Foreign Affairs Committee on Nov. 21st, 2022

[Stephen Brown]

Thank you very much, Mr. Genuis.

I'd also like to thank everybody here for their work on getting this bill to where it is, and the senators who sponsored the bill.

On your question specifically, yes, I agree. The reason why we believe it's so important to mention East Turkestan, in this specific case.... We think there are three key reasons that compel, specifically.

First, we have to remember that the House passed, while non-binding, a motion that labels what's happening right now in East Turkestan a genocide. There's no reason to equivocate about what's happening over there. Everybody knows exactly what's happening.

The second brings us to the issue of enforcement. Given the fact that there's no legislative framework that relieves.... The CBSA has no visible cues to determine what is coming out of East Turkestan. It's very difficult to ascertain what is coming in. How do you source those goods? Having legislation that relieves them of the very onerous process of trying to determine where those products come from or were manufactured, and having a reverse onus provision that places responsibility on companies operating in the region, allows the CBSA to do their job.

The last thing is coming in line with our other partners. The United States, the U.K. and Australia have all passed legislation recently. I think there are many examples of how to do this. There are many reasons why we should do this. The fact that there's a genocide happening over there is clear. We need to give law enforcement the tools to do their job.

Thank you.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

That was four minutes, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Yes, that's correct.

We'll now go to Mr. Zuberi.

You have four minutes, Mr. Zuberi.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to start with Mr. Friedman.

Could you please map out this piece of legislation—Bill S-211—for us, how it's situated within the framework of similar legislation in other jurisdictions—in particular, you talked about the evolution of transparency legislation—and how it lands within that evolution over the years?

[Matt Friedman]

Basically, what you have with this legislation is many of the same components that you would find in Australia, the U.K., and the California act. As I mentioned, there is a progression over time. California was simple; the U.K. and Australia were a little bit more. What you have added that's different is the procurement emphasis of the public sector, which is extremely relevant and important.

There is more of a benchmarking of the fact that if a company does not comply, there will be fines and penalties associated with this. As I indicated, the other acts imply that some type of punishment will occur if compliance doesn't take place, but it's really not spelled out and we really haven't seen that applied in the other transparency legislation component. As a result of that, there are a lot of companies that simply don't submit anything at all.

What makes this different is that you have criteria that are a little bit different in terms of the revenue, the assets, and the number of employees related to companies, and so on. This emphasis on ensuring that companies submit and go into a public registry is what puts this further along in the transformation of transparency legislation.

What will happen over time, as I said, is that other countries will catch up to where you guys are, so you're setting the bar up higher than what we've seen in other legislative presentations.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Very quickly, Mr. Friedman, how important is it to get the buy-in from the corporate sector within Canada for legislation like this? How important is due diligence as well?

[Matt Friedman]

Many of the companies are already doing this for other transparency legislation. If you have products in the U.K., you're already submitting. I think corporate sector inputs are essential in helping to clarify the direction of this, but the writing is on the wall. This needs to happen. It's going to happen in many other countries as well, so let's go ahead and get this legislation across the line.

I really don't think it's going to be a burden or a problem. What it does is sensitize the corporate sector to what they need to do. It educates them, informs them, and the peer pressure will get them to actually be involved.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Mr. Friedman, thank you for that.

What you said about getting this legislation through the door and passed is echoing what other witnesses have said, including from the National Council of Canadian Muslims.

I'm going to give the remaining time to my colleague, Ms. Bendayan.

[Rachel Bendayan, Liberal, Outremont, QC]

Many thanks to my esteemed colleague.

Mr. Dumas, I found your opening remarks very compelling. I wanted to give you some time to explain the amendments you are proposing in greater detail. You could always explain them in writing after the meeting as well.

Your second comment had to do with the definition of child labour in section 2 of the bill. If I understood you correctly, you want to strengthen that definition. I'm very curious to know why. Could you give us more details about that?

I'd also like you to tell us about—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Ms. Bendayan, you're out of time. We're out of four minutes.

Can we get a very brief response, less than 20 seconds, please?

[Martin Dumas]

All right, Mr. Chair.

Actually, I don't know that it would strengthen the definition of child labour, but I would focus the definition by removing the two problem paragraphs that I mentioned, paragraphs (a) and (c).

[Rachel Bendayan, Liberal, Outremont, QC]

So, that broadens the definition, it doesn't strengthen it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Ms. Bendayan, you're out of time.

[Martin Dumas]

Actually, removing those paragraphs focuses the definition on the worst kinds of child labour, and that's definitely more effective, in my opinion.

I'll give you an example. Sometimes standards will look great on paper, but in reality, they end up very poorly enforced because it's extremely difficult to track child labour. If you want to go out there and check whether or not children are working, local communities must permit and trust you to—

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

I'm afraid you're out of time, Mr. Dumas.

[Martin Dumas]

Already? My apologies.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

My apologies.

I'm sorry. I asked for a 20-second response and then there was a follow-up question.

We will now go to Mr. Bergeron.

You have four minutes, sir.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First, thank you so much to all the witnesses for being here today and enlightening us with your remarks.

If I may, Mr. Chair, I'm going to pick up where Ms. Bendayan left off. She asked Mr. Dumas a question, or at least she was about to ask him.

Mr. Dumas, in your presentation you stated that you had three comments about the bill. The first one was about the preamble. The second one had to do with paragraphs (a) and (c) of the definition of child labour. If I'm not mistaken, you had a third comment to share with us. Would you like an opportunity to enlighten us on that third comment?

[Martin Dumas]

Yes, thank you.

The third comment is that it's very difficult to effectively monitor a ban on child labour, and it's even more random when monitoring relies on written reports, as is intended here.

That being said, if you are planning to check your facts against written statements, ideally it should be about the worst forms of child labour, to avoid two problems. First, the unintended consequences of a strict ban should be avoided, that is, one prohibited job being replaced by another, like prostitution or child trafficking, that's even more dangerous. The second issue to avoid is the concealing of visible forms of child labour through clandestine employment. If the definition of child labour is too broad, communities that consider some forms of child labour to be legitimate will hide evidence of such work and turn it into a form of clandestine labour.

Some adverse effects of regulation have been observed in the past, and I'd like to draw the committee's attention to them.

Focusing on the worst types of child labour is a good thing, because in any event, the situation would be improved for a child facing difficult circumstances. In other cases, one would risk affecting situations in which the child's work and pay provide crucial assistance to their family in dire straits. For example, imagine a single-parent family where one parent has died and a 13‑year‑old boy becomes the sole breadwinner for the family. Some countries don't have the social safety net that we have in Canada, and parents find themselves in dire straits there. It's much more common than you might think.

So that's a realistic perspective that I'm trying to put forward here.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Dumas. I find your insight on child labour very compelling, and even a little disturbing.

As I listened to you, I thought to myself, even here, where we do have a certain social safety net, we allow some forms of child labour. For example, look at work in family businesses, or work in the fields in the summer for young people under 16. This is becoming more and more common with parental consent, keeping in mind that school is mandatory until the age of 16. More and more young people are working for fast food companies, for example, due to the labour shortage.

I find the perspective you bring fascinating, in that it sounds like we're berating and lecturing developing countries, when we see forms of child labour happening right here in Quebec and Canada that could probably be considered objectionable under paragraphs (a) and (c) of the definition in the bill.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Mr. Bergeron, I'm afraid you're over time, but we will provide the witness with 25 seconds to respond briefly to the concern you identified.

[Martin Dumas]

It's important to understand, however, that even if we do allow some forms of child labour in Canada, we're still in a situation where we can prevent these working children from sacrificing too much of their education. On the other hand, in some countries, suspending studies can be the lesser of two evils, as I explained earlier. It also prevents undesirable situations where one prohibited job is replaced by another job that's prohibited but even more dangerous.

Therefore, I'd like to warn the committee about this problem that often arises in the fight against child labour.

That said, even if you change nothing in the bill, I'm convinced that out there, it will be hard to fully enforce a ban on child labour, because you won't have the cooperation you need from local communities to prevent it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you, Mr. Dumas. We're considerably over time.

We go now to Ms. McPherson for four minutes.

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to all the witnesses for being here today to talk about this very important legislation. It's very interesting to me.

My concerns stem from the difference between asking for reporting and for companies to do the reporting due diligence versus action being taken. I definitely hear what our friends from NCCM have been saying, that we need to act with the urgency that this requires. I also have concerns about how we are operationalizing this, because this is a concern we have with regard to other things, such as the sanctions regime and whatnot.

I might start by asking you how many shipments CBSA has seized. How is Canada doing compared with other countries? Perhaps that can illustrate a bit the urgency with which this legislation needs to brought forward.

[Stephen Brown]

Absolutely, MP McPherson. Thank you very much for your question.

The CBSA has actually intercepted one shipment. The United States of America has intercepted about 1,300 since they passed similar legislation. We have a lot of catching up to do.