A foreign interference report lobbed bombshells at Parliament. Now what?
Are parliamentarians and parties capable of investigating themselves?
If nothing else, this week's report from the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians offers an firm response to opposition politicians who have dismissed the relatively new body's ability to do valuable work.
When the Liberal government suggested that NSICOP should investigate the allegations of foreign interference contained in a series of media leaks last year, critics were thoroughly unimpressed. But the committee of MPs and senators has now delivered a highly critical report that scrutinizes the government's response to foreign interference — and also levels new allegations against parliamentarians.
It might be fair to ask whether NSICOP went too far in its reporting. Regardless, the special committee has sent the issue back to Parliament. And now the question is what, if anything, the federal government, law enforcement and parliamentarians themselves are going to do about the claims NSICOP has put on the public record.
Over 94 pages, the national security committee report walks readers through the threats posed by meddlesome foreign states, pokes at shortcomings in the government's response and recommends a number of legislative and governance changes that would put Canadian institutions in a better position to respond.
But the report also makes a series of claims about unnamed parliamentarians.
At paragraph 164, the committee says it has "seen troubling intelligence that some Parliamentarians are, in the words of the intelligence services, 'semi-witting or witting' participants in the efforts of foreign states to interfere in our politics." (Emphasis theirs.)
This participation allegedly includes: parliamentarians communicating frequently with foreign missions before or during a political campaign to obtain support from community groups or businesses; accepting knowingly or through willful blindness funds or benefits from foreign missions or their proxies; providing foreign diplomatic officials with privileged information on the work or opinions of fellow Parliamentarians; responding to the requests or direction of foreign officials to improperly influence parliamentary colleagues or parliamentary business; and providing information learned in confidence from the government to a known intelligence officer of a foreign state.
Separately, the report refers to "members of Parliament who worked to influence their colleagues on India's behalf and proactively provided confidential information to Indian officials." The committee also points to "a particularly concerning case of a then-member of Parliament maintaining a relationship with a foreign intelligence officer."
But NSICOP's report stops short of naming the parliamentarians at the centre of these allegations.
Sounding an alarm vs. sowing doubt
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Liberal MP David McGuinty, the chair of NSICOP, said the committee had disclosed everything it was able to and it's now up to law enforcement to decide whether further steps could or should be taken.
The committee's accusations against unnamed individuals are reminiscent of similar allegations made by Richard Fadden in 2010, when the former civil servant was the director of CSIS. In an interview with CBC News in June 2010, Fadden said CSIS believed there were several municipal and provincial politicians in Canada who were "under at least the general influence of a foreign government."
Politicians across the country criticized Fadden's comments and a House of Commons committee later demanded Fadden's resignation for "sowing doubt about the probity and integrity of a number of elected officials and creating a climate of suspicion and paranoia."
Fadden is entitled now to enjoy the irony. But it's also hard to see how the public safety committee's criticisms in 2011 couldn't be levelled at NSICOP in 2024.
By failing to name names, is NSICOP not sowing doubt about all 430 current MPs and senators? If they couldn't name the parliamentarians, would they have been better off not levelling these allegations?
With only NSICOP's report to work with, it's also impossible to know whether there's evidence to support the allegations. (In its response to the report, the Liberal government notably said it had "concerns " about NSICOP's "interpretation of intelligence reports, which lacked the necessary caveats inherent to intelligence.")
The members of NSICOP may have calculated that the need to raise the alarm outweighed the risk of casting doubt too widely. But now that the alarm has been sounded, what should happen next?
Can parliamentarians investigate themselves?
The NSICOP report acknowledges that while some of the alleged actions might be illegal, criminal prosecution might be difficult.
Passing the government's recently tabled foreign-interference legislation and pursuing other changes recommended by NSICOP might provide protection against future wrongdoing. But would that necessarily ensure clarity and accountability for the allegations outlined this week?
Will the major parties now pursue investigations of their own members?
In an appearance on CBC's Power & Politics this week, Fadden argued that Parliament should take it upon itself to pursue the allegations — the House of Commons and Senate are, after all, responsible for their own affairs and, as NSICOP noted, it's possible that some parliamentarians violated their oaths of office.
There's certainly logic to Fadden's argument. It only remains to be seen whether parliamentarians are interested in — or even capable of — investigating themselves seriously.
While Bloc Quebecois Leader Yves-François Blanchet and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh pursued NSICOP's allegations in question period on Tuesday, the Conservatives focused entirely on other matters. On Wednesday, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre used just one of his five questions to ask about foreign interference — he demanded that the government identify the MPs who "knowingly worked for foreign hostile governments."
In response, Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc said Poilievre should get the security clearance he needs to review an unredacted version of the NSICOP report — something Poilievre has resisted in the past. LeBlanc also accused Poilievre of casting "aspersions on the floor of the House of Commons without any information whatsoever."
But of course, those aspersions are already before the House.
Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong later stood and called NSICOP's allegations "shocking." But the Conservatives soon thereafter dropped the issue to pursue what they claim is a "carbon tax cover up."
Just a little over a year ago, David Johnston, the respected former governor general and much-maligned special rapporteur on foreign interference, released his report on the media leaks regarding meddling by the Chinese state in Canadian politics — the first of what are now four official reports on the issue.
Johnston worried aloud about the public's trust and faith in its democratic institutions. In not recommending a public inquiry, he argued that Parliament and parliamentarians should be able to confront and deal with the problem.
He may have been wrong about an inquiry, which proved to be quite useful. But a year later, the challenge of foreign interference has landed with a terrible crash in the laps of parliamentarians. What are they going to do about it?
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