That's perfect. Thank you.
Thank you very much for inviting me here today. The committee and the work you are doing are critical to protecting Canadian democracy, and there's no way around it. The facts that have come to light so far are extremely troubling. It is the most basic responsibility of the government to protect Canadians and our democracy from foreign interference, and it is increasingly clear that the government has completely failed in this responsibility, leaving our country vulnerable to hostile foreign actors. We now know, thanks to patriotic Canadians who are willing to ring alarm bells in public, that this government has been systematically turning a blind eye to illegal foreign interference from Beijing.
New evidence of this country's cavalier attitude and wilful blindness towards Beijing's interference in our country's electoral system seems to emerge every week if not every day. This government has been aware for at least two years that a PRC diplomat was targeting the family of Conservative MP Michael Chong in Hong Kong in an effort to silence him.
This is a genuinely shocking revelation and one that raises extremely serious questions about this government. Any intimidation of Canadians, whether directly or through their family members, by a foreign government is wrong, and in this case Beijing was specifically targeting an elected MP for the principled and courageous position he has taken in condemning Beijing's human rights abuses.
That kind of direct interference in our electoral system cannot be tolerated, but what did this government do to protect Canadians or MP Chong? They did nothing. They didn't expel the diplomat or protest to Beijing until they were forced to by incessant questioning from the Conservative Party. They didn't even tell Mr. Chong at all about what they knew was happening to his family until there were media reports.
Sadly, this approach of turning a blind eye has been the government's standard way of addressing this extremely serious issue. The government's silence has left Canadians and their family members overseas more vulnerable than ever to foreign interference activities, and their indifference has undermined our democracy.
Instead of doing their job and protecting Canadians, especially members of Canada's Chinese community who are the primary victims and targets of Beijing's interference efforts, the Liberals have spent an extraordinary amount of time and effort trying to stop any independent investigation into foreign interference from moving forward at all. They only gave in and allowed these hearings when the NDP, their coalition partner, finally forced them to. Since then, we've heard disturbing allegations in connection with the Trudeau Foundation.
Dr. Pascale Fournier, the former president and CEO of the Trudeau Foundation, raised the alarm over a donation that the Trudeau Foundation received from Beijing around the time that Justin Trudeau became Prime Minister, before Xi became president. Astoundingly, Trudeau even appointed the president and CEO of the Trudeau Foundation at the time of this donation to author a report on foreign influence in the last election. It is clear that the point of this donation by a billionaire with ties to Beijing was to try to influence the Prime Minister.
Dr. Fournier said there was evidence that members of the foundation's board worked with the donor to hide the true source of the funds. She also said she believed an independent investigation was needed but that the board members with deep ties to the Trudeau family refused. She resigned, but some of those board members remain in place. It has since been reported that foreign donations to the Trudeau Foundation increased by 10 times around the time Justin Trudeau became Prime Minister, and this while the Prime Minister's brother was an active member of the Trudeau Foundation.
All of these attempts at foreign influence are concerning.
Even more concerning is the government's obvious desire to sweep them under the rug. The Prime Minister couldn't even bring himself to call for an independent investigation into the problem. Instead, he appointed an old family friend, who also happened to be a member of the Trudeau Foundation, to look into the idea for him. It has become clear that this government does not take the threat of foreign interference in our political system seriously. If they did, they would be doing something about it. They would be trying to get to the bottom of these allegations.
Instead, they are fighting at every step to shut down hearings and delay investigations. It often seems as though this government and its friends are angrier at the whistle-blowers and the journalists who are reporting on foreign interference than they are about the serious threat to our democracy that this foreign interference poses.
As someone who's been involved in Canadian politics for more than two decades and who believes strongly in protecting our democratic rights and freedoms, I'm glad the Liberals finally were forced into taking a serious look at this issue, even if they had to be dragged here kicking and screaming.
I look forward to answering your questions.