Thank you very much.
Yes, it's been a happy morning, having my computer fail me, but I'm very pleased to be here with you. I welcome the opportunity to share Amnesty International's views and recommendations with respect to Bill C-300.
Certainly for many decades the crucial global struggle to better safeguard and protect the human rights of women, men, and young people around the world has been very much focused on governments, both in the sense of governments being the ones who violate human rights and in the sense of governments being the ones who have to take action to protect human rights. However, in the past 10 to 15 years, there has been a multitude of ways in which the international system has recognized that it's vital to move beyond that sole focus on governments and to look at the various ways in which a range of non-state actors, certainly including companies, impact in very significant ways on human rights.
That's certainly very true when it comes to companies. On both sides of the coin, if they act responsibly, companies can in many important ways help promote and safeguard human rights and can strengthen human rights culture in the countries in which they operate; but when companies act in an irresponsible manner, we know only too well that their activities can and do, both directly and indirectly, cause or, at the very least, very significantly contribute to grave human rights violations.
Over the past decade, therefore, much has been done, a great deal of it in the broader context of trying to advance notions of corporate social responsibility. This takes us also into the realms of environmental protection and labour rights, for instance. To look at this issue of how to better ensure that we're getting the former company activities that will help promote human rights and avoiding the latter company activities that will cause or contribute to human rights violations, companies themselves have taken individual action, governments have launched some initiatives, and at the international level, initiatives like the UN Secretary General's Global Compact, work being done within the UN Human Rights Council, at the International Finance Corporation and other settings, things are being done as well.
What virtually all of those initiatives have in common are two significant shortcomings.
The first is that the human rights aspect of the various standards and principles that are being developed and adopted are, at best, vague, certainly almost always very general, and frequently even non-existent. For instance, the International Finance Corporation's performance standards, which are central to the government's new CSR strategy, are silent when it comes to human rights.
The second is that there is virtually nothing mandatory or obligatory about the expectation that companies will conform to these standards. The approach taken, rather, is to hope that companies will voluntarily choose to do so. As such, monitoring and enforcement mechanisms, where they exist, are generally weak and have no power to order or require companies to comply, but rather have power to suggest or advise.
In the broader human rights system, we've long learned that hopeful promises and voluntary commitments are not enough. It doesn't deliver the goods when it comes to protecting human rights. We, of course, want people, governments, to volunteer, but that doesn't get us to that end point of strong human rights protection. We know that only too well by looking at the international system. It's no different, and there's no reason it would be any different, when it comes to companies.
Much is at stake here. Company security forces, if not held to careful standards, can and do operate in ways--for instance, to dispel protests by indigenous communities in and around their operations--that lead to injuries and even the killing of protesters--the right to life at stake. Any irresponsible approach taken to how mining companies deal with their tailings and industrial waste may contaminate the local area and lead to serious violations of the right to health. Inappropriate use of company infrastructure by local security forces or failure to carefully monitor how company royalties are used by a government may simply exacerbate terrible wars and conflicts in regions where companies operate, again leading to civilian casualties.
So much is at stake, and clearly more is needed. That is why Amnesty International has so actively participated in all recent efforts to review and strengthen Canadian law, policy, and practice going back to 2005 when your subcommittee conducted its study. Certainly in 2006 we were an active participant in all cities that the round table process visited. We welcomed and endorsed the report prepared by the advisory group to that process and then, like many, waited anxiously for two years to see what the government's response would be.
While we do recognize and acknowledge that the government's new CSR strategy is a step forward, we are fundamentally disappointed with it with respect to the two key challenges I just mentioned earlier.
The first is the issue of standards. The new CSR strategy essentially takes up existing standards, the International Finance Corporation's standards, for instance, that I referred to earlier and a number of others that, combined, really give no more than scant or selective attention to human rights. The round table recommendation had called for new standards, very explicitly incorporating Canada's international human rights obligations.
The other concern is on the level of enforcement. The CSR strategy, of course, doesn't take up the call for strong, meaningful oversight and enforcement; gone is the idea of an ombudsman; gone is the idea of a tripartite compliance review committee. Instead, we have a CSR counsellor whose powers are really to advise and guide, and only to investigate if all are in agreement and with no real powers to sanction.
Bill C-300 offers Parliament an opportunity to move ahead on the human rights front, and as I say, it's very much needed. As such, Amnesty International certainly welcomes this initiative and calls on Parliament ultimately to pass it. There are ways in which we might have urged for it to be stronger, but we think it is the right step forward.
It's the right step forward when it comes to standards. It is so important that Bill C-300 calls for the development of international human rights standards, for instance, based on treaties that have been ratified by Canada, based on customary law. This is a crucial dimension that we think absolutely has to be key to any initiative in this area. We think that Bill C-300 moves us forward in a meaningful way when it comes to enforcement as well. The power and responsibility given to ministers to launch investigations when there are concerns about a company possibly falling short of these new standards and the associated possibility of that having implications for eligibility for EDC financing, for assistance from government diplomats and trade officers, and even of being a possible target for CPP investing, is all crucial.
So why not? What are the possible objections to a new approach that puts Canada's human rights obligations front and centre and endeavours to ensure there will be compliance with those standards? Most often what we hear is a fear that requiring Canadian companies to live up to what are sometimes described as cumbersome human rights obligations puts Canadian companies at a competitive disadvantage. Companies from other countries, goes the argument, don't have to live up to those obligations; forcing Canadian companies to do so costs money and means they can't compete.
In Amnesty's view, that is both overstated and shortsighted and it is ultimately irrelevant. It is overstated in that it is hard to imagine how putting in place measures to ensure that company personnel don't mistreat or even summarily kill protesters, or safeguards to avoid the possibility of company infrastructure being misused by government security forces to mount sorties in the region that would lead to civilian casualties is somehow so onerous and costly as to tip the balance between profit and loss.
Further, it overlooks and ignores the many ways that regard for human rights actually boosts a company's position, improves its reputation, ensures that there's a good relationship with the local population, and helps ensure stronger rule of law, all of which is beneficial in many ways to company operations and means that it is less likely that company will ultimately be a target, for instance, for boycotts or protests.
This argument is shortsighted in that it assumes that CSR improvements would somehow begin and end with Canada, that no other country is doing similar things or is likely to follow suit. Canada shouldn't shirk leadership but rather rise to it. We also should not assume that leadership is lonely at this point. Many countries are moving forward on this front. Canada can't be, shouldn't be, at the end of the line. We must be among the leaders and work persistently, bilaterally and multilaterally, to press others to adopt stronger laws and policies.
Lastly, as I said, this argument is irrelevant, as Parliament must ultimately recognize that Canada's international human rights obligations are on the line here. Human rights obligations do not only mean that government officials and agencies themselves must refrain from human rights violations. More is at stake. Governments are obliged to ensure that individuals, including individuals abroad, are protected from abuses at the hands of those over whom the government has some jurisdiction and authority. That is certainly the case with companies, which, after all, are incorporated under and regulated by federal and provincial laws and regularly benefit from various forms of government assistance and support. The government is obliged to act here.
Amnesty therefore very much believes Bill C-300 should be supported. It conveys the very important message that business can be good for human rights, but also that human rights can be good for business.
Thank you.