Debates of Oct. 22nd, 2024

Reference to Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

That is not a point of order.

The hon. member for Timmins—James Bay.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is typical that they are shouting about tweets when we are talking about CSIS reports. A CSIS report says there were allegations that the Indian consulate informed one leadership candidate, Patrick Brown, that it was not going to allow him at its events. The Indian consulate officials pushed two Conservative MPs to switch their vote for the present member in Stornoway, so we know the Modi cronies supported the man who is now living in Stornoway.

These are issues being raised by CSIS. I want someone to stand up and name the names of the Conservatives who conspired to take down the former Conservative leader and put the man in Stornoway today.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member for Timmins—James Bay will notice that while he was asking his question, I never heckled him once. I actually listened to his question, which is something he rarely does. What always amazes me about the member is how thin his skin is. He has so much to say, but when something gets redirected to him, all of a sudden he is offended so easily. He offends everybody.

The point is, the New Democrats have been propping up the current government for years now. I am sure some of the reason the member is retiring from politics is that it is unbearable to come home to his riding every weekend and have to go to an arena, a legion or a community centre and be asked, "Hey, man, why are you supporting these guys?" He has not got an answer for that, unfortunately.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to respond to comments about Bill C‑234. We have always supported this bill. When it came back from the Senate, we did the rational thing, not because we obey the Senate, but because we felt it might not come back to the House if it were sent back to the Senate again. We wanted to lock in the new grain drying provision.

The truth is that the Conservative Party is not letting us pass Bill C‑234, which would give producers in the rest of Canada an exemption for grain drying. I talked about that in my first speech on this bill back in January. It does not even apply to Quebec. We did the honourable thing with respect to the agricultural exemption, but the member is refusing to acknowledge that. I find that offensive.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Madam Speaker, as much as I think highly of the member, he is not telling the whole story, because there is also the heating of livestock barns and other buildings for growing food. He did not mention that. What he would have mentioned if he was being completely forthright in the debate was that the Senate took that out. Why would the Bloc Québécois take orders from the Senate? The other point he made was that it does not even impact his province, so why does he not help us out in Ontario, all the way to Alberta? That would be great.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Madam Speaker, I have a letter written by the RCMP commissioner for the chair of the procedure and House affairs committee, and it says, “I wish to inform you that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) investigation into SDTC is ongoing.” As there is an ongoing investigation, my question for my colleague is simple: Why does he think the NDP and the Liberals will not help the RCMP and release these documents? How bad is it going to be?

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Madam Speaker, the best way they can help the RCMP is to release all the documents. The RCMP is having to pull them one or two at a time and it is taking forever. The easiest thing for the Liberal government to do, if it really wants to get to the bottom of this, is give all the documents to the RCMP, do a complete dump, so the RCMP can look at everything and see where the trail leads.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, with serious allegations of foreign interference in the leadership race of the Conservative Party, today's leader of the Conservative Party is being questioned about the methods with which he achieved the leadership. Why would the leader of the Conservative Party not take the initiative and get the security clearance that every other leader in the House of Commons has in order to take a look at the allegations and the names? What is the leader of the Conservative Party so afraid of? Is he scared that something in his past is going to deny him the opportunity to get clearance?

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Madam Speaker, I do not think the Leader of the Opposition is scared of anything, other than maybe when he upsets his wife.

I think he is scared for the future of this country if the Liberals stay. That is why he is asking for a carbon tax election. As we see when we are in our communities, seniors and people on a fixed income are hurting, and every day the Liberal-NDP government is here is one more miserable day in the life of a senior on a fixed income pension.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is my honour to rise in the House today to address the matter before us about the failure to produce documents pertaining to Sustainable Development Technology Canada. As a member of the public accounts committee, I am very familiar with this particular matter, how it all come to light and how the minister of ISED took corrective actions to address it as soon as it came to our attention.

To brief members, as soon as allegations were brought forward, an investigation was done immediately. Plans were made to fold Sustainable Development Technology Canada into the NRC, and it will abide by very stringent regulations going forward. The former board was dismissed, and we now have a new interim board of three members, only in place for one year to facilitate the transition to the NRC. That work is going very well.

There were 12 recommendations made to address the concerns that have been identified. I am happy to say that already 11 of them have been addressed. The 12th one is under way and should be completed by the end of December this year. That recommendation has to do with reviewing all the various awards of funds that were made to make sure those awards were valid, that nothing untoward was done and that the businesses that applied were entitled to those funds. That is a very important feature.

I want to emphasize that none of the businesses were found to be at fault. It was the director who had a conflict of interest, which is not a reflection on the businesses that applied in good faith. We want to return to funding these very important green, sustainable businesses because they are start-ups that depend on this money. They would not be able to function and carry on without it. That is a very important thing to bear in mind as we are discussing this. We must not lose sight of the key factor that this was a very important funding program that did a lot of exceptionally good work. I worry that sometimes we lose sight of that.

Just to get this on the record, since its creation in 2001, SDTC has invested more than $1.71 billion in over 500 companies that have generated $3.1 billion in annual revenue, created 24,500 jobs, commercialized 224 new technologies and reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 25 megatonnes of CO2 annually. SDTC's impact is equivalent to taking almost seven million cars off the road every year, and SDTC-funded companies have received global recognition and are consistently listed on the annual global clean-tech 100 list, where Canada punches well above its weight. Despite all the clouds that have been generated by the AG's report, which was very complete and very well done, we must not lose sight of why the fund was created and all the good work that it has done.

Turning to the privilege motion, which has held up the work of several committees and the House, it is about releasing documents and the problems that are occurring. I want to let the House know that many of the documents requested, a great number, have already been provided. The problem is not about the government making the documents available. It is that we do not want to make them available to third parties like the police because that is an abuse of people's charter rights. We must protect people's charter rights at all costs.

On the record, the AG has stated that if the documents collected in the course of her investigation were released, made public or given to the police, going forward, people may be very reticent to speak to the AG and co-operate with her investigations because of what could happen down the line. They may not have confidence that the information would not be abused and inappropriately shared.

I want to share some concerns. Our committee received from the RCMP commissioner a letter saying that the RCMP does not want to receive the documents from the government because it would not be able to use them. The police are investigating. If the police, in their investigations, feel they need access to documents and information, they have the legal means to get them through the court process. The police can use warrants. If they obtain the documents through legal justice provisions, they can use them in court. Anything they obtain from us would not be usable because they are under the governance of the justice system, which is separate from the parliamentary system. It needs to be that way, and that is what we are fighting to protect.

I want to read some information into the record. Former law clerk Rob Walsh commented on the June 10 House order ordering the production of papers related to SDTC to be sent to the Speaker and then given to the RCMP. He stated, “[in my humble opinion], it is an abuse of its powers for the House to use it's power to demand and get documents from the Government in order to transfer them to a third party (RCMP) that wouldn't otherwise receive them or to compel the Government to give documents to the third party.”

Mr. Walsh further stated that the government must give Parliament the documents it demands, but “not for the purposes of making them available to a third party such as the RCMP.” Mr. Walsh also stated that the House's privileged power to demand the production of documents from anyone is for the purposes of its own proceedings where the legal rights of the affected individuals would be protected by parliamentary privilege.

Another former senior parliamentary counsel to the House of Commons, Mr. Steven Chaplin, was interviewed over the summer and stated that the June 10 order was both “completely unprecedented” and a likely abuse of parliamentary powers. He said that the House of Commons was simply acting as a “mailbox” for the police force, which is not one of its duties. He also stated, “It is not a parliamentary or constitutional function of Parliament to help the police.”

In the same vein, former RCMP deputy commissioner Pierre-Yves Bourduas commented, “we all know that the rule of law is predicated upon a separation between what [Parliament is] doing and the law enforcement agencies, in this case the RCMP.” Separation between Parliament and the police force is critical. He also stated that he believed the House had overstepped, and that this raises a number of constitutional issues.

Mr. Bourduas also said, “there needs to be this separation, this segregation, between Parliament and the gathering of documents and what the RCMP can do because it could jeopardize any future prosecution if the perception, not the reality, the perception, that the RCMP tried to circumvent proper procedures, criminal procedures, could jeopardize any future cases before the court.” He reiterated later, “it's crucial for the RCMP...not only to maintain the separation, but also to maintain the perception of the separation for the general public and for the greater good of our justice system.”

Mr. Bourduas went on to say, “the RCMP would try to avoid [creating charter concerns] at all costs, and this happened before where the RCMP was accused of trying to circumvent legal process, obtaining search warrants by gathering documents that were not legally obtained”. This would severely impact its ability to conduct an investigation that could produce legal consequences if it got to that stage.

A Conservative member, who I believe represents Brantford—Brant, knows that the RCMP does not need help with getting documents. Just recently, he said that what happens if we cannot get a document is we go to court and ask for search warrants or production orders. That is how it is done. The RCMP has its own means to do it, and if it obtains the documents in that fashion, it can use them to prosecute the case. Using its processes for purposes that were never intended and that are not connected to a parliamentary proceeding is the concern.

The RCMP commissioner himself has stated his consternation about the documents sent his way and there is significant risk that the motion could be interpreted as a circumvention of normal investigative processes and charter protections. Canadians value their charter rights; they are enshrined in our Constitution. We need to assure Canadians that parliamentarians will not use parliamentary privilege to ever abuse those charter rights.

We need to support the AG so that she can conduct her work in an objective fashion, and people who co-operate with her know that they are protected as well, and that any information they divulge will not be used against them and forwarded to the police in a future investigation. That is very critical. We have the documents; we did produce them and more are still coming in from the various agencies requested, but we cannot pass them on to third parties, particularly our national police force. That would be an abuse of the rights of Canadians, and that is not how the information was given originally. It was divulged with the knowledge that people's charter rights would be protected and the information would not be used against them down the line.

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise on behalf of the people from Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo.

I listened intently to my colleague's speech, because I really enjoy speeches on the law, and she said a few things that were rather puzzling. One was that people may not want to do business with the government because the information could then be passed on to the police. Well, that is what happens when people do wrong. When someone commits a crime, information should be passed on to the police. If somebody will not do it, Parliament should. That is absolutely ludicrous.

Second, she talks about the abuse of rights. My question is a very straightforward one, and I have an idea of the answer, but I am curious if she does: What rights are being abused here? She talked about the charter rights being abused. Simply, what right is being abused?

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, I believe that when many people co-operate, they are not the guilty party: They are being asked to provide the information they know. I think it is parliamentary privilege being abused here. We are being asked to abuse our parliamentary privilege and use it in a way that was never intended. It is not intended that we provide documents to third parties, in this case the RCMP, when it is quite capable of deciding what it wants to investigate, who it wants to investigate and how it goes about obtaining the evidence it needs. That—

[Marty Morantz, Conservative, Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, MB]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The member just said that parliamentary privilege is being abused, and yet we are debating a motion that comes out of a privilege ruling the Speaker made. The member is essentially saying that the Speaker's ruling was an abuse. The member is basically saying that the ruling—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

That is debate and is definitely not going to be resolved through this.

The hon. member was answering answering a question that was asked of her, and I will let her finish.

The hon. member for Kitchener South—Hespeler.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am not quite sure of the question. Could the member repeat the question?

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

The charter right being abused.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, the charter right would be that people have the protection that evidence that they give in confidence to, for example the AG, is not going to be forwarded to the police. When people speak to the AG, they expect that that will be treated in a judicial matter and not forwarded to a law enforcement agency.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Madam Speaker, this whole issue leads me to reflect on the very foundations of our democracy and on responsible government, the principle of the people delegating power to their elected officials, who can demand documents. This is how we keep society free from corruption and how the government keeps the public's trust.

We have here a striking example of a situation where that is not happening. How can the public trust its government if the government disregards an order it received from the House?

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, the problem is not providing the information to Parliament; the problem is when the opposition is demanding that we then forward that information to the police, to a third party, any third party, but particularly when we involve law enforcement. They do not need us to provide that information. They have gone on the record and said that they do not want to obtain the information in this fashion, because they cannot use it.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, nobody loves a good Liberal scandal like I do. In fact, I made my name on Liberal scandals, because there are so many of them, going all the way back to the rum bottle politics on the Rideau. We could count Liberal scandals. This, to me, is something different. There is a finding of the government refusing to turn over documents. This is now to be sent to committee, which is the process that should take place. There may be a very important finding but what we are dealing with here is the complete obstruction of Parliament by Conservatives who do not want the work of the nation to take place. This is, I find, concerning.

It reminds me of 2009, when Stephen Harper refused to turn over the Afghan detainee documents. That was much more serious, because it spoke to the very heart of our nation. There were allegations of horrific torture that brought down the reputation of Canadian soldiers who were on the front lines in Kandahar. When Harper refused to turn over documents and listen to the will of Parliament, he was actually found in contempt of Parliament; he was the only prime minister found in contempt of Parliament.

What did he do? He shut down Parliament. He shut down our democracy. This is the Conservative record on documents and their refusal to respect democracy. I would suggest that this be sent to committee. Maybe the Prime Minister will be found in contempt by committee. It is the committee's job to ascertain whether the Prime Minister has lived up to his obligation to be transparent. This is the work of Parliament, and I am very concerned that we are now three weeks into obstruction when we have serious issues in our communities that need to be addressed.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, I completely agree. This is about process. Our government definitely wants this matter to be referred to the appropriate committee for further investigation. That is how it should be dealt with. He is quite right in mentioning that for two weeks, going on three weeks now, the work of the House has ground to a standstill. We are talking about this privilege motion instead of bringing forward new legislation that could actually help Canadians. That is what we are here to do. That is what we are elected to do, to come down here and make life better for Canadians.

There have been multiple committees that have been seized with the SDTC report already, and they have held numerous meetings. It is not just the House of Commons here in the chamber that has been stymied for progress. It is the work of the committees as well. In public accounts, our jurisdiction is to review AG reports. She does hundreds of reports a year. There is a lot of stuff to go into in depth. It is supposed to be a non-partisan committee where we try and get to the root of things, and we are not able to do that because we are going on and on and on, with numerous witnesses on this, when there is nothing further to discern.

[Chandra Arya, Liberal, Nepean, ON]

Madam Speaker, I think the hon. member's speech was very calm. She explained, in detail, the entire problem with this motion without using any political rhetoric like we see from the other side of the House. I want her to expand on one particular thing. If we go ahead with this demand that we give this document, through the law clerk, to the RCMP, which the RCMP has conveyed in writing is irregular and that it is very unlikely that they will be using it, there are unintended consequences that may actually hamper any possible criminal investigation.

The end objective of all of us here is that anybody who has done anything wrong should be held accountable. If we go through this process, this may have unintended consequences of actually scuttling that.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member is quite right. Not only is it the wrong thing to do, it is completely ineffective for what the opposition is trying to accomplish. RCMP officials have clearly stated that, one, they would not be able to use the information and; two, they have other means to obtain the same information through the normal course of the judicial process, which they could actually use in bringing forward any prosecution. So, not only is it a waste of time, it is an ineffective use of time, and it will not accomplish what the Conservatives are trying to do.

I agree completely with the member. Also, it would send a very bad message to the Canadian public that their charter rights are not being protected, that they can be abused by the Parliament of Canada, which is not anything we would want to convey.

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

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to serve with my colleague, but she said something in her previous answer to my colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue that is not entirely true.

The House asked that the government submit the documents to the law clerk and parliamentary counsel, who could then pass them on to the RCMP, if the RCMP so wishes. The order is quite clear. It says to send the documents to the law clerk and parliamentary counsel.

Yesterday, the law clerk and parliamentary counsel confirmed in a report that some of the documents had not been sent and that the others were heavily redacted. It is time that the member acknowledged the primacy of Parliament and persuaded the government to hand over the documents so that we, as parliamentarians, can do our job properly.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Madam Speaker, I do not recall saying that the documents could be provided to the law clerk. However, I do realize that some of the documents have been heavily redacted, we just heard this yesterday in testimony, and that is the first I became aware of it. The people submitting them must have their reasons for that. I think if they could be reassured that they were not going to be passed over to a third outside party, perhaps they might revisit it, but I have no first-hand knowledge of that.