Evidence of meeting #139 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was anderson.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Okay. You did that during the amendment.
Now I'm going to go to Mr. Housefather.
Mr. Housefather, your hand is not up. Is that—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Are you ready to go? You're next on the list. Go ahead, please.
Liberal
Anthony Housefather Liberal Mount Royal, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I want to come back to the reason for bringing Minister Boissonnault before the committee for a third time. I understand very well that the question before the committee is to establish whether Mr. Boissonnault was linked to the company after the date on which he became minister.
Mr. Boissonnault has appeared before the committee twice, and he has twice denied that he was connected with the company after that date. The real question is why Mr. Anderson repeatedly used Mr. Boissonnault's name in text messages and perhaps in conversations with people who were potential customers or suppliers of the company. For this purpose, we need Mr. Anderson.
The first time Mr. Anderson appeared before the committee, he was clearly a terrible witness. For this reason, and because of Mr. Anderson's failure to provide the information requested by the committee, the members of the committee unanimously asked the House to raise a question of privilege and bring Mr. Anderson before the House of Commons to answer our questions before the Speaker and all Canadians.
In my opinion, this must be the next step. It seems to me completely pointless to call witnesses who have had no direct communication with Mr. Boissonnault, and it's pointless to call Mr. Boissonnault a third time without new information.
Here's what we should do. The House of Commons should refer the present question of privilege to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. This is what was proposed by the Speaker, this is what is the subject of the motion before the House, and this is what is currently being filibustered by the Conservative Party. Once we've dealt with this motion of privilege, we'll turn to Mr. Anderson's question of privilege. We can all, unanimously and very quickly, pass this motion and bring Mr. Anderson before the House to get real answers.
If, after Mr. Anderson's testimony before the House of Commons, we have new information and intelligence that helps us understand why Mr. Anderson used Mr. Boissonnault's name in his text messages and conversations, it may be useful to call Mr. Boissonnault or other witnesses to testify again before the committee. However, it seems to me completely pointless to deal with this matter before we have called Mr. Anderson before the House of Commons.
For these reasons, I will vote against the motion.
Conservative
November 7th, 2024 / 5:55 p.m.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
A lot has been discussed here, and I'm going to try to add some comments. We've gone in a lot of different directions.
It's clear that Mr. Anderson's actions during his appearance here were unacceptable. He has clearly misled the committee in a number of different ways. He's using Minister Boissonnault's name to leverage his interests in some capacity in a number of different ways.
I agree with Mr. Housefather that this matter can be dealt with in the House, as we've all agreed to, as long as the Conservative Party can drop the filibuster that's been going on there for a number of weeks. Ultimately, that's not up to me, but if this matter is to be studied at a committee....
This goes back to Mr. Barrett's original motion. It's to do with an application to the indigenous procurement program. I am a member of OGGO and Mr. Barrett is also a member, and we have an indigenous study taking place there currently. It's under way. It has been a robust study, and the committee has been proceeding collaboratively in the study to look at the procurement strategy for indigenous businesses, which was first established in 1996.
We've had a number of different witnesses come in: First Nations Finance Authority; First Nations Financial Management Board; PLATO, which does software testing; National Aboriginal Capital Corporations Association; Assembly of First Nations; and Canadian Council for Indigenous Business. We've discussed how the government could find indigenous businesses on lists; who should best manage these lists; who should be applying for, or warranted to be, an indigenous business; and who should be qualified for, or accredited to apply as, an indigenous business.
I think it could be helpful if this study, specifically in relation to Mr. Anderson and what led him to apply, could get to the bottom of why he would consider this. What are the different questions we could ask?
At the same time, we could talk about how, under the program, federal organizations may set aside procurement for indigenous business under the PSIB, but in some cases the set-asides are mandatory or the set-asides give indigenous business a right of first refusal or exclusive bidding rights on federal contracting opportunities. What led Mr. Anderson to think that he could apply?
In August 2021, the Government of Canada recommitted to renewing and strengthening the economic relationship with indigenous entrepreneurs and communities by providing increased economic opportunities for first nations, Inuit and Métis businesses through the federal procurement process.
Initial reports show that government departments are now actually exceeding the 5% target, and that's not a maximum by any means. It was a minimum target that was set, and this of course continues to allow for more opportunities to work with indigenous businesses and to continue to try to improve. As we talk with first nations, Inuit and Métis partners, including business leaders and financial institutions, to figure out what's working or not working and how to do it better, we need to root out these types of false applications.
Going back to Mr. Anderson and his use of a minister's name for leverage, it's clear that is what he was doing in a lot of these messages. Perhaps he was even trying to intimidate whoever he was working with by saying that he has this minister onside. It's probably not the first time people have done that.
I know I'm a new member, but there are all kinds of lobbyist activities and all kinds of networking. You have people saying, “Oh, yeah, I'm buddies with Pierre Poilievre” or another member of this House, trying to leverage their position while negotiating something. That's not far-fetched. I think something like that is happening. Look at other engagement opportunities and partners. I think Mrs. Shanahan showed us an example of this earlier today. We've seen certain businesses ultimately called in and whatever contracts they had revoked, or even whatever status they were trying to use to obtain some of these contracts being revoked.
On Mr. Barrett's original motion, I know members in the mighty OGGO might not be too happy if we look at the study going on over there. Maybe it's a possibility. Something like this could go in that direction, in order to see what led Mr. Anderson to apply for something he may not be qualified for. I want to see whether there's some opportunity to co-operate and get to a different way forward and move this discussion forward.
I'll leave my thoughts there. I may come back.
Thank you.
Conservative
Liberal
Brenda Shanahan Liberal Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC
Thank you, Chair.
Mr. Green brought up quite a salacious story. I want to bring up something. That article—I believe it's the same Global News article—clearly states that Global News found no direct tie between Boissonnault and LeBlanc.
The member mentioned another name—Arseneault—but maybe that was misspoken.
Liberal
Brenda Shanahan Liberal Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC
I thought I heard “Arseneault”. You were really rhyming the names off there.
Anyway, Mr. Boissonnault came out with a statement that he had no knowledge of this person, and so on and so forth.
Mr. Green's point about the relevance of this is well taken. It's not relevant. I don't think we're here to start accusing people simply by association. If that is the case, anybody who had a friend in school, or whatever....
Chair, I'm going to leave it there. If anybody wants to see the article, I found it by looking up “Anderson” and “cocaine”.
Conservative
Liberal
Iqra Khalid Liberal Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON
Chair, I'll relinquish my time to Mr. Green. I always love to hear what he has to say.
NDP
Matthew Green NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Thank you.
In the same story, the editor's note referenced by Mrs. Shanahan says that Global News has not independently verified this claim.
Thank you.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Thank you, Mr. Green.
I have nobody else on the list.
We're on the motion proposed by Mr. Barrett.
Do we have unanimous consent?
Liberal
Iqra Khalid Liberal Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON
Can I have the floor after the vote?
I think it's probably going to be a recorded vote. Is that right?
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
This will be a recorded vote, but I have Mr. Villemure.
I will call the vote.
Madam Clerk, go ahead.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
I will vote yes.
(Motion agreed to: yeas 6; nays 5)
Go ahead, Ms. Khalid.
Liberal
Iqra Khalid Liberal Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON
Thank you very much, Chair.
I had intended to move a motion today, but I will leave that for another day.
What I would really like to see from you, Chair, is our work plan for the rest of the year. I'm not sure if you could outline today what we're expecting or anticipating up to the end of the year and into the new year.
Perhaps you could send us a digital copy of the working calendar that you're working on with the clerk. That would be really helpful for all of us in this committee so that we'd be able to gauge and schedule accordingly.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
I appreciate that.
We did schedule some committee and subcommittee meetings to work out a schedule, but you'll recall that back in April or May, we had situations that kept us from getting much done in the way of committee business.
I can certainly share with the committee, as I did at the top of the meeting, what the game plan is for the week of the 19th and who we have coming in.
We're still waiting to hear from the minister on the CRA study. The study on disinformation and misinformation is something that the analysts are working on. Maybe I can get a better sense from Maxime or Alexandra on where we are on the disinformation and misinformation study in terms of timelines. We've had some conversations about that as well.
Not to put you on the spot, but perhaps you could share with the committee some of that information.
Maxime-Olivier Thibodeau Committee Researcher
Sure. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
It's being drafted right now, as fast as we can. The schedule dates are to be distributed to the committee members on December 11.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Okay. We will have to schedule some meetings before the House rises for the winter break to ensure that we deal with that report. As you can imagine, it's going to be a fairly lengthy report. We had quite a few witnesses over several meetings.
That's the work plan. We have, as I said, the CRA motion, and now there's the adoption of this motion. That should take us the next two or three weeks at least, but we'll—
Liberal
Iqra Khalid Liberal Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON
Is it this motion specifically, Chair? Is this motion going to...?