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Member of the Joint Interparliamentary Council

Michael Cooper

  • Member of Parliament
  • Member of the Joint Interparliamentary Council
  • Conservative
  • St. Albert—Edmonton
  • Alberta
  • Voting Attendance: 68%
  • Expenses Last Quarter: $119,185.60

  • Government Page
Context: House Hansard - 311 - May/8/24
Mr. Michael Cooper (St. Albert—Edmonton, CPC)
  • May/8/24 11:09:00 p.m.
  • Watch
Mr. Speaker, I rise to participate in the debate arising from your ruling earlier this evening of a prima facie breach of privilege involving 18 members in the House who were targeted by the Beijing-based Communist regime as part of a hacking operation, a progressive reconnaissance attack, due to their affiliation with the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, or IPAC. This attack occurred in early 2021, and for three years, these members were kept in the dark, which is completely unacceptable, so I welcome your ruling, Mr. Speaker, because here we go again one year later. One year ago, we were having a very similar debate in the House based upon the ruling of your predecessor, Mr. Speaker, of a prima facie breach of privilege concerning the member for Wellington—Halton Hills. That was referred to the procedure and House affairs committee through which a report was recently tabled in the House finding that indeed the privileges of the member for Wellington—Halton Hills were violated, and for the very same reason that those of the 18 members of Parliament who were subject to the matter of your ruling were, which is that the member for Wellington—Halton Hills was kept in the dark that he was being targeted by Beijing and that his family in Hong Kong was being targeted by the Beijing-based regime. This hacking attack did occur in 2021. It was reported by the U.S., by the FBI, to the Communications Security Establishment, to this government, in 2022. However, like the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, many of the 18 members first learned that they were being targeted by Beijing not through a briefing but through a report in The Globe and Mail. It raises serious questions as to why it is that this came to light because of The Globe and Mail reporting on it, and not based upon information from this government but from the U.S. government. Indeed it was an unsealed indictment of the justice department earlier this year that resulted in the IPAC secretariat becoming aware that members of IPAC were targeted, and not only Canadian members of Parliament but parliamentarians from around the world who were part of IPAC. That, in turn, led IPAC to ask questions of the Department of Justice in the U.S. as well as the FBI as to why members were not informed. The FBI, in effect, said that due to jurisdictional issues, it could not communicate directly to them and could not directly brief them, but it did, as soon as possible, provide that information to the Government of Canada, more specifically to the Communications Security Establishment. From there, that information went into a black hole, just as it did with respect to the targeting of the member for Wellington—Halton Hills. What is also disturbing is that, once again, the excuse being offered by the government is that it is not its fault; it is someone else's fault. When The Globe and Mail reported that the member for Wellington—Halton Hills was being targeted by the Beijing-based regime, the Prime Minister first claimed that he learned about it in The Globe and Mail. Then, he said that it was the fault of CSIS. He said to the media at the time, “CSIS made the determination that it wasn't...needed [to] be raised to a higher level because it wasn't a significant enough concern”. Then, it was revealed that what the Prime Minister said was not true, that the information had in fact been passed on to the Prime Minister's department, the PCO, to the Prime Minister's national security and intelligence adviser and that the information was not acted upon and was not shared with the member for Wellington—Halton Hills. Nothing was done. Again, the Prime Minister was very quick to blame someone else, to blame CSIS. The same is true of the Minister of Public Safety. It was learned at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, during the study we undertook on the question of privilege, that in fact CSIS had sent an IMU to the Minister of Public Safety, to the deputy minister of public safety and to the Minister of Public Safety's chief of staff, alerting them about the fact that the member for Wellington—Halton Hills and his family were being targeted by Beijing. When the Minister of Public Safety came to committee, he, just like the Prime Minister, said that it was not his fault, that it was the fault of CSIS and that somehow CSIS had made an operational decision not to inform him. He said that repeatedly and unequivocally. It was not a misstatement. Those were carefully selected words by the Minister of Public Safety that were patently not true. How could CSIS have made an operational decision not to inform the Minister of Public Safety when it sent to him an IMU, addressed to him, his deputy minister and his chief of staff? It is patently absurd. When the director of CSIS came before the procedure and House affairs committee, I asked him what the significance of an IMU was. He said that it was a matter of high importance. It was not just any memo that was sent, it was sent specifically to get the Minister of Public Safety's attention. Not only did the minister not act upon the intelligence concerning the member for Wellington—Halton Hills, not only does he bear responsibility, along with the Prime Minister and the government, for keeping that member in the dark, which led to a breach of that member's privilege, but also the minister may not have been entirely forthcoming with all the facts, in a desperate and pathetic effort to blame someone else. The Liberals and the Prime Minister are not responsible, and that is true. They are not a responsible government. However, when it comes to taking responsibility, it is always someone else's fault. Here we go again with another instance. This time, 18 members of Parliament were kept in the dark for two years. It was three years from the time of the attack, but two years from the time that the government was informed by the FBI. What is the excuse offered by the Liberals? It was a decision of House of Commons administration. Somehow it was the House of Commons administration's fault, not the government's fault. I say that is completely unacceptable in terms of an excuse for keeping members of Parliament in the dark about something as serious as a progressive attack against them. It was an attack that, yes, began at a low level, but it was an attack aimed at gathering information about them, information that could have impeded their ability to do their work as members of Parliament and that could have threatened their safety and security and that of those with whom they meet, including members of the diaspora communities that are targeted by the Beijing-based Communist regime. For the Liberals to simply pass the buck to the House of Commons administration on something like this is a complete abdication of responsibility. At the end of the day, the ultimate responsibility lies with the government and, in that regard, the government completely failed. I would submit that it was more than just a failure; for the Liberals, the information that had been passed on to them by the FBI was inconvenient. The Liberals did not want to pass the information on to members because it could have resulted in members' putting pressure on the Liberals to actually do something, to take action in response to the Beijing-based regime, which, I will remind members, the Prime Minister said was a dictatorship he admired. He admired its basic dictatorship. The Prime Minister extended his hand, time and again, to the Beijing-based regime and who turned a blind eye to Beijing's interference in our democracy because, as he saw it, it was benefiting the Liberal Party. Therefore we need to get to the bottom of what happened, who learned what, where the information went and why members were left in the dark. Why was it information from the U.S. Department of Justice, in an unsealed indictment, that led to IPAC's raising questions that in turn resulted in members of Parliament being informed in some cases by IPAC and in other instances through the report in The Globe and Mail? Let me observe it more broadly. When it comes to foreign interference, and specifically interference by the Beijing-based regime, which is the largest threat when it comes to interfering in Canada, targeting diaspora communities and interfering in our democracy and our sovereignty and impacting the safety of Canadians, the current government's record is an abysmal one. It simply cannot be trusted to stand up to the Beijing-based regime. The current government is a government that turned a blind eye to Beijing's interference in the 2019 and 2021 elections, notwithstanding the fact that the Prime Minister had been repeatedly briefed about that interference. He covered it up when Global News and The Globe and Mail first reported on it in the fall of 2022 and early 2023. He tried to downplay it. He is not able to downplay it now that the first report of Madam Justice Hogue was issued last week, which is a damning indictment on the Prime Minister in many respects. Under the government's watch, police stations have been operating in communities across Canada, targeting Chinese Canadians. At least two of those stations remain open. The government was actually funding some of the organizations that were operating the police stations. There was a major national security breach at the Winnipeg lab, Canada's highest-security lab, in which agents of the Beijing regime transferred sensitive materials to PRC institutions, including the transfer of two of the most deadly pathogens, Ebola and Henipah, at the direction of one of those scientists. That happened even after PHAC's fact-finding report indicated that the scientist had breached multiple security and intellectual property policies of PHAC and that the individual had collaborated with Beijing on an unauthorized basis. Nonetheless, under the government's watch, Henipah and Ebola were sent to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. At the Winnipeg lab, a military scientist had access to the lab, someone who was working with Beijing's foremost expert in bioterrorism and biodefence. The list goes on and on. It is pretty incredible. It is what happens after nine years under a Prime Minister who is not serious, does not take foreign interference seriously and does not take these threats seriously. The Prime Minister's chief of staff said at committee that the Prime Minister reads everything put on his desk and that he is frequently briefed. Then we learn, when the Prime Minister appears at the foreign interference inquiry, that he actually does not really read anything at all. We have a Prime Minister who, at best, is asleep at the switch and, at worst, has turned a blind eye, at times, and even been willing to go along with Beijing's interference if it benefits the electoral interests of the Liberal Party. In closing, the facts underlying this prima facie question of privilege that the Speaker has ruled on are a matter that should never have happened. The government can point blame at everyone else all it wants, but a directive was finally issued in 2023 to inform members of Parliament. It should not have taken until 2023, but it was issued then. Still no action was taken and the members were kept in the dark. Why were they not informed, at the very least, after that directive was issued? These are among the questions that need to be answered. There needs to be accountability for this very serious breach. I believe that it was not just a prima facie breach but that the privileges of those 18 members were violated.
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