Foreign Affairs Committee on Oct. 24th, 2006

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

That tends to be through an international window, so IFIs, or NDI, or the Parliamentary Centre here in Canada, or any one of the multitude of UN agencies, or the Commonwealth Secretariat.

Those entities, working locally, would come to us and say they need a Canadian who is of Congolese descent and has recent knowledge of the Congo; that they're looking for someone who is a former MP; or that they're looking for this kind of an individual and there would be a real advantage if it was a woman because they have an underrepresentation of women; or whatever they want to set out as criteria.

Directly, with local organizations, is not our skill set, and we don't pretend to have that kind of connection. It's for other agencies out there to be making those connections, but then coming to us to find the right Canadians to plug into their endeavours.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

Madame McDonough.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I have four questions that I'm going to try to spit out as fast as I can.

Thank you for the presentation. Starting with Haiti, I would certainly congratulate you for your role there. I had the opportunity to be there during the second round of elections, when I think there was an absolute minimum incidence of irregularities. It was very impressive.

One of the things you said, which I very much applaud, is that it's extremely important to do the training of the local population. One of the things that surprised me a lot was that when we visited Elections Canada sites on the election day, there wasn't a single local anywhere to be seen. I'm not sure about where CANADEM leaves off and Elections Canada picks up in that regard. Could you comment on that briefly?

Secondly, you were speaking about the CAN-Jeunesse program, which aims to involve young Canadians. I very much applaud that. I'm wondering if you suffered any cuts in this recent round of cuts to the international internship program, or whether you're not directly affected by that.

Thirdly, with respect to the Ukrainian election observing, there was a fair amount of criticism about the recruitment and perhaps inadequate training of some of those who were sent. I'm wondering if you can comment on whether it just grew out of anything that had been anticipated. Is that the reason why? Could you shed some light?

Finally, speaking about involvement in Afghanistan, could you speak specifically about the nature of any involvement in Kandahar? Several of us have heard really shocking, worrisome testimony this morning from the Senlis Council about the unbalanced mission in Kandahar that is leaving people literally starving, including children. People aren't the least bit Taliban-sympathetic, but they are nevertheless accepting money to fight and kill for the Taliban because it's the only way they see themselves as being able to feed their children and save them from starvation.

In that context, my question is, what is the involvement in Kandahar, if any? What are the prospects for any kind of winning of their hearts and minds and winning them over to democracy, given the desperate humanitarian situation that prevails at this point?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Madam McDonough

You have four questions there.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

I've observed that he answers very quickly and precisely, so it's a compliment to him.

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

Where does CANADEM leave off and Elections Canada or MINUSTAH or whoever start? We basically leave off when the plane takes off. In other words, we get them onto the plane. We may get them onto the plane with weapons, we may get them on the plane with equipment, we may get them on the plane with training, but all that happens before they get onto the plane. Once they get onto the plane and then once they touch down, they'll be taken and they'll be under the command and control of that particular mission, which will explain some of my other answers here a little bit.

Very briefly on CAN-Jeunesse, yes, we were affected by that because we have interns from Foreign Affairs. That's a shame, but I must admit I anticipated it.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

How many interns have been cut?

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

It has been variable, but that will cut back twelve interns for us. However, we're looking at alternate ways of funding that. In fact, I will say without hesitation, to any individual who wants to start their international career, that if they're trying to decide whether they should take a master's in something or whether they should pay for their own internship, they should self-fund their own internship. That's the way to start your career. God, I wish that had existed when I was trying to start my career, because it's a catch-22 if you don't have experience. Nobody wants to talk to you.

So I think there are a lot of different ways. We're going after corporate funding, but I think self-funding internships is the way to go on that one. So it's a shame, but I don't believe it's the role of the government to always pick up the tab on this one.

On the Ukrainian recruitment, was it a smart idea to suddenly decide to send 500 election observers to Ukraine? Was that the best expenditure of money? You know what? I don't want to go down that road. It wouldn't have been my first choice. Let me put it that way.

We were anticipating a deployment of maybe 75 individuals. That's what we were geared for. Suddenly, 15 minutes after it was announced in the House, we heard that 500 were being sent, CANADEM was it, register with CANADEM.

I'm impressed at how that turned out. The partnership between Foreign Affairs, CIDA, and us was impressive. A number of things could have gone wrong on that one, so I think it was in fact a very successful mission. Was it the best thing to do? I wouldn't recommend it. Let me put it that way.

On Afghanistan and Kandahar, I have my own personal thoughts on Kandahar and the motivation for some of the Canadian presence in Kandahar, which I think is perhaps misguided. On the other hand, other motivation to help the Afghans in Kandahar is good motivation.

Is it the best time to be going in there, following on from a fairly heavy-handed military presence by the States and others? Again, you could take it in various different ways. But those are my personal views.

Our job at CANADEM is not to get too much into the merit of what's being done on the ground. If it's outrageous, obviously we don't want to be part of it. But other than that, we assume that the Canadian military, NATO, the UN, and international organizations have thought about it and they think it's the right way to go.

They ask us for experts. We drill down into our database and we find the 300 people who fit the criteria. We send those people a message saying what the terms are; what it is; what it pays, that it's pro bono, or that it's a D1 post with the UN that is hugely paid; that it's for six days or six months or two years. We put it all in there and they make an informed decision. It's their call. We're like matchmakers. If we have a willing mission that wants people and we have willing individuals who want to go out there, if they want to go to Kandahar, great. We make the introduction and then we step out of it.

Most of the time, we're just matchmakers. Sometimes, though, we do go that added bit when the Canadian government or somebody else says they also want us to give them a contract and get them over there. We're then engaged until their flight takes off. But once they take off, command and control transfers over to that particular entity on the ground.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. Edwards.

Mr. Van Loan.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Welcome, Mr. LaRose-Edwards.

I want to follow on Madam McDonough's question. I know she asked you a lot of questions. You didn't have a lot of time to answer, and I didn't want you to leave the committee with a misleading impression.

Actually, after five years with no changes in your funding, the funding to your program actually went up 28% this year under the government. Is that right?

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

Is this the funding for the rapid recruitment assistance program?

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

For CANADEM, it went from $500,000 annually up to $640,000 annually.

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

That's for the rapid recruitment assistance program, from Foreign Affairs, to assist the international community, both UN and others.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

That's CANADEM's funding.

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

Yes, it is.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

I just wanted to make that clear, since you hadn't told the committee that had gone up 28% this year. I wanted to get that from you, and I thank you for that. How is that money spent?

Also, what is the difference between CANADEM and Canada Corps? The programs you've talked about—the Ukrainian monitoring and Haiti monitoring—are things that, until now, I had always been told were Canada Corps. I'm hearing today that they're CANADEM. What's the difference?

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

First of all, on the funding, thank you for bringing that up. In your opening remarks you talked about that funding being $500,000. That had been flatlined for four years, but this year Foreign Affairs fortunately agreed that we had just taken on so much more.

That money is used for the recruitment of people to the roster and the screening of individuals on the roster, which is a major challenge for us because we don't put anybody forward unless they have been screened. It then pays for a team of people who respond to international requests for individuals to go in and make that match-up. It's for going in, finding the experts, sending those experts a message, finding out who is free, and making sure that gets to the UN.

So that covers that component of what we call our rapid recruitment assistance program, where we're assisting the UN and others in the international community to identify experts. To do that, we have to create and maintain this roster, and then respond when they're looking for individuals. That's what the money pays for.

For anybody who has run an organization, you know $650,000 doesn't go very far, so—

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Is that mostly salaries or contracts?

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

It's mostly salaries.

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

How many staff do you have? Do you have an office and that sort of stuff?

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

Our staff right now is running in the range of 25 individuals, but that covers the whole of the spectrum. The roster team has five full-timers and about three or four part-timers, but we also use a lot of stringers, so to speak, for screening, for example.

We use a former police officer to screen the police officers registering with us. We have over 700 police. We use ex-military to screen ex-military. We use human rights experts.... You see what I'm driving at. We use a lot of people out there to do our screening.

We also employ search personnel. On the Ukraine deployment, because it was so much so fast, during that period of time we engaged 25 search personnel to make that happen. So that was on the roster or on the deployment side.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

What about Canada Corps and CANADEM?

[Paul LaRose-Edwards]

Quite honestly, I'm not too sure what Canada Corps is. It has been morphing over the years. I don't think anybody was too sure right at the beginning, and I don't think anybody is too sure now exactly what it is.

What's in Canada Corps? On the Ukraine deployment, all of us were three days into the deployment—me, Foreign Affairs, CIDA—and we would meet every day. On day three, we were sitting down and doing our daily debriefing. We had a dynamic team that really clicked along. We were about fifteen minutes into that debriefing and in walked someone to tell us that, by the way, this was a Canada Corps deployment.

One person from CIDA said, “Oh great. Does this mean I don't have to fund it?” “No, it's still coming out of your budget.” Someone from Foreign Affairs said, “Does that mean we don't have to do this?” “No, you're still doing it.” We said, “Is our involvement going to stay the same?” “Oh yeah.” Nothing changed. We didn't see Canada Corps until the day of the deployment. So was that a Canada Corps deployment? Yes, sure. I'm easy. I don't really care.

So what's Canada Corps? I'm not too sure. But don't get me wrong. The concept of Canada Corps is a great idea. We worked very hard with the two co-chairs on that one on what it could have become. It didn't go that route, and Gordon Smith and Julie Payette finally sort of...they got partly pushed out and they partly walked away.

Let me not go too deeply into this, because the concept was a right concept. It was a concept that really laid the foundation for CANADEM. That's why we have CANADEM.

I suspect that the people who were thinking about Canada Corps were not fully aware of CANADEM. They weren't fully aware of a whole raft of other Canadian organizations that do similar things. There are a ton of people out there doing this. We're not the only ones. Let me emphasize that we're just one of a number of Canadian tools, both governmental and non-governmental, that is doing this stuff.

So I think Canada Corps was thought up with a great motivation, but without a full understanding of how much existed already.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you, Mr. LaRose-Edwards.

Mr. Martin.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Paul, it's great to see you here. Thank you very much.

I just want to say on the record what an admirer I am of the work that CANADEM does. You're a lean, mean organization that fulfils a major deficit in international development. The fact that you well articulated Canada's excellence in this area is all the more reason why I hope the funding continues, and continues to grow. All of us who have been in the environments that you work in know full well that capacity-building is a major obstacle to development. It's a major area where Canada can make an effective contribution, and your CANADEM does that.

I want to just follow along some of the questions that Mr. Van Loan asked. I might be a little less charitable about Canada Corps than you are. I think it's a great idea, but it's a runt of an organization that is utterly dysfunctional. It has been a great disappointment personally in trying to get that thing moving forward.

What is the relationship, if you could, between CANADEM, CESO, CUSO, and other organizations that were alluded to before?

And my second question is, how can we move forward to make your organization and what you do more effective, and to be able to broaden those opportunities? Given that the effective demand on the ground is so large and what we're doing is great but modest, we are part of an untapped potential of what you're dealing with. How can we expand the capabilities of CANADEM, then? What can we do to assist you to be able to be bigger and have a larger reach, if you will?