Foreign Affairs Committee on Dec. 13th, 2021

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much, Mr. Bergeron.

We've had a full discussion on this. There are other considerations that we may potentially raise. One of them, Ms. McPherson, might be that part (b) of the motion talks about “to attend briefings concerning national security”. One might also consider whether the position of a witness who is precariously positioned because of political or other sensitivities should be protected through an in camera option and if, in that case, it would have to be unanimous, or whether members should be able to vote in those cases by majority to protect the name of that witness, the identity, the geospatial location and the substance of what that witness will tell us. That might be equally important for the committee to consider.

This may also be a motion that we might want to incubate a bit more, especially in light of what Monsieur Bergeron just told us, and see if there's a modulation of the motion that you may wish to reintroduce, or we can see how our practice establishes itself. At a minimum, I would think, it's a backstop to potentially regulate our decision-making with respect to in camera work if members don't feel that it's going in the right direction or that it could be fine-tuned through that motion.

I don't know how colleagues feel. Are there any other points in terms of what we should do with this motion today? Would colleagues wish to vote on it today, or should we have some sideline conversations in terms of the substance and revisit it?

Mr. Chong, go ahead, please.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Are we finished with the routine motions?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Yes. This is a procedural motion, not necessarily routine, that Ms. McPherson has introduced. It's about governing the work of the committee. We need to find a way to dispose of it today or in the future.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Chair, I'm happy to withdraw it and bring it forward at another time if that is deemed necessary.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Okay, sure. We can do that if it solves the situation.

Mr. Chong, did you want to come in on that motion?

No? Okay, perfect.

Colleagues, I think that has taken us to the end of not only routine motions but also procedural ideas with respect to how to structure our work.

Colleagues have put forward a number of notices of motions with respect to substance going forward. We have a good amount of time left if colleagues wish to speak to any of those motions that they would want to bring forward with respect to substantive work in the 44th Parliament. I think there's an opportunity to do that now. I invite colleagues to raise their hands and signal for attention so we can get into that discussion.

Mr. Chong, go ahead, please.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Congratulations on your acclamation as chair.

Before I move the motion I have in front of me, I would like to give it to you to distribute to members of the committee. The motion is in both official languages.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you, Mr. Chong.

It's being circulated as we speak. If you wish, you can start.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Would you like me to read it into the record, or is the paper copy sufficient, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

I understand that it's rather lengthy. If you wish to start speaking to it, you can certainly do that.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

I won't read it into the record since members have a paper copy of it. I will speak to it briefly.

The motion calls for the government to deposit with the Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel, in both official languages and within one week of the adoption of this motion, the documents concerning the breaches at the government's Winnipeg lab.

We have put in place measures in this motion to ensure the safeguarding of national security. The motion calls for the law clerk to transmit the documents in redacted form to the clerk of this committee, who would then, in turn, distribute the documents in redacted form to the members of this committee.

Then we would meet with the law clerk, who would tell us whether or not he is satisfied with the redactions proposed by the Government of Canada. If the clerk is not satisfied, a report indicating such would be tabled in the House by yourself, Mr. Chair.

This motion takes into account concerns about national security. It allows the government to propose redactions while at the same time respecting the right of Parliament to get information from the government.

I will finish there. I hope members of the committee will support the motion. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chong.

Is there any discussion?

Go ahead, Monsieur Bergeron.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

I have had the opportunity to express to our colleague the discomfort that introducing such a motion causes me. I emphasize the word discomfort, not necessarily disagreement.

Let me also share my discomfort with you. Some chose not to reconvene the Special Committee on Canada-China Relations. That choice was theirs to make. Personally, I have very many reservations about that choice because I believe that, with the major obstacle removed, meaning the illegal detention of the two Michaels and the extradition request for Meng Wanzhou, we are at a kind of crossroads in our relations with the People's Republic of China. Consequently, I believe that the committee is perhaps more important than it was before. But others chose differently.

I was concerned by the fact that, although the choice was made not to reconvene the Special Committee on Canada-China Relations, there was perhaps the wish for the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development to do part of the work left unfinished by the Special Committee on Canada-China relations. That is a source of concern for me.

The other source of concern, and I will come back to it in a few moments, is this. If that committee had been reconvened, it was my intention to bring to the attention of the members of the committee one of the most significant challenges that the West may well have to confront in a few months. This is the possible invasion of Taiwan by the People's Republic of China. If that were the case, we would face a dilemma worthy of Corneille. We would have to decide whether to put the lives of our sons and daughters at risk in a conflict that we would very likely lose in order to defend our values or whether we would abandon our allies in Taiwan to a sad fate.

My view is that the subject deserves our attention in order to avoid any situation that anyone might want to use subsequently in a political way. I do not want people to think that I am alluding to the situation in Afghanistan. But it is a situation that most definitely deserves our consideration in advance. In that way, we will not be taken by surprise if it were to happen. So, in a few moments, I will have a motion along those lines, Mr. Chair.

However, I am also of the opinion that one situation we saw in the previous Parliament is still unresolved. This is about the mysterious events that took place at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg. Someone, somewhere in this Parliament really has to want to get to the bottom of things.

Although I am uneasy about this motion, as I have told my colleague, I would be inclined to support it, if only to prevent this becoming one of the countless mysteries of history that remain unresolved. I feel that we have the tools to let us get to the bottom of things while still accommodating the government's legitimate concerns for national security, for personal privacy, and for potential criminal investigations.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much, Mr. Bergeron.

Mr. Oliphant, the floor is yours.

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Don Valley West, ON]

To follow up on Mr. Bergeron, it was news to me that there's not going to be a Canada-China special committee. Maybe I'm outside those discussions, and that may be a negotiation happening among parties to which I'm not party, so I don't know. I'm not even sure...If it hasn't happened, I'm not sure how we know something hasn't happened, because it just hasn't been brought up yet, but maybe I'm outside the loop on that one, which is fine.

I'm not opposed to our doing work on the Canada-China relationship in this committee. It was my argument in the last Parliament, when that special committee was set up, that we are the foreign affairs committee, and it is a good place to discuss all our relationships. My concern is that we find a procedure to address all the possible work in a way that looks at the world, because right now we have a critical issue in Ukraine and we have issues going on in Ethiopia. We have a number of issues that are really quite timely that I think Canadians want us to discuss.

It would be very appropriate to find a way to have input from all the parties—from the Bloc, the NDP, the Liberals and the Conservatives—and get those motions into the subcommittee on agenda. We can then have the subcommittee on agenda present a proposal for this committee to deal with as a whole with respect to what we do, and when and how we do it. It's not to preclude that we wouldn't do China right away if there is no special committee, but it also doesn't tie us if there is a special committee on China.

I know that on the government side there are four or five motions that have not yet been submitted as notices of motion. We can obviously put in motions today when we're in a business meeting, but to be thoughtful and fair, and to look at our work in an orderly way, I would like us to consider that we set a date by which all notices of motion should be in. I'm not precluding that there are ways to always.... We pass routine motions about those motions, but we could set up a kind of first tranche of topics, have the agenda committee meet on them, set some priorities based on input from all the parties, and then come back to a meeting of this committee to make a decision on whether or not to accept the report of the subcommittee.

I may need some help from the clerk on what an appropriate timeline would be to make sure we get a good set of motions, because the motions from previous Parliaments are no longer available. They're gone. We would want to make sure that every member has a chance to put in some motions so that we don't jump over the goodwill of any member of the committee because we decide to study something right away today.

I'm prepared to make a motion on that if that's deemed in order, but we have a motion on the floor from Mr. Chong. I'm not quite sure how we would do that, because I don't want to defeat that motion. We may want to support it, but to be fair to the committee, we should be looking at everything, or at least five or six things, to decide what we'd want to do first, second, third and fourth.

We need a little bit of help from the clerk on two things: how we can we dispose of that motion in a way that is within the Standing Orders and how can we keep it available for discussion at the subcommittee along with other issues; and what an appropriate timeline would be for us to work with to make sure every member of the committee, regardless of how big their party is, is heard on this issue.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Mr. Oliphant, thanks very much.

I have Mr. Chong, Ms. McPherson, and then Madame Bendayan on the list, but why don't we go to our clerk, before I pass the floor to Mr. Chong, to give us a few thoughts on timing and the way to deal with the motions, including the one that's currently in front of us?

[The Clerk]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It would really be up to the committee to decide what its timeline would be. Looking at the House of Commons sitting calendar, having new motions in for consideration this week seems unlikely, which means our first meeting when the House comes back would be January 31. Having all motions in and circulated sometime in mid-January would definitely be suitable for me, but it would be up to the committee members to decide.

The other issue was how to dispose of this motion before us but not defeat it. You could certainly refer it to the subcommittee on agenda and procedure, or with unanimous consent, it could be withdrawn to be moved at a further time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

Next up are Mr. Chong, Ms. McPherson and then Madam Bendayan.

Mr. Chong, please go ahead.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

It sounds like there's no opposition to the motion on the floor, so perhaps we could move to a vote on the motion if there's no further debate, and then move on to other business.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you, Mr. Chong.

I think Ms. McPherson had her hand raised, and Madam Bendayan as well.

Go ahead, Ms. McPherson.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

There are further interventions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

There seem to be additional speakers, yes.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Okay. Well, briefly then, there are a lot of provisions in the motion on the floor to protect national security. We're asking the government to come forward with proposed redactions to the documents, which the law clerk would review. The committee would receive the redacted versions through you, Mr. Chair, and the clerk, of the documents. The law clerk would then sit down with us at an in camera meeting to discuss those redacted documents and whether or not, in his view, those redacted documents are consistent with the terms of the motion.

I have complete faith in the Parliament of Canada's security measures that are in place. In fact, I've more faith in Parliament's security measures, in some ways, than in the Government of Canada's. I noted over the weekend an email that we all received about security breaches in information technology systems that took place in the Government of Canada's systems but not in the Parliament of Canada's systems, which I think speaks to the quality of the professionals we have working here on Parliament Hill. I think the provisions we've put in place in the motion are very responsible and I think they will ensure the protection of national security in any ongoing criminal investigation.

I hope that we're able to dispose of this motion at this committee meeting. For matters that we're not able to deal with in the next 35 minutes, perhaps we could take those up at the steering committee between now and the end of January.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you, Mr. Chong.

Ms. McPherson is next.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank everyone for their interventions. This is very interesting.

I'm very interested in this motion. I see a lot in this motion that is useful. However, I understand the concerns that Monsieur Bergeron has raised. Some of my concerns also stem from hearing the clerk talk about the fact that we are not going to be sitting again until February. Knowing that this committee has not sat since June and will not sit again until February is quite worrying for me.

Of course, there are things happening in this world that need our attention urgently. Some of those have been outlined. Some other ones that I would like to move motions on today are things around vaccine equity, the importance of dealing with how Canada has responded to COVAX and how we are working with countries around the world to ensure vaccine equity is happening. As well, what is happening in Ukraine is deeply troubling and I think requires parliamentary study.

I would like to suggest that if we want to have more time to examine this, perhaps this committee could agree to have a meeting next week. I know it is not a traditional sitting week, but we have the ability to sit next week to develop a plan, to develop what our strategies are, so that the clerk and the team supporting us can use the month of January to line up our work and we can hit the ground running.

As disappointed as I am that we are going from June until February without the foreign affairs committee of the Parliament of Canada sitting, I think this would be a compromise. We would have some time. We would be able to pass some of the motions before us and we would be able to have a work plan in place for February, or January 31, I suppose, when we reconvene.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sven Spengemann]

Thank you very much, Madam McPherson.

Madam Bendayan, I think you had your hand up.