Public Accounts Committee on May 15th, 2023

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Good morning, everyone.

I now call the meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 64 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Public Accounts.

I believe everyone is with us.

This meeting is taking place in hybrid form.

Mr. McCauley, I saw you trying to get my attention. You have the floor.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Are you finished, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Yes, you have the floor.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I'm sorry. I missed that part. I was playing with my microphone.

I'd like to table my motion, which I put on notice on Friday, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I'll read the motion and then I'll turn the floor back to you, Mr. McCauley:

That, in relation to its study of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, the Committee order the Canada Revenue Agency to provide it with the following documents without redaction and in both official languages within the prescribed timelines:

Form T3010, along with all accompanying Schedules and related documents, for Charitable Information Returns filed by the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation for the past 10 years, provided to the committee within 2 weeks.

All Charitable Information Returns filed by the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation for the past 10 years, with all schedules and related documents, provided to the committee within 5 weeks.

All documents related to any audit or investigation of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, provided to the committee within 2 weeks, and then any additional documents generated up until August 31st, 2023, provided to the committee by September 15th, 2023.

I believe that is your motion, Mr. McCauley.

I will turn to—

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I'd like to make a few comments.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Go ahead, Mr. McCauley. You have the floor.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Thanks, Mr. Chair. I just want to talk on my motion.

This came out of our meeting on Thursday with the CRA. Obviously, significant concerns have been brought forward with the foundation and the issue of foreign interference.

There are three bullet points in this motion. The first one is the form T3010. These are the foreign donations. Foreign donations above $10,000 are required to be submitted separately to CRA, so I think Canadians are due an explanation on this specifically.

We heard from the CRA on Thursday. I thought it was very disturbing commentary about their inability or refusal to commit to, or even discuss, a possibility of an audit on the Trudeau Foundation charity.

One of the ongoing issues I found particularly egregious was that for 10 years now the CRA has been almost at war with charities that are faith-based. There's one specifically that's been in the news, the MAC, the Muslim Association of Canada. We have the Rahma Mosque, which is part of the MAC family, in my riding of Edmonton West. They're phenomenal folks. They do a lot of great work in the community. I've spent some time with them in Toronto. I've seen their work with their schools.

Right now the MAC is in front of the Superior Court of Ontario, I understand, and the judge presiding over it had eviscerated the CRA on the issue. We've seen them go after other places of faith, and yet at the same time we heard testimony from the CRA that they don't enforce necessarily the rules. It seems to be that they will decide who they will audit. We heard very clearly that charities such as the Trudeau Foundation, despite wilfully and knowingly violating CRA rules, could get away with just perhaps a training session.

Average Canadians, whether it's on CERB clawbacks, TFSA overpayments, or faith-based charitable foundations, have been targeted to the point of persecution. There's even a very strong smell of Islamophobia with the CRA's persecution of some of these faith-based charities. At the same time, we see the head of the CRA, who is also in charge of the charitable part, commenting on the Trudeau Foundation that if they violate it knowingly, the CRA may just let them off with a training recommendation or perhaps a strongly worded memo.

I think Canadians are owed a proper explanation. Is there political interference with the CRA's decision to target some charities but give others a pass, or is the CRA going off on their own bent and not following the rules?

I'd like this information provided to the committee so that we can get a clear answer on these questions on the foreign donations and also on how the CRA decides what charities to audit.

We'd also mention there are not-for-profits that have been identified by the RCMP as being Communist Chinese police stations operating in Montreal and Toronto. Is the CRA going after these? There's not even a push-back from the CRA of “Well, we can't even look at that.” It's no comment, no comment. I would like to see a clear indication if they're following the rules on this specific charity or if they're just giving it a pass. Are regular, everyday Canadians who are not related to the powerful elites or businesses or donors in Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal getting the same treatment?

That's what this motion is about.

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much, Mr. McCauley.

Ms. Gaudreau, you now have the floor.

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

Good morning, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for letting me speak.

At this point, we absolutely must get to the bottom of everything we have seen and heard.

Today, I am filling in for a committee member. As a result, I've learned a few things.

I would like to speak to the 27th committee report.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted on April 24, the committee agreed to report to the House and to request that the Canada Revenue Agency investigate the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation.

I would like to move an amendment to the motion, to include this at the beginning of the third paragraph:

And, pursuant to the Committee's request in Report 27 that the Canada Revenue Agency investigate the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation,

Then we can continue with “All documents related to any audit [...]”.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

We have an amendment to the motion on the floor.

I'm going to see whether either the analyst or the clerk....

Did either of you catch that, by chance, and can you help us out here?

I heard it, but...

Could you repeat it again, please, adding to the third bullet?

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

Yes. I also have it in both official languages.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

All right. That's fine.

Thank you.

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

I can hand it to you right now.

I move that the third paragraph begin with:

And, pursuant to the Committee's request in Report 27 that the Canada Revenue Agency investigate the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation,

The rest of the paragraph about all documents related to any audit or investigation remains unchanged. My amendment would certainly make the words “or investigation” unnecessary. We want one. We have the motion here to that effect.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Could you read it in English as well, so that all members are teed up?

[The Clerk of the Committee, Mr. Cédric Taquet]

Do you mean the entire motion?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

No, just read the addition.

[The Clerk]

The amendment would be to add, at the beginning of the fourth paragraph before the words “All documents related to any audit”, the following: “And, as requested by the committee in its Report No. 27 asking the Canada Revenue Agency to investigate the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation”.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I'm going to recognize Mr. Fragiskatos.

Mr. Clerk, would you be able to send that out to members as Mr. Fragiskatos is addressing us?

It's over to you, sir.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I won't speak to the amendment that was just raised, but I will speak to the substantive motion that was put forward.

Mr. McCauley and I have had a very good working relationship at this committee and elsewhere. He rushes. It's nothing personal—I can assure Mr. McCauley of that.

However, I'll begin with his point that he would like to know more about how the CRA chooses organizations to audit. He had an opportunity just a few days ago to engage with the CRA on that. I think, if my memory serves, he asked a question in that direction. If he's not satisfied with the answer, of course, there are other ways to put that question forward so Canada Revenue Agency could provide a response. He could write a letter, for example, if this is what animates him as an MP and if this is his driving concern at the moment. He can raise that directly with the agency in a way that does not create a number of problems for us as parliamentarians.

I wonder whether Mr. McCauley, in preparing this motion, had an opportunity to look at the privacy provisions of the Income Tax Act, because what he is calling for is incredibly problematic, with all due respect. He is putting the officials of the CRA in a terrible position, in that they would be asked to break the privacy provisions of the Income Tax Act.

That's not an exaggeration. That's not me being political. That's me looking at the act and recognizing the serious violations that follow in terms of monetary penalties. It's $5,000 for each violation of the act, and even jail time.

We heard very clear testimony from CRA officials on Thursday about why they can't divulge information about work they may or may not be doing vis-à-vis organizations in question. The privacy provisions of the act are quite clear. They are there for a reason. They are there to make sure the CRA—

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

Mr. Chair, I have a point of order.

Mr. Fragiskatos said at the outset that he's not speaking to the amendment but to the main motion. Should we—

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

This is on the main motion.

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

I know, but we are actually in debate on the amendment, so we should respect.... I had other things to say in response and I probably will, but let's deal with the amendment and then get back to debate on the main motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Sure. I hear your point, Mr. Genuis. As an opening, I'm going to allow Mr. Fragiskatos to continue, because I think he's directing his concerns to Mr. McCauley, who will hopefully also be brief. Then, Mr. Genuis, you're up after that.

Mr. Fragiskatos, you have the floor.

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

My point of order was that this is not on the amendment. You're supposed to debate on the amendment.