voluble
So these are two different things right? Election interference is one thing, but MPs being compromised by a foreign government is another different thing.
They’re not always different. The Han Dong case is an example where they’re intertwined. We know for a fact that Han Dong’s nomination for Liberal candidate in the safe Liberal riding of Don Valley North was influenced by Chinese government pressure on Canadian citizens. It doesn’t properly fall into Elections Canada’s purview. The Liberals only ejected him from their party once it became publicly known that his candidacy was influenced by China. Somehow, he’s still a sitting MP.
I don’t think it should be left up to the leader of the party to make a call on what to do. Liberals w/ Han Dong (and possibly others, we don’t know), and Conservatives, with their leader not even being briefed. There needs to be some other system or mechanism to address foreign compromise that doesn’t rely on the whim of party leaders who have proven that they’ll choose to deal or not deal with interference issues depending on how it might benefit or harm their party.
If RCMP investigations get bound up, and information sealed away for instances of interference that ultimately don’t end up being criminal (like in Han Dong’s case), something should still be done to remove them from Parliament, or censure / warn them, as the circumstance dictates. It seems to me that the secrecy of active investigations functionally acts to shield foreign influence operations from being exposed and properly responded to.
I know what you mean when you say that the government shouldn’t be relied on to investigate itself. At the same time, I think they are the only body right now that can put effective mechanisms in place to deal with this issue. The fact that neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives are trustworthy enough to do this, is neither here nor there. Government should be doing something, and a responsible government that worked for the people would have started 7 years ago.
My hope is that the Election Interference Commission provides sound recommendations that are actionable before the next federal election. However, we’re in a situation where the next federal election could be any day now. This is all happening too late, and I can’t see how that’s anybody but the Liberals’ fault.
I agree. Poilievre’s choice to not be cleared, like many of his other choices and positions, is asinine and idiotic.
The Liberal talking point of, “if only Poilievre would get the clearance, we could get to work on fixing this” is also asinine.
It’s worth remembering that the CSIS-briefed, PM-known issue of election interference predates Poilievre by 5 years, and a span of 2 federal elections, one of which the Liberals enjoyed a majority government. The Liberals are being insincere when they throw their hands up and say there’s nothing they can do because Poilievre won’t do something he’s made clear he won’t do. Trudeau and the Liberals have been happy to sit on their hands on this issue, for years, and it has left parliament vulnerable to foreign influence. That’s uniquely Trudeau and the Liberals’ fault, and they ought to be taken to task for that. It’s a huge deal.
Dear downvoter in the thread: just testing something out here-
Parliamentarians who are wittingly working with foreign powers to interfere in Canadian politics, should be expelled from parliament.
Your thoughts?
I think a responsible government would be having an open conversation about it, getting consensus from the other parties, and doing something, rather than nothing. That conversation should have started 7 years ago, when the PM was first briefed on election interference. A responsible government wouldn’t have tried to minimize or bury the issue.
We’ve had two federal elections since the PM was first briefed on interference, and are about to have another without a clear plan for how to deal with compromised parliamentarians. As a citizen, I don’t find that acceptable.
The line that gets trotted out is that interference “didn’t change the outcome of the election” in 2019 and 2021. That is absolutely not a satisfactory threshold for action to be taken. Nobody is talking about how the threshold should be much, much lower. If the current government isn’t making an attempt at defining that threshold in an ethical and non-partisan way, that’s their failure.
To your question, I think egregious examples of foreign compromise should absolutely be criminalized, and handled by the judicial branch. But the legislative branch needs to be empowered to act swiftly to prevent compromised parliamentarians from operating in Ottawa unhindered.
It’s an unusual axe to choose to grind during testimony. Take it from two former CSIS directors:
Richard Fadden and Ward Elcock — two former CSIS directors — told CBC News’ Power & Politics on Wednesday that Trudeau probably shouldn’t have taken such a partisan turn in his testimony.
“He lapsed into really extreme partisanship when he made this accusation and he made it in terms that could not help but enrage the Conservative leader. So that was his objective. I think it worked,” Fadden told host David Cochrane.
“Did it advance the cause of national security? Did it advance the interest of the inquiry and the commissioners’ work? I’m not so sure.”
I seem to recall someone mentioning a while back that T&T or an asian grocer might have it. Failing a local brick & mortar option, try a science supply site. Agar is used for making media for petri dishes.
Also, with agar, a little does goes a long way.
The issue is that foreign interference isn’t properly encompassed by the legal system in Canada. The party in charge doesn’t seem to be bothered by this fact, and has done nothing to actively remedy it. They could be setting definitions, and standards for what counts as interference, determining where the bar for intelligence credibility should be set, etc. Instead, they’ve left the door open to interference, and made it clear that when it happens, nothing will be done about it.