House Hansard - 193

44th Parl. 1st Sess.

May 9, 2023 10:00AM

May/9/23 12:23:17 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the other area where we are seeing some significant gaslighting is where the government says that it is the member's fault and the member should have known about this. This is an interesting thing about victim blaming. We see the government accuse others of doing this all the time, and here we are seeing that once again. The government's newest line is that it did not know; it only found out on Monday, just the other day. However, there seems to be a lot of evidence that it knew about this over two years ago. That does not include all the other troubles we have with foreign interference in this country. The Trudeau Foundation is embroiled in a whole host of scandals now around taking Chinese money. When the government was kind of embarrassed about its coziness with the Beijing government and Chinese influence in Canada, it appointed a special rapporteur. This position does not have any legal standing in Canada; nonetheless, it has appointed this person. One would think that if one were trying to allay Canadians' fears around this foreign interference issue, one would find somebody with no connections to the Beijing government and no relationship to the people who are being accused of not doing anything about it. However, here we are with the director of the Trudeau Foundation being appointed as the special rapporteur. That organization has taken money from the Beijing government or their emissaries. We have seen all kinds of confusion around who took the money and how it was organized. The Prime Minister's brother was the one who facilitated a donation. Then we see that this organization's annual report names the Prime Minister as a member. Now, he says he is unaffiliated and has not had contact with it for over 10 years, but his name is still in the annual report. He is still part of the Trudeau Foundation. That is the reality, whether the Prime Minister wants to admit it or not. He can say that he is currently uninvolved in the operations of the organization, but when he leaves this place, he will be able to be a part of its directorship. If he says that funds donated to that organization today could not be disbursed in the future, what does he take Canadians for? Today, donations are being made to the Trudeau Foundation; despite saying he is unaffiliated to it at the moment, the Prime Minister has connections to this organization. It is obvious that even if it were true that he is unaffiliated, which it is not, he will be reaffiliated in the future. He will be back on the governance board doing the same things, and he will have whatever kind of money has been donated to the Trudeau Foundation at his disposal once again. We have also seen over and over that the Liberals' claim to success is about how much money they spend. The Liberals accuse the past Conservative government of not doing anything and then go on to state how much they have increased funding for whatever the situation is. The Liberals accuse Conservatives of not having done something compared with how much more money they are spending on a particular thing. Again, this is another place where the Liberals will say that they have spent more money on this, which is an interesting way of ranking things. If we can get something and not have to spend money on it, that would seem to be a good win. We will not have to spend money on it if we can have national security because of our posture in the world and because we speak softly and carry a big stick. We will not have to spend money if we have no foreign interference because, rhetorically and by our posture, we signal to the world that Canada is not open to foreign interference. These are things that will happen naturally and organically. We will prevent foreign interference by our posture and by our rhetoric, and we will not have to spend money. However, the Liberals will come and tell us how much money they are spending on initiative X, Y or Z as a point of proof that they are doing more. I just want to reject that whole premise outright. The amount of money that is spent dealing with a particular thing does not necessarily correlate to taking action on that thing. I just want to restate once again that Canada is not for sale. Canada is a sovereign nation. The Canadian government should do all that it can to prevent foreign influence in our democracy and ensure that Canadian democracy is upheld wherever it is under threat.

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House Hansard - 193