Procedure and House Affairs Committee on June 1st, 2023

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

I will pose the question more generally.

In any CSIS warrant application that you approved, did CSIS identify any individuals who may be intercepted in the course of surveillance who were members of cabinet, any sitting members of Parliament or senior officials in government?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I'm sorry, Mr. Cooper. That information is something that I am not prepared to discuss in a non-secure setting, simply because I've taken an oath not to, and I intend to uphold that oath.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Are you aware of Mr. Chan in any way communicating with members of cabinet, any sitting members of Parliament or senior officials in government?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Is there any context to your question? Mr. Chan has been around for a long time. I will tell you that when I was police chief, I encountered Mr. Chan on a number of occasions.

Is that the nature of your question?

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Okay. How long have you known Mr. Chan? Has he been involved in any of your political campaigns?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I don't believe so, directly, but I'm aware of the man. Like I said, I've known him since I was the police chief in Toronto.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Do you consider him to be a friend?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

No, sir.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

How long has your chief of staff known Mr. Chan and worked with him?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I don't have any idea, sir.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

You have no idea. Okay.

Minister—through you, Madam Chair—did you receive the PCO daily foreign intelligence brief dated February 21, 2020, which stated there was an active foreign interference network by Beijing in the 2019 election?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I'll have to check. I don't recall that particular date.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Maybe to help refresh your memory...on December 21, 2022, you were quoted in a Global News article, acknowledging that you had received certain information from that memo, so I presume you have seen that memo.

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Again, it's a classified document, and I can't discuss classified documents in this setting.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

I certainly appreciate that you're not able to talk about classified documents, but what has been produced to this committee in that memo—so it's not classified—spoke of an “active foreign interference...network” by Beijing in the 2019 election. That isn't classified.

Did you see that?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I'm sorry, Mr. Cooper. I've seen quite a number of documents. I can tell you that during that period of time, we were taking action to respond to foreign interference by the People's Republic of China against our government, but I can't speak to this particular document.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Madam Chair, this is not intended to be a prop. I'll try to refresh the minister's memory. This is a document, a memo, that is one of the very few documents that have been produced to this committee, so it has been asked about multiple times. I'm surprised you're unfamiliar with it, given that fact, given that you're appearing here on foreign interference, given that you were the minister of public safety, and given that you stated on December 21 that you acknowledged having received certain information.

I'll put it to you again. Did you receive that memo? Were you aware of that interference network by Beijing? What did you do with that information?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I would like an opportunity to confirm. I want to give a forthright answer to this committee on whether, in fact, that particular memo was shared with me. Again, I can't see, from this distance, what you've held up, and it appears to be heavily redacted in any event. However, I'll certainly determine whether or not that briefing, in fact, took place and when it took place, and I'll happily report back to this committee.

[Michael Cooper, Conservative, St. Albert—Edmonton, AB]

Just very quickly—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bardish Chagger]

No, there's no “really quickly”. The members who sit here.... You guys know that the beep goes off, and then you know how I am. If I don't run a tight ship, then you guys complain to me that I didn't run a tight ship and that we didn't get all our rounds in. I wouldn't sit on the fence for too long because after a while it starts to hurt.

Mr. Fergus.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and through you, I'd like to thank the minister and his ADM for being here today to answer our questions on this important issue.

Minister Blair, can you go into more detail about the steps the government is taking to combat foreign interference?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

There have been a number of very significant efforts on how we've been dealing with foreign interference, and election interference in particular, in this country. They began as early as 2015.

There was, for example, the establishment of NSICOP in order to provide parliamentarians with insight into all of the intelligence that we were receiving and the actions that we were taking.

I actually have quite a list here that I'll be more than happy to share with you, but there have been a number of fairly significant investments made, as well, into how we respond to this. In particular, the RCMP, as I mentioned recently, received $48 million to strengthen its capacity to protect Canadians from hostile actors. There's been a significant investment of $13.5 million in the national counter-foreign interference office at Public Safety Canada. We have also made a very strong attempt to improve our intelligence collection and our intelligence sharing to the extent possible.

I would simply point out that during my tenure, Mr. Fergus, when I was the public safety minister, CSIS continued to advise of a growing threat of interference from a number of hostile state actors, including the People's Republic of China in particular. We made a very conscious decision to be very forthright and public about that threat, to tell people about it. That's one of the reasons I tabled a report before Parliament in December 2020—to make sure that people had an awareness. I worked very closely with the director of CSIS, who made a number of very significant public pronouncements, and in July 2021, there were also reports that were published that particularized the nature of this threat.

While the government was making significant investments and taking significant steps to protect our elections.... As well—as you're well aware—I should have mentioned that there was also a group of officials that was stood up in order to monitor the impact of political interference on our elections. They did important work on our behalf in order to determine it, and as well, Elections Canada was notified of information that could also be relevant to its important work of maintaining the integrity of our elections—where foreign money, for example, might be contributed. There are a number of significant steps that have been taken, and what has clearly been identified—which we fully acknowledge—is that there's more to do.

That's why I would respectfully suggest that the important work of Mr. Johnston going forward, in examining the issues and bringing expertise and information forward, will enable us to identify additional steps that we can take as a nation in order to protect these important institutions.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

This is really important in terms of the “going forward” aspect of things, but there also has to be some accounting for the past. You mentioned in your testimony, in response to questions from some of my colleagues across the way, that you weren't provided this information beforehand.

How can you act on information you don't have?

[Bill Blair, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Very obviously, Mr. Fergus, you can't.

I want to be very careful though. I'm not suggesting that CSIS purposely withheld information from me. They make a determination on the credibility and the seriousness of the intelligence they've gathered, and they make a determination as to what needs, therefore, to be shared with a minister or with the Prime Minister, or even publicly.

In this case, they did not come to that conclusion.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

This is going to be a really tough question to answer in a short period of time, but why is it that within the system there is a reluctance to share national security allegations that are unproven, uncorroborated, with government?