Foreign Affairs Committee on Feb. 12th, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

I'd like to call this meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 94 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room, as well as remotely using the Zoom application.

I'd like to make a few comments for the benefit of members and our distinguished witness.

Before speaking, please wait until I recognize you by name. You may speak in the official language of your choice. Although this room is equipped with a powerful audio system, feedback events can occur. The most common cause of sound feedback is an earpiece worn too close to a microphone.

With regard to a speaking list, the committee clerk has very kindly and graciously done her best to maintain a consolidated order of speaking for all members.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on Wednesday, November 8, 2023, the committee will resume its study of Canada's diplomatic capacity.

Today, I have the great pleasure of welcoming Senator Boehm, someone who obviously requires no introduction to any of the members. It would be fair to say that the breadth of experience he has is really unsurpassed.

We're very grateful, Senator, that you made yourself available.

I should also acknowledge that your committee did a very comprehensive review of how to reform our foreign service. We're very grateful that you agreed to be here.

You have five minutes for your opening remarks, after which we will proceed to questions from members.

Thank you, Senator.

[Senator Peter M. Boehm, Senator, Ontario, ISG]

Good morning, everyone.

Mr. Chair, thank you for your warm introduction. I'd also like to thank the committee for inviting me to appear before you today.

I'm here as chair of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade. I'm going to talk about our committee's report, “More than a Vocation: Canada's need for a 21st Century Foreign Service,” that was tabled in the Senate on December 6, 2023.

Prior to our committee's study, the last in‑depth review of our foreign service was done in 1981. It resulted in the release of a report by the Royal Commission on Conditions of Foreign Service, headed by Commissioner Pamela A. McDougall, a former Canadian diplomat.

The key question guiding the Senate committee's study was: Are Global Affairs Canada and the Canadian foreign service fit for purpose?

Our answer is yes, but with several caveats. Over 16 meetings between April 2022 and June 2023, we were guided by 22 hours of testimony from expert witnesses ranging from current and former ministers, including one former prime minister, to retired practitioners, academics, younger serving officers and members of employee-led networks within the department.

The Senate committee also undertook productive fact-finding missions to Washington in December 2022 and to London, Oslo and Berlin in September 2023. That's because several of our major allies, including Germany, Norway, the United Kingdom and the United States, have also undertaken or are in the process of undertaking reviews of their own foreign services.

We made 29 recommendations designed to strengthen the already considerable abilities of Canada's foreign service. The results of our survey, launched in the Senate before the announcement of the department's own “Future of Diplomacy” review, is an excellent and comprehensive report, but, of course, I'm biased.

The Senate committee's recommendations span areas including organizational structure and coherence, recruitment, career management and conditions of foreign service. Among our concerns is staffing. The foreign service is still feeling the effects of a suspension in recruitment between 2009 and 2019.

Recent events have also underscored the importance of a foreign service that can respond with agility to emergencies, including evacuating Canadians from conflict zones such as Lebanon, Afghanistan, Ukraine, Sudan and Gaza; however, we heard that the department's search capacity should be increased. That's why the Senate committee strongly recommends that Global Affairs Canada run an annual entry-level foreign service officer recruitment campaign to fill vacancies and create that needed surge capacity.

It should also recruit more mid-career professionals from other government departments and from outside government altogether. Our study revealed that generalist knowledge is prioritized over specific thematic expertise, due in part to some of the staffing challenges.

Russia and China will continue to hold the world's attention for years. That means that Russia and China specialists, people with understanding of the languages, cultures and goals of these countries and governments, are invaluable.

This is why the Senate committee urges Global Affairs Canada to increase investment in foreign language training and to provide opportunities for Canada-based staff trained in a foreign language to maintain their foreign language skills throughout their careers.

This also speaks to our recommendation on the equal use of French and English within the department and to ensure that, ab initio, official language training is maintained for new hires.

The conditions of the foreign service could also be improved. The foreign service directives provide for allowances and benefits for staff serving abroad. Because they have not been reviewed since 1981, the Senate committee strongly urges a complete modernization of the foreign service directives to ensure that they are adapted to the current and evolving realities faced by Canada's public servants.

What happens around the world impacts us here at home, from economic security to physical security, and Canada's foreign service, through a broad range of duties, is at the forefront of mitigating negative impacts and taking advantage of opportunities.

This goes to the heart of the committee's first recommendation, that Global Affairs Canada must do a far better job of communicating to Canadians what it and the foreign service specifically do.

There is hard work ahead, and what the Senate committee recommended is not the end of it. We did not even get into costing issues. We need to ensure that our talented people have the tools, skill sets, funding and consistent, non-partisan political support to do their jobs.

Again, thank you for the invitation to be here today. I'll be pleased to answer any questions you might have.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you, Senator.

It was just brought to my attention that your mic is having some technical problems, so if you would be gracious enough to use mic number 16, we'd be—

[Peter M. Boehm]

Do you mean no one heard what I said?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

No, we heard it all.

[Peter M. Boehm]

Okay. Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Thank you kindly, Senator.

First up, we'll go to MP Aboultaif.

You have six minutes.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Welcome to our committee, Senator Boehm.

Thank you for the report, and as you mentioned, there are certain areas that haven't been tackled, or weren't tackled, in Europe. One of them is justice. As justice is not referenced in Canada's “Future of Diplomacy” discussion paper, what efforts should the government adopt to make sure we uphold international justice and accountability efforts?

[Peter M. Boehm]

Could I just ask you to be a little more precise? By “justice”, do you mean legal services within the department, or do you mean public international law?

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

I mean public international law.

[Peter M. Boehm]

You'll see that there is a recommendation there that the legal services provided in the department be retained. There have, over the years, been various ideas floated to have the Department of Justice handle these particular issues more directly—for example, extradition and issues like that.

However, as recent activity has shown, particularly with issues involving the International Court of Justice in The Hague or the International Criminal Court, it's a great value to have a functioning legal bureau or, in fact, perhaps even more than one, because there are also trade lawyers in the department—it is a combined department, as you know—who handle legal questions that could come up in the context of negotiating free trade agreements.

Those services are there, and there is also, of course, a component that is consular in providing assistance.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

You've also mentioned the surge capacity and the need for extra tools or support. Does the department have enough of those tools that could be useful in supporting further international justice and accountability?

[Peter M. Boehm]

I think the tools are there. I think they need to be refined, and I think there also has to be a way to ensure that when there is a crisis—if Canadians needed to be evacuated out of Sudan or out of Gaza or Israel right after October 7—that surge capacity is there.

I'll go back a bit to my own experience, if you'll indulge me, Mr. Chair. In 2006 I chaired a task force on the evacuation of Canadians from Lebanon. We learned a lot through that, because we could not, like the United States, send in the navy to pick up our citizens. We had to get very creative, and we developed some best practices at that time that have been refined, including during the pandemic.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

I'm going to kind of move in a different direction.

A recent article talked about direct foreign investment being in decline in Canada in the context of how much we're losing versus how much we're gaining. We are in a net loss as far as that balance between what we invest outside and what gets invested in Canada. How do you see the future diplomacy role in making sure, first of all, that we uphold that balance or a surplus?

The second is to examine.... It's a concern, to be honest with you, if international investments are not coming our way in the way they should be. I believe that diplomacy has a role in this case.

Do you mind commenting on that?

[Peter M. Boehm]

You're absolutely right. Diplomacy does have a role there. In fact, the Canadian trade commissioner service predates the creation of the old Department of External Affairs—it goes back to the 1880s—so, at most of our missions abroad and certainly at headquarters, there is a component that looks at trade promotion but also at investment. Under the previous government, that was changed to make it two-way investment, so there is a dedicated core that works on that.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

I have a final question.

One of the recommendations from the witnesses on the report called for establishing an ambassador for international justice. What do you think of that suggestion? Do you support it, yes or no, and why?

[Peter M. Boehm]

As you know, I'm not with the government. At some point, the government will have to respond to our report, and that is not one of our recommendations. There's a reason that it's not one of our recommendations. I think you can have designated ambassadors for different functions. Climate change is a good example. In the past, there has been an ambassador for religious freedom and the like. However, for justice, if you have, in my view, a functioning cadre of lawyers who are well versed in public international law, treaty law and international humanitarian law, I don't see why you would need to have one person covering all of this. It would be, I think, too much.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ali Ehsassi]

Next, we'll go to MP Oliphant. You have six minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll begin by recognizing the students from Saint‑Hyacinthe, Quebec, who are attending our meeting today. We're very pleased to have them with us.

We'll be on our best behaviour when we have young guests with us.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

What are you talking about?

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

We will be on our best behaviour.

Thank you, Senator, for being with us today. I've read your report. It's very helpful. It's a portion of our study on the future of diplomacy, because the human resources capacity is one portion.

I want to ask about recommendation number 26, which is about rotational and non-rotational staff. This also gets us a bit into generalists and specialists and that balance between those people normally housed here in Ottawa, who become content experts or sometimes functional experts, versus those who are trained to go to the field and become experts at amassing information and doing the two-way bilateral relationship.

I want to give you a bit of time to delve into that with me and say what your learnings were around the advantages and disadvantages of having increasing staff here in Ottawa and decreasing staff in the missions. Where should we be focusing, and how could we do that?

[Peter M. Boehm]

Thank you, Mr. Oliphant.

As you noticed, we didn't make a specific recommendation on resource allocation. It is really up to the government, the minister and the department how you want to do that.

I referred in my remarks to the 10-year dearth of new hires. As a result, you have the average age of a foreign service officer at 47—in my previous life, I started in my 20s—so it's very difficult to build a career or to focus on a generalist or specialist thing. Moreover, because there were no new hires, there were a lot of hires who were brought in as temporary or in different occupational groups other than foreign service officers, who were basically doing foreign service officer work at headquarters. However, when it came time for an assignment overseas, they were overlooked, because the first priority was always for foreign service officers.

What has been created and what we heard from witnesses is a type of caste system within the department. It's complicated as well, in that there are three occupational groups, so there are three unions representing people working in the department at the professional officer-type level. That is a difficult thing.

On generalists versus specialists, you have niche expertise such as trade negotiators, for example. You have the development specialists, who would have been separate in—

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Montarville, QC]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

The wrong mike is on for the senator, so the interpreters can't hear him.

Sorry, Senator.

[Peter M. Boehm]

I thought these problems only existed in the Senate.