Evidence of meeting #65 for Canadian Heritage in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cmac.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:15 a.m.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Mr. Marouf tweeted that he was “begged” by the department and that money was thrown at him with regard to this grant.
Is there any truth to that claim?
11:15 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
No, Madam Chair, there is no truth to that claim. The organization was contacted to see if they would be interested in having their project looked at again, because after the initial call was done it was not successful, and then we were looking at projects again. In that case, the outreach was made purely to see if they were still interested in having their application reviewed.
11:15 a.m.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
In terms of the application that was submitted by Mr. Marouf or CMAC, would you be willing to share a copy of that application submission?
11:15 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
I believe we could do so, yes.
11:15 a.m.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Awesome. I'd love for that to be tabled with the committee.
It's come to light that Mr. Marouf is quite the anti-Semite, and very public about it. It's all over his Twitter account and other social media accounts. It's interesting that this wasn't caught.
When did the department become aware that there was a problem? When did that first cross the desk of someone within the department?
11:15 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
It was on July 26. That was when the minister's office called to say that there was an issue that required some follow-up with respect to anti-Semitism with one of our projects.
11:15 a.m.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Okay.
So July 26 was when the department was made aware. What's interesting to me is that Minister Hussen has testified at this committee that on July 19 he became aware. It took him about seven days to finally contact the department and ask that action be taken. I'll let that rest there.
I'm curious to know what the department did when they became aware of this.
11:15 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
On August 2, one of the offensive tweets was sent to the department. We did work to identify Mr. Marouf and the connection with CMAC. We looked at the contract to assess the contract, sought legal advice and then by August 19 suspended the project.
11:15 a.m.
Conservative
Rachael Thomas Conservative Lethbridge, AB
Okay.
What kind of communication was had with the minister?
11:15 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
During that period, we were keeping the minister's office aware of the work we were doing.
11:15 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
Madam Chair, the money has been requested to be paid back. We have hired a third party collection agency. It's been demanded to be paid back. We first started with a collection agency that has been making attempts since December to get the money. We have not yet received the money, so the minister is—
11:15 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
No money has yet been received.
11:15 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Hedy Fry
Thank you. I think that's it, Mrs. Thomas.
I will now go to the Liberals and Mr. Housefather.
Anthony, you have six minutes, please.
11:15 a.m.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you for being here today, both of you. In my second round, I'll come back to where we are now and what changes have been made to the process to stop this from ever happening again, but I need to start with where we started from.
As for Laith Marouf and why this is important for Canadians, this was his Twitter description: “I have a motto: Life is too short for shoes with laces or for entertaining Jewish white supremacists with anything but a bullet to the head.” That was the top thing you saw on his Twitter feed.
In 2021, we had a rise in anti-Semitism like we've never seen. We had to hold a national summit, the first national summit on anti-Semitism, and this was his tweet about it: “A wacko Indigenous House-Slave of Apartheid Canada, from the 'First Nations Confederacy of Educational Centres', opens the Jewish White Supremacist Colonist conference hosted by the Zionist Lobby, PM @JustinTrudeau and Apartheid Israel; to infer Indigenity on Zionist Colonists.” These things were in his Twitter, along with racist, francophobic, horrible things.
On April 14, 2022, a press release was issued. I can understand what you said, that you only looked at CMAC for the grants, but a press release was issued that quoted both Laith Marouf and Ahmed Hussen.
At that point, did anyone bother to google Laith Marouf?
11:20 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
Thank you, Madam Chair, for the question.
Organizations are responsible for their communications. In this case, we were relying on the initial vetting, so there was no additional vetting done—
11:20 a.m.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
So nobody looked at the press release in the department and said, the minister is going to put a quote there, we're putting his good name out there, this gentleman's name is there, and we should google that gentleman.
11:20 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
Madam Chair, we relied on the initial vetting that had been done.
11:20 a.m.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
Will this process now change as well for press releases?
11:20 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
We are looking at how we can ensure that we, systematically, over the course of the projects that are approved, at such key moments as press releases, do additional screening before that happens. Yes.
11:20 a.m.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
Would you be able to provide to the committee a copy of the new screening mechanisms? I would like to see how department officials are now being trained on anti-Semitism and other forms of hate, what the new training process is and what the new vetting process is. Could you provide those documents to the committee?
11:20 a.m.
Associate Deputy Minister, Department of Canadian Heritage
Yes, we can provide those documents to the committee. There was training done in October for all program advisers with respect to both the way in which the criteria are to be implemented and the training on anti-Semitism and anti-racism.
February 13th, 2023 / 11:20 a.m.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
If we could get those documents, that would be great.
I now want to come to the termination, because Mrs. Thomas pointed out something I was going to remark upon. It's on the public record that I alerted the minister on July 18. I sent him three emails on that day with the information that would easily have been able to tell you who Laith Marouf was.
You're saying that you first received communication on July 25, or was it July 26?