Foreign Affairs Committee on March 12th, 2015

[Diane Jacovella]

It's quite incredible when you go to some of these health clinics in some of the developing countries. Sometimes it's a little book that community health workers write the information in; sometimes there's nothing at all. And some of it is a little bit more sophisticated; they register the child by mobile technology. It really varies from country to country.

[Bernard Trottier, Conservative, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

You also mentioned in your remarks the initiative with Rotary for the eradication of polio. Many of us in our communities have worked with Rotary on some fundraising initiatives. I think one of the reasons that it's been so successful is because it's a fairly narrowly focused program, with a clear objective. The objective is the complete eradication of polio. It's really energized Rotarians. It's also energized donors, because they know it's something that's achievable and doable. One of the challenges, I suppose, with maternal and newborn health is that it's vast. It's hard to really put your finger on what the actual target is at any one time.

Is there a challenge when it comes to leveraging, compared to, say, the program with Rotary, for the eradication of polio? So much of that is voluntary contributions from members of society, and in this larger, vaster program we're looking at billions of dollars at the macro level. Are there private individuals, volunteer organizations, that are stepping up and leveraging the government contributions?

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

That's all the time we have, but we'll have a quick response.

Go ahead.

[Diane Jacovella]

I would like to say that the global polio eradication initiative is a great partnership with a number of players. WHO and UNICEF are key partners. The Gates Foundation is a strong contributor. It has been able to rally many people together. The Rotarians were a great example. They were very successful in Canada, but they are also very successful internationally.

One of their concerns is people are forgetting what polio looked like. It's easy to forget it. One of the issues now is often the safety of polio workers. We have seen cases in some places in Nigeria or Pakistan. We're now trying to tackle the most difficult areas.

The last thing I want to say is that a lot of the polio workers, and the network that had been created for this, have been extremely useful for Ebola to make sure the health system is also able to address issues like this. We've seen in West Africa how they have been able to use that network.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Brown, for five minutes.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

Ms. Jacovella, in your remarks you talked a bit about the vulnerable children's consular unit.

I wonder if you could give the committee a bit more information on that. What is its mandate? Are we unique in having something like this, or are some of our allied countries doing the same thing? Where is it?

The reason I ask particularly is I had a situation in my own riding where two children were taken across international borders by their mother. I know there is a court case. I know that is another issue that probably rests more with consular services than anything else.

I wonder if you could give us a bit more of a picture on what this agency looks like and what its mandate is.

[Diane Jacovella]

It was set up because we realized, as you mentioned, often there are a lot of cases of Canadians who have difficulty in dealing with this. This is a small unit that is trying to be a bit of a match.

I'll turn to Rachael who is our expert in this area.

[Rachael Bedlington]

Thanks very much.

This is an innovative move by the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development. It's a unit that's set up within our ministry. I think it was created in recognition of situations out there that are challenging and particularly affect children; if we talk about abductions, if we talk about families who exist between two countries, if we talk about instances to do with taking children overseas for the purposes of marriage or tied to FGM, female genital mutilation, for example.

There are all kinds of situations that are challenging for consular officials to deal with. A decision was taken to look at this in a very concentrated way, to put resources in to develop a capacity within our foreign ministry, and to have policies that would respond to some of these challenging issues.

In terms of what others are doing, I believe the U.K. might have something similar. Of course, there's always a dialogue back and forth to try and find best practices, to try and do the best we can to help Canadian children, because that's what the consular service is there for when they are faced with some of these very challenging issues.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

We know one of the issues, and I would expect this falls under their mandate for Canadian children. One of the areas we know is of considerably difficulty in the world is the whole issue of human trafficking. Children are the ones who are the most vulnerable in situations like that, first of all because they don't have the resources. Nor in many cases do they have the ability to connect with anybody who can remove them from those situations.

Is there any mandate within your office to work on those initiatives, or does the department have any other initiatives on human trafficking?

[Rachael Bedlington]

Human trafficking is an area of great concern. Canada is signed up to a number of action plans with regard to how to tackle human trafficking. Everybody who is trafficked is vulnerable, but if you think about children then we're talking about extreme circumstances.

Yes, it's something the department works with in concert with others across government. It's not just an effort led by our ministry at all; it is something that the consular unit I mentioned would be working to assist with, but it's broader than that. There are action plans in place to try and tackle it from a Canadian perspective and as it affects Canadian citizens.

[Julie Shouldice, Director, Education, Child Protection and Gender Equality, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development]

As Ms. Bedlington mentioned, there is a national action plan to combat human trafficking. It was put in place in June 2012. The lead is with Public Safety, but our department is looking at this from an international perspective.

There is certain funding that we provide to help other countries deal with trafficking issues. We've done some work in Latin America dealing with child sex tourism in Costa Rica and victims of commercial sexual exploitation, both on the prevention aspects, and then on helping victims and doing some of the tracing, reunification, and psychosocial support afterwards.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Dewar, you have five minutes.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have a comment regarding registration. That was a really good question from my colleague across the way. We've heard about it before. I think digital is a huge opportunity, having just talked to someone who had been working with the World Bank on this. We haven't tapped that technology enough. It's incredible how connected cellphone technology is in these areas. I think it would be really important to pursue those opportunities, not just in registration but in so many other areas.

My questions are for our ambassador.

One of the most disturbing features of conflicts, be they in Syria or the DRC, which we were just debating, is the extension of the violence and abuse in these conflicts to children. You referenced child soldiers earlier, but it also includes the torture of children. I'm wondering if you could tell the committee what the government's position is on the optional protocol to the convention on torture.

My second question is on what you spoke about earlier, on efforts to advance the interests of children in the UN negotiations for the SDGs.

By the way, it's really good to see you. I don't think we have invited you to committee at all, so I'm going to take advantage of this.

What intelligence have you found regarding the main institutional or diplomatic barriers when advancing the interests of children in the UN negotiations—just on the optional protocol and the intelligence that you can share with us?

What are those barriers you're facing when you're trying to push things through at the UN in regard to the interests of children?

[Guillermo Rishchynski]

In response to the latter part of your question, Mr. Dewar, I think that there's reticence in many quarters amongst member states to take on commitments for which they know that their capacity and financial wherewithal to be able to deliver what's being asked is just not there. If you're representing a country that has very limited instances to be able to invest in basic services.... Many countries, some 40% of the world, don't even have water and sanitation.

When we start looking at specific initiatives around child protection, it's not that there's a reticence personally or emotionally to not want to stand up, the problem is if we do that what do we have to stop doing because we don't have the resources?

The key discussion right now around the post-2015 development agenda is a recognition that domestic resource mobilization, people paying their taxes, is going to have to be a critical element in giving countries the ability to invest their own funds in addition to what might come from official development assistance, from private investment, and from philanthropic organizations. The scale of the needs that exist in a world with seven billion people that will grow to nine billion by 2040 simply outstrips what we as donors can provide. We're now a drop in the ocean, we're 15% of the total financial need that's out there.

While people are motivated by a desire to do what is right and what is best for their populations they are constrained by the financial realities and the enormity of the challenges that they face. And because everything is required, particularly if you're coming out from a conflict situation, which so much of the world is, they don't know where to start.

The UN, to its credit, has really raised its game from the point of view of working with them to prioritize the areas of immediacy. They can in essence divide the labour with partners and then be able to build incrementally over time, but more importantly track the progress and move resources around to meet critical gaps that may arise. It's not a perfect system but I think we're much better today than we were before the adoption of the millennium development goals in being able to do that.

Why are children so wound up in conflict as victims? It's simply because they are the most vulnerable. In every conflict situation it is women and children who suffer the most. They do so because they do not have the same inherent abilities, if you will, in terms of where they can go for refuge, and in conflict situations they are reduced almost to an act of survival.

For children it becomes something even more grotesque, if one can use that term, because if they lose a parent and are utterly disconnected then from any kind of sociological system that they're connected with, then they become that much more susceptible to abuse and victimization from those who hold power. Why does a child pick up a gun? It's because that gun gives that child the feeling that they are empowered at some level to be able to deal with the realities of violence that may exist in their society.

These are intractable problems. We're doing better at being able to address them but there are days when you wonder whether we are doing enough from the point of view of the growth of this phenomenon, as so much of the world becomes consumed by conflict.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

The time has run out for me.

Do you have an answer to the question on the government's position on the optional protocol to the convention against torture?

[Guillermo Rishchynski]

I think Ms. Bedlington may be in a better position to answer in terms of the official position, but from our perspective here and the perspective of our High Commissioner for Human Rights council in Geneva, torture is an issue that we take extremely seriously around the world and Canada's voice is heard in denunciation of those instances whenever necessary.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you.

It's good to have you here.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thanks.

Do you have a quick response?

[Rachael Bedlington]

Let me try to make this a concise response.

As you know, Canada is a party to the seven core human rights treaties. Time doesn't allow me to run through them all, but certainly the convention against torture obviously is right up there and, as Ambassador Rishchynski said, we've got a very clear commitment when it comes to where we stand in seeing that torture is not present.

When it comes to the optional protocol, I think the one that you're referring to has to do with oversight of detention facilities, and at this stage we don't have any plans to join that optional protocol. We believe that obviously there's a great deal of importance that should be placed on independent oversight of the conditions in places of detention, but Canada has robust mechanisms to do that and so that would be my response to your question.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

We need to suspend. That's all the time we have. We have to do a little committee business.

I want to thank all of our guests for being here today and certainly our ambassador from New York. I'll reiterate Mr. Dewar's words, it's great to have you here with us. It's the first time we've had you here, so that's great.

To all the rest of you, thanks you very much.

Let's suspend for a couple minutes to go in camera.

[Proceedings continue in camera]