Evidence of meeting #39 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 csis.
A video is available from Parliament.
NDP
Lisa Marie Barron NDP Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC
No. Thank you so much for clarifying, Mr. Gilmour.
Mr. Gilmour, under what circumstances and conditions would you consider that the national microbiology laboratory in Winnipeg should be resuming collaborations with entities and individuals in the PRC?
Research Scientist, As an Individual
Mr. Chair, I'm not sure I'm in a position to speak to that because I don't have a role within the Government of Canada anymore. I certainly do hope.... Again, judging by the conversations with the witnesses who preceded me, it sounds like the level of interaction and engagement between the leadership team at the NML and the security authorities is greatly heightened. I'm very pleased to hear that.
NDP
Lisa Marie Barron NDP Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC
Thank you.
Mr. Chair, perhaps you could clarify how much time I have left before I continue.
NDP
Lisa Marie Barron NDP Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
In the last of my time, perhaps I'm going to go a little high level just because I'm not a regular member here.
What are some takeaways that you can share with us as a committee, in your role, Mr. Gilmour, that are essential that we take with us in our continued work?
Research Scientist, As an Individual
Mr. Chair, my takeaway is that the conversations between security and the specialized scientific institutes need to be very active and profound. This can't be something that's just left as a background conversation. Again, it's one of the reasons I was pleased to hear that it sounds like this is happening now between the security agencies and the management team at the Public Health Agency of Canada and the NML.
Liberal
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Dr. Gilmour.
Dr. Gilmour, knowing what you know now, do you think it was a good idea for the Winnipeg lab to transfer Ebola and henipavirus to the Wuhan Institute of Virology?
Research Scientist, As an Individual
Mr. Chair, I can absolutely see how, in the light of 2024, there would be concerns over the transfer. Certainly at the time, though, we were acting upon the information we had and acting under a different operational tempo where the concern, as I stated before, was assurance on things like biosafety.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
It was a highly unusual transfer. Is that correct?
Research Scientist, As an Individual
Mr. Chair, it would be difficult for me to say whether it was highly unusual. Certainly the transfer of materials between different laboratories would happen on a regular basis.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
But this type of transfer didn't typically occur with PRC laboratories, did it?
Research Scientist, As an Individual
Mr. Chair, I think that's best coming from the current employees of the NML. I don't specifically recall. It would have been a very low incidence, if at all.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
A low incidence of that type of transfer of materials to PRC institutions, correct?
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Okay.
On March 27, 2019, days before the transfer, you sent an email to Steve Guercio, the executive director of the Winnipeg lab, in which you stated, “I'd like you to be comfortable with this before it goes [out]”, that being the transfer of the Ebola virus and henipavirus.
Why did you send that email to Mr. Guercio? Did it have anything to do with the fact that, four days earlier, PHAC obtained a fact-finding report that raised serious concerns about the activities of Dr. Qiu, who was directing this transfer?
Research Scientist, As an Individual
Mr. Chair, it's a very good and very valid question. I remember the nature of my concern. That email was a follow-up to my original email that had been sent to the team, where I explicitly said that I had a concern, and I outlined the nature of my concern.
All the concerns were about the validity of the recipient. It wasn't about who within the team was initiating the transfer. That email to the executive director was a reiteration to make sure that we as a team had done all of our process to make sure that we had gone through the due diligence.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Did the fact-finding report of March 23 not raise additional red flags with you or anyone at the lab? I understand that we learned a lot more, but at the time, PHAC knew that she had.... It was registered on a PRC patent. There were multiple policy breaches. There was the unauthorized transfer of materials to the PRC. There was evidence of collaboration with the PRC.
Again, this is Canada's highest security lab. Surely there must have been additional red flags.
Research Scientist, As an Individual
It's very conceivable that this would have been a red flag. I certainly remember at the time that the nature of the concerns over the individuals, as you stated, evolved to something completely different. At the time, the level of concern was much lower—potentially even things that we could manage within the lab.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Respectfully, I find it concerning that it took three and a half months before she and Dr. Cheng were finally marched out of the lab.
You met with Dr. Qiu on June 19. What happened between the receipt of that fact-finding report, your meeting on June 19 and then July 5, when they were finally escorted out?
Research Scientist, As an Individual
Mr. Chair, in my memory it was a discussion with the senior executives within the Public Health Agency of Canada on how to initiate what was ultimately the administrative investigation. It was the orchestration of how to actually introduce this to the employees' supervisors and then to the employees themselves on the 5th of July.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
But were additional facts gathered between that time about the activities of Dr. Qiu and Dr. Cheng? There's just a big gap, in the documents we have, between this fact-finding report and then July 5.
Research Scientist, As an Individual
It's a challenge for me to fill that gap for you. In my own review of the documentation, I didn't see anything missing in terms of additional investigations. Again, these were investigations that were done by other authorities.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
I think that would underscore, I would submit, why action should have been taken on or around March 23, 2019, and not July 5.
