Hon. Andrew Cardozo: Senator Yussuff, thank you for your speech and for taking leadership on this, and also thank you to Sherry Romanado in the House.

It is, of course, unfathomable that firefighters have uniforms designed to keep them safe from fire in the workplace that are, in fact, dangerous because they carry carcinogens and put firefighters in fatal danger. Is this going to be a straightforward implementation of the standards, or will the federal government have to negotiate with provincial governments? Is this going to be a drawn-out process once we pass it?

I want to add that I certainly will be pleased to support the bill.

Hon. Pat Duncan: I would also like to thank the senator for the sponsorship of this bill and to indicate that I am also prepared to support it. I apologize for not giving you advance notice of this question. I would like to build upon Senator Cardozo’s question.

As you’re aware, I have been involved in adjudicating workers’ compensation as well as having served as a workers’ advocate. This is, as you noted, an issue that is a complete patchwork across the country, and it is in much need of reform.

I am wondering if, in addressing this bill in the House of Commons, you and others involved in this bill have contemplated any sort of an amendment or methodology by which we might persuade, amicably, the workers’ compensation boards across the country to adopt a standard or a regulation such as you’ve proposed.

Hon. Marc Gold (Government Representative in the Senate): Honourable senators, I rise to speak in support of Bill C-224. I want to thank Senator Yussuff for sponsoring the bill and for your helpful and fulsome remarks.

Across this country, 32,000 firefighters and 100,000 volunteer firefighters play a critical role in keeping us and our communities safe. Canadians respect firefighters. We appreciate the work they do, work that is both essential and dangerous.

When firefighters respond to a call, they know they can face immediate dangers. They know there can be physical hazards each and every time they enter a burning building. A roof can fall down, a floor might give away and so on.

There are also a number of other less immediate dangers that firefighters face when they respond to a fire. As Senator Yussuff told us, and as we know, some household products become very dangerous when they burn. That means that firefighters can be exposed to toxic substances, such as potentially harmful flame retardants in upholstered furniture, mattresses or electronic devices, whenever they respond to a fire.

We know that chemical flame retardants can save lives by slowing the ignition and the spread of fire, but they might and do also cause harmful health effects, such as cancer, when they are burned and inhaled.

While this exposure tends to be rare or limited for most citizens, they can become more prevalent among firefighters. The reality is that firefighters are more likely to develop cancer and, sadly, to die from cancer as a result of these exposures. This is true for almost all types of cancers, colleagues, but it is particularly so for digestive, oral, respiratory and urinary cancers.

There is also emerging research that shows that women and racialized firefighters suffer an even higher risk of cancer incidence and cancer mortality.

Colleagues, cancer represents 86% of occupational fatality claims among firefighters in Canada. These unfortunate statistics do not only apply to firefighters in Canada. Allusion was made by Senator Yussuff to the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer. Last July, the International Agency for Research on Cancer, which is the specialized cancer agency of the World Health Organization, classified the occupational exposure that firefighters experience as carcinogenic to humans. In recognition of these realities, the International Association of Fire Fighters has designated the month of January as Fire Fighter Cancer Awareness Month.

The Government of Canada is committed to protecting firefighters and has put into place several measures to support our firefighters across this country. For firefighters and other first responders who have died because of their job-related duties, the Government of Canada supports their families through the Memorial Grant Program. Through this program, their families receive a federal tax-free payment of up to $300,000.

The government also developed a federal action plan to protect firefighters from harmful chemicals that are released during household fires. Announced in 2021, the action plan focuses on chemical flame retardants found, as I mentioned a moment ago, in many household items, including upholstered furniture and electronics, to name but two.

Significant progress is being made to address harmful chemical flame retardants and to support the development and the use of safer alternatives.

As well, the Government of Canada makes significant investments in cancer prevention and research, and this includes research on firefighting and its links to cancer. Between 2015 and 2020, the government invested approximately $927 million in cancer research through the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

The Government of Canada also supports the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer and CARcinogen EXposure Canada, an institute that tracks occupational and environmental carcinogen exposure in the workplace.

Colleagues, Bill C-224 calls on the Minister of Health to develop a national framework that raises awareness of cancers linked to firefighting and supports improved access for firefighters to cancer prevention and treatment.

As Senator Yussuff outlines, the bill before us today essentially has three parts: First, supporting improved access for firefighters to cancer prevention and treatment; second, designating the month of January as Fire Fighter Cancer Awareness Month; and, finally, setting out new reporting requirements on the effectiveness of the framework, including a report to be tabled in Parliament.

This bill will set out a common framework to guide future government actions building on the work already under way. The framework will be based on engagement and it will serve as an opportunity to exchange information and best practices between stakeholders and the many jurisdictions implicated in this issue.

Through these actions, the Government of Canada aims to raise awareness and share best practices between stakeholders and jurisdictions to ensure that Canadian firefighters, regardless of where they live or their postal code, receive the very best prevention and treatment possible.

The Government of Canada fully supports Bill C-224 so that we can respect and continue to foster our relationships with the provinces and the territories while strengthening the work we do to protect our firefighters.

Through a national framework, the Government of Canada will continue to take action on firefighters and cancer, with the goal of improving access for firefighters to cancer prevention and treatment, as well as explaining and supporting research on the link between firefighting and certain types of cancer. That includes promoting data collection on the prevention and treatment of cancers linked to firefighting, promoting information and knowledge sharing, including training, education and guidance needs across Canada, making recommendations for regular cancer screening for firefighters in Canada and preparing a summary of standards that recognize cancers linked to firefighting as occupational diseases.

The government will also designate and promote January as Fire Fighter Cancer Awareness Month. Colleagues, awareness is a key tool that we need to leverage to all stakeholders — from firefighters themselves to health care professionals in Canada — so that all are more aware of this important issue.

[Translation]

In closing, I’d like to once again thank Senator Yussuff, who sponsored this bill, and Senator Wells, the bill’s critic.

Through a national framework, the Government of Canada will improve our understanding of the link between firefighting and cancer and will adopt a more proactive approach to preventing cancer among firefighters.

This government will work closely with the provinces, territories, Indigenous groups, scientists, health care professionals and the firefighting community to shape this framework and develop an approach that meets the needs of firefighters across the country.

The government will continue its efforts with all of its partners to better protect firefighters against toxic chemicals and reduce the risk of cancer related to occupational exposure. Canadian firefighters deserve nothing less.

(On motion of Senator Martin, debate adjourned.)

[English]

The Senate proceeded to consideration of the ninth report of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade (Budget—study on the Canadian foreign service and elements of the foreign policy machinery within Global Affairs Canada), presented in the Senate on April 25, 2023.

Hon. Raymonde Saint-Germain: Senator Boehm, I’d like to know if you think a study on international diplomacy and the effectiveness of our foreign service should include municipalities inside Canada?

Senator Boehm: Thank you for the question, senator. We plan to travel outside Canada only.

Hon. Peter M. Boehm moved the adoption of the report.

The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Senator Boehm, will you take more questions?

Senator Boehm: Yes, of course.

Hon. Percy E. Downe: I have a question as well.

Hon. Yonah Martin (Deputy Leader of the Opposition): I have a question for Senator Boehm.

I notice that this is a report related to a budget. I wanted to ask for the sake of others in the chamber — and similar to what Senator Lankin asked on a previous report — what the nature of the trip is. As well, what are some outcomes that you expect from the trip? Maybe you could elaborate on the budget. Thank you.

Senator Boehm: Well, thank you very much, Senator Martin. It is, in fact, for a trip, and it’s a trip that was planned to take place earlier and features a revised budget — a lower budget — that was sent to the Subcommittee on Senate Estimates and Committee Budgets, or SEBS, and then to the Committee on Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration, or CIBA, for approval afterwards.

It’s in support of the long study that the committee has undertaken on the fit-for-purpose nature of Global Affairs Canada. It is supplementary to a trip that the committee took to Washington in December of last year. This one will take the committee — in a reduced number, I should add, because what was approved was the chair plus six members of the committee — to London, Oslo and Berlin.

In terms of why there, it’s because these particular countries have a similar system to ours in the way they conduct their foreign policy. They have recently integrated their aid and development function. In the case of the U.K. Foreign and Commonwealth Office, or FCO, it’s now the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, or FCDO, and the Norwegians have done the same thing, as did the Germans, because they are like-minded.

We will be looking at conditions of foreign service — this is not a foreign policy review per se — how people are recruited and how they are supported. This trip is planned for a non-sitting week — the week before we return in September — and it is basically the last element of this study that we have been working on since last April.

I hope that helps a little.

Hon. Marilou McPhedran: As a senator for Manitoba, I acknowledge that I live on Treaty 1 territory, the traditional lands of the Anishinaabe, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota and Dene, and the homeland of the Métis Nation.

I acknowledge that the Parliament of Canada is situated on unceded and unsurrendered Algonquin Anishinaabe territory.

[English]

Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to Senator Omidvar’s Motion No. 3, which asks us to adopt Recommendation 8 of the 2019 report of the Special Senate Committee on the Charitable Sector, chaired by former senator Terry Mercer, with Senator Ratna Omidvar as deputy chair.

Specifically, Recommendation 8 is simple and achievable, requiring the Canada Revenue Agency to include questions on tax forms for registered charities and federally incorporated not-for-profit corporations on diversity representation on boards of directors. I applaud Senator Omidvar for bringing this motion forward. Too often, excellent Senate reports with sensible, needed change strategies are not pursued in such a practical manner.

The non-profit sector is an economic driver and influencer in this country. Canada has over 170,000 charitable and non-profit organizations that are largely governed by boards of directors that often do not represent the diversity of the communities they serve and Canada as a whole. In supporting this motion, I do not wish to take away from the work these organizations are doing, but to highlight that a lack of diversity and representation saps legitimacy, limits voices and ideas and sows disconnect between groups and the communities that these boards serve.

Efficacy in the charitable sector is undermined where there are perceptions of bias, exclusion or mistrust. Further, when boards do not address diversity, a disconnect with the communities they serve will inevitably occur, resulting in limited networks, limited funding sources and difficulty in developing new ideas. The lack of diversity can create a conformity bias or groupthink mentality, which can lead to making the wrong decisions at a strategic level for effectiveness.

Senator Omidvar has detailed how Canada’s charitable sector lacks diversity, particularly in management positions, sometimes called “snow capping.” Snow capping occurs when racialized workers appear on the front lines while top positions are maintained by non-marginalized individuals. Another unintended consequence is the “cloning effect,” which refers to the bias, unconscious or otherwise, that sometimes occurs when, in recruiting new board members, trustees tend to seek out those from their immediate circles of influence, almost cloning themselves with look-alike and think-alike individuals who experience life much like they do, creating a homogeneous board that risks being disconnected from the communities in need.

Boards of directors who are not representative of their communities underserve their populations and create barriers for equity-deserving groups to advance to positions of authority. Conversely, a diverse board of directors can bring a realistic view of the community, strengthen the organization’s connections and credibility to its constituency, improve fundraising and assist with targeted, effective policy creation and implementation. In essence, it makes a board more effective at carrying out its mission.

Notably, Canada lacks comprehensive reporting mechanisms and statistics on diversity in its charitable sector. In 2021, Statistics Canada launched its first voluntary questionnaire to gather information on diversity among Canada’s charities and non-profit boards of directors. While the data was not collected using probability-based sampling, the results demonstrate the lack of equity in Canada’s charitable sector. Over 40% of respondents indicated that their organization does not even have a diversity policy. Conversely, organizations that did report a written diversity policy indicated they had higher proportions of diverse representation among their boards, including individuals living with a disability, First Nations, Métis, Inuit, visible minorities and LGBTQ+ individuals.

Recent developments in Canada’s corporate sector indicate that increased diversity reporting requirements can result in concrete diversity advancement for boards of directors. Since amendments were made to the Canada Business Corporations Act in 2020, requiring publicly traded organizations to disclose information on the diversity of their boards of directors and information related to their written policies concerning diversity, there have been substantive, measurable and positive developments. The amendments likely assisted in spurring a normative change, wherein boards of directors saw increases in the representation of minorities, women and Indigenous peoples.

The starting point for good policy and reform begins with transparency and data and leads to accountability. Motion No. 3 would galvanize necessary reporting requirements on board diversity within Canada’s charitable sector and lay the foundation for more targeted reform based on information and data collected. It may also spur a normative change within the sector by requiring organizations to consider and reflect upon the composition of their boards of directors and their diversity policies or lack thereof.

I commend Senator Omidvar for her long and dedicated leadership in the non-profit sector. This motion builds on the crucial work of civil society by shining a spotlight on where further study, data collection and inquiry are essential to building paths for growth and change that are necessary for a more just and effective Canada with a more inclusive economy and, in turn, a stronger democracy.

Thank you, meegwetch.

(On motion of Senator Seidman, debate adjourned.)

[Translation]

On the Order:

Resuming debate on the motion of the Honourable Senator McCallum, seconded by the Honourable Senator LaBoucane-Benson:

That the Senate of Canada call on the federal government to adopt anti-racism as the sixth pillar of the Canada Health Act, prohibiting discrimination based on race and affording everyone the equal right to the protection and benefit of the law.

(On motion of Senator Petitclerc, debate adjourned.)

On the Order:

Resuming debate on the motion of the Honourable Senator Omidvar, seconded by the Honourable Senator Dean:

That, given reports of human rights abuses, repression and executions of its citizens, particularly women, in Iran by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Senate call upon the government to immediately designate the IRGC as a terrorist entity.

Hon. Senators: Agreed.

(Motion agreed to.)

Hon. Denise Batters: Thank you. Senator Boehm, you alluded to budget in one of the answers you gave to Senator Downe. However, I didn’t hear you say what the actual budgeted amount is. Of course, we’re dealing here with a trip that is not within Canada, as perhaps that poverty trip was. We’re dealing with a trip to different European capitals, which can be quite costly. Can you please tell us what the amount is?

Thank you.

Senator Boehm: I believe it’s around $275,000, Senator Batters. We dropped it from the original cost, which was over $100,000 above that. I don’t have the exact figure in front of me.

[Translation]

Hon. Julie Miville-Dechêne: I rise today to support Senator Ratna Omidvar’s motion calling on the government to designate the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, as a terrorist entity. I want to begin by saying that, last week, Senator Omidvar gave a very intelligent and heartfelt speech about this regime and about Iran, where she used to live. I share her opinion.

Given the human and women’s rights violations and the crackdowns on protesters, the Canadian government should use this terrorist entity designation to increase pressure on the Iranian regime.

The IRGC was established in the aftermath of the 1979 Islamic revolution. It is one of the most powerful paramilitary organizations in the Middle East. It exerts an influence over nearly 50% of the Iranian economy and is making headway into Europe and the United States.

In 2020, the Tony Blair Institute in Great Britain exposed the training manuals used by the IRGC to indoctrinate recruits. They promote a violent and extremist ideology and describe the regime’s political opponents as apostates.

To date, only the United States has designated the IRGC as a terrorist entity, but parliamentarians in Europe and Great Britain are also exerting political pressure in that regard.

For its part, Canada opted for a strategy of gradual sanctions, instead of putting the entire Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the blacklist. Since October, the government has banned nearly 1,000 senior Iranian officials from entering the country. Other sanctions followed, but it stopped short of invoking section 83.05 of the Criminal Code, which allows a judge to order that the entity be listed as a terrorist group.

More than 70 organizations are currently designated as terrorist entities under this provision, which allows the courts to order the seizure or restraint of certain assets. One such designated entity is the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force, a clandestine unit that has been providing arms and funding to extremist groups for the past 10 years.

To justify Canada’s policy, Justice Minister David Lametti explained that the IRGC is part of the armed forces in a country where military service is mandatory. He expressed concern that section 83.05 of the Criminal Code could be used unfairly, since Canada could target opponents of the Iranian regime who have taken refuge in Canada and would have been ordinary conscripts.

In practice, however, the designation would primarily affect senior officers who have assets, who may interfere in Canada or try to cross our border.

The House of Commons passed a motion on this in 2018, but unfortunately no action has been taken.

It is time that the Senate voted on this as well, in the hope that Parliament will speak with one voice and call on the government to recognize the IRGC for what it is, namely a terrorist entity, and treat it as such. Thank you.

Hon. Stan Kutcher: Honourable senators, today I rise to speak to Motion No. 113 for a Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, or SOCI, study on health misinformation, its impacts on Canadians and potential remedies.

In April of this year, the Food and Drug Administration’s Commissioner of Food and Drugs, Robert Califf, reported that the recent rapid drop in life expectancy in the United States of America was in great part due to increased health misinformation.

The Council of Canadian Academies’ January 2023 Fault Lines report determined that, between March and November of 2021 alone, at least 2,800 Canadian lives lost to COVID-19 could have been spared, over 10,000 hospitalizations could have been prevented and $300 million in hospital costs may have been saved if not for disinformation impacting health behaviours of Canadians. Vaccine disinformation alone is in large part responsible for these negative findings.

In a study published in the journal The Lancet on June 23, 2022, Dr. Oliver Watson and colleagues used excess death analysis to determine that vaccinations prevented 19.8 million deaths globally during the first year of COVID-19 vaccination.

In December of 2022, the C.D. Howe Institute report Damage Averted: Estimating the Effects of Covid-19 Vaccines on Hospitalizations, Mortality and Costs in Canada noted that between January 2021 and May 2022, vaccines were highly effective at reducing COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths: 21% fewer cases, 37% fewer hospitalizations and 34,900 fewer deaths. Its economic modelling reported an estimated net cost/benefit of between $0.4 billion and $2.1 billion in cost savings alone, and when the statistical value of life analysis was applied, these savings added an additional $27.6 billion.

Yet, this vaccine disinformation continues to expand, reaching countless Canadians through social media and “alternative news” channels that promote and distribute many different kinds of disinformation; belief in health disinformation is also linked to beliefs in various types of conspiracy theories. Put together, these forces contribute to what scholars such as Kathleen Higgins and Ralph Keyes have called a “post-truth era,” with its attendant social polarizations.

Recently, this chamber initiated legislation calling for improved national action on addressing the needs of people and families living with autism, a very important step forward, indeed. Autism has been a health disinformation battleground for some time now, ranging from the completely false and fully discredited assertions that routine vaccinations cause autism, to the endorsement and, I might add, highly profitable sales of so‑called alternative treatments that have no scientifically valid evidence of positive effect but that in some cases could cause great harm — so-called treatments such as craniosacral manipulation, iron chelation therapy, and daily use — by drinking, bathing or enemas — of chlorine dioxide, which is also known as Miracle Mineral Solution or Master Mineral Solution or, more commonly, bleach.

The widespread concern about health misinformation is summed up in the preamble to the Council of Canadian Academies report:

Misinformation can cause significant harm to individuals, communities, and societies. Because it’s designed to appeal to our emotions and exploit our cognitive shortcuts, everyone is susceptible to it. We are particularly vulnerable to misinformation in times of crisis when the consequences are most acute. Science and health misinformation damages our community well-being through otherwise preventable illnesses, deaths, and economic losses, and our social well-being through polarization and the erosion of public trust. These harms often fall most heavily on the most vulnerable.

A 2020 U.S. Surgeon General report titled Confronting Health Misinformation similarly noted this negative impact and called for immediate and effective action to deal with health misinformation:

Health misinformation is a serious threat to public health. It can cause confusion, sow mistrust, harm people’s health, and undermine public health efforts. Limiting the spread of health misinformation is a moral and civic imperative that will require a whole-of-society effort.

Sadly, there is little that we in Canada can point to in the way of federal-government-supported, coordinated and effective action to address health misinformation. There are some interventions under way, such as the ScienceUpFirst initiative, that — in the interest of full disclosure — I, along with Professor Timothy Caulfield, catalyzed during the first pandemic year. There are several other government-funded activities under way, through the federal Digital Citizen Initiative, the Encouraging vaccine confidence in Canada fund, the Vaccine Community Innovation Challenge and a few others.

There is a government website that provides information on disinformation and how to spot it. In an unscientific straw poll of senators and staff that I recently conducted, only 2 of 48 people even knew it existed, and only one had actually bothered to look — not very effective.

The Government of Canada also commissioned a number of reports on this topic, such as Misinformation in Canada: Research and Policy Options, from Evidence for Democracy; Science Disinformation in a Time of Pandemic, from the Public Policy Forum; and Vulnerable Connections and Fault Lines from the Council of Canadian Academies.

Yet, only the minority of Canadians are up to date in their vaccinations, and health disinformation continues to proliferate. Just two weeks ago, UNICEF Canada reported that the proportion of Canadians who believe childhood immunizations are important has decreased by 8% since the onset of the pandemic. Should this trend continue, we can expect the return of a myriad of deadly infectious diseases, including measles, polio and even smallpox. As well, health disinformation is increasingly being used to sell unregulated and possibly harmful so-called cures or treatments for COVID-19 or other diseases to people online.

The reports that I identified earlier included a number of recommendations for citizens, governments and social media platforms that they felt are necessary to effectively combat disinformation. These included dealing with social media companies in their role as enablers or purveyors of disinformation and the development and delivery of effective public education campaigns to counter the health and social harms of disinformation, all things that could be looked at further in committee study.

Colleagues, action is needed, and our work in the Senate through a SOCI study can be an important part of countering the negative impacts of the many-headed hydra of health disinformation.

As we are aware, health disinformation has always been with us, but, in recent years, it has become a substantial and growing concern with well-established negative impacts on the health of individuals and populations. It has also negatively impacted our trust in public health and in health providers, as well as our economic and civic well-being. It has integrated itself into a social framework that rejects expertise, confuses science with information and encourages verbal — and even physical — attacks on scientists and health providers alike.

Indeed, the World Health Organization, or WHO, has called this growing pernicious threat an “infodemic” that has spread deeply into every part of the globe, and for which our societies have yet to find a fulsome, effective and durable response.

The Senate of Canada is known for the solid studies that its committees conduct. I am hopeful that the Social Affairs Committee will be able to delve into the complex and challenging aspects of health disinformation as it affects Canadians, as well as identify some effective remedies that could be applied.

Today, I would like to suggest some directions that the committee could consider in its work. I will start by addressing what is meant by the terms “disinformation” and “misinformation.”

Generally, disinformation refers to false or inaccurate information that has been deliberately created to deceive. It is created by unique actors, both organizations and individuals, and spread for various purposes. These actors can be outside or inside of Canada; they can include foreign governments whose use of disinformation is designed to create internal division and civil strife in our country, as well as organizations or individuals whose purpose is mercenary or ideological, or both.

Some examples of this include the attempts of the Russian state to sow civil discord in Canada by spreading anti-vaccination messaging through various sources, as well as the self‑proclaimed health experts who spread anti-vaccination information as a vehicle for selling their so-called health products — Mercola Market is a good example of this.

Misinformation also refers to false information, but it is often applied to identify the process by which disinformation is spread — which is frequently by individuals or groups who do not take the time to critically evaluate what they are spreading, or who do so because of emotional investment in the message that they are spreading.

For the sake of brevity, I will use the word “disinformation” to include both the deliberate and inadvertent spread of false or inaccurate information intended to deceive. The outcome is similar.

Sadly, colleagues, health disinformation is also a yellow brick road into conspiracy theories and anti-civil society institutions. Robust research demonstrates that once an individual has gone down the rabbit hole of health disinformation, they are much more likely to become involved in one or more conspiracy theories. Once a person becomes involved in one conspiracy theory, they are more likely to embrace many.

Some classic health misinformation-driven health conspiracy theories pertaining to vaccines are the following: COVID-19 vaccines are a bioweapon for population elimination; COVID-19 vaccines contain microchips to be used by Bill Gates, the World Economic Forum, or WEF, and the WHO for population control; the vaccine alters a person’s DNA; the vaccine is the cause of COVID-19 variants; and vaccines cause large numbers of sudden deaths.

All of those are conspiracy theories that grow out of, use and amplify health disinformation.

The concern is that these health disinformation conspiracy theories are becoming increasingly linked to other conspiracy theories, such as the Great Reset — and that the WEF and the WHO are taking over the governance of sovereign states.

Often, these conspiracy theories spread through algorithms within social media channels and through alternative news sources, such as BitChute, Rumble, Infowars, the Gateway Pundit, the Last Line of Defense, Natural News and The Unhived Mind newsletter, just to mention a few.

Once an individual — who is caught up in health disinformation — links to those sources, other types of conspiracy theories on numerous other topics can become part of their belief system.

In Canada, EKOS Politics has created a disinformation index made up, in large part, of belief in health disinformation.

Canadians who score high on the index, meaning that they believe health disinformation — which is about 15% of Canadians — are much more likely to distrust and not follow public health advice, much more likely to dismiss the importance of Indigenous concerns and much more likely to dismiss the importance of climate change.

Furthermore, data from EKOS polling shows that Canadians who score high on this disinformation index tend to support Russia in its war against Ukraine.

This fits with the alarms sounded by many, including Marcus Kolga, of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, who has clearly demonstrated the role of Russia in spreading health disinformation in Canada. Other scholars have noted that China has also been actively engaged in spreading health disinformation.

One other issue that has received scant media attention is the impact of belief in health disinformation and conspiracy theories on families. As some of us know from personal experience, adherence to health disinformation and conspiracy theories can pull otherwise cohesive families apart. If that can be the impact of health disinformation on families, just think of what it can do to communities or civil society.

Indeed, some scholars have already noted the relationship between health disinformation and social and civic polarization.

Colleagues, there are numerous remedies that have been proposed to help counter health disinformation, and a thorough Social Affairs Committee study should critically assess these remedies, as well as provide direction on how those that are effective can be best applied. Those remedies might require numerous concurrent interventions and will need to be well supported, established outside of government and sustainable — because we are in this for the long haul.

Colleagues, the Senate is known for its good committee work in helping Canadians journey through complex issues and difficult topics. Health disinformation and its negative impacts, as well as the potential effective remedies and how to apply them, are some of the wicked, complex issues facing Canadian society. Indeed, health disinformation might be one of the most important issues that not only Canadians, but also global citizens, have ever faced.

I look forward to further debate on this motion and to its rapid passage so that the Social Affairs Committee can get to work on this challenging opportunity.

Thank you. Wela’lioq.

The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: I’m sorry, colleagues, but there is no more time for debate, unless Senator Kutcher wants to seek leave for five additional minutes.

The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Is leave granted, honourable senators?

Hon. Mary Coyle: Senator Kutcher, this seems like an important motion that you have put forward. I just want to understand the scope of what you are recommending to the Social Affairs Committee in terms of examining and reporting on the negative impacts of health disinformation on Canadian society, and what effective measures can be implemented to counter that impact.

You’ve spoken about the yellow brick road; you’ve spoken about the rabbit holes and the other issues. Do you see this particular study as being focused exclusively on health disinformation, or do you see health disinformation as a Trojan Horse that could bring in other areas of disinformation that the committee would also want to study?

I’m just curious how far beyond health disinformation you are expecting the scope of the study to go, if at all.

Hon. Senators: Agreed.

Hon. Marty Deacon: The timing is interesting on this. Yesterday, the National Security and Defence Committee took a look at disinformation as it relates to national security. But the conversation about health and health-related issues — for example, COVID — was not off the table. It’s certainly part of it. There is no question this is as complex as the day is long.

I don’t think this is a scope question, but I’m wondering from you, Senator Kutcher, if you were sitting at the Social Affairs Committee table looking at this, what expertise beyond the health sector — I was going to ask you what your dream solution was, but that’s such a complex issue. What expertise would you like to have at the table for this conversation?

Hon. Pamela Wallin, pursuant to notice of April 25, 2023, moved:

That, notwithstanding the order of the Senate adopted on Thursday, December 16, 2021, the date for the final report of the Standing Senate Committee on Banking, Commerce and the Economy in relation to its study on matters relating to banking, trade, commerce and the economy generally, as described in rule 12-7(10), be extended from June 30, 2023, to December 31, 2025.