Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to speak in this chamber. I will start by saying that I will be splitting my time with my colleague from Battle River—Crowfoot, so I look forward to his comments at the conclusion of mine. As indicated, this current debate is regarding the concurring report from the foreign affairs committee, which condemns the imposition of sanctions by the Government of China on the member for Wellington—Halton Hills.
I will start off by saying that I am actually quite shocked that there was concurrence with this decision and with this report, because this certainly does not match the legacy of foreign affairs and foreign affairs strategy, or lack thereof, and direction from the government. From the top, it would seem that this concurrence report is about China, and, yes, it certainly is about China, so let us talk about China for a moment and its atrocities on Canada, Canadians and the world.
Of course, there is the horrible genocide of the Uighurs, and it was the member for Wellington—Halton Hills speaking up about this and taking a principled stand in the House that earned him these sanctions, but in addition to that, we have more than two years of the arbitrary incarceration of Kovrig and Spavor. That is something that we can be disgusted about, regarding the People's Republic of China.
In addition, there is the banning of imports. In particular, with pulses, we saw the terrible trickle-down effect this had for our agriculture and for our farmers, but Canadians have not been alone, in terms of the effects felt from China. Schellenberg remains on death row. Taiwan has faced horror as China's next-door neighbour under constant threat, but my point here tonight is not that.
This concurrence report is not about China. This concurrence report is about the types of leaders in the world who are willing to stand up to the world's dictators and determine the direction that the world will go in. There are two types of leaders. There is the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, who I will go back to, and there is the Prime Minister, who has praised the dictatorship of China; the Prime Minister, who wrote a tearful eulogy for the passing of one of the greatest dictators Latin America has known; the Prime Minister, who has donated more than $50 million to the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank to contribute to the Belt and Road Initiative around the world that keeps developing nations captive.
That is one type of leader, the Prime Minister that this world has, but it is not the type of leader the world needs. The type of leader the world needs is the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, who said that he would wear these sanctions like a badge of honour. He went further than that. He said in the House:
The sanctions imposed on me and others have brought us together. They have backfired. I have met with elected parliamentarians who have been sanctioned in the United Kingdom, the European Union and members of national parliaments throughout Europe. The sanctions have brought us together and have brought us together in action.
He continued:
The sanctions imposed on me and others are a clumsy effort by the People's Republic of China to silence the free speech and open debate at the heart of Liberal democracies. They will work if we are silent. We cannot be silent. We cannot lose the hard-won and hard-fought-for ideals that underpin our democracies: a belief in liberty and freedom, a belief in human rights, a belief in democratic institutions and a belief in the rule of law. For if we are silent, we will let these hard-won and cherished beliefs be lost to a new ascendant model of authoritarianism, repression and fear.
I will add that the member for Wellington—Halton Hills was in good company in the last administration of the Canadian government with Harper, John Baird and my predecessor in Calgary Midnapore, Jason Kenney, because they were a government that was governed by the values of democracy, the rule of law and human rights, all of which have been lost by the current government.
I am pleased to see concurrence in this report. However, this report is not about China. It is about the types of leaders in the world who are willing to stand up for the values that will put the world forward, and one of those leaders is the member for Wellington—Halton Hills.