Evidence of meeting #30 for Canada-China Relations in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was aiib.
A video is available from Parliament.
4:20 p.m.
Bloc
Stéphane Bergeron Bloc Montarville, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Pickard, I would like to continue on this topic. The government has suspended its participation indefinitely. You seem to be optimistic about what has been done since then.
What makes you optimistic?
4:20 p.m.
As an Individual
As a Canadian living overseas under the pressure of that situation, I was very impressed, surprised and pleased when the minister announced an immediate review of the situation.
There's no question: I feel that was a highly supportable decision. I believe that the current review and the broadening of the review are positive developments.
4:20 p.m.
Bloc
Stéphane Bergeron Bloc Montarville, QC
Do you think external parties should step in to clean things up at the organization?
Is it unrealistic to think that we can get external parties to step in?
4:20 p.m.
Bloc
4:20 p.m.
As an Individual
I don't know.
I feel that we, as a country, have to ask ourselves this: If AIIB were founded today under the current geopolitical conditions and with AIIB's supporting China's geopolitical interests, would we and other western countries join this bank?
I don't think so. I hope not.
Why would we do that and give the geopolitical credit for their billions in lending to China, which is a hostile country that's preparing for war against Taiwan and its western allies?
4:25 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Ken Hardie
Thank you, Mr. Bergeron.
We'll now go to Ms. Ashton for two and a half minutes.
4:25 p.m.
NDP
Niki Ashton NDP Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB
Thank you very much.
Mr. Pickard, is there a role in in this world for an improved Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, given that there are so many countries on the Asian continent that face an immense infrastructure gap and where there is immense opportunity?
4:25 p.m.
As an Individual
It's important for members to realize that most of the AIIB's financing is co-financing with existing MDBs, such as the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank. So far, most of the AIIB's projects are in the future.
I think that we have to ask ourselves as a country [Technical difficulty—Editor] multilateralism, and do we want to finance development projects through a Chinese-dominated multilateral or through a western or Japanese-dominated multilateral? Those appear to be our current options.
4:25 p.m.
NDP
Niki Ashton NDP Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB
Domestically, there's been a fair bit of criticism of our own infrastructure bank here in Canada—of its governance, its lack of transparency, its lack of accountability, and the way it's not meeting the stated goals, including real investments in taking on the infrastructure gap that we face in our own country, particularly in indigenous and northern communities.
While you've raised particular concerns, one may also note that it's not as though Canada's infrastructure bank is an incredible model when it comes to acting on its mandate.
I'll leave it there. I'm not sure if you have any comments to make on that, but it's certainly some food for thought.
4:25 p.m.
As an Individual
We have a lot to learn from China when it comes to building infrastructure. There's no question about that, but China has a lot to learn from us in terms of respect for communities, listening to people affected, and talking about impact on the countries where it's building infrastructure. Are we putting people on a debt treadmill, building debt traps that they cannot escape from?
These are some things that are worthy of further conversation.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Dufferin—Caledon, ON
Mr. Pickard, given your experience with CCP members in the bank and given what I just gave a brief excerpt from—the 2017 National Intelligence Law—do you think this bank is reformable at all to get out from under the yoke of influence of the CCP?
4:25 p.m.
As an Individual
Chinese Communist Party members, in a subterranean way, will always be the power network inside of this bank.
Having done business in China since the year 2001, I can tell you that if there are no Communist Party collaborations in this bank or no informal groupings, it would be the only such organization in all of the PRC that this could be said of, and I don't believe that it's so. There may not be an officially registered party committee or cadre in the bank, but I believe that the operation and the collaboration is very similar to such in a more informal way.
4:30 p.m.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Dufferin—Caledon, ON
I'm going to press you, although I appreciate your answer.
Do you think it can be reformed, given the sort of vast influence that you're describing of the Chinese Communist Party within the bank itself and its influence over Chinese citizens as a result of the National Intelligence Law?
4:30 p.m.
As an Individual
Well, they are all on their best behaviour in Beijing right now...at the bank. I would say that so long as we have the current geopolitical situation and so long as we have the Chinese Communist Party trying to work to undermine western democracies and replace the United States as the number one power, it is impossible for that to happen.
4:30 p.m.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Dufferin—Caledon, ON
Thanks.
I want to turn to the bank's report. I don't want to go to any specific parts of it, but given what you've described as the influence of the Chinese Communist Party and given the structure of the bank itself, which I'm sure you're familiar with, what would you say would be the possibility that their own internal report is going to be fair, balanced and fulsome?
4:30 p.m.
As an Individual
I would not have confidence in any report coming from that bank—the objectivity, professionalism, the lack of independence.
In my case, with the lack of any independent report produced by a department with Chinese Communist Party officials, and with senior executives criticizing me publicly while the report was being written, I would not trust anything coming from them. I don't think they have the resources anyway. It's very lean internally. There's not a lot of bandwidth there. It's understaffed.
4:30 p.m.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Dufferin—Caledon, ON
To be clear, this report was an internal report done.... These weren't external auditors who came in to sort of balance what the bank was saying versus what you were saying.
4:30 p.m.
Conservative
Kyle Seeback Conservative Dufferin—Caledon, ON
Being in the PR business yourself, would you hazard to say that their internal investigation was more of an exercise in PR than it was in fact finding?
4:30 p.m.
As an Individual
Yesterday the Global Times accused me of hype and smears, so I feel like I have some familiarity with this.
I feel like that's exactly what they've done to me, levelling various allegations as a hatchet job report. What's the expression we should look for? Is it a kangaroo court, or is it a snow job? They did not do an independent report. I refused to participate in that report. They gave me no access to my documents. To the member's earlier question, I couldn't have provided them because they wouldn't let me have them anyway.