Opposition MPs on the Special Committee on Canada-China Relations voted Tuesday to delve into the massive security breach at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg.
Liberal MPs on the committee tried to curtail the parliamentary examination, introducing a motion that would not make the investigation a priority and limiting the number of meetings into the matter.
Liberal Yasir Naqvi said he was concerned the inquiry would be “all about political posturing” and attempts to “score political points” rather than getting answers about what happened at Canada’s only Level 4 infectious disease lab.
The Conservatives, Bloc Québécois and NDP defeated Mr. Naqvi’s motion and another one that would not have allowed MPs to summon witnesses if they refused to testify. BQ MP René Villemure reminded the Liberals that it was the government that played political games by denying Parliament access to classified documents on the matter.
Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong, who tabled the motion for a parliamentary investigation, said government witnesses “had obstructed, obfuscated and delayed” providing the documents covering why two infectious disease scientists were fired in January, 2021.
Mr. Chong and other opposition MPs also agreed the committee should have the power to summon witnesses who refuse to testify.
The investigation is needed because the goings-on at the National Microbiology Lab “are serious national security breaches,” he told the committee.
“It is a grave and serious matter because the government scientists clandestinely collaborated with the government and the military of the People’s Republic of China and were paid clandestinely by the government and the military of the People’s Republic of China, without the government of Canada knowing anything,” he said.
The Conservative motion calls for the appearance of nine witnesses, including Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc, Health Minister Mark Holland, CSIS Director David Vigneault and senior leaders at the Public Health Agency of Canada.
Opposition MPs want to know how the security breach happened and what steps are being taken to make sure it cannot happen again.
Declassified documents tabled in the House of Commons in late February showed that Xiangguo Qiu and Keding Cheng provided confidential scientific information to China and that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service found Dr. Qiu’s association with multiple talent-recruitment programs run by Chinese authorities.
Investigators for the government ultimately concluded that Dr. Qiu represented “a realistic and credible threat to Canada’s economic security” and that Mr. Cheng posed “a very serious and credible security danger to the government of Canada.”
Property records show Dr. Qiu and Mr. Cheng still co-own two houses in Winnipeg’s South Pointe neighbourhood, a wealthy suburban area surrounded by parks and interconnecting creeks, about a 30-minute drive from the city’s downtown. They also own an undeveloped property in cottage country in Gimli, Man. They are listed as co-owners as of a title search on March 6.
The two scientists were escorted out of the National Microbiology Laboratory in July, 2019, and later had their security clearances revoked. They were fired in January, 2021.
They have been under an RCMP national security investigation since May, 2019.
The Globe and Mail revealed last week that the pair are now working in China and that Dr. Qiu is collaborating with researchers from the People’s Liberation Army. The couple are now using the pseudonyms Sandra Chiu and Kaiting Cheng, conducting research at prestigious institutions in China and alongside some of that country’s most noted scientists.
At China’s University of Science and Technology, a school with close ties to the People’s Liberation Army, Sandra Chiu uses an e-mail address that includes the name “qiu” and first initial “x.”
Internet archives show that somewhere between January, 2020, and June, 2023, a one-paragraph biography of Dr. Qiu at Virologica Sinica, a scientific journal where she was on the editorial board, becomes a biography of Sandra Chiu, with no change to the wording.
OTTAWA – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the NDP is caving to political pressure from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre when it comes to their stance on the consumer carbon price.
Trudeau says he believes Jagmeet Singh and the NDP care about the environment, but it’s “increasingly obvious” that they have “no idea” what to do about climate change.
On Thursday, Singh said the NDP is working on a plan that wouldn’t put the burden of fighting climate change on the backs of workers, but wouldn’t say if that plan would include a consumer carbon price.
Singh’s noncommittal position comes as the NDP tries to frame itself as a credible alternative to the Conservatives in the next federal election.
Poilievre responded to that by releasing a video, pointing out that the NDP has voted time and again in favour of the Liberals’ carbon price.
British Columbia Premier David Eby also changed his tune on Thursday, promising that a re-elected NDP government would scrap the long-standing carbon tax and shift the burden to “big polluters,” if the federal government dropped its requirements.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
Simon Jolin-Barrette, minister responsible for consumer protection, has tabled a bill to force merchants to calculate tips based on the price before tax.
That means on a restaurant bill of $100, suggested tips would be calculated based on $100, not on $114.98 after provincial and federal sales taxes are added.
The bill would also increase the rebate offered to consumers when the price of an item at the cash register is higher than the shelf price, to $15 from $10.
And it would force grocery stores offering a discounted price for several items to clearly list the unit price as well.
Businesses would also have to indicate whether taxes will be added to the price of food products.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
Quebec legislature member Youri Chassin has announced he’s leaving the Coalition Avenir Québec government to sit as an Independent.
He announced the decision shortly after writing an open letter criticizing Premier François Legault’s government for abandoning its principles of smaller government.
In the letter published in Le Journal de Montréal and Le Journal de Québec, Chassin accused the party of falling back on what he called the old formula of throwing money at problems instead of looking to do things differently.
Chassin says public services are more fragile than ever, despite rising spending that pushed the province to a record $11-billion deficit projected in the last budget.
He is the second CAQ member to leave the party in a little more than one week, after economy and energy minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced Sept. 4 he would leave because he lost motivation to do his job.
Chassin says he has no intention of joining another party and will instead sit as an Independent until the end of his term.
He has represented the Saint-Jérôme riding since the CAQ rose to power in 2018, but has not served in cabinet.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
