security, we need agencies to be inclusive, diverse and culturally sensitive so Canadians can have trust and confidence that, as we are taking actions to mitigate the threats to national security, they believe that we are consistently going to act in the national interest.

The last thing I would say, Mr. Fragiskatos, is that, while there is attention to looking at each of the examples of the tools that we may consult on, including the foreign agent registry, I would discourage the members of this committee from quickly concluding that any one of these in isolation will work by itself. That's why my colleagues and I frequently resort to creating a tool box that is made up of a suite of measures that can be deployed rapidly and transparently.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

We have limited time, so I want to ask Commissioner Lucki a question.

Commissioner, you said—and we know it—that there is a 1-800 number in place. You also talked about the ability of citizens who might not have English or French as their first language to send in a question to the RCMP and have it translated. My question is twofold.

Number one, how is information about the 1-800 number communicated to the wider public so they're aware of it?

Number two, what is the turnaround for providing answers to members of the public who might wish to send in a question in a question in, let's say, Mandarin or Cantonese, and have that question translated?

[Commr Brenda Lucki]

Thank you for that question.

The engagement with the public, obviously, is so important. That's exactly why we brought in that number and the email address. We encourage people to send those in. The way we advertise is through engagement with the community, making sure there are groups of community members we can share that with, and through various non-governmental agencies sharing the information. The places they go to get information on general government programs are where a lot of that information is shared.

As I said, it's about building that trust and confidence. The best information we can get comes from the victim. If the victim does not feel comfortable coming forward, it really ties our hands. It makes the investigation more difficult.

As far as the turnaround time is concerned, I do not know the answer to that.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you, Mr. Fragiskatos.

We will now go to Mr. Trudel for two and a half minutes or less.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

I believe the House voted on November 18, 2020, to create a registry of foreign agents. Now, you seem to be walking on eggshells to tell us that things aren't moving forward that much after all.

I'm not sure if my question is for Commissioner Lucki or Mr. Vigneault.

In concrete terms, if this registry existed today, would it have helped us detect Chinese police stations or find the spies working at Hydro-Québec? Would it have helped us with the funding of candidates in elections?

Would this particular tool that we've been waiting two and a half years for be useful today to prevent what we're witnessing?

[David Vigneault]

As the minister said, the threat is evolving, and the tools need to evolve as well. So yes, absolutely: this would be another tool to improve transparency. But I wouldn't want people to think that this would be the only tool needed.

By requiring people to declare their affiliation publicly, such a registry would effectively increase transparency. It might force people who want to commit these acts of foreign interference to use more resources, which might make it more difficult for them to do so.

So in terms of the ecosystem of foreign interference in Canada, this tool would therefore be useful, but other tools must also be considered.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Do you personally put pressure on the minister to bring this tool into our lives?

[David Vigneault]

I never put pressure on the minister, but sometimes I have fairly direct conversations with him.

This is indeed something we have said publicly. One of the things we've said is that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act, which dates back to 1984, needs to be modernized. We have very direct discussions with the minister and with the government.

One of the things this committee can also do is find ways to work more effectively, while ensuring that all Canadians feel safe.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ken Hardie]

Thank you, Mr. Trudel.

Now we'll go to Ms. McPherson for two and a half minutes or less.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Two and a half minutes—what will I do with all my time?

Mr. Vigneault, I'm going to ask you a question.

You were just talking a little bit about security legislation in Canada. I know that the foreign investment promotion and protection agreement, or the FIPA, locked us into a 31-year deal to protect Chinese investments in Canada. I know that, in theory, there is a provision for the Canadian government to block investments due to security concerns. However, of course, there was such a ridiculous mess with regard to Huawei that it could, in fact, take between five and 10 years.

Do you believe the FIPA has made it more difficult for Canada to push back on national security threats coming from the Chinese government?

[David Vigneault]

Thank you for the question.

Ms. McPherson, I'm not an expert on the FIPA, but what I can tell you is that, over the last number of years, we have seen how effective the tools under the Investment Canada Act have been to counter investments in Canada that have been or could be detrimental to our national security. There are security provisions in the act that prevent the disclosure of specific details.

I can tell you there's more and more activity in our organization at CSIS and with the other agencies of the national security community looking specifically at those investments. Throughout this period, the FIPA has not been one of the issues that has been raised to my level to say that it was of concern, but there are other experts in government who may speak in more detail.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

I think some of them may be joining us later, so we can ask that again.

You did talk about security legislation, though, with my colleague, Mr. Trudel. What security legislation do you think needs to be updated with regard to the Canadian government and how we deal with these crimes?