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Decentralized Democracy

Member of the panel of chairs for the legislative committees

Hon. Michael Chong

  • Member of Parliament
  • Member of the panel of chairs for the legislative committees
  • Conservative
  • Wellington—Halton Hills
  • Ontario
  • Voting Attendance: 65%
  • Expenses Last Quarter: $120,269.09

  • Government Page
Context: House Hansard - 170 - Mar/21/23
Hon. Michael Chong
  • Mar/21/23 12:56:50 p.m.
  • Watch
Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for her question. I believe that the government needs to provide us with more information. I believe that is a problem here in Ottawa. We could even say that this place is information-free compared to the capitals of other G7 countries. It is a huge problem with the lack of transparency and information. It is very difficult to find out from the government whether or not shipments have been interdicted and blocked. We often have to get that information through access to information requests or other investigative techniques, rather than the government being transparent about what is going on by default. That adds to the problem. People are generally not aware that we are not upholding our treaty obligations. We are not upholding the rules-based international order when it comes to preventing imports using forced Uighur labour. Part of that problem is the lack of transparency from the government about what exactly is going to be interdicted at the border. We do know one thing, which is that no shipment has been blocked from Xinjiang that has been produced using forced Uighur labour.
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Context: House Hansard - 36 - Feb/21/22
Hon. Michael Chong
  • Feb/21/22 4:06:19 p.m.
  • Watch
Madam Speaker, the issue here is not a lack of laws to effectively deal with the situation either here in Ottawa or previously at the four border crossings; it is a lack of law enforcement. As the former commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police said yesterday, the power to make arrests, seize and tow vehicles, cordon off the city, put up checkpoints and get thousands of additional officers in to assist the Ottawa police already exists in the existing laws of Canada. In fact, he said that it is used practically every Canada Day in this city. It is used practically every Remembrance Day. Clearly the emergency powers were not required for the clearing of the blockades at the four border crossings, because in some cases they were cleared prior to the invocation of the public order emergency and in some cases before the orders had really taken effect.
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