Procedure and House Affairs Committee on June 20th, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Okay, thank you, Minister.

Ms. Fortier, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for being here.

I also want to greet Ms. Nathalie Drouin, who is accompanying you.

I'm happy to see you here today.

I think Canadians are asking themselves a lot of questions right now. It might be a good idea to provide them with some explanations, which would also be of interest to the people here around the table.

When we're talking about a confidential or secret document, how do you determine what information will or won't be made public? How was it determined, with Commissioner Hogue, which documents would be made public?

Can you elaborate on that?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Chair, I thank the member for her question. However, I'm going to ask Ms. Drouin to answer it, because she has a great deal of expertise in this area and will be in the best position to do so.

That said, I'd like to make a comment, if I may. I think it's important to make it clear that the government has never invoked cabinet secrecy to withhold commission documents relating to incidents of foreign interference. It's important to say that. This is a clarification that Ms. Drouin gave me.

We are having discussions with the commission, and these are going well. It's very important that people understand that if cabinet had been informed of incidents of foreign interference or proposals to counter foreign interference, the cabinet documents would indeed have been forwarded to the commission.

I will now turn the floor over to Ms. Drouin to answer your question, Ms. Fortier.

[Nathalie Drouin, Deputy Clerk of the Privy Council and National Security and Intelligence Advisor to the Prime Minister, Privy Council Office]

Thank you very much.

The first frame of reference is really the mandate that was given to the commission. The criteria are evaluated according to their relevance to the mandate. More specifically, the commission itself sends us requests for information. Unfortunately, there have been leaks to the media, and the commission has decided to request specific documents.

I'd like to clarify what Minister LeBlanc was saying about the discussions held with the commission.

When it comes to cabinet, the commission understands the importance to our legal system of protecting cabinet secrecy, particularly for reasons of solidarity among ministers. Ministers must be allowed to express their opinions freely during cabinet deliberations.

In addition, the commission wants to be sure that it has all the necessary elements, particularly on the political level, before making any recommendations. It wants to ensure that it will not make a recommendation on something that, for example, would have already been considered by cabinet, but for one reason or another was not put forward.

When we work with the commission, we never deny them access to a document out of hand. We discuss different elements with the commission, and provide context.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Chair, if I may, I'd like to add something. Ms. Drouin can correct me if I'm wrong.

These discussions are led by senior Privy Council officials. It's not political assistants or elected officials who lead the discussions. That's the responsibility of the Privy Council. They are the ones who hold these discussions with the commission and their representatives.

[Mona Fortier, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

In your opening remarks and in one of your responses, you said that it's not often that so many documents are forwarded to public commissions of inquiry.

Could you elaborate on that? Why is there more information than usual in this case, compared to other inquiries? Why is there more participation in the investigation?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Thank you for the question.

As I said, there have been 44 commissions of inquiry at the federal level since 1977. Only five commissions of inquiry have had access to cabinet confidences. Of these five, four were created when the prime minister's name was Trudeau. As for the other, it was the late Brian Mulroney, prime minister at the time, who authorized the transmission of certain cabinet documents to the Oliphant Commission. So this is something exceptional.

If my memory serves me correctly, in the past, certain commissions of inquiry that touched on matters of national security did not have access to documents subject to cabinet secrecy.

It's also important to note that this was part of the mandate. It should come as no surprise that the government, as it should, protects cabinet or legal counsel documents. This was understood and accepted by the House Leaders of all recognized parties in the House of Commons.

We are now coming to the end of the parliamentary session, and there is a desperate desire to exaggerate things before the end. However, I don't think it will come as a surprise to anyone.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you, Ms. Fortier. You only have 15 seconds left. We can come back to you later.

Ms. Gaudreau, good morning. You have the floor for six minutes.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Hello. Thank you very much.

Today, we could have gone about our business elsewhere than here, but unfortunately, there was a golden opportunity to demonstrate good will and a desire for things to change. I'd venture to say that after 70 meetings and 150 witnesses, we've given birth to a commission of inquiry. The commission of inquiry wants to do its job and asks for precise documents, because it knows what it's looking for, and now it's in the papers. How does it feel to be a minister and have this happen to you?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Ms. Gaudreau, I feel very good to have been able to work with your House leader, Alain Therrien, whom I hold in high esteem. Together, we drew up the very specific terms of reference for the commission of inquiry, which targeted four Privy Council and cabinet documents that would be given to it. Parliamentary leaders from all parties agreed to this mandate.

When the commission members began their work, as Ms. Drouin explained, they had questions about other cabinet documents. It's an active, collaborative discussion between senior Privy Council Office officials and the commission team. So I'm feeling very good at the end of this parliamentary session.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

What I see is that when you have the good will that a commission of inquiry can do its job well….

As everyone around the table knows, if there's one MP who isn't partisan, it's a Bloc Québécois MP. Now, we in the Bloc Québécois want the commission of inquiry to succeed in doing what it has to do by December 31, but it needs to have the tools to do it, and we call that an inquiry.

We're here today to say enough is enough, the nonsense. There's work to be done. There's just one more mandate. People are worried and have lost confidence in our democracy. Can we put things right quickly?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Ms. Gaudreau, we will continue to work with the commission. I agree that Bloc Québécois members, in many of the discussions on interference, avoided the extreme partisanship that other political parties were unable to avoid. I thank and congratulate the Bloc members for the motion tabled last week. I was pleased that the committee accepted the very clear will of the House of Commons.

With all due respect and friendship, I don't think there's any nonsense here. On the contrary, we are very committed to ensuring that the commission has access to all the documents and witnesses it needs. We focus on cabinet documents, as we should and as the commission wants us to do, and we're happy to do that, but the commission has tremendous access to witnesses who can speak to issues of intelligence and foreign interference.

It's important to know that we have released all highly confidential documents concerning incidents of foreign interference, because these are, in our view and that of the government lawyers, precisely the examples of cases that the commission can study well.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Minister, I understand, but how is it that once again, this has to come out in the media? We do a press review, we find that there isn't enough information and that the commission of inquiry can't do its job, and then it comes out in the media. If everything had gone well, and there had really been a steady improvement, it wouldn't have come out in the media.

Will this be the last time? Will it be business as usual between now and December 31? I just want to get that confirmation, because a little bird tells me we'll be seeing each other again in a couple of months because other things will have been published in the Globe and Mail or elsewhere. What do we do?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

I totally agree that everything will go smoothly until December 31. In fact, that's what I'm hoping for too, and I'm confident we'll succeed.

You're a politician, you're a very effective person when it comes to understanding public policy issues. So you'll understand that I'm not responsible for what certain colleagues are going to say to the Globe and Mail, and I'm not talking about the Bloc Québécois. Unfortunately, if that's the assessment we wish to make of the situation, I'm afraid that colleagues may go overboard and say things to other media, perhaps even to the Globe and Mail.

As Ms. Drouin reminded us just a few moments ago, it's important that cabinet, the council of ministers, not discuss any particular incident of foreign interference. If there are further questions on this subject, Ms. Drouin will be able to elaborate later. It's important for people to understand that, when the council of ministers meets, it doesn't go into the details of an incident involving country X trying to interfere in some particular way somewhere. That's a matter for the individual ministers. These matters are dealt with by the various ministers involved, under their authority, but there are no cabinet documents that deal with incidents or that mention specific information on actual or alleged incidents of foreign interference.

If we're lucky, Ms. Drouin will be able to give us some extraordinary explanations on this subject, I'm sure.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

I'll look forward to hearing that soon.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Thank you, Ms. Gaudreau.

Ms. Kwan, welcome to PROC. The floor is yours for six minutes.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the minister for coming to the committee today.

Minister LeBlanc, central to the mandate of the foreign interference inquiry and Commissioner Hogue is to find out who knew what and when, and what the government did about it. After much deliberation and push from the NDP, we finally do have this inquiry, which is a good thing. When it was announced, you said in the media, “Justice Hogue will have full access to all relevant cabinet documents, as well as all other information she deems relevant for the purposes of her inquiry”.

The commission is now asking for the unredacted cabinet documents in order to assist them with their work. With regard to the commissioner's asking for this, if they didn't feel it was important for them to fulfill their mandate, they wouldn't ask for it. Would the minister agree with that assessment?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Through the chair, thank you, Ms. Kwan, for the question, and thank you for your participation in this important issue over the last number of months. I think Canadians have seen your personal implication in this. I think certainly it speaks to your strength as a parliamentarian. I just wanted to say that.

Ms. Kwan, I am comfortable with what I said in that particular media interview, that the commission will have access to all the relevant cabinet documents. As I indicated, when I worked over the summer with your House leader, Peter Julian, whom I've known for a long time, we agreed on a specific list of cabinet documents that the Hogue commission received very early in their mandate.

As I said, there is now an ongoing conversation between the lawyers of the Hogue commission and senior officials of the Privy Council Office. They have come to us, as you noted, Ms. Kwan, with requests for additional documents. Madame Drouin would have specific examples. It's not only with respect to cabinet confidence. My understanding is that the Hogue commission would come to the Privy Council Office with respect to national security documents that might be in the possession of CSIS or other government agencies.

That is an ongoing conversation that not only is focused, obviously, on cabinet documents, per se, but that is, as you noted, part of that conversation.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I take that to mean, yes, those are important documents that the commission would require, whether it's cabinet documents or national security documents or all documents, really, for her to fulfill her mandate. I appreciate that House leaders prior to this work came to some sort of agreement, but we have to note that those House leaders, of course, are not doing this work. We have to trust and enable the commission to fully investigate this matter and restore trust and faith in the hearts and minds of Canadians. In order for the commission to properly do this work, the government needs to facilitate that and ensure that they can actually access the documents they require.

There's ongoing discussion with respect to what other documents will or will not be released. We know that about 10% of them are not being released at the moment. With regard to the documents that the government is withholding, whether cabinet documents or otherwise, can the minister confirm that those documents would not assist or provide any insight to Commissioner Hogue in fulfilling her mandate of the inquiry?

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Chair, it's a very good question, a precise question, and perhaps Madame Drouin, who has a better line of sight on the process of which of these documents are...can provide a precise answer to Ms. Kwan, if it's acceptable.

[Nathalie Drouin]

As Minister LeBlanc said, we already shared four MCs with the commission, and those—

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Madame Drouin, I don't mean to correct, but “MC” is—

[Nathalie Drouin]

It's a memorandum to cabinet. I'm sorry.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

I tease these deputy ministers, Mr. Chair. Often they use acronyms. “MC” is a “memorandum to cabinet”.

[Nathalie Drouin]

I'm sorry. Thank you for this precision, Minister.

Those cabinet documents are the most relevant to the point, really addressing foreign interference, or FI—for example, the memorandum to cabinet regarding hostile actors—so we shared with the commission, in a very transparent way, things that are relevant to the point with them. Then the conversation is, are there other accessory conversations at cabinet that may have been in the policy sphere? I again need to be precise that it's not about specific FI incidents. No specific FI incidents have been withheld from the commission. I need to reassure parliamentarians of that.