Public Safety Committee on March 3rd, 2022

[Jacob Wells]

Yes [Technical difficulty—Editor].

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Can I pause my time, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Yes, we'll pause your time while we sort out this technical problem.

Ms. Wilson, I hope that your connection is not frozen and the you are in a position to answer these questions on behalf of the company. Are you ready to engage with us now?

[Heather Wilson, Co-Founder, GiveSendGo]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Thank you. Go ahead, please.

[Heather Wilson]

I think the question was on whether or not we feel like we need to abide by Canadian law. Jacob started to answer it before his connection froze.

The answer is, yes, we do feel like laws are important for people. But we also—

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

I just wanted that confirmation, because it's important for me to get to my next point.

On Thursday, February 10, when the Conservative government of the province of Ontario applied to court to have the funds frozen that were raised on your platform, GiveSendGo posted a statement on Twitter that said, “Know this! Canada has absolutely ZERO jurisdiction over how we manage our funds here at GiveSendGo.” It continues to say, “All funds for EVERY campaign on GiveSendGo flow directly to the recipients of those campaigns, not least of which is The Freedom Convoy campaign.”

So if you respect applicable Canadian law, and a court came through and froze those funds—we have all of this documented evidence of what the police were reporting and the fact that the City of Ottawa had applied a local state of emergency—how does your statement on Twitter fit with what you've just told this committee right now?

[Heather Wilson]

I guess it comes back to the fact that as much as you want to say that the Canadian government made all these statements, if you were concerned about GiveSendGo and what we were allowing, I do not know why they did not reach out to us to ask us to take a look at this. We were all on hearsay, by what we were hearing from media on both sides, and it was not important enough for your government to reach out to GiveSendGo and tell us, “Hey, this is what's going on; this is where we're walking.”

We were going by what we were hearing on both sides of the aisle and we were walking it out the best we could with, again, as Jacob said, standing on the line of freedom, allowing people.... You know, I really believe that if Trudeau had just come out and spoken with the truckers when they got there, a lot of this would have been avoided.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Sure, that's certainly an opinion that's out there. I mean, a lot of people would probably wonder which truckers we should have spoken to, because there was a variety of opinions within the convoy movement.

As you know, with the declaration of emergency that was made—and there will probably now be plans to bring crowdfunding sites more permanently under FINTRAC's jurisdiction—I'm just wondering, going forward, because I think our country needs a time of healing going forward, how you think GiveSendGo will learn from this experience. What do you think you will do differently, based on what you've learned?

[Heather Wilson]

That is a great question. It's what Jacob and I talk about all the time. We're siblings. We are walking this out. We've learned that we need to give grace to everybody involved. We have very strong opinions on things, but we need to give grace to the people who disagree with us. We need to give grace to ourselves to just understand that we're not going to get it right every time. We're going to continue walking this out and learning what God has put in front of us.

Our whole goal in this is to share hope with people. People who come on our platform are looking for something. They usually are raising funds. Very rarely is it political. They're looking to raise funds for something that's important to them. In that, we want to share something that goes beyond funds, and that is the hope we have found in Jesus. That is what we're going to continue to do.

As Jacob said earlier, we're going to take each step and case-by-case scenario. Just as we do our KYC and just as we review every single campaign and recipient who comes on our site, we are going to continue to be diligent in walking this out. We're not always going to get it 100% right, just like nobody in this room is going to get it 100% right all the time.

That's why these discussions are awesome. We can get together and we can talk about how we move forward to make sure people feel heard and they feel like their government hears them—

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you. I want to get one more question in, and I have only a minute left.

Regarding the jurisdiction piece going forward, you made the statement on Twitter that Canada has “absolutely ZERO jurisdiction”. I would beg to differ, because you do use payment processors who are subject to our laws. I would just make the statement here that if you want to continue to operate in Canada, I think you do have to acknowledge that the Canadian government does have jurisdiction.

Specifically going forward, there was evidence of police reports and local states of emergency. It took the Government of Ontario to apply to the court to stop this. How can you learn from those specific things that happened? Do you need to be more cognizant of police reports and of what's going on in courts, etc.? I would like your comments on that specifically.

[Heather Wilson]

Sure. I think actually that the government needs to be more proactive in reaching out to the offenders or whoever they believe the offenders are.

We were doing our business, allowing people to raise funds on GiveSendGo. Your government took issue with that, but it would not come to us and tell us it took issue with it, and so if anybody should be looking at this, I think it should be a two-party act, so that if anybody has an issue.... The Bible speaks to this and says that when you have an issue with somebody, you go and talk to them about it and you resolve it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Thank you very much. We appreciate that.

Now we move into the second round, to be opened by Ms. Dancho.

Ms. Dancho, you have five minutes, and the floor is yours.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I very much appreciate the testimony of the witnesses for the last hour and a half. It's been very informative with excellent questions from all sides.

Mr. Chair, I am going to pause my time and move a motion.

I move the following motion:That, pursuant to standing order 108(2), the committee immediately begin a study on Canada's emergency preparedness for the range of threats posed by Russia, including threats to Canada's public safety and national security, to Canada's critical infrastructure (both physical and cyber), as well as the threat that Russia could resort to the use of espionage, sabotage, and weapons of mass destruction; that this study include at least eight meetings; that the committee invite the Ministers of Public Safety, Emergency Preparedness and National Defence to appear, and other witnesses as requested by the committee; and that the committee report its findings to the House.

Mr. Chair, after very fulsome and collaborative discussions with all parties—and I very much appreciate that we've had those—if I may speak for my party, we agree that this is an urgent matter. That's why we've decided to bring it forward today, given the context of what's happening in Ukraine.

We have had some discussions, and Ms. Damoff, I believe, will be next, and I very much hope we can reach a quick agreement and get back to the committee witnesses.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Ms. Damoff, I see your hand.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Yes, Chair, thank you.

I want to thank Ms. Dancho for bringing the motion forward. I also wish that Canadians could see the cross-party collaboration that happens at committee. Too often we base our perception of politics on what we see in the House of Commons, and we don't see that parties do actually work together.

I am going to propose a couple of amendments, which, I believe, we all agree should be accepted. The first one would be that we add Russian misinformation and disinformation, in the motion, so specifically that following the words “both physical and cyber,” we add the words “the prevalence and impact of Russian misinformation and disinformation”, and at the very end of the motion we add the words “and that, pursuant to Standing Order 109, the Government table a comprehensive response to the report.”

I think we all want to hear the government's response. The amendments would be those two additions.

I would just add—and I'm not going to change the motion—that there was a conversation and in good faith we recognize that especially with what is happening in Ukraine at the present time, it may be difficult to get the Minister of National Defence here in person. Every effort will be made, but recognizing that, we could have top officials from the department, including the chief of the defence staff, if we are unable to coordinate the three ministers.

I am moving the amendment to include those two additions and changes to the motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Are there comments?

Is there debate on the amendment? Let's go that way.

Ms. Michaud.

[Kristina Michaud, Bloc, Avignon—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Mr. Chair, I want to comment on what Ms. Damoff just said.

It's true that there was a lot of cross-party discussion and co‑operation to reach a consensus. I, too, want to acknowledge that.

I also want to say that, because of the amendments brought forward by the Liberal Party, the Bloc Québécois will be supporting the motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Mr. MacGregor.

[Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I'd also like to express how well I think the negotiations went. I appreciate Ms. Dancho's bringing forward this motion. We've had discussions with Ms. Michaud and Ms. Damoff, and I'm glad that we could collaborate.

One thing I've found, Mr. Chair, is that this committee needs to be very nimble on its feet given its mandate, and certainly what's happened with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Of course, with Canada's very vocal support of the Ukrainian people in their brave fight against total Russian aggression, we are opening ourselves up as a potential target of Russian activities. As a committee, we need to make sure that we are providing oversight and investigative tools to find out whether we are doing our best at countering these threats.

I appreciate the discussion that's been going on. I'm very happy with the direction we're going with this motion and the amendment.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Thank you.

I saw two hands up, from Ms. Damoff and Ms. Dancho.

Go ahead, Ms. Damoff.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Oakville North—Burlington, ON]

Very quickly, Mr. Chair, I forgot to mention that we also had discussions in that we would be continuing with the IMVE study that we have already passed a motion for. We'll do both of these studies simultaneously, and the subcommittee will meet as soon as possible to get a fulsome work plan done for the committee moving forward.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

Go ahead, Ms. Dancho.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Again, I have two things.

I would like to thank committee members for their compromise in the negotiations on this very critical issue. It's very reassuring, I believe, for Canadians to know that the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security will be undertaking this study immediately.

I also appreciate Ms. Damoff's suggestion that, as she mentioned, if the Minister of Defence cannot come, that the chief of the defence staff come. I think that is a critical piece to reassure Canadians that everything is in hand, and I look forward very much to hearing some top officials explain to the committee and Canadians our emergency preparedness plans and procedures that are critical at this time, as very well outlined by Mr. MacGregor.

Thank you for that.

I think we can probably vote on the amendment now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Jim Carr]

I'll first ask if any members of the committee have further comments before we do.

Mr. McKinnon, did you have your hand up?