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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 147

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 13, 2022 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 147 - Dec/13/22
Mr. Garnett Genuis
  • Dec/13/22 10:27:15 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have observed over the last few years that the last two Canadian minority Parliaments have been able to play a significant leadership role in the world, when it comes to confronting human rights abuses being perpetrated by the Chinese Communist Party. While Canada's Parliament has led in the world, though, the Government of Canada has been a laggard. Canada's Parliament was the first to recognize the Uighur genocide. The Government of Canada has still not recognized the Uighur genocide. Canada's Parliament has passed various motions calling for action on foreign state-backed interference. We continue to hear news about government entities signing contracts that raise significant concerns from a national security perspective, because they involve Chinese state owned or affiliated companies. We have this interesting contradiction that I think people around the world are observing, which is leadership by a minority Parliament. It is often driven by the opposition, but often includes certain backbench members of the governing party, which is out of step with the unwillingness of the executive to be realistic about the threats posed by the Chinese Communist Party. Hopefully action by parliamentarians will continue to prod the government to do better.
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Context: House Hansard - 147 - Dec/13/22
Mr. Denis Trudel (Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, BQ)
  • Dec/13/22 10:31:45 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, last spring, I had the opportunity to meet with Mr. Grandi, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, when he was in Ottawa. Since I was sitting on the Subcommittee on International Human Rights of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, a few MPs and I were able to talk to him for an hour. He raised a very important point. We are talking about human rights. He agreed that we were focusing narrowly on the war in Ukraine when there are numerous crises going on in the world. For example, there are crises in Tigray, Ethiopia, as well as in Haiti and Yemen. There is also a crisis in Tibet, which we are currently discussing, and, obviously, the Uighur genocide. That was a problem, in his opinion. Generally speaking, when its interests are at stake, the west raises concerns about human rights to intervene in certain crises, when there are many more crises elsewhere in the world. What does my colleague have to say about western countries’ tendency to react only when their interests are at stake by raising concerns about human rights when that is not really what they are talking about?
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