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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 311

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 8, 2024 02:00PM
Context: House Hansard - 311 - May/8/24
The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)
  • May/8/24 7:09:59 p.m.
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We will try to get the information as quickly as we can from the Hansard. We will get back to the House if need be. The hon. Minister of Environment and Climate Change is rising on a point of order.
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Context: House Hansard - 311 - May/8/24
Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)
  • May/8/24 9:29:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I always listen attentively to my colleague. I think, in this case, it is very clear, as we have seen with Justice Hogue's preliminary report, which points very clearly to some things. There is a real shortcoming in terms of how the government and past governments have dealt with the information around foreign interference. We have seen repeatedly, from the 2019 election and the 2021 election, that information was not communicated to candidates. In this case, addressed in the question of privilege, information was not communicated to members of Parliament. There is a lack of protocols and a lack of organization, not necessarily around the obtaining of the information but in actually communicating that information to people who might be impacted. This may be members of Parliament or, as we saw in election campaigns, candidates. We need to ensure that action is taken to prevent further interference of this type. Whether the foreign government is Chinese, Indian, Russian or Iranian, we have certainly seen enough examples to know that we need to put protocols in place and we need to put in place an action plan. My question to my colleague is very simple: Why has the government not moved to put into place that action plan and those protocols so that the information is communicated and members of Parliament do not find out from a Globe and Mail article information that should have been given to them years ago?
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Context: House Hansard - 311 - May/8/24
Mr. Garnett Genuis (Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, CPC)
  • May/8/24 9:58:20 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, earlier in this debate, I posed a question to the parliamentary secretary, and I was quite disturbed by the response. We all know governments make mistakes. Every government makes mistakes. I asked if he acknowledged that it was a mistake for the government to not inform members of Parliament that they had faced a cyber-attack from a foreign state. He said no, he did not think it was a mistake. He said that protocols and processes can change, but when I asked if it had been a mistake to not tell me and 17 other parliamentarians that we had been targeted by a foreign government, he said no, it was not. I find that very disturbing. I hope we can work toward a consensus on how to move forward, but it should be acknowledged at a basic level that failure to inform parliamentarians about these threats to themselves, their cyber-presence and their offices is wrong and unacceptable. The government should be willing, at this point, now that it has been caught not sharing that information, to acknowledge that. I would like to ask the NDP for its perspective. Does it think the government erred in not sharing this information?
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Context: House Hansard - 311 - May/8/24
Mr. Ziad Aboultaif (Edmonton Manning, CPC)
  • May/8/24 10:22:18 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the government sat on the information without even bothering to inform the very people who were affected by such an atrocity and such a danger and threat. What does that tell Canadians, parliamentarians and people who want to be involved in politics? Could the hon. member comment on the message the government is sending?
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