My respect for your work as legislators and parliamentarians is implicit in my remarks.
As a strategic foresight consultant, I advise business, government, higher education, NGOs and registered charities about comprehensively and strategically thinking about the future. Once clients understand plausible scenarios that they may face, they can prepare for disruptions. I propose to this committee that parliamentarians must thoroughly prepare for uncertain futures.
Today Canada is less resilient than it was prepandemic. Many of us feel highly distressed, experience a more challenging economy, view politicians and institutions with greater distrust, and face the toxic consequences of polarization online and in real life.
We are living through multiple converging and overlapping crises, geopolitical instability, climate impacts, emerging diseases and technologies that fuel misinformation and disinformation. The RCMP's heavily redacted report indicated similar foreboding threats in Canada's near future. At this crossroad, I believe that Canada faces two stark choices: to build resilience to reveal falsehoods and ascertain truth with coordinated and holistic efforts or to see resilience neutralized through individualized and fragmented responses.
I harbour grave concerns about what governing might be like in a future where parliamentarians and Canadians are unable to differentiate facts from mis- and disinformation and ultimately act contrary to their individual, community and collective interests.
Parliamentarians' work influences all persons living in Canada. While all of us, including your constituents, are targets of mis- and disinformation, you as parliamentarians are at increased risk of being targeted because of your time-honoured political and legislative roles. Multiple anti-democratic actors, nation-states, criminal entities and advocacy interests seek to subvert or co-opt parliamentarians by amplifying mis- and disinformation from individual to population scales.
Canada's adversaries seek to obstruct parliamentarians' deliberative decision-making and stakeholder engagement. This threatens Canada's domestic and foreign policy, thereby challenging Canadians' economic prosperity and social cohesion. It is a common misconception that these efforts are easily detected, but subtle manipulation of a single piece of information can be easy to miss. Targeting of your trusted staff, departments and the agencies you rely on for research and analysis creates new information vulnerabilities.
Mis- and disinformation exploit technologies of social media, machine learning and artificial intelligence that parliamentarians increasingly depend on for democratic engagement and constructive action and that our economy depends on for competitive advantage. By design, mis- and disinformation are threat multipliers. They promote distrust of bedrock institutions such as the Parliament of Canada, the justice system, fact-checked media, non-partisan research, universities, health care providers and the international institutions that arose after World War II to foster co-operation and stability.
Politics of rage and grievance driven by mis- and disinformation instigate polarization at individual, group and population levels. In this environment, parliamentarians must determine if and how their positions on policy, funding and legislation may unwittingly serve Canada's adversaries or be influenced by any entity that could compromise Canada's resilience.
Parliament needs to be seen to balance mis- and disinformation with the broader contextual perspective expected of trusted institutions behaving in the national interest. Establishing cohesive whole-of-Parliament and whole-of-society approaches to addressing this mis- and disinformation is a critical mission to rebuild trust and social licence.
Parliamentarians need no reminder that Canada's enemies are pleased for us to be divided, rendering Parliament incapable of acting in the national interest, protecting agri-food supply chains, building climate security, strengthening energy and transportation networks, and securing our elections. For parliamentarians, ensuring that mis- and disinformation do not interfere with cross-party collaboration in the House is necessary for Canada's material well-being and physical and mental health.
Parliamentarians and their staff need to continuously learn about how sophisticated approaches to deception and/or impersonation of legislators via convincing AI-driven manipulations of video, voice, text and images may irreparably harm political reputations and our democracy.
In the short term, as Canada navigates an era of multiple converging crises, the structured approach of scenario planning can assist parliamentarians as they devise resilient public policy, legislation, regulation and stakeholder engagement. In the longer term, consider the potential for a Canadian charter of digital rights and freedoms to articulate responsibilities and protections for Canadians related to mis- and disinformation.
Thank you.