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Mr. Jasraj Singh Hallan (Calgary Forest Lawn, CPC)

Dec/7/21 11:25:40 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the failures in Afghanistan are not anything new, especially when it comes to religious minorities and minority groups like the LGBTQ community. As someone who has personally sponsored a refugee family from Afghanistan, I know first-hand that it took the Liberal government four years to get that family here when they were under persecution. I want to correct the member, but this is not to denigrate the civil service at all. It is to hold the government to account for its failures. I went through that process and have seen it, and the Liberals continually fail. We are at 1.8 million cases in immigration backlogs. It is not the fact that the public service has failed; it is the government's failure for creating this bureaucratic mess. We have all seen images of the young women and girls who are being forcibly converted and married. What is going on is devastating. Let me be very clear. The Conservative Party does not want to destroy the refugee class in any way. Actually, we want to make it better because of the bureaucratic backlogs the Liberal government created—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Dec/7/21 11:27:00 a.m.
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I have to give the hon. parliamentary secretary a chance to answer. The hon. parliamentary secretary.

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Mr. Robert Oliphant

Dec/7/21 11:27:04 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the officials at IRCC are working day and night to do these processes. This is not something new. I was in opposition during the Harper government, and believe me, I waited years and years to help refugees at that time. The system does not work perfectly. Can we find ways to improve it? Absolutely. Let us take that to the citizenship and immigration committee, which needs to do it. We will continue to stand with Ahmadiyya. We will continue to stand with the Sikh community in Afghanistan. We will continue to stand with persecuted religious minorities in Afghanistan, because that is what we do and that is what Canadians want us to do.

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Mrs. Julie Vignola (Beauport—Limoilou, BQ)

Dec/7/21 11:27:49 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, frankly I do not even know where to begin. I was listening to my colleagues and I could see a lot of motivation on their part. Nevertheless, this is not the first war we are getting involved in. We know the consequences of getting involved in a war and the consequences of having people work for us and help us in a country that is not our own. We have known all of this for a long time. We should have planned our involvement from the outset and had a vision of the future for these people; the same goes for when we left the country in 2014. Now where are we? We are improvising, asking for things from people who do not even have access to the Internet, and closing the embassy. Every government is at fault. We have to acknowledge that and review this situation to ensure that it does not happen again. Does my colleague agree that we must examine what happened to ensure that girls, women and children never again starve to death or get killed?

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Mr. Robert Oliphant

Dec/7/21 11:28:54 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I agree. I believe such a review is indispensable. However, the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development must also conduct its own study. That is very important.

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Ms. Heather McPherson (Edmonton Strathcona, NDP)

Dec/7/21 11:29:15 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I want to think about how we can work together and how we can work in a positive forward-looking way, but I have to call my colleague out on one of the comments he made today, that is, that nobody could have predicted what was going to happen in Afghanistan. I wrote to the minister in February and explained that this would happen. My colleagues in the NDP have written to the minister as well. People from from the Hazara community had written to the minister and explained what was going to happen in August when we knew the U.S. would be pulling out, so I do want to call him out on that a bit. More importantly, I would like the member to comment, if he could, on the situation we are in. Will the government be coming up with a plan to work with the non-profit sector, CSOs and multilateral organizations to ensure they can get support to the Afghanis, knowing the very complicated scenario we have in Afghanistan with regard to anti-terrorism legislation and whatnot?

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Mr. Robert Oliphant

Dec/7/21 11:30:20 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, yes, absolutely. We need to work with civil society organizations. I have had conversations with Rainbow Railroad. I have had conversations with a number of organizations that are attempting to find pathways in a very, very difficult situation. I would not say that no one could have predicted what was going to happen. When the decision was made by the United States to withdraw on September 11, contingency plans were put in place, obviously. What we needed to do then was absolutely expedite them to make sure that when the decision was made to advance, we did the best we could. Was this perfect? Absolutely not. Can it be improved? Absolutely, yes. We will continue to do that, and we welcome help and suggestions.

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Mr. Alex Ruff (Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, CPC)

Dec/7/21 11:31:15 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have a couple of comments rather than a question, and some corrections to make to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. First off, the mission did not end a decade ago. The combat mission ended a decade ago, but we did not leave Afghanistan until 2014. I would like to correct a few members who keep referring to “Afghanis”. That is the currency in Afghanistan. It should be “Afghans”. Next, the member mentioned that— An hon. member: Oh, oh!

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Dec/7/21 11:31:43 a.m.
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To the hon. parliamentary secretary, we have not finished questions and comments. The hon. member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound.

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Mr. Alex Ruff

Dec/7/21 11:32:01 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think the member will find it easier to respond to my comments if he actually listens to them. He talked about time and that nobody could have predicted this. He sort of corrected that in his last response, but this was predicted. His own backbencher, the MP for Thunder Bay—Rainy River, raised a concern with the Liberal government two years ago that this was going to come down the pike, so this should have been predicted. I raised it myself in the national media weeks before the government took action. I will agree with the member. It is the backbenchers' responsibility to stand up and criticize the government at certain times. I am looking forward to members of the Liberal caucus voting for this motion today.

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Mr. Robert Oliphant

Dec/7/21 11:32:52 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, my apologies. I thought you were recognizing the next debater. On the question, let me be very clear that in four months, this government brought in more Afghan interpreters than the previous Conservative government brought here in four years. That is absolutely true. I know those people; they live in my riding. I am in contact with them every day. I understand what that was about. I also understand that the situation changed and Canada continued to adapt. I want to thank the member for Thunder Bay—Rainy River, who was absolutely helpful in raising the issue. We have constantly been engaged on the issue and will continue to be engaged on it.

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Mr. Kody Blois (Kings—Hants, Lib.)

Dec/7/21 11:33:42 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I always find my hon. colleague's remarks in the House to be very insightful and engaging. During the last intersection, I had the opportunity to ask the member for Wellington—Halton Hills about the concerns I have with the text of this motion regarding the one-month timeline and the committee's ability to basically overrule the parliamentary law clerk as it relates to the redacted documents. Can the member speak about his concerns regarding that particular text?

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Mr. Robert Oliphant

Dec/7/21 11:34:15 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, obviously we have a concern about that because we already have a taxed public service. We have a holiday period coming up. We think it is unreasonable, and we have to find ways to work around that. We also have suggestions, and we have a proposal right now on how we should be handling documents that we think parliamentarians should have access to. We will find a way—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Dec/7/21 11:34:38 a.m.
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Resuming debate, the hon. member for Saint-Jean.

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Ms. Christine Normandin (Saint-Jean, BQ)

Dec/7/21 11:34:43 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with my esteemed colleague from Lac-Saint-Jean, who will give a superb speech that I will be most pleased to listen to. First, I would like to highlight what I believe to be some strong points in the motion presented today by the Conservative Party. As the saying goes, we should not throw out the baby with the bathwater, and the motion has some worthwhile elements. I am thinking in particular of the reason why they are asking that a special committee be created. My colleague, the parliamentary secretary, mentioned that he hoped the study would be conducted by the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development. However, this matter touches on international relations, defence and immigration, a combination of areas that we do not see all that often. In addition, one of the advantages of creating a special committee is that it frees up the schedules of the standing committees, which, as one might expect, will have a lot on their plate in the coming year and will be very busy. I am thinking in particular of the standing committees on foreign affairs and international development, national defence and citizenship and immigration. The study the motion proposes is extensive and could take several months. Tasking a standing committee with this study would likely prevent that committee from focusing on other equally important issues. Finally, there is a need to restore the Canadian Armed Forces' image, a significant issue that I will carry forward and address over the next year. A number of military members have taken it upon themselves to help the local interpreters they worked with in Afghanistan. They have provided private funding to set up houses to keep people safe. If nothing is done and we send the message that some individuals could be left behind, we risk undermining not only the alliances we may want to make with international partners on future missions, but also the Canadian Armed Forces' internal recruitment. For all these reasons, I think it is appropriate to ask the question and to study what went wrong and why allies who had worked with Canada were not evacuated. The wording of the Conservatives' motion raises the issue of calling an election in the midst of the Afghan crisis. It is very interesting and relevant, but is this really the right place to raise the issue? I am not sure. However, if we were to go down this road, I daresay it might be interesting to see how we could put limits on a government's power to unilaterally call an election without being brought down by the House. I doubt that the Liberals and Conservatives would want to discuss this in the context of the motion we are debating, but I still think it is worth raising this possibility. What bothers me about this motion is that the Conservatives seem to have written it more to make the government look bad than to really find immediate and future solutions. I will give an example. Paragraph (m)(v) of the motion calls for an enormous quantity of documents to be produced within one month of the creation of the special committee, which is likely to be voted on tomorrow. One month from now will be January 7. Between now and then, there are about seven or eight sitting days left in the House, people and staff will be on vacation, and they may still be on January 7. On that date, it would be very easy for the Conservatives to say that the government has once again disobeyed an order of the House by not producing the documents requested by the deadline. That deadline, however, is absolutely impossible to meet, so the objective will not be met. Accordingly, I think that we could be a little more flexible, for example by allowing the committee to decide for itself which documents it wants to obtain and the timeline for producing them. These choices can change depending on what happens in committee and what the committee needs in order to plan or amend its decisions. Another aspect of the motion that bothers me is the fact that it is only retroactive in scope. While the Leader of the Opposition talked more about the need for recommendations for the future, it seems to me that it is more about picking at scabs than anything else. Just between us, I do not think that we need a special committee to see that things were botched. We only have ask the members who had all their immigration cases put on hold this summer because of the lack of capacity to deal with Afghan refugee applications. The system was not even close to being ready; cases in the Department of Citizenship and Immigration were already moving slowly, and this just added to it. Afghan refugees do not need a special committee to tell them that things were botched. We only have to ask the 200 Afghans whose names were leaked to the media by IRCC, which put their lives at risk. They do not need a special committee to tell them that things were botched. We only have to ask the 40,000 minus 3,700 Afghans who are still there. Let us ask them if they need a special committee to tell them that things were botched. With that in mind, there is no point to creating a committee whose sole purpose is to analyze the past. It is somewhat akin to the work of a coroner who is asked to determine the cause and circumstances of a death. Their work would not be that important if it simply involved telling us why and how a person died. The coroner’s real job is to make recommendations to prevent it from happening again. That is what I would like to see from the committee that is to be set up. If worst comes to worst, an amendment could be introduced to that effect. If the special committee's sole purpose is to provide feedback, it becomes less useful. I would prefer to have it look at other issues, such as what to do with the people who are still in Afghanistan. There could be millions of them, and they could starve to death in one of the worst famines in human history. How can we get international aid to these people in the immediate future? The committee might consider what kind of diplomatic ties we should have with the Taliban government. Although it is the de facto government, it is not a recognized government, since the Taliban are considered a terrorist organization. Still, we will need to figure out how to deal with them to ensure delivery of humanitarian aid. It is also important to look at government funding. Since the Taliban have been recognized by several countries as a terrorist organization, aid is often frozen. International donors are more fearful, so the money that the government relies on to keep running is not coming in. Under the circumstances, we do not really seem to be grasping this sense of urgency and the need for action right now. Those are not secondary issues; they should be a key focus for the special committee. I think that is what the Conservatives' motion is lacking. I would not be comfortable supporting the motion as written. It is basically smoke and mirrors. Really, it is mud-slinging, and it is not constructive. When I read the motion as it stands, I worry that it will not help anyone other than maybe the Conservatives. Passing this motion will not get any more Afghans out of Afghanistan. It will not get any humanitarian aid into the country. This motion will not do anything to improve diplomatic relations insofar as that is possible. I think there is room for improvement. The Bloc, as always, wants a partner it can talk to and work with constructively. We are reaching out to our Conservative colleagues, not for their good, not for the good of the government and not for our own good, but for the good of those who need it most right now.

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Mr. Alex Ruff (Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, CPC)

Dec/7/21 11:44:12 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I agree with my colleague that there is always room for improvement through amendments. I am looking forward to seeing those and hopefully coming to some sort of consensus, if her party wants to put forward amendments. I would also agree with her that this committee is not just about identifying what went wrong. It is about figuring out what we need to do better for the future. Having ample experience with lessons identified and lessons learned within the Canadian Armed Forces, the key difference is that if we do not actually learn from mistakes made in the past, we can identify them until the cows come home and we will be doomed to make the same mistakes again. I encourage the Bloc Québécois to work with our Conservative team to come up with an amendment that would work for all of us.

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Ms. Christine Normandin

Dec/7/21 11:45:10 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have two things to say about that. First of all, as I said in my speech, the need to learn from mistakes is one thing. I am not rejecting that part of the Conservative motion, but I think it needs to lead to something else, and that is what I want to emphasize. Second, I just made some suggestions for possible amendments. The Conservatives did not try to get any support from the other parties to make sure this motion passes or to make it worthwhile. This only makes me question the purpose of the motion even more. Is it just smoke and mirrors? The question remains.

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Mr. Lloyd Longfield (Guelph, Lib.)

Dec/7/21 11:45:50 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I agree that the motion looks more like theatre than looking to improve the lives of Afghanis and the functioning of our government. Having a critical look at what has happened in the past is something our committees could do. Our existing committees are set-up for that. Could the hon. member comment on the role that could be played by the National Security Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians, or the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, or the public accounts committee or other committees to look into what happened and what we could do better in the future?

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Ms. Christine Normandin

Dec/7/21 11:46:30 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, as I said, this is such a broad subject, which encompasses so many files and requires such a large effort, that it should be the purview of a special committee. Will the Department of National Defence really look into why Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada did not have enough staff to deal with the cases? This is such a complex problem that, on the face of it, it warrants the creation of a special committee. As well, that would avoid monopolizing the time of other committees that will already have a lot on their plates during this Parliament.

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Mr. Alistair MacGregor (Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, NDP)

Dec/7/21 11:47:14 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, a unique part of this motion to create a special committee is that it would be accompanied by a special order of the House, which is informed by experiences of standing committees in the previous Parliament that ran against obstructive measures from members of the government and had to request the House's help to solicit documents and actually have them put before the committee. I wonder if my colleague has any comments on the fact that we are probably saving some time by putting a special standing order of the House in the motion so the committee is equipped with that before and would not have to make use of it at a later stage.

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