Information & Ethics Committee on April 11th, 2024

[Darren Fisher, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I certainly hope you can hear me. I have been having some Internet issues.

I put my name on the list and put my hand up so that I could talk about the appropriateness of this motion for this committee. I believe that Mr. Gerretsen spoke to that. Mr. Chair, when my Internet was off, I believe you ruled that it was the appropriate place to have it. I still question why that is.

I do find it funny that Mr. Cooper is here today. He parachuted in from PROC, of which he is vice-chair and which is sitting right this minute, so I do find that a bit of a surprise.

I'm interested in getting back to the thing we had on the agenda today, the consideration of the draft report. I see now that we have 44 minutes left before our time is up, and we were going to have an hour and 45 minutes to talk about the consideration of the draft report.

Since there are other people on the list, I will certainly listen to the other people who have their hands up, but I would like to see if there's a possibility today to get to that draft report.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Fisher.

Mr. Bains, you're next. Go ahead, please.

[Parm Bains, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

There's a lot to unpack here. I'm actually concerned about the hypocrisy of the Conservative Party here. I'm going to talk about a few things.

I'll start off with the fact that this motion is a little bit confusing, considering that we have a public inquiry that is currently taking place and that this is an unconfirmed media report. I know the motion says “Given that, media reporting states”. We have a public inquiry. I'm not sure if this is a discovery that was made there or if this is a revelation of a media report. We've seen allegations in the media take place previously.

I know the member, Mr. Cooper, indicated that there are a lot of questions. There are a lot of questions. The broad topic of foreign interference and the national security and integrity of our systems is extremely important. However, I'm curious as to why the Conservative Party is quiet and has been quiet. We had a Canadian murdered on Canadian soil. We had an emergency debate on it. There was zero interest. Nobody showed up on the other side of the House.

We have a motion put forward by the member for Surrey-Newton, a very important motion on the intimidation and the threats of foreign actors on Canadian soil. That's coming up. I hope the members will second that motion and join the important discussion and debate that will take place around that.

The hypocrisy I want to speak to is the fact that we've had reports post-2021. There was the nomination of the member of Oxford. We've had issues stated by.... We've even had the former leader of the Conservative Party make claims that there was foreign interference in his being ousted as the Conservative leader. This is recent. There have been issues of Iranian interference in the Richmond Hill CPC nomination race recently.

More importantly, the strong relationship between the member for Calgary-Heritage and the Prime Minister of India goes back many years to when he helped produce a news report claiming that Pakistan was involved with the Sikh separatist movement. If you look at some of the information surrounding his history.... I would like to raise his relationship with the New Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation, an Indian think tank set up with funds from Indian oil giant Reliance Industries.

The member for Calgary-Heritage also helped produce a controversial report by former CBC reporter Terry Milewski that alleged that Pakistan secretly created a Sikh separatist movement. The report was amplified by official Indian government accounts, which triggered a backlash in the Sikh diaspora community here. There was silence on the other side—nothing.

The topic is extremely important. However, this motion is clearly based on media allegations and on nothing revealed in the public inquiry that's currently going on, which is extremely important. We need to know that.

If these allegations are real, bring it all forward.

Why is there silence on the other side about these issues I'm raising right now? I know Mr. Cooper talked about questions. Which top Conservative is turning a blind eye to concerns in the nomination battles they're having? If you look at their leadership race, even, there are allegations of foreign interference from India. You have Iran, India, China. All of these issues are currently being studied in the public inquiry taking place. They're being investigated. If there are allegations that are found to be true, the RCMP will step in.

Why is the Conservative leader himself not obtaining security clearance? The hypocrisy is unbelievable.

All I see here is a lot of bluster and an opportunity for grandstanding and getting the clips they need when we have a very important public inquiry taking place in front of everybody—all of Canada. They can tune in. Discoveries are made. People are testifying. Witnesses are being called. All the important people listed here will be called in to present the information they have. Therefore, I don't understand why this is being introduced here when we have a fulsome public inquiry taking place.

If there are any questions, they should be directed toward the Conservative Party about the hypocrisy they're showing right now, their silence on the meddling by other nations taking place, and their sole focus on just one.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Are you done, Mr. Bains? I heard a pause there. Are you good?

[Parm Bains, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

I paused. Are we allowed to pause?

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

You are allowed to pause. It was an extended pause, so I was wondering whether you were done.

You have the floor. Continue, please.

[Parm Bains, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

Thank you.

I think that the members opposite often come in and table-drop motions so that they can repeat their practised lines and talk about corruption. What about the corruption, or the silence and the hypocrisy that we're not...? If you want to hold one party to account, hold yourself to account, because accountability should be across all aisles.

I know that members opposite have raised issues, such as allegations about police stations, but they never raise the point that it was the previous Harper government that set that poor precedent and allowed Chinese police officers to come here, to intimidate and to try to repatriate citizens who they alleged were criminals. They set that poor practice, and we're cleaning up that mess now.

I just want to reiterate that the key word today from the Conservative Party should be “hypocrisy”. They talk about corruption. It goes both ways. The hypocrisy that they're showing, the silence in all of these nomination races that are taking place within their leadership.... They're not coming forward and calling any of this to account. Their former leader, who recently claimed that he was ousted, claimed it was due to foreign interference that he was pushed out of the Conservative Party.

I'll just reiterate that the first four words in this motion state, “Given that, media reporting states”. We have a public inquiry in which Justice Hogue is taking this matter in front of all Canadians. The public inquiry should continue, and if there are any revelations there that are discovered, the appropriate public safety agency should step in to investigate the matter further.

I'll end my comments there.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Bains.

I have Mr. Gerretsen, Mr. Housefather, Mrs. Romanado and Mr. Barrett.

Go ahead, Mr. Gerretsen.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Bains said it so well that I don't think I need to add anything. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

The extended pause really added a lot more drama.

Thank you.

Mr. Housefather, are you in agreement with Mr. Bains?

[Anthony Housefather, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

I am totally in agreement—no problem. I cede the floor.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Mrs. Romanado, are you in agreement with Mr. Bains and what he had to say?

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

I will just say that I remove myself from the list.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you.

Mr. Barrett, go ahead, please.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Thanks very much, Chair.

I don't agree with Mr. Bains, but I'm glad we were able to hear comments from members.

I will propose an amendment. Once it's moved and the clerk has the opportunity to capture it, then perhaps I'll leave it to you, Mr. Chair, to consider if a suspension is in order for it to be translated and circulated to members.

I'm going to go ahead with the amendment, if that's okay.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Go ahead, Mr. Barrett, with the amendment.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

In the motion, where it says “sharing this information, the committee”, it would strike the words “call the following witnesses” and read, “direct the chair of the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics to write to the chair of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs and ask the procedure and House affairs committee to consider this matter, including the following witnesses”. That's the end of the amendment. The list of witnesses, with Mr. Brock's amendment having been accepted, would be included.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Barrett.

Mr. Green, I see your hand up on the amendment. I understand that the parties have been working on this. I'm going to allow the clerk to do what she needs to do, but I think the amendment is very clear and very simple. I'm going to go to Mr. Green on the amendment, and if there's a need to suspend so that we can circulate the amendment, we'll do that.

On the amendment, Mr. Green, go ahead.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Not to shock the Hansard, but I will go on the record and say that this is a very practical and appropriate move by friends on the Conservative side. I certainly support it and I think it shows good faith, particularly, if I'm being very open here.... We spent our time discussing our priority of business in the beginning of this meeting in a way that would have have set forth the rest of our calendar. One of the issues that I've had—and I won't be nearly as animated as my last description about Mr. Chong—is having the same things going to multiple committees, and I think what Mr. Barrett has done is eliminate that prospect.

Certainly, if there are concerns—and they've outlined them in a very long and detailed way—they should be studied. I think PROC is the appropriate place for it to be studied, and I look forward to that. Should there be any unresolved issues that would have more alignment with our mandate here at ETHI, then at that time I might be willing to entertain a revisiting of that. In the meantime, I think it's important that this committee stay the course with the work that we've set out to do for the remainder of this session, and not necessarily have a new thing coming from our Conservative friends every other week, who want it to take precedence over everything else that we do at committee.

I appreciate that we're going to get a chance to hopefully explore some of the valuable work put forward by my friend from the Bloc, Mr. Villemure. I just want to say that I appreciate Mr. Barrett's intervention and amendment, and hopefully we can find good consensus around the table to have this referred to PROC.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Green.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Michael, if you want to clip that and go ahead and put it in your fundraisers, feel free to do that.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Breaking news.

Mr. Green, I appreciate that.

We'll suspend for a few minutes, just to give the clerk enough time to work on the amendment proposed by Mr. Barrett.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thanks for your patience, everyone.

We wanted to make sure that we got the amendment proposed by Mr. Barrett to everyone in both official languages.

I'm just going to read the amendment one more time. Well, I'll read the motion, as amended:

Given that,

media reporting states that a Liberal Party member informed the Liberal candidate for Don Valley North that he was the subject of a CSIS investigation in 2019 and that,

this information could only be obtained from classified national security briefings, with the leak undermining the work of Canada’s intelligence agency and violating—

It should be “violation”.

—of Canada’s national security laws and that,

since only select individuals in the Liberal government and Liberal Party would have received this classified information from CSIS, and would have been responsible for sharing this information,

that the chair of the committee write—

Well, this says “write”.

[The Clerk]

Yes, sorry. That's my mistake. It should read, “that the committee direct the chair of the committee to write”.