THE WEST BLOCK
Episode 24, Season 10
Sunday, March 7, 2021
Host: Mercedes Stephenson
Guests:
Jagmeet Singh, NDP Leader
MPs Panel:
Karen McCrimmon, Kanata—Carleton, Ottawa
Leona Alleslev, Conservative Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill
Randall Garrison, NDP Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, Colwood, BC
Mehmet Tohti, Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project, Ottawa
Location: Ottawa, Ontario
Mercedes Stephenson: This week on The West Block: Who knew what, when, about the allegations against former chief of the defence staff General Jonathan Vance?
Gary Walbourne, Former Military Ombudsman: “The only thing I ever wanted the minister to do was his job.”
Mercedes Stephenson: Explosive testimony about Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan.
Harjit Sajjan, Minister of Defence: “Any allegations for any information that were brought forward, was always quickly and then taken to the appropriate authorities.”
Mercedes Stephenson: And what did the Prime Minister’s Office know?
Cong Peiwu, Chinese Ambassador to Canada: “Allegations of genocide and forced labour in Xinjiang are the lies of the century.”
Mercedes Stephenson: The Chinese ambassador calls it a lie, but we’ll speak to a member of Canada’s Uyghur community about what’s really going on in China.
Mercedes Stephenson: Hello, and welcome to The West Block. I’m Mercedes Stephenson.
Questions continue to swirl about the allegations of sexual misconduct in the military and what the government is doing to fix the problem.
Last Friday, the prime minister was asked if the government should set up an independent office of an inspector general to investigate these kinds of complaints.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: “The minister has committed to moving forward on establishing a more independent external process to move forward, so that we can truly demonstrate our commitment to everyone who chooses to serve Canada and that they will be supported and protected in issues like this.”
Mercedes Stephenson: Joining me now to discuss whether there should be a public inquiry and if the opposition still has confidence in the minister of national defence, leader of the NDP Jagmeet Singh. Thank you so much for joining us, Mr. Singh.
I’ll start by asking you, after what you heard this past week at the committee. Do you have confidence in Harjit Sajjan as the minister of national defence?
Jagmeet Singh, NDP Leader: I have serious concerns, and this doesn’t stop at the minister. This goes all the way to Justin Trudeau. What we’re seeing is really an erosion of the trust that Canadians have, but particularly that the Armed Forces, the people that serve our country have, they need to be safe. They need to know that decisions are made so that they are kept safe and that they can bring forward concerns. All of these things are in question. And finally, there seems to be a pattern here, where the Liberal government, as a whole, continues to make bad decisions with respect to vetting. Whether it’s the governor general, when there were clear allegations of improper conduct in the past with staff in terms of harassment, and then the allegations and how long they continued for at Rideau Hall. Now with the military and this Liberal government’s inability to vet out a problem and respond to problems, both of those are deep concerns.
Mercedes Stephenson: Do you think that Minister Sajjan should have looked at the evidence that Gary Walbourne says he was trying to hand him? If you were the prime minister and this was your minister of defence, what would your expectation be?
Jagmeet Singh, NDP Leader: That there is follow-up. There’s no way something as astounding and as serious as that—that testimony was just shocking—that evidence was brought forward and presented and there seemed to be an unwillingness to do anything with it. So far, from what we know, it looks like there was this case of the hot potato. No one wanted to look at the evidence when that’s what everyone should be doing: trying to get to the bottom of this, making sure that people are safe, making sure allegations are pursued or investigated. That is the job to hold the safety of the people who serve to the highest importance and make sure any allegations are investigated and taken seriously. That does not look like either the Prime Minister Justin Trudeau or the defence minister did that.
Mercedes Stephenson: Now the Liberals say that they passed this on to the appropriate authorities, Privy Council Office, to investigate. They didn’t do anything with it. They said they couldn’t find any evidence to look into it. Do you think that somebody should have told the prime minister?
Jagmeet Singh, NDP Leader: Absolutely. At the end of the day, the prime minister’s responsible to make sure the leadership ends with him, in this case, and Justin Trudeau should have gotten to the bottom of this. These allegations should have been pursued. There seems to be massive breakdown here, but there’s no way the ombudsman bringing forward really clear testimony that there as evidence that was raised and there was nothing done. There has been a series of failures here, but really at the end of the day, the responsibility lies at the top. Justin Trudeau needs to make sure any of these allegations are being followed up, that there are the right mechanisms in place. I don’t accept that it stops with the minister; it goes right to the top. And Justin Trudeau has to be responsible for making sure any allegation of harassment is followed up on, people are kept safe and that people feel comfortable bringing forward their concerns.
Mercedes Stephenson: Big news for the government two weeks in a row on getting AstraZeneca approved and then the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. More vaccines coming after that initially stalled rollout. You had said that your party would not go to an election during a pandemic. What are you thinking in terms of election timing here? Does the influx of vaccines change your willingness on calling a spring election?
Jagmeet Singh, NDP Leader: My focus remains the same; I want to see everyone in our country vaccinated. That has to be the priority. People are worried; they’ve been in a lockdown and in a pandemic for so long now. We’re over a year and people want to know that there’s a way out. And that light at the end of the tunnel is the vaccine and that’s our focus. It has to be getting everyone vaccinated. I don’t believe it’s the right thing for Justin Trudeau to be angling for or strategizing around an election. The soul focus we have to be giving all of our attention to is getting everyone vaccinated and that’s what I’m going to focus on. I’ve made the commitment while we’re fighting this pandemic. Our goal will be to get everyone vaccinated, not to try to find a way to go to an election. I hope Justin Trudeau does the same and focuses on getting everyone vaccinated first.
Mercedes Stephenson: Jagmeet Singh, NDP leader. Thank you very much for joining us today, sir.
Jagmeet Singh, NDP Leader: Thank you very much, it was my pleasure. Thank you.
Mercedes Stephenson: Up next, explosive testimony, contradictions and questions left unanswered: key members of the defence committee on their probe into sexual misconducted in the Armed Forces.
Gary Walbourne, Former Military Ombudsman: “I reached into my pocket to show him the evidence I was holding and he pushed back from the table and said, ‘No’ and I don’t think we exchanged another word. I did offer to shake his hand at the end of the meeting and he said, ‘Please, do get back to me with some advice to tell me what I should do with it.’”
Mercedes Stephenson: That was former military ombudsman Gary Walbourne when he says he tried to hand the Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan, proof of the allegations of alleged sexual misconduct by then chief of the defence staff General Jonathan Vance.
Members of the Defence Committee are now calling to expand their probe into the alleged sexual misconduct in the Armed Forces. Today, I’m joined by members of that committee: NDP MP Randall Garrison; Conservative MP Leona Alleslev, who served in the Armed Forces; and 31 year military veteran Liberal MP Karen McCrimmon.
Thank you all for joining us today. Karen, I’d like to start with you. You’re here representing the government on the show today. We’re hearing from the former ombudsman that the minister physically pushed himself back from the table, put his hands up and said no when he tried to hand him evidence of alleged sexual misconduct against General Vance. The minister appears not to have told the prime minister. The minister has said he disagrees with elements of Mr. Walbourne’s testimony but he hasn’t said what. I think a lot of folks at this—are looking at this and they’re wondering, you know, is the standard that we should expect from a minister of the Crown to refuse to look at evidence, to not call the prime minister, to not take any action personally?
Karen McCrimmon, Kanata—Carleton, Ottawa: Well I think that’s an incorrect assessment of the situation. I think the minister did take action. And you can tell that he did because even the ombudsman said that the PCO, the Privy Council Office, called him the very next day. And then yes, two days later, one of the minister’s staff called him again to make sure that he was in contact with the PCO. It’s the right—it was the right thing to do. Now the—the ombudsman brought a confidential and unactionable issue to the minister, and the minister said I shouldn’t be seeing this. This is not who—you should not be talking to me. You should be talking to the Sexual Misconduct Response Centre or you should be talking to the provost marshal. But he did ask the PCO to go and look into it and see what was behind these—this information that the ombudsman wanted to get him, because you know the minister can’t do things without solid evidence. Just think about it…
Mercedes Stephenson: Well but he didn’t even look at the evidence, so how would he have known whether or not it was solid?
Karen McCrimmon, Kanata—Carleton, Ottawa: He sent it to the PCO and said to the PCO, you go and do—look at it, this evidence. Tell me if it’s what—if there’s something here I can do. But the Privy Council Office, which is an independent, non-political, outside the chain of command organization who do this all the time. It’s their job to do this for governor and council appointments. They looked at it and said I’m sorry, there’s nothing here that’s actionable. So—but the minister didn’t just drop it. He followed up and had his staff follow up to make sure that the PCO was engaged on the file.
Mercedes Stephenson: Leona, the PCO is the investigating authority for governor and council appointments of which the CDS is one. Why is it that your party feels the minister didn’t do enough if he did report it to the PCO?
Leona Alleslev, Conservative Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill: Well in this case, it’s actually very different because the chief of the defence staff, under the National Defence Act, has a very different accountability. He is directly reporting to the minister of national defence. The minister of national defence absolutely has the responsibility, the authority and the duty to take action. He doesn’t need actionable evidence. Simply by virtue of being the minister of national defence, he can take action, investigate and that is exactly what he should have done. It’s his sworn oath to do so and he chose to turn a blind eye.
Mercedes Stephenson: Randall?
Randall Garrison, NDP Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, Colwood, BC: Well let’s look at this from the point of view of those who have complaints to make. And what’s clear is that there was no effective action. So it’s a little bit tiresome to hear people say oh, you knocked on the wrong door, you used the wrong channels. The minister of defence clearly is the person the chief of defence staff reports to. And if we’re going to have any confidence that we’ll ever deal with the problem of sexual misconduct in the military, people serving have to have confidence that at the highest levels, people understand the problem and take it seriously. Unfortunately, with the recent allegations we’ve had against two chiefs of the defence staff, we’ve got a lot of work to do to restore that confidence.
Mercedes Stephenson: Karen, the Prime Minister’s Office, The Globe and Mail is reporting, was in fact told about these allegations. Privy Council Office was, Minister Sajjan knew. When the decision was made to extend Jon Vance’s term, to make him the longest serving chief of the defence staff, an unusually long time, should somebody have raised this with the prime minister at that time? Not necessarily an investigation but just said hey, you should know an allegation was made.
Karen McCrimmon, Kanata—Carleton, Ottawa: The Privy Council Office knows how to deal with these things. That’s what we hired them for. They’re used to dealing with very sensitive information. But you cannot, as a senior officer, go off and start doing things and ordering investigations. Like I—as a squadron commander, I knew I had the power to call a summary investigation, but I also knew that that power was limited and I couldn’t use it for a code of service discipline and I couldn’t use it for a criminal matter. But then I think it’s the same goes with the further up the chain you go. So he used the mechanisms that were available to him and that was descended to the PCO for them to do an investigation. They did an invest—they looked into the matter and they said there’s nothing here that we can use.
Mercedes Stephenson: And we don’t really know how they determined that because we have asked them. And they won’t answer us on how that decision was made, what policies they used, what they determined. It’s kind of a black hole right now, but Leona, I know the committee that all three of you sit on are looking into this. You’re meeting tomorrow. You want to see this probe expanded. Who else do you want to call? Are you going call Jon Vance? Are you going to call minister—members of the prime minister’s staff? Who else is it that you feel you need to hear from at this point?
Leona Alleslev, Conservative Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill: Well that certainly is the decision of the committee, but we believe that the investigation needs to be much broader. It needs to be much more thorough. We have a responsibility not only to service members but to Canadians, to ensure that the honour and integrity of the Canadian Forces, and the values for which it and Canada stands, are protected. Our job, as parliamentarians, is to ensure that we do the best to make sure that that happens. So yes, we need to hear from anyone that was involved but most importantly, we need to understand why the minister chose not to act and if this in fact, is the prime minister’s standard to which he holds ministers. It was the authority and the responsibility of the minister, the buck stops with him. He chose to turn a blind eye, leaving men and women in uniform in doubt as to whether or not we can achieve a harassment-free workplace and whether or not those who were complicit and have allegations against them will be held accountable.
Mercedes Stephenson: Randall, who is it you think the committee needs to hear from to get to the bottom of this?
Randll Garrison, NDP Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, Colwood, BC: Well I think, you know, officially we’re done with this study, so the committee has to expand the study for two reasons. One, we now have the current chief of defence staff, who has been suspended while under investigation. So I’d like the minister to come back and tell me why this didn’t happen in 2018. It looks like a similar circumstance, unfortunately. And then, of course, the minister sat in front of us and told us that he was as surprised as anyone to learn of allegations in 2021, when it’s now very clear after the testimony of the military ombudsman that he knew about allegations in 2018. So I think the minister has a responsibility to come back and explain the discrepancy between his previous testimony and that of the military ombudsman.
Mercedes Stephenson: Karen, do you think that the minister needs to come back so he can explain? I mean he said he disagrees with elements of the testimony but we don’t know what those are.
Karen McCrimmon, Kanata—Carleton, Ottawa: Like there’s no trouble. I don’t think there’s any trouble with having the minister come back, to tell you the truth. And I just need to correct a statement. The current CDS was not suspended, he stepped aside voluntarily. So there was some—obviously some evidence or something that was actionable that made him decide to step aside voluntarily. So but it’s all about making sure the process is right. And if you look at the testimony we’ve had at the last two weeks in the committee, we have had brilliant ideas about how we go about fixing this for the people of the Canadian Forces.
Mercedes Stephenson: I think there’s still a lot of questions in accountability in all this and there’s questions, as you raised, Karen, for women who are coming forward now and we’re hearing from them, who are prepared that they want to know there is going to be a mechanism in place, a system in place that they can trust will not see them punished for coming forward and that will actually be independently investigated. Lots more to talk about here. It’s all the time we have for today, so thank you very much to our three MPs from the National Defence Committee, for joining us.
Up next, the Chinese ambassador calls it the ‘lie of the century.” But we’ll speak to a member of Canada’s Uyghur community about alleged human rights abuses in China.
Mercedes Stephenson: Welcome back. Last week the Chinese ambassador to Canada held a rare press conference, where he flatly denied evidence of human rights abuses occurring in Xinxiang province in China.
Cong Peiwu, Chinese Ambassador to Canada: “Allegations of genocide and forced labour in Xinxiang are the lies of the century.”
Mercedes Stephenson: This is contrary to what human rights groups and journalists have reported is happening. And Prime Minister Justin Trudeau warned about possible consequences from the international community over China’s treatment of the Uyghurs, although his cabinet abstained from the vote in which the Canadian Parliament proclaimed it to be a genocide.
Joining me now is the executive director of the Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project, Mehmet Tohti. Thank you so much for taking the time to join us, Mehmet. I know that your family has a personal connection to this. Can you tell us what your reaction was when you heard the ambassador’s comments, when he called the allegations of human rights abuse is the ‘lie of the century’?
Mercedes Stephenson: Well and when you were preparing to speak about this publicly, you received a direct message on Twitter about your mother. Tell me what that said.
Mercedes Stephenson: What would you like to see Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his government do?
And the second message to our prime minister, is Canadian market is full of Uyghur forced labour tainted products from cotton to tomato to solar panels. And for example, just cotton, the one third of global supply of cotton products coming out of the area. And one third almost, ketchup or tomato-related products are coming out of the area. Almost 43 per cent of global supply of poly silicone that is being used for solar panels are coming out of the area. These are the huge numbers. And unfortunately, our market is tainted with Uyghur forced labour products and so we—this is our moral obligation and we don’t have any piece of legislation to address that, and our government and the Parliament should step up to introduce legislation and stop—clean up our market because otherwise as Canadians, we are indirectly without knowing or directly by knowing now, contributing a Chinese crime of genocide and the crime against humanity by purchasing those products and sending our pocket money to China. This is unacceptable.
Mercedes Stephenson: Thank you for joining us and our thoughts are with you and with your family.
Mehmet Tohti, Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project, Ottawa: Thank you.
Mercedes Stephenson: That’s all the time we have for today. For The West Block, I’m Mercedes Stephenson. I’ll see you back here, next Sunday.
Comments