Information & Ethics Committee on May 9th, 2023

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

I'm going to call this meeting to order.

Welcome, everyone, to meeting number 70 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics.

Today’s meeting is taking place in a hybrid format pursuant to the House order of June 23, 2022; therefore, members can attend in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application. Should any technical challenges arise, please advise me.

I see we have Mr. Bains on Zoom today. Please note that we may need to suspend for a few minutes, as we need to ensure that all members are able to fully participate.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(h) and the motion adopted by the committee on Wednesday, December 7, 2022, the committee has resumed its study of foreign interference and threats to the integrity of democratic institutions, intellectual property and the Canadian state.

I would like to welcome our witness today. From the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, we have Mr. Edward Johnson, chair of the board of the foundation.

We will be having votes in about 50 minutes. Can I have the committee's consent to get through Mr. Johnson's five-minute comments and then perhaps the first round? That will put us at 39 minutes, which will give us plenty of time to get upstairs.

Are we good with that, Mr. Fergus?

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Everybody is good with that.

You'll notice that we amended the meeting notice to include an in camera session related to information. That information relates to the documents that we have received and an update to the committee on the translation of those documents. We will be doing that, but again, we're going to have to determine how we are for time when we get back after the votes. My plan is to still have that committee business portion at the end.

Mr. Johnson, I want to welcome you to the committee. You have up to five minutes, sir, to address the committee. Go ahead, please.

[Edward Johnson, Chair of the Board of the Foundation, Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation]

Thank you, Chair.

I'll cover three points now: the mission of the foundation, governance matters raised in previous testimony needing correction, and a message to our scholars.

First, I'll go to the foundation. The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation is a non-partisan charitable scholarship foundation created in 2002, with broad cross-party support in the House of Commons. The first board of directors included Bill Davis, Roy Romanow and Peter Lougheed. It was granted a $125-million endowment by the government, and since then it has spent some $95 million providing 295 doctoral scholarships, plus mentorships and fellowships, and related programming. We achieved that without touching the capital, which now stands at $145 million. Today we rank up there with Rhodes, MacArthur and Fulbright as a sought-after scholarship, and many of our scholars say that their involvement was a life-changing experience.

Our directors and members are all volunteers. The overwhelming bulk of private donations to the foundation are from board members. The Trudeau family has no financial interest whatsoever in the foundation.

President Fournier and I enjoyed a friendly and effective working relationship over almost all of my two years as chair. But intense national attention beginning on February 28, relating to a donation seven years ago totalling $140,000 by a Chinese Canadian entity put severe pressure on the entire foundation at its busiest time of year. The consequences are well known.

Let me add that the foundation has been subjected to unwarranted and unfair attacks. The Chinese Canadian donation came to us through the Université de Montréal. We were never offered $1 million, and we never received any red flags from CSIS.

Turning now to previous testimony before the committee, it's important that I respond to some earlier testimony here.

At no time did I receive a legal opinion on possible conflict of interest involving me or other directors relating to the 2014-17 donations, but I did not need a legal opinion to tell me what I instinctively knew. I was on the board at the time, so I should not be involved in any oversight of any outside review of those donations. At no time did I resist or attempt to narrow such an independent review, nor, to my knowledge, did any other director.

Throughout March, with concurrence of outside counsel, I urged that an independent review should be overseen not by Ms. Fournier, not by me, but by a special committee of three directors, who had no involvement whatsoever in the foundation in the years 2014-17. I proposed this formally to the full board meeting on March 31.

As to my eligibility to chair that meeting, there was no question. My interests aligned perfectly with the interests of the foundation. I wanted an independent review, and so did the rest of the board, and it was my duty as chair to preside.

There were two outside lawyers from two firms advising the board at that meeting, and both said they had not given opinions on conflicts of interest. Neither they nor any director questioned my legitimacy to chair or to vote at that meeting.

Over the subsequent week, a board consensus emerged among directors that indeed the outside review should be overseen by a special committee of three, as I had originally recommended, and that it must not report to management.

I'm providing the committee with the memo I sent to the entire board and Ms. Fournier on Easter Thursday, April 6, proposing a path forward. To my disappointment, the board resigned on April 10, Easter Monday, before the consensus reflected in my memo could be given effect.

As to my eagerness to have an independent outside review, I wrote to the Auditor General on April 14, three days after the board resignations, to ask her to investigate all aspects of the receipt and handling of these donations by the foundation. I'm providing copies of my letter here.

Looking ahead, I want to say a special word to our scholars, mentors and fellows and to our marvellous and enthusiastic team at the foundation. The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation will continue to provide its outstanding academic program, and thanks to the volunteers on our finance committee, we continue to be well financed. Our excellent team is working ahead on the selection of our next cohort and planned leadership development events. It's an exciting future for the foundation.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Brassard]

Thank you, Mr. Johnson.

Members, I've been advised by the clerk that we do have a hard stop at six o'clock this evening. There are other committee meetings this evening as well.

I appreciate your opening remarks, Mr. Johnson.

We'll go to Mr. Barrett for six minutes.

Sir, go ahead, please.

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

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you for being here today, sir.

Who requested that Mr. Alexandre Trudeau sign the donation agreement for that $140,000 that was backed by Beijing?

[Edward Johnson]

I wasn't involved in that decision and wasn't aware of it at the time.

I heard the testimony of both Mr. Trudeau and Mr. Rosenberg here last week explaining how that came about.

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

Do you know how many scholarships bear the name Pierre Elliott Trudeau across the country?

[Edward Johnson]

Of ours, there are 295 so far.

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

Those are scholarships with universities and educational institutions.

[Edward Johnson]

Yes, that's right, here and abroad.

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

What was the number?

[Edward Johnson]

It's 295 so far.

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

Of those 295 so far, how many of those agreements did Mr. Alexandre Trudeau sign off on?

[Edward Johnson]

None, to my knowledge.

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

The reason I ask is that, as you heard in Mr. Trudeau's testimony, the reason he said that he was required to sign the donation agreement from these folks acting on behalf of the dictatorship in Beijing was that it invoked his father's name. He also said that it was the only time in 20 years that he signed a donation agreement.

It's highly suspicious that we have this one occurrence, this one donation, that is the subject of this meeting.

You said that it didn't raise any red flags for you. You were on the audit committee at the time. The process of having the donation receipt sent overseas, having officials from a foreign government in the meetings to agree on the donation agreement and the circumstances on the signing ceremony, that didn't raise any red flags for you?

[Edward Johnson]

I wasn't aware of it at the time. This matter didn't come before the audit committee, to the best of my knowledge.

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

No one ever asked if it was illegal?

[Edward Johnson]

I can't say that.

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

Did people ask at the time if this was illegal?

[Edward Johnson]

I'm unaware of whether anyone did or did not. I'm sorry.

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

CSIS recorded a conversation between the Beijing consulate and the donor. Are you aware of that now?

[Edward Johnson]

Is that the Globe and Mail report of February 28?

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

Yes.

[Edward Johnson]

I've read the article.