Canadian Heritage Committee on Feb. 13th, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Ms. Lantsman. I think your time is now up.

I'm going to go to the Liberals for five minutes, please.

Mr. Housefather, you have five minutes.

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I want to start off by going through the list of things I would like to see you deliver to this committee. They've been mentioned by me or my colleagues, or I'm going to add them.

I want to see the new training that the department received. I want to see the new diligence procedures. If you have a copy of the former diligence procedures, I'd like to see the former diligence procedures. I would like to see the actual contract with CMAC. I would like to see the new template agreement that has replaced the old document that CMAC had. I would like to see the new attestation. I would like to see the suspension letter to CMAC, the termination letter to CMAC and any other correspondence between the department and CMAC.

Can you provide that, please?

[Mala Khanna]

We will make our best efforts.

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Thank you very much.

I'm tempted to ask for internal emails, but I will not do that.

I want to come back to another issue, which is something that is really gnawing at me. It's the termination notice. In Ms. Lantsman's last round of questions, the suspension was on August 19 and the termination was on September 23. Presumably, this means that the lawyer who looked at this file, or the department—whoever made the decision—determined that the contract could not be terminated for cause effective immediately.

Was there no clause in that agreement? I've never seen a contract in my life—and I've been a lawyer for well over 20 years—that did not allow immediate termination for cause for egregious things like this. Did that contract not have any provision that allowed termination for cause immediately?

[Mala Khanna]

I don't believe that it did. I believe that we needed to, in that case, ensure that the 30 days' notice was respected—

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Was there any provision in the contract, whether or not for this issue, that said it required 30 days? Was there any issue?

Let's say he had killed somebody. Was there any issue for which you could terminate it immediately?

[Mala Khanna]

When the contract was suspended, it froze the situation. There was no further activity that could happen. They wouldn't have been able to do anything more on the project.

This notice period was meant to give them, or anybody, the opportunity to—

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

I understand, but let me again.... I'm going to give you....

Notices relate to an opportunity to cure. When you have given a notice period, it's because you believe the defaulting party can cure the ill in the agreement. You're saying, “You didn't deliver me the goods on this date. I'm giving you this number of days to deliver it.”

You always have in contracts cure periods related to defaults that can be cured, and terminations immediately when the default cannot be cured. An example is when the company goes bankrupt. I'm shocked to hear that the department's standard contract didn't have that. That's why I want to see the contracts.

Let me go to another question. Did any employee within Canadian Heritage have any sanction or any discipline related to the delays?

[Mala Khanna]

Thank you for the question.

We have learned from this experience. We have taken—

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

The answer is no.

[Mala Khanna]

That's correct.

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Thank you.

Let me just come now to another issue I have to get into because it's important.

Does the new contract incorporate the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism? Does either the attestation or the new contract require applicants to subscribe to the government's anti-racism strategy, which incorporates, by definition, the IHRA definition?

[Mala Khanna]

The attestation and the requirements require that the individuals not undermine Canada's anti-racism strategy—

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

That incorporates, by reference, the IHRA definition.

Let me just mention this because it was important. My friend, Mr. Julian brought it up.

The Jerusalem declaration is a competing definition of the IHRA definition. The IHRA definition was developed by many countries, including Canada, over 10 years to come to a consensus definition of anti-Semitism. The Jerusalem declaration was developed by eight people. It was a response to IHRA.

The internationally accepted definition that all Jewish organizations—all mainstream Jewish organizations—in Canada subscribe to is IHRA, which is why the government adopted that, so I wouldn't want to see a competing definition come into this.

Do I have any time left?

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

You have 30 seconds.

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Thank you.

I'll just to finish off in terms of the new agreement.

Has a clause been included that prohibits discrimination on the basis of language? Such a clause wasn't included in the previous agreement. I think it's important for Quebeckers.

[Mala Khanna]

Thank you for the question.

Yes, discrimination on the basis of language is also one of the criteria that would make an applicant ineligible for government funding.

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Anthony.

Now I will go to Mr. Champoux for two and a half minutes, please.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mrs. Khanna, do you feel that the lesson you had to learn from this incident has been well understood and applied by all government departments?

[Mala Khanna]

Thank you for the question.

All departments that have grants and contributions have been very attentive and interested in the work and the learning we have done over the last few months. We have had at least two meetings with other departments to share the work we have done.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Were you consulted when it came time to appoint Ms. Elghawaby as Canada's special representative on combatting Islamophobia? For example, did you advise the people who had to do the vetting to go and look at her Twitter account and other social media and her past statements?

There seems to be a trend within the departments, and it concerns me that something as serious as the Community Media Advocacy Centre case hasn't received a more obvious response from all the departments.

I have just two and a half minutes, Mrs. Khanna, so I'll tell you that the clerk of the committee just emailed us a few minutes ago the old and new versions of the applications and agreements. We obviously haven't had time to read all of this since we are here with you today.

However, since you have a front-row seat for this issue, can you tell us what the new agreement contains that addresses the concerns that have been expressed since the committee began its study?

[Mala Khanna]

Thank you for the question.

Madam Chair, I'm going to turn to my colleague, Mr. Slowey, to answer the question.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Madam Chair, I don't have much time, and I would ask for your indulgence.

I don't think Mrs. Khanna's colleague heard the question, so I'm going to ask it again. With the generosity of the committee, I'd like to have some time because I think it is of interest to everybody.

Mr. Slowey, a few minutes ago, we received the old and the new version of the program applications and the new version of the contract. I want to know if this new version contains the responses to the concerns we've been expressing to you since the beginning of this study.

[Charles Slowey]

Yes, in the materials that you received, you received both the previous contribution agreement and application and the new contribution agreement and application, where we strengthened...particularly in the contribution agreement under annex C, which is the general terms and conditions.

Number two is the obligations. We clearly lay out new expectations and obligations for all applicants. It strengthens the points that we've made around clarifying up front the expectations for certain behaviours. Then there are the repercussions within section D for what we can do in terms of acting quickly to end the contract.