SoVote

Decentralized Democracy

Member of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians

Stéphane Bergeron

  • Member of Parliament
  • Member of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians
  • Bloc Québécois
  • Montarville
  • Quebec
  • Voting Attendance: 59%
  • Expenses Last Quarter: $115,582.71

  • Government Page
Context: House Hansard - 200 - May/18/23
Mr. Stéphane Bergeron (Montarville, BQ)
Madam Speaker, you may have noticed that, as my hon. colleague from Mirabel will definitely appreciate, I am proudly wearing the traditional Ukrainian embroidered shirt known as the vyshyvanka today, on international Vyshyvanka Day. Of course, I am wearing it in support of the very courageous Ukrainian nation, which was invaded by Russia illegally and without justification. I am beginning my speech by talking about the vyshyvanka for a reason, as my remarks will show. I am pleased to speak to Bill C‑281. I think the motivations underlying the bill are really very noble. However, as the saying goes, “do not bite off more than you can chew”. This is a bill that has very different scopes and, as a result, it contains a number of flaws. We tried to fix these flaws through amendments at committee stage. Some of them were even introduced at report stage. In spite of these amendments, we still get the impression that this is like a patchwork quilt that—unlike those made by our valiant farm women in their farm women's groups—is not very pleasant to look at. Despite our efforts to try to correct these flaws, there are still a number of them in the bill. I want to say a few words about that. First, this bill is intended to increase government transparency, as it will have to report to the House on international human rights issues. For starters, we had a problem with the definition of prisoner of conscience, because the notion of a prisoner of conscience can involve a value judgment. What is a prisoner of conscience? We wrestled with a few definitions, one of which was proposed to us by Alex Neve, the former head of Amnesty International Canada. I think we came up with an arrangement that, on the whole, enabled us to correct the bill's vague initial concept of a prisoner of conscience. The focus is more on people who are victims of human rights violations under international law. We were able to rectify that little issue in the original wording of the bill. There was also a proposed amendment that was ruled out of order, but the committee nevertheless adopted it. We overruled the chair. What a surprise it was yesterday to see our colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, intervene to ask the chair to rule the amendment out of order, which the chair actually did. I will explain what was so surprising about the request by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons. This is the amendment in question: “The Minister must develop and maintain a government-wide international human rights strategy.” The deputy House leader rose in the House to ask that the amendment be withdrawn, even though it simply requires the minister to develop and maintain a government-wide international human rights strategy. This same government, which is currently making a bid for a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, asked for the following to be removed from the bill: “The Minister must develop and maintain a government-wide international human rights strategy.” I could not make this stuff up. The government claims it wants to become the best human rights advocate in the world, but at the first opportunity, it eliminates the minister's obligation to develop and maintain a government-wide international human rights strategy. I have to say that it is very astonishing. If not for the intervention from the government's parliamentary secretary, perhaps the Chair would have had the indulgence to allow this amendment. However, it was ruled out of order because of the magnificent intervention from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons. Another element of this bill concerns the fact that new sanctions will be imposed on corrupt foreign officials, in particular by requiring the Minister of Foreign Affairs to respond within 40 days to any committee report recommending sanctions against a foreign national under the Magnitsky Law. I have nothing particular to say about this provision. We can see that this bill is trying to cover a lot of bases, because another provision prohibits the issue, amendment or renewal of a licence in relation to a foreign propaganda broadcasting undertaking when the foreign country is recognized by the House of Commons or the Senate as having committed genocide or being subject to sanctions under either the Magnitsky Law or the Special Economic Measures Act. As far as the Magnitsky act is concerned, although the government got it passed, it has never enforced it in any way so far. I must say that this amendment to the act bothers the government a bit because it means that when a House or Senate committee or when the House or Senate identifies a state as having committed genocide, it would be binding on the government. Members will recall that the House nearly unanimously acknowledged the Uyghur genocide. The government is ignoring the democratic will of members elected by the people of Canada and Quebec; it is doing what it wants. This provision would make it so that from now on, the government would have to consider the opinions of the House and its committees or the Senate and its committees. I must say that caused much gnashing of teeth across the way. The last amendment, and this is another attempt to cover all the bases, is about prohibiting any investment in an entity that violates the Prohibiting Cluster Munitions Act. To be clear, Canada signed the international Convention on Cluster Munitions. Once again, as I was saying, one cannot be against motherhood and apple pie. In theory, therefore, everyone should agree with this provision, except that it has indirect consequences that are potentially harmful. For example, the Government of Canada plans to purchase a number of F‑35 aircraft from Lockheed Martin. Lockheed Martin makes cluster munitions, though. Is the Canadian government breaking its own law by doing business with a company that manufactures cluster munitions? We therefore came up with an amendment to correct that little legislative oversight as well as we were able. There is another one too, because the bill would also crack down on direct or indirect investments in companies that manufacture cluster munitions. We tried to introduce that amendment, but we were unable to do so in committee. The Chair ruled against the amendment I had proposed on the grounds that it should have been moved in committee, and that is true. However, we were unable to move it in committee because there was no consensus. That is why we moved it at report stage. Here is the problem. Any one of us, any of my fellow MPs, may hold investment funds that make us unwilling investors in companies that manufacture cluster munitions. In theory, we could all be held responsible for violating this provision that says that we cannot directly or indirectly invest in companies that manufacture cluster munitions. We tried to correct that, but were unable to do so, so if the bill were to be passed as it is currently worded, anyone here in the House could, along with our fellow citizens, find themselves to be in violation of the act. Despite the flaws I mentioned at the outset and discussed throughout my speech, we will have to vote in favour of this bill because—I am sorry to have to say this again—we cannot be against motherhood and apple pie. Still, we have to recognize that this bill has issues. Despite people's efforts during the committee's study and even during the debate at report stage, I believe we will have to conclude that, unfortunately, the bill's provisions are still flawed. We may eventually have to introduce another bill to fix it all.
1329 words
  • Hear!
  • Rabble!
  • star_border