Veterans Affairs Committee on Feb. 7th, 2024

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I'm sure we can find somebody else to chair in your stead. I'm happy to stay until 7:10. I just thought I would let the record show that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you.

I will ask for unanimous consent. We'll find someone to chair if the committee decides to go over 6:30.

I'll go to Mr. Richards, and after that it will be Mr. Miao.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

Mr. Chair, I'm incredibly disappointed in the situation that we're faced with here. We have now attempted to move this motion to get to the bottom of the situation of the Prime Minister and his office interfering in the building of a monument to our veterans who served this country in Afghanistan and delaying the construction of the monument.

We have now tried.... I believe this might be the fourth time. The Liberal and NDP parties have found ways to delay the ability to move this motion so we can just try to get to the bottom of what has happened here.

It's incredibly frustrating. I can only imagine how the veterans who served this country in Afghanistan must feel when we can't even have a motion to try to get to the bottom of what happened.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I have a point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Excuse me, Mr. Richards.

Ms. Blaney, go ahead on a point of order.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I'm sorry. I'm just asking for clarity. Maybe this isn't a point of order, but I was hoping the motion would be moved so that we can vote.

I think we only have eight minutes, so hopefully that can be done.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Yes, exactly, but Mr. Richards has the floor, so I will let him go.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

I just want to make it really clear that I would certainly have hoped that we could have a vote today too. I'm quite worried that this may not in fact happen now.

Just to provide a little bit of context, we have a Prime Minister whose government spent several years just trying to get a design for a monument. In November 2021, they were informed of a design that had won a competition that they had set up. Over the course of a year and a half following that, the government for some reason or other, which is unknown to anybody except the Prime Minister and his office and maybe a few other individuals, spent a year and a half trying to find a way to change the decision, despite all of the advice that we've seen as a committee that came from the departments involved—Veterans Affairs and Canadian Heritage—saying that this is absolutely what should happen.

Here we have again a situation of a Prime Minister who has this pattern of disrespect for our veterans. He was the one who told them that they were asking for more than he could give. He's the one who—

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I have a point of order.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Go ahead on a point of order, Ms. Blaney.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I'm sorry to interrupt again. I'm just checking. We're now down to six minutes.

As I said publicly, I'm willing to support this motion, so I'm hoping we can get to it. With only six minutes left, I'm really concerned that it won't get done today, so hopefully we can see that motion moved.

Thank you so much, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you, Ms. Blaney.

Mr. Richards has the floor.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

The more points of order there are, the more difficult it is to get to a vote. Hopefully we can get to it.

The bottom line is that there's been interference by the Prime Minister's Office. We need this motion to be able to get to the bottom of what that is. It's been stalled and delayed several times now, so let's get to the motion. Let's vote on it today. I hope that all members will support this motion so that we can end whatever the cover-up is here and get to the bottom of whatever the situation is and why the Prime Minister interfered to delay the construction of this monument to honour our Afghanistan veterans.

Mr. Chair, I move:

That, in relation to its study on the National Monument to Canada's Mission in Afghanistan, the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs

a) call the Deputy Commander of Military Personnel, Lieutenant-General Lise Bourgon; and

b) order the production of all memoranda, briefing notes, e-mails, correspondence or any other records of conversations or communications (including text messages, Microsoft Teams messages, WhatsApp messages, Signal messages or other electronic messaging), with regard to the National Monument to Canada's Mission in Afghanistan, transmitted, since November 8th, 2021, between

(i) the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Office of the Minister of Veterans Affairs,

(ii) the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Office of the Minister of Canadian Heritage,

(iii) the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Privy Council Office,

(iv) the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Privy Council Office,

(v) the Privy Council Office and the Office of the Prime Minister,

(vi) the Office of the Minister of Veterans Affairs and the Office of the Prime Minister, and

(vii) the Office of the Minister of Canadian Heritage and the Office of the Prime Minister, provided that these documents shall be provided to the Clerk of the Committee, in both official languages and without redaction, within 21 days of the adoption of this motion.

I move that motion, Mr. Chair. I really hope that the cover-up is going to end here, that we will get to a vote, that we can pass this motion and that all members will support it so we can get to the bottom of why this monument was delayed due to the interference of the Prime Minister's Office.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you, Mr. Richards.

I have a few names on the list. I have Mr. Miao, Mr. Casey, Ms. Blaney, Mr. May, Mr. Desilets, and Mr. Paul-Hus.

Mr. Miao is first.

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

Mr. Chair, the following comment is not an intervention about this motion. I have a flight to catch, so I would like to see if we can debate this later on, because there was opportunity for the Conservatives to talk about this motion in previous committee meetings, and I don't understand why they are putting this forward in such a manner.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you, Mr. Miao.

I have other members on the list.

Let's go to Mr. Casey, please.

[Sean Casey, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to propose an amendment to the motion. I think it would probably make it stronger.

We've heard an awful lot of comments around this issue. Most of the times that the minister has come before the committee in recent months, whether the purpose of her visit was actually on this study or whether it was on estimates or whether it was on anything else, this subject tied it up.

We've heard debate in the House, and there's been a lot of discussion about the jury, and in the House there was a reference that the jury made a unanimous decision. I think that's an important element if we're going to dig into all of the other things that are contained in this production of documents motion. I would like to propose the following amendment to add another category of documents as paragraph b)(viii). It would be that we add “that Veterans Affairs Canada produce any correspondence received from members of the jury responsible for evaluating the final designs for the national monument to Canada's mission in Afghanistan since June 2023.”

I think that those documents would be relevant to assessing the claim of unanimity within the jury, whether there were preoccupations, whether any jurors had some concerns after the fact, what communication there was among members of the jury leading up to the decision and what communications there were between the jury and Veterans Affairs.

There have been public statements made that everyone was on the same page, but we don't know that. I think it's important, so I would like to propose that amendment to the motion.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you, Mr. Casey.

Now members of the committee, we have an amendment. The list that I had previously was on the main motion. Now I have an amendment. I don't know if members who already have their hands raised would like to.... No. Okay.

Before we go further, I am so sorry that I have to leave. First of all, we need unanimous consent to go over 6:30, and if yes, we're going to have to decide on a chair for the committee for the rest of the meeting. We have to start with the first vice-chair, the second vice-chair, and so on.

First of all, I'd like to know if we have unanimous consent to continue until 7:10.

[Randeep Sarai, Liberal, Surrey Centre, BC]

No. Unfortunately I have an event to go to, and I think he has a flight.

[Blake Richards, Conservative, Banff—Airdrie, AB]

The cover-up continues.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

We have no consent.

I'm sorry, we have to stop right here.

Thank you to everyone who took part in today's meeting. Thank you to our interpreters, technicians, analyst and clerk.

The meeting is adjourned.