(Ottawa) “False facts”, “puns”, “diametrically opposed to the truth”: Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre went into language acrobatics on Wednesday to avoid accusing Justin Trudeau of lying about the Chinese interference, which is prohibited in the House.
Splattered with new revelations about what he knew (or didn’t know) about Chinese interference in the 2019 and 2021 elections, the Prime Minister had a bad time, coming under heavy fire from the political parties. ‘opposition.
He had a taste of the questions he would be asked when he stopped by the parliamentary reporters ahead of his weekly caucus meeting on Wednesday.
Rather than answering it, he dodged each time, taking refuge behind the measures he unveiled on Monday evening, including that of appointing an “independent special rapporteur” responsible for advising him on the relevance of opening a public inquiry.
But he was asked for specific details about the revelations in a new Global News report about Beijing’s interference in the last two federal elections, in which the Liberals picked up minority victories.
According to what the English-speaking network reports, the Prime Minister had been informed of China’s intentions to favor candidates. This time, the allegations come from reports from the Privy Council Office and the secret National Security Committee.
It is to this group of deputies and senators, the Committee of Parliamentarians on National Security and Intelligence, that Justin Trudeau relies to conduct investigations into matters of foreign interference.
Their report quoted by Global News says that “an interlocutor from the embassy [chinoise] founded a group of community leaders called the ‘tea party’ to select candidates they would support and ultimately publicly endorse.
It also specifies that a former Chinese consul informed Beijing-linked companies “of the rules regarding political contributions” and “urged certain business leaders to make donations through Canadian subsidiaries and acquisitions”. .
The copy that Global News says it viewed had not been redacted.
Opposition parties keep up the pressure
Conservatives, Bloc Québécois and New Democrats continue to insist that the way forward is that of a public and independent inquiry. On Monday, by unveiling a trio of announcements that in no way satisfied the opposition parties, Justin Trudeau argued that acquiescing would have been the “politically easy” solution.
“If I had announced a public inquiry […]as soon as we reach a point where I have to say: “Oh no, but we can’t give you these documents and those documents”, the independence of this process, [son] efficiency as well as [son] impact would have been undermined,” he argued.
Meanwhile, the discord continues at the Commons committee which is looking into Chinese interference.
Tired of seeing the opposition return to the charge with a motion calling for the appearance of Katie Telford, the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, the Liberals chose not to show up when the committee’s work was scheduled to resume, after question period on Tuesday afternoon.
Their absence meant that the quota was not met for the meeting to be held, so it is still officially considered “suspended”. The behavior of the Liberals was castigated by elected officials from all parties who sit on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.