John Ivison: MPs suspected of foreign influence deserve justice, but not frontier justice   (2024)

It’s a rare thing when political debate in this country changes anyone’s mind. Speeches are not meant to be persuasive; they are delivered to confirm the prejudices of partisans.

Yet, at the parliamentary public safety committee on Thursday, Dominic LeBlanc made a convincing case for not releasing the names of MPs and senators who were named in the redacted National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP) report released earlier this week.

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The report said that a number of unnamed “semi-witting or witting” MPs and senators helped foreign states to the detriment of Canada’s democracy and national security.

At committee, Conservative MP Frank Caputo said the government’s decision not to release the names left a “cloud of suspicion” over all MPs. He asked the public safety minister whether he believes Canadians have a right to know whether their MP is under the influence of a hostile state when they go to vote next time.

LeBlanc said it is important for Canadians to know that the names contained in intelligence reports are often based on uncorroborated information. “The idea that there is a perfect list of names that is entirely reliable and that should be released to the public is simply irresponsible,” he said. “Should the RCMP decide that charges should be laid — that’s our system, the rule of law.”

LeBlanc’s point is politically convenient for the Liberals, but it is also in keeping with due process in this country.

Having made it, the minister could probably have done without his sophom*oric colleague Jennifer O’Connell hollering “Boo, hoo, get over it” at Caputo (at least that was the allegation levelled by Conservatives on the committee. Her comments were partially audible, but muffled).

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But the minister is correct. If the names were released, those identified would be ruined, possibly without the appropriate level of proof.

Having followed the British Post Office miscarriage-of-justice scandal, where more than 900 sub-postmasters were prosecuted for stealing because of incorrect information from a faulty computer system, I am obliged to reconsider the opposition’s call for frontier justice.

This is not Tombstone, Ariz. from the Wild West where an old gravestone concedes that one George Johnson was hanged by mistake: “He was right/ We was wrong/ But we strung him up and now he’s gone.”

At the same time, the Liberal government has long displayed an ambivalence bordering on disinterest for getting to the bottom of the foreign interference issue.

LeBlanc’s call to let the RCMP be the sole arbiters of consequences is sure to bury the file for years to come, allowing the guilty men and women to continue to sit in Parliament.

The Mounties confirmed in a statement there are investigations into a broad range of foreign interference in Canada, “including matters that intersect with democratic institutions.”

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But it recognized “challenges” in using intelligence as evidence in criminal investigations. The NSICOP report said charges are unlikely because of the need to protect classified information during the judicial process.

A third option was suggested by Norman Spector, who served as chief of staff to prime minister Brian Mulroney and held several other senior government roles. He said the prime minister could share the names of MPs and senators suspected of collaborating with foreign countries with other party leaders, allowing them to remove any miscreants from their caucuses before Parliament returns in the fall. Although, this wouldn’t work for any of the 83 senators unaffiliated with a party caucus.

“Opposition parties would be fools to allow the government to send the issue into the dark hole of the RCMP,” Spector said.

His suggestion of course would also require party leaders to recognize there is a problem — a perception the Liberal leader does not appear to share.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has, presumably, more information at his fingertips than anyone, yet when he was grilled at the Hogue foreign interference commission, he said he didn’t feel there was sufficient or “sufficiently credible” information to justify removing any candidates, including Don Valley North MP Han Dong.

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The NSICOP report confirmed much of the media reporting on Dong, saying the Chinese consulate arranged for 175 to 200 international students to arrive at the Liberal nomination meeting and told them to vote for Dong if they wanted to maintain their student visas.

It was Trudeau who ordered the redactions to the NSICOP report, on the basis that they could be “injurious to national security, national defence or international relations.”

After downplaying this story for 18 months, the suspicion must be that the bigger fear is that being more transparent would be injurious to the prime minister’s re-election prospects.

The breakdown in relations between the Liberals and Canadian Security Intelligence Service was explained to me by one former senior adviser, who said the security services are considered “embarrassing” by his ex-colleagues in the government. “Their advice is often mediocre — I’m not surprised people didn’t listen,” he said.

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But the intelligence leaks to the media, and their subsequent corroboration by NSICOP, suggest CSIS was right and the Liberals were wrong.

Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland has committed to an “internal follow-up” on the NSICOP revelations, but that sounds a bit Yes Minister, as per Sir Humphrey’s contention that government security inquiries are only used to kill press stories. “They enable the prime minister to stand up in the House to say: ‘We held a full inquiry and there was no evidence to substantiate these charges’.”

Yet, if the opposition leaders were to take action and quietly remove from caucus any parliamentarians suspected of working against the interests of Canada, pending evidence that clears them, it would put pressure on the Liberals to follow suit.

The Conservatives have already said that they would “take appropriate action” if names were provided, while Bloc Québécois leader Yves-François Blanchet said that if it was clear a Bloc MP was involved in helping a foreign state “he would not remain part of the caucus.”

No wonder, given those MPs may have accepted political support or funding from foreign powers or their proxies.

It is absurd that a party dedicated to breaking up the country appears more loyal to the Crown on this issue than Canada’s “natural governing party”.

But, boo-hoo, we should probably all get over it.

jivison@criffel.ca

Twitter.com/Ivison

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