Public Accounts Committee on June 8th, 2023

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Johnson, I just want to clarify. It is your belief today, as I believe it was your belief when you last testified before Ethics, that the $140,000 came from a Canadian corporation—is that correct?—the Millennium Golden Eagle corporation?

[Edward Johnson]

That is my belief.

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Okay.

Either, sir, you have not done enough research on this particular issue, or your handlers or someone within the foundation is not giving you the straight goods, because the foundation gave the ethics committee a series of documents. I'm looking at one particular document, which is a banking document from your institution, the BMO, which has the Trudeau Foundation as its customer. On July 25, 2016, the foundation received not a Canadian donation but rather an international donation of $70,000. Were you aware of that?

[Edward Johnson]

No, I was not.

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Okay—

[Edward Johnson]

I'm not sure it makes a difference—

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

I think it makes a big difference sir, with all due respect.

It makes a big difference because the committee members presented to you on May 9 a series of red flags that, for someone with your intellect and your business acumen, and the fact that you are a lawyer, the fact that you are the chair of the foundation, should have raised a number of red flags.

I know that you went into that committee, as you went into this committee, talking about “unfair” ungrounded allegations. Well, let's talk about facts.

We're not talking about simple intelligence. We're not talking about simple rumours. We're talking about an intercepted recorded conversation between CSIS and one of the donors, Mr. Bin Zhang, and a Toronto consulate, who was promised as follows. The donor, Mr. Bin Zhang, was told by the Communist Party in Beijing to offer the money in the hopes of influencing the new Liberal leader, Justin Trudeau, and—surprise, surprise—money flows in, the foundation reaches an agreement with Mr. Zhang and Mr. Gensheng, and within five months, both of those businessmen, those Chinese businessmen—not Canadian businessmen—were granted private access to the newly minted Prime Minister. That didn't raise a red flag to you.

Furthermore, sir, we have a real discrepancy when it comes to the tax receipts.

The first tax receipt I brought to your attention was issued to the Millennium Golden Eagle International Canadian-incorporated company, with an address in Hong Kong, and then Beijing interfered, contacted the foundation, contacted one of your employees and said, “Sorry, wrong address, send it to Beijing.” I told you, sir, that the address that Millennium Golden Eagle International (Canada) Inc. originally gave the foundation was fake. A reporter went to Hong Kong and knocked on the door. They'd never heard of the corporation and they'd never heard of Mr. Bin Zhang or knew Mr. Niu Gensheng.

That didn't raise any red flags to you as the chair of the board either—did it?

[Edward Johnson]

To be fair, we wouldn't have been aware of any of that at the time, but also, I must say the story—

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Hold on, sir. The foundation was aware of that because the foundation was contacted by Beijing to redirect the receipt.

[Edward Johnson]

I've looked at that—

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Sir, with due respect, you were aware of that.

Now the second receipt that came in 2017 lists the same corporation, this time to an address in Brossard, Quebec, and it lists Zhang Bin and Niu Gensheng, notwithstanding this particular address does not accord with the address the corporation was registered under, which is in Dorval, Quebec. Did you know that, sir?

[Edward Johnson]

I've heard that. Again, the difference between a registered address and a business address with many corporations is quite different.

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Sir, I think it's important, because your past CEO, Mr. Rosenberg, misled and in fact lied to Canadians, and I would probably suggest he misled the Canada Revenue Agency, by suggesting this was, in fact, a Canadian donation as opposed to a foreign donation—

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you, Mr. Brock.

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

—and that was the concern Ms. Fournier had.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

That is your time, Mr. Brock.

Ms. Shanahan, you have the floor now for five minutes.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

I would like to thank the witness for being here.

Mr. Johnson, please take this opportunity to respond to some of the allegations we heard from the other side.

[Edward Johnson]

Thank you.

I have a couple of points to follow up on what Mr. Brock has laid out. Number one, the story that I did read, and that started the ball rolling on February 28, alleged that a consular official at the Chinese embassy had been in touch with Mr. Zhang in Canada and had instructed him to give a million dollars to the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation. The foundation was never offered a million dollars. The million dollars went to the University of Montreal, so I have difficulty connecting the allegation in that story with the facts. That story has never been confirmed, to my knowledge, by a government official or by CSIS. The amount I want to underline that was actually received by the foundation was $140,000 over two years. The facts don't accord with the allegation.

The use of a Hong Kong address.... If I make a donation to the Red Cross and I'm going to be in Florida at tax time, I ask the Red Cross to send the receipt to me in Florida in a different jurisdiction. That doesn't make a difference. I'm a Canadian. I'm a Canadian taxpayer, and I made the donation. I've always felt that similar logic applies to the case of this particular donation. The donor was a Canadian corporation—Millennium Golden Eagle International (Canada). That's the donor, and the receipt was made out to the name of that Canadian donor. Frankly, the receipt would be of no value to a non-Canadian taxpayer—to an entity that's not paying Canadian taxes.

If I may just add one broader thought taken from 10,000 feet, I am concerned—deeply concerned—to see the receipt of a donation in 2016 being judged by the standards of 2023 vis-à-vis China.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Why do you say that?

[Edward Johnson]

It's because the context has changed so much.

The years 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017 were all material times in connection with this donation. Canadian universities were falling all over themselves to develop relations with China and Canadian corporations, ditto. The Government of Canada, in 2014, I believe the prime minister of the day visited China, as did the president of France and the chancellor of Germany.

The predictions were that China was going to be taking over the world economically by 2045. It was going to pass the gross domestic product of the United States. Canadians were working energetically to develop relations, and then, in the case of Canada, the two Michaels were kidnapped, and the world changed.

Today it's a fundamentally different world, and China appears to have done some very nasty things, some utterly inappropriate things, not only in Canada but in other western democracies. There's a serious threat there that must be dealt with, but that wasn't the case in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thank you for that fulsome response, Mr. Johnson.

I'd like to come back to what this committee does. We are the standing committee, the audit committee, for the Government of Canada.

I very much enjoyed the remark that you quoted from Warren Buffet that audit committees do not go line by line, because, if you've seen the public accounts, you know that there are three volumes.

[Edward Johnson]

Indeed....

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thankfully so, because we have, of course, the very competent and professional—

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Ms. Shanahan, I'm afraid I'm going to have to interrupt. Your time has elapsed.

Ms. Sinclair-Desgagné, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm going to get back to what I was asking about earlier.

However, the information just provided by the colleague to my right differs considerably from what you just said, Mr. Johnson. He said that one of the receipts was sent to China, whereas you just told me that it was sent to Canada.