44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 12, 2022 10:00AM
- May/12/22 10:24:55 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the Bloc Québécois welcomes this motion with great interest.
We know that China now has the financial means to hire foreign agents who interfere in the economic and democratic affairs of major economies.
One of the current candidates for the leadership of the Conservative Party has worked for Huawei.
Would my colleague be in favour of lobbying to have all the unredacted contracts between Mr. Jean Charest and Huawei tabled in the House?
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- May/12/22 10:25:25 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his question.
The Canada-China relationship is a broad one. There are many issues between our two countries, particularly with respect to economic matters. There is no question that we must pressure the government to develop a policy on companies such as Huawei.
For four years now, the government has been saying it will present a policy on Huawei. However, a decision has yet to be made. That is another reason to establish a special committee on Canada-China relations.
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- May/12/22 10:26:20 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague from Wellington—Halton Hills for his great explanation and presentation on the need for this committee.
He referenced, in his answer to the previous questioner, the need to provide the government some help on a policy with respect to Huawei, hopefully to ban Huawei from Canada's 5G network.
What other policies should the committee inform the government on? What other existential issues is Canada or the world facing with respect to risks in the Indo-Pacific and our relationship with the People's Republic of China?
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- May/12/22 10:27:07 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, the issue of Huawei is one that needs attention. Then public safety minister Ralph Goodale, in May 2019, said that the government would be delivering a decision on Huawei before the 2019 election. Then the government changed its mind on it. Several months later, it said the decision would be coming after the 2019 election. We still have no decision. Last September, the Prime Minister indicated to Global News that a decision would be forthcoming in several weeks, and yet there is still no decision today.
It is another reason why we need this committee, to help the government along with its policies on Canada-China. There are so many aspects of the security relationship that need attention that I cannot elucidate them here in my short answer to the hon. member.
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- May/12/22 11:27:26 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague from Montarville on his speech. I have learned more about international politics and global issues from his speeches than I did during all my years at university.
I would remind my colleague that, in 2020, the House of Commons adopted a motion calling on the federal government to develop a strategy to combat Chinese aggression and make a decision on Huawei. Nothing has been done since.
As we all know, one of the Conservatives' new friends, Jean Charest, has returned to the fold and is trying to win the party leadership. He has a history of professional relations with Huawei and is a friend of the company. Should a special committee on the relationship between Canada and the People's Republic of China be formed, does my colleague think that the Conservatives' demands and intentions with respect to this committee could change, given their new relationship with Mr. Charest?
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- May/12/22 11:28:18 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, my colleague asked a very interesting question, and he is absolutely right.
There is reason to be concerned about Huawei's presence in the 5G sector in Canada, despite the company's good intentions. For example, when the Chinese offered to build an ultramodern building for the African Union, it turned out that the company and Chinese authorities were spying on the African Union.
Given the danger, our other four Five Eyes allies, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand, decided to remove Huawei from their 5G networks.
Strongly influenced by our Conservative friends, the House of Commons asked the government to remove Huawei from the Canadian 5G network, but the government continues to drag its feet. This is hurting our businesses, because many of them have chosen Huawei technology.
Our Conservative friends will therefore have to deal with an aspiring leader who is a close friend of Huawei. I look forward to seeing where they stand on this issue at the special committee on the Canada-People's Republic of China relationship.
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- May/12/22 12:09:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is plain and simple. The foreign affairs committee is seized with so many issues, and the relationship with China is so complex and multi-faceted, that we really do need another committee to study it. My friend referred to a couple of things, but when I think about the list, there is Huawei, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the Uighurs, Tibet, the recent pact with Russia, trade issues, espionage and human rights. There are just simply not the resources or time at the foreign affairs committee to deal with these.
Around the discussion of the timing of the committee, that is a reasonable question. Let us see how the debate unfolds.
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- May/12/22 12:23:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am looking at an article entitled “Chinese firm's Canadian contracts raise security fears: Barred by the U.S. and Australia, tech giant Huawei makes inroads in Canada”. It is dated from 2012. In that article, former prime minister Stephen Harper is touting the greatness of Huawei.
As the hon. member mentioned that Huawei's charter makes it subservient to the Communist Party of China, did that charter also exist in 2012?
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- May/12/22 12:24:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a sad state of affairs when my friend has to go back a decade to find any article that links our former government to Huawei.
I will say this. Huawei was here for a while and it has been trying to break into the Canadian and American systems. It had access to 3G technology and was supplying 3G technology to Canada, to the United States and to European nations. Everybody, at that point in time, 10 years ago, was hoping that the communist regime in Beijing was going to march forward into market-based economies that would respect human rights, democracy and civil liberties.
That is not the case today. We know a lot more, and we should be banning Huawei.
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- May/12/22 12:25:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my colleague criticized those benefiting from the Chinese government's largesse.
Jean Charest, a Conservative Party leadership candidate, is among those who have supposedly benefited from this regime. He allegedly was paid tens of thousands of dollars by Huawei, an appendage of the Communist regime.
I am relying on the knowledge of my colleague, who has been a member of the House longer than I have. Would the study of the contracts between Jean Charest and Huawei fall under the new committee being proposed by the Conservatives, or rather under the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, on which my colleague from Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman sits?
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- May/12/22 12:25:46 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, well, just to put it on the record, I am supporting the member for Carleton in this leadership race, and I do share some of the concerns that my friend from the Bloc just raised.
Let us go back, again, to the issue of Huawei. We now know that, within the Five Eyes relationship we have with the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand, all four of those countries have banned Huawei. Why is Canada still dancing around the issue?
The excuse used to be that we had to get the two Michaels out of detention in Beijing. Well, they are back in Canada, so why are we dancing around this issue when we should be banning Huawei from having any access to our 5G network?
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- May/12/22 12:39:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the relationship with China is very complex and the member has touched on a couple of those issues. We have a large trading relationship that is very beneficial to Canada. It is $20 billion, up from $3 billion in 1992. However, as the member mentioned, we have human rights concerns. We have Huawei and we have concerns about that, etc.
When it comes to looking at these issues and dealing with them, we know it is tulip season and the Tulip Festival here in Ottawa, but why are we tiptoeing through the tulips when it comes to China and not putting a committee together that is going to deal with it, ensuring we treat that relationship with the utmost professionalism that it needs?
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- May/12/22 4:29:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, throughout the debate today, I have heard a lot of conversation about Huawei, Canadian security and issues along those lines. One of the issues that we came across in the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates was the purchasing of scanners for our embassies. In particular, the company Nuctech is a Chinese company that has a connection with high-ranking officials in China.
We still need those scanners, and I would like to hear how the member feels. Might this be something the committee would also consider pursuing?
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- May/12/22 4:30:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the issue of Nuctech was discussed at certain points in the committee. More broadly, we see this trend where my party, and some members of Parliament in other parties as well, are aware of the significant risks that come with doing business with Chinese state-owned and state-affiliated companies: the risks to our security and also the risks to human rights.
Notwithstanding the fact that these issues are being discussed, there does not seem to be a sort of fulsome penetration of the recognition of this problem within all aspects of the bureaucracy, where there still are significant gaps in terms of procurement happening that raise major questions and concerns about national security and human rights. We have yet to hear a decision from the government on allowing Huawei into our 5G network. It has been years that we have been told the decision is coming. We need to have decisions on this, and we need to move forward in a way that reflects the recognition of the problem across all levels of government.
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