The demise of the Special Committee on Canada-China Relations is not a good look
It was one of Parliament’s only open windows into the Trudeau government’s secretive dealings with Xi Jinping’s regime in Beijing. It was one of the few vantage points available for Canadians to get a glimpse of the Chinese regime’s influence operations in Canada.
Now it’s gone, at least for now, and while the Liberals’ aversion to any scrutiny of its China diplomacy is well known, it’s falling to the Conservative Party to shake off suspicions that its own internal calculus is the reason why the House of Commons Special Committee on Canada-China Relations is no more.
“Conservatives are not going soft on China,” Michael Chong, the Conservatives’ shadow minister for foreign affairs, told me Tuesday. “It’s not true. It’s just not true. I want to scream it from the rooftops. The Conservative Party’s position on China remains unchanged, full stop.”
And it is true enough, as far as it goes, but it’s going to be hard for the Conservatives to argue that they’re not getting squeamish about their party’s focus on the Xi regime’s malignant conduct in China, in Canada and abroad — no matter how broadly the party’s policy accords with overwhelming Canadian public opinion.
During the September federal election campaign, the Conservatives were battered by a disinformation operation carried out by Beijing and its proxies in Canada that cost them votes in 13 ridings across Canada, an internal party review has concluded. In as many as three ridings, it’s likely that the operation was effective enough to tip the scales in favour of the Liberal candidates.
The Conservatives managed to establish the Special Committee over the Liberals’ objections in December 2019, but Conservative leader Erin O’Toole won’t be seeing to its restoration when Parliament resumes January 31. Chong makes a persuasive case that the reason is largely a matter of logistics.
The technical capacities of the pandemic-accommodating “hybrid” Parliament are such that for now, apart from the House of Commons’ two dozen standing committees, there’s no resources to run a third Special Committee on top of the new Special Committee on Afghanistan, a Conservative initiative, and the Liberals’ new Standing Committee on Science and Research. Chong said there’s a good chance the Special Committee on Canada-China Relations could be up and running again by June.
Even so, it’s not a good look. David Mulroney, a senior fellow with the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy and a former ambassador to China, described the Special Committee’s demise as a “kneecapping,” describing the event this way: “A committee where we learned about Chinese influence operations is shot down by a Chinese influence operation.”
The Atlantic Council’s Forensic Research Lab and the Canadian NGO Disinfo Watch have conducted analyses of the September election that accord with the Conservative Party’s internal assessment and bear out warnings from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service delivered to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last summer. The Atlantic Council’s researchers concluded: “China-linked actors took an active role in seeking to influence the September 20, 2021 parliamentary election in Canada, displaying signs of a coordinated campaign to influence behaviour among the Chinese diaspora voting in the election.”
That campaign was laser-focused on the Conservatives’ proposal for a foreign agents registration law along the lines of the Australian model. In Chinese-language media and in a variety of China-based social platforms, where CSIS says Beijing’s influence operations have been “normalized,” the proposed law was represented in routinely hysterical terms, to the effect that Chinese-Canadians would be forced to register en masse as foreign agents for merely maintaining relations with businesses or family members back in the Peoples Republic of China.
The Conservative proposal was the subject of a private members’ bill put forward by the popular Metro Vancouver MP Kenny Chiu, whose campaign was badgered constantly with disinformation. Chiu ended up losing to his Liberal opponent by 3,000 votes. Ironically, the Conservative’s proposed law, which would merely require lobbyists and agents of foreign powers to register with Ottawa, has been more convincingly criticized for being too lenient.
Tarun Krishnakumar, a researcher with the Foreign Influence Transparency Initiative at the Center for International Policy in Washington, D.C., describes the Conservatives’ proposed law as “extremely limited in terms of the range of influence activities it aims to cover.” It fails to take into account the diverse targets and channels of foreign influence campaigns, and would apply only to “an extremely narrow slice of the overall influence and interference spectrum identified by agencies including the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.”
Chong said the Conservatives took a beating at polls in many ridings where Chinese diaspora communities are concentrated not because of the Conservatives’ actual policies, but because of the way they were distorted, misrepresented, and mischaracterized as racist and far right. That’s another irony, since the party’s carefully articulated standpoints would be perfectly suitable to any party across the political spectrum that pays close attention to the Xi regime’s domestic and foreign belligerence and bullying. The positions staked out by the Conservatives are also direct responses to the specific appeals of Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Chinese human rights defenders, Hong Kong Democrats, Canada’s Uyghur community, the Taiwanese diaspora, and so on.
It hasn’t helped that among the Conservative dissenters calling for Erin O’Toole to be subjected to an early leadership review is Burt Chen, a now-deposed member of the Conservative Party’s national council, who protested that O’Toole has been too hard on China. And a self-described Chinese-Canadian Conservative organization, not affiliated with the party but aligned with Beijing, blasted O’Toole for the “hatred” embedded in the Conservatives’ policies, slammed Canada for having “started the war” that led to the arrests of Michel Kovrig and Michael Spavor, objected to Canadians raising concerns about human rights in China, and spoke out in support of Beijing’s military overflights of Taiwan’s air-defence zone.
So it’s a mess, Chong said. “It wasn’t all our fault, but we certainly didn’t help ourselves.” The Conservatives’ “war room” didn’t have a single Mandarin or Cantonese speaker on staff. While CSIS has outlined the alarming extent of pro-Beijing control of Chinese-language media and social-media platforms popular in Canada, the Conservatives should have been ready with a rapid-response strategy to counter all the propaganda. “Even if we had one we might have been on our back heel, but at least we’d have had a fighting chance.”
Beijing’s well-documented “elite capture” strategy in Canada and its multi-dimensional influence operations are matters of urgent national security and sovereignty, Chong said — matters far too important to avoid confronting, even if it will mean losing some votes in certain ridings.
But for now, at least, there will be no Special Committee on Canada-China Relations to shine a light on any of this.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.
Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.
She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.
Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.
Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.
The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.
Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.
“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.
“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”
The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.
In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.
“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”
In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.
“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”
Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.
Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.
“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”
In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.
In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.
“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”
Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.
“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”
The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.
“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.
Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.
“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
— With files from Keith Doucette in Halifax
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