Mr. Speaker, leaders from the Green Party, the NDP, the Liberal Party and the Bloc Québécois have all received a top-level security clearance recently, and that is because they take all the attacks on our democracy by foreign interference seriously. However, the leader of the Conservative Party does not. Despite CSIS, the RCMP and the entire security and intelligence apparatus insisting that it is essential for all leaders to get cleared, the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, who has been a member for over 20 years, refuses. The Canadian national security experts who have urged him to get briefed have said that the Conservative leader is playing with Canadians.
The member for Carleton is unserious, reckless, arrogant and unfit to lead Canada. There is a paragraph in the NSICOP report on foreign interference that describes India's alleged interference in Conservative Party of Canada leadership races, so perhaps that explains it. His disdain for science and expertise, his contempt for the media, his appreciation for conspiracy theories and his refusal to get briefed are all emblematic of far-right populist threats that we see from Trump's Republican Party.
He should get the clearance, take the briefing and protect the country, but he will not because he does not care about Canada. He is in politics only for himself.