Foreign Affairs Committee on April 23rd, 2015

[Peter Goldring, Conservative, Edmonton East, AB]

You're saying, on one hand, push back on the myths, like genital mutilation. You have your rights from the convention. Surely, that type of barbaric fashion can be written into those rights in some fashion, in some way? But, ultimately, it's going to be the governance in the country. And who is the governance from a political aspect? We know it's the various political parties and how they develop their principles and policies that they bring forward to speak about in their various governments.

[James Chauvin]

Perhaps I could just add something on this again. I work with public health associations in capacity-building for them and in governance, not only their governance, but the whole issue you're talking about of how they reach out to the government structures and talk to them. One of the things that has been very successful is that some of the public health associations hold legislative assemblies during their annual conferences in their own countries. They draw in a lot of parliamentarians around issues of immunization, HIV, whatever. It's quite exciting to see them get engaged with the parliamentarians around health issues. Certain parliamentarians representing a region have said to them, “Can you give us data on your region? We want to go back and actually see what's happening.” Well, that's a problem because of what we were just talking about—civil registrations, etc. The data isn't necessarily there. But some of the public health associations have been working to create the data so that these engaged parliamentarians can go back and be engaged as champions around health, and they can help within parliament as well.

[Eva Slawecki]

I like that you use the term “best practices”, because best practices should be written up, and they should be shared, and they should be disseminated. But that's again a long-term investment in order for a country to have the capacity to write up the best practices and to disseminate them appropriately. That has to start from engaging the academic sector, the education process, so that people know what is a best practice. Then how do you translate and transfer that knowledge to the people who can make good use of it?

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

Everyone has had a chance now. I'm going to ask a question. Are there any additional questions that people have while we have our guests here?

Do you have a question?

It was your turn next but I know we're okay over here.

Mr. Rousseau, why don't you ask a question, and then Madam Laverdière.

[Hélène Laverdière, NDP, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

I'll go ahead with my short question.

Dr. Bhutta, you pointed out that not enough attention is being paid to young people and teenagers in the post-2015 objectives or the program.

Could that still be introduced without potentially undermining the delicate balance and the consensus that have been achieved?

[Dr. Zulfiqar Bhutta]

I think there is language in the post-2015 sustainable development goals that does address young people, adolescents.

What I was pointing out is that the language is disproportionate in terms of what is there for young girls as opposed to young boys; boys seem to have an education target and girls have more than one.

First, I think it's a bit late now to be...and there has been a very involved process. With all due respect to everybody who's been engaged, this has been, as I said, very inclusive. Perhaps one of the reasons we have these 160 plus indicators, which we have to bring down to 100, is that everyone wants their favourite indicators in there.

Be that as it may, I think the proof of the pudding will be in the implementation of these sustainable development goals. After we have reached a consensus this year, the big challenge I see will be working with countries to make sure that they are as engaged in this process as they were with the millennium goals, particularly millennium goals IV and V.

One big concern that I have, and I indirectly expressed it in today's conversation, is that we don't want to lose sight of our goals and declare premature victory in the maternal and child mortality scenario. We still have 6 million children dying every year. We still have close to 280,000 women dying around childbirth and in childbirth every year. That's a huge global challenge. In the quest for new indicators and new targets we shouldn't lose sight of that core function.

I think what will happen, and what should happen—and this is where Canadian leadership is so important because of Muskoka ll and the fact that, as a society, we have very strong feelings on this—is that as we move forward next year we must ensure that we don't throw the baby out with the bath water; that we have our four health indicators; that we open the door to integrating some of the other indicators for social determinants of health, including education, empowerment, gender empowerment in particular, and particularly things that relate to a safe environment, which is so important moving forward; and that we bring them closer to the health indicators, which is the third millennium development goal.

I think this will happen, but what we require is concerted pressure until September and then even more pressure beyond that for their adoption by countries.

[Jean Rousseau, NDP, Compton—Stanstead, QC]

Thank you all for being here today.

My question is for Mr. Morley, Mr. Chauvin or the other two witnesses.

Europe is currently being hit by a wave of immigration. That always seems to be a result of conflicts. If we consider the situation as a whole, conflict zones are often the cause of malnutrition and of all the problems that have been raised. There are more and more immigrants all around the world. Climate change is also to blame. Population displacements in certain parts of the world are expected.

What can a global leader like Canada do to identify areas that will be problematic in the future? Despite all the good things currently being done and the fact that the situation is improving in certain parts of the world, there are other places—such as Haiti—where not all the problems have yet been resolved. Problems are expected in some countries as a result of conflict zones and climate change. What can we as a country do to be a global leader in this regard?

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

It's a short question.

[David Morley]

Yes, really.

I'm very lucky because I get to travel a lot around the world and spend time with people, from street children to leaders in countries.

We are doing something special in Canada that people look up to. I'm not talking about money. I find that what we're trying to build in Canada constantly, for all of our imperfections, is something that many other countries look at. They scratch their heads and they're wondering.

I was working once in Brazzaville, Congo. There was a war going on, but they were asking a couple of members of Parliament to go there to talk about how we run our country. They wanted to learn.

I think we bring a diversity here. I don't know how we export it, but I think we model it a lot in our behaviour. There are more things we can do. You would know much better than I do because you're closer to the levers of power. But there is something we do when we're out there as Canadians.

When I was with Médecins Sans Frontières, sometimes when there were disagreements in the teams they would call us up and say, “Can we just have a Canadian?” It wouldn't matter if it was a francophone, an anglophone, or an allophone. You didn't even have to be born here; usually if you went to school here.... There's something we do that's good. I think there's that kind of leadership.

I would like us to take a bigger leadership in the United Nations, but I think that's a place where I see it happening around the world.

[James Chauvin]

You've asked a very interesting question. Actually we have with us Dr. Jan Hatcher Roberts, who did work at the International Organization for Migration. Jan would probably be much better than the rest of us to answer this question.

One of the things Canada used to champion—and I don't know if it still exists, David—was days of peace, with immunization programs. Was it days of peace?

[David Morley]

Yes, days of peace. El Salvador was the big success.

[James Chauvin]

This was where you would basically get the parties to stop fighting in order to allow children to be vaccinated. This was amazing work. It took a lot of time. But again, it worked. You could move in and actually create peace. Now, it was temporary, but still, people sat back.

Again, from my days working in the Balkans, I mentioned the Canadian embassy as a meeting place. We had together people from the Balkan countries who were previously fighting. They came together and they were talking about how to ensure that polio didn't cross over from Kosovo into Montenegro. How do we ensure this, or how do we ensure that?

These were people who were belligerents, but who found a safe space within the Canadian embassy, and they talked. It was amazing to watch this happen. We got out of there thinking that we helped create bridges across some big gaps. I think that's where Canada can lead.

I'll just leave that with you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

To our witnesses, thank you very much for today. It was a very good session.

I'm going to suspend for 30 seconds. I have a little committee business. We don't need to rush you out. It does need to be recorded. I just want to talk about some guests who want to come and let you know what we're doing. I'll give you the update and then I'll adjourn the meeting.

Thanks.

[Proceedings continue in camera]