Evidence of meeting #33 for Foreign Affairs and International Development in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was china.
A recording is available from Parliament.
10:25 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you, Dr. Leung. Did you want to expand on that a little more? I hope I wasn't cutting you off.
10:25 a.m.
Professor, Culture Regeneration Research Society
Yes, okay, maybe just a bit more.
10:25 a.m.
Professor, Culture Regeneration Research Society
I studied the history of democracy in the west, and it took 200 or more years to develop real democracy in England. In 1689 they declared the Bill of Rights, but not until 1938 did they have total human rights in which everybody can elect the government. So it took 200 or more years for the British to understand the real meaning of democracy.
And for America too. Canada is better because we have the British and the American systems to follow.
At first China just followed the Russian system. They've just now learned to follow western ways.
So the best strategy is that by using the term to keep track with the international community, that means the track of western countries; we have to match your track. This is a term used by the Chinese. We want to become a good country that is just like western countries, like you are. We have not yet developed the same system, but give us time.
Culturally it needs time, but they are going through all kinds of reform, even though slowly, but they are still moving forward.
These are my observations of China.
10:30 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you very much, Doctor.
To conclude our statements, it's my understanding that the reason we're having this discussion as a committee again was that the United Nations Commission on Human Rights seemed to get bogged down. China and other countries felt we were just coming up against a roadblock.
Then there was this exercise whereby other countries moved toward more bilateral discussions. What Canada called its bilateral discussion was the Canada-China Bilateral Human Rights Dialogue. Now I think there is the feeling of getting bogged down again on some of these specific issues.
Your suggestion is to have more cultural exchanges and continue talking and doing those. We all agree with that. But there still has to be some stage or some avenue to be able to voice specific concerns and bring certain issues to the front, not just with a cultural exchange.
But what happens when we have a Canadian citizen who is denied consular services in China? What happens? How do we deal with that with China?
So to that end our subcommittee began a discussion and study on this policy tool, and we're going to continue that. Certainly we want the cultural exchanges to continue. Certainly we appreciate the influence both ways. The students who are trained here in Canada in universities and colleges and then go back to China, we think all of that is positive for human rights and for other issues, like emerging economies and for commerce and trade. All those things are good.
But when we have those specific concerns, we need policy; we need a tool to address them. So that's why we're still continuing to study and to try to learn.
We thank you for your words today and for your testimony. I think we've seen another side of China today and we've seen there is hope and there is growth.
I really loved your analogy that we have the old culture, the old country, but we have the new, the child as well, where they're learning but they're growing, they're taking those steps.
We thank you for your input today.
We are going to conclude now. Do we have any committee business we want to discuss today? No?
We will adjourn, and again, thank you all.