Madam Speaker, we have this opportunity at the end of the day to ask members of the government to answer a question that we do not feel was properly answered during question period.
I have to say, reviewing the question and the answer that were given in this case, it was if the question was not even heard when the answer was given. The question I asked was:
Mr. Speaker, China has just passed a new law aimed at shutting down Christian house churches where over 70 million Chinese people worship. In the same week, Muslim parents in the PRC were told that they would be reported to police if they encouraged their children to participate in religious activities.
I ask the minister to take this opportunity right now to specifically condemn these outrageous abuses of human rights. Will the government speak out clearly and specifically against the latest crackdown on religious liberty in China?
That was my question. It was a clear question, asking the government to take the opportunity to identify, to respond to, hopefully to condemn the abuses in China, happening then, happening now against Christians, Muslims, and other faith communities.
Here is the response that I got from the then-parliamentary secretary:
Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to discuss the office of human rights, freedoms and inclusion. We have a comprehensive mandate that includes all human rights, including, as I know it is so important to the member opposite, freedom of religion. Moreover, we have all 135 ambassadors championing this comprehensive vision. It is entrenched in their mandate. It is central to their work.
This allows Canada to be a more effective defender of universal human rights, which are universal, indivisible, and interdependent, and is properly reflected in the office of human rights, freedoms and inclusion.
Unfortunately, in asking a question specifically about the abuse of human rights in China, I got a response that did not mention China. The member did not even say the word China in response to a very clear and important question. I should add that these human rights issues are not difficult partisan questions. I am not laying a trap for the parliamentary secretary. I am simply asking the government to speak out clearly and specifically about things that should be Canadian values.
The government, tonight, has another opportunity. We know what is happening in China right now. We know that the current President Xi Jinping is pushing this crackdown against faith communities. It is something that we need to speak clearly about.
Many members in this House have spoken clearly about religious liberty issues in other places. We had a whole emergency debate here that I participated in around some of the policies in the United States. Yet, we need to speak more about the situation in China, the country with the world's greatest population, a rising economic power, and a country with which we have an important relationship with, but with which we cannot allow the compromise of our values in our interactions.
We have the opportunity tonight, again, for the parliamentary secretary, a different parliamentary secretary, to clearly and specifically speak out against the abuses of fundamental human rights that are happening in China. If we are true to our values, if the government is true to its stated commitments around human rights, then we need to hear it speak specifically about the abuses in China.
In the past, the government has declined to take the opportunity to make these clear and specific and pointed comments. Minorities in China, the Christian community, the Muslim community, the Buddhist community, and other communities want to see that kind of response. I look forward to the parliamentary secretary now speaking clearly and specifically about the human rights abuses in China, and how unacceptable they are to us as Canadians.