Madam Speaker, I would like to begin by just acknowledging the arguments put forward by my friend from the Bloc Québécois, who suggested that because he is a nice person, he would not want to suggest that this bill is somehow engaged in what he called “virtue signalling.” He raised some points around virtue signalling, and said that because he was nice, he would not say that.
In response, because I am also nice, I would suggest that he is actually not being naive about what is before us here today.
I am proud to rise on Bill C-231, an act to amend the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act in relation to investments, which has been put forward by the very learned MP from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, who is bringing to us today a very serious response to all of the rhetoric we hear in this House about an international rules-based order.
The CPP is one of the largest pension funds in the world. As we have heard in the debate today, it totals almost half a trillion dollars. Bill C-231 seeks to amend the investment policies, standards and procedures of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, which manages the funds not needed to pay current beneficiaries. The amendments will require a proactive approach to due diligence with consideration towards ethical business practices in environment, labour and human rights.
As New Democrats, we understand that Canadians expect the investments of the CPP fund to be carried out with certain principles in mind. Despite its adherence to policy on responsible investing, this investment board has billions of dollars of our pension funds tied up in the oil and gas sector, weapons manufacturing, and other companies that do not always operate within ethical business practices. These include corporations that have been highlighted by the Public Eye Awards, which focus a spotlight on companies that have some of the very worst human rights and environmental records, and mining companies that have received single-digit scores on the Responsible Mining Index.
The Liberal Party talked about the lack of specificity. We heard that, in fact, from our friends in the Bloc. Let us be clear about specificity. I am going to take my time to drill down into what some of these examples might look like.
I will begin by saying that I think my Conservative friends missed their opportunity in this debate, which was to point out the cognitive dissonance of the Liberal government in having before us gun restriction laws on assault rifles and assault weapons while simultaneously, under our current laws, allowing the CPP to invest in these very weapons.
According to a CBC article in 2019, “Canadians who want to steer clear of investing in gun companies are out of luck if they pay into the Canada Pension Plan.
“CPP owns shares in American firearm manufacturers, including the parent company of handgun manufacturer Smith & Wesson, assault rifle maker Ruger, and Olin Corp., which produces ammunition for the AR-15, the weapon of choice for many perpetrators of mass shootings.”
The Alberta pension fund does not even own these shares anymore. The B.C. pension fund and Quebec do not own any.
It appears, then, that there is a bit of a consensus among provinces. We heard the Conservatives suggesting that we would have to get consensus on this stuff. It appears that the consensus is already there, because even those provincial pension funds think that these companies are too hot to handle. The CPP owns more of gun companies than BlackRock Asset Management Canada Limited.
As Canadians who pay into the fund, we are by extension the shareholders in the companies that benefit from the fund's investments. There is a lot of influence that could be had by divesting from companies that conduct themselves unethically or violate human rights or labour or environmental laws.
I have heard the Conservatives talking all week about virtue signalling. That is a very problematic term, and yet here they are, talking about Magnitsky sanctions against state operators who are involved in these human rights abuses. The hypocrisy is that the Conservative caucus fails to hold to account private corporations around the world that are involved in these types of atrocities and human rights abuses. They want to have a free market for international crime when it comes to profit, but when it comes to state actors, they want to pretend they are on the side of international human rights. We know this. We have heard it this week.
Divestment would be an opportunity available to us through amending section 35 of the CPPIB Act, which is what this legislation seeks to achieve by requiring the board of directors to take a proactive approach in ethical investments.
Let us look at a few of the examples of the types of impacts being experienced around the world.
Last week, the Peruvian organization, Derechos Humanos Sin Frontera/Human Rights Without Borders, wrote an open letter to the Peruvian delegation at the Prospectors & Developers Association's convention in Toronto and a more detailed letter to the Canadian mining company Hudbay. The letters denounced police repression against locals peacefully protesting stalled negotiations between Hudbay and the province on a framework agreement for the company's mine in Peru. At least 17 protesters were injured.
This speaks to a story we hear in Canada. We know that in the global south many of these people in these places like Peru are indigenous people. These are violations of the UN Declaration for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. In the same way the Liberal government would violate indigenous rights in this country on behalf of oil and gas by refusing to provide free, prior and informed consent, it is more than willing in the CPP to take its investments abroad and do the same.
MiningWatch Canada in its mandate letter talks about creating better control for corporations. It states that Canadian mining companies operate around the world and dominate in the amount of capital raised in exploration. Bay Street funds the mining sector globally. However, there are no regulations in its activities to prevent it from profiting from weak protections for the environment, workers, indigenous peoples and human rights in the host countries.
In April 2019, the Liberal Minister of International Trade commissioned an external legal review to advise him on how to best equip the Canadian ombudsman for responsible enterprise with sufficient tools to engage in credible and effective investigation of alleged human rights abuses and to ensure that he had the powers to compel witnesses and documents. True to form, the performative Liberal government would like to speak the language of justice and human rights, but when it comes down to actually putting teeth in legislation to hold big businesses and corporations accountable, the Liberals do the sleight of hand. They say one thing to the public and they do something else when it comes to creating systems that will hold these people accountable.
For a year and a half, the government buried the results of the timed-bound external legal review and failed to give CORE the powers that were promised and the reviews that were confirmed as needed.
Last February, the Canadian Network on Corporate Accountability, which works tirelessly to ensure that Canadian mining, oil and gas companies respect human rights and the environment, when working abroad, stated, “The Government of Canada has caved to industry demands and is ignoring and concealing expert legal advice it commissioned on how to give the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE) the powers it needs to do its job.”
The government has legal advice. When it talks about us not having specificity, we have these frameworks in place. The government just fails and refuses to act on them. The Liberals have the legal advice by the McIsaac report and for over a year and a half, they have failed to act on the report's findings and make that report public. The report had to be leaked by civil society just to see the light of day.
“By ignoring and hiding its own expert advice, the federal government is showing it is more interested in appeasing the demands of the mining industry than upholding its human rights obligations or making good on its promises.” That was a quote from Emily Dwyer, the coordinator for the Canadian Network on Corporate Accountability. She states, “The Government of Canada has turned its back on the communities and workers harmed by Canadian companies overseas.”
The element of the bill seeks to ensure labour rights are respected. This would have a positive impact by leveraging the CPP, which has funding purchasing power and the ability to punish corporations, through our divestment, with poor human rights track records, where labour practices are discriminatory against women. The government is a self-proclaimed feminist government. The Liberals have the ability to provide these GBA+ analysis that they talk about abroad, yet they refuse to act.
As New Democrats, we want a Pension Plan Board to take a proactive approach and due diligence in its investment policies. We want to leverage the half a billion dollars of investment and we want to ensure that all the companies have ethical business—
