(OTTAWA) A Commons committee is expected to decide on Tuesday whether or not to expand its review of foreign election interference, to include more details on the recent 2021 election.
The daily Globe and Mail wrote last week that China would have maneuvered in the last federal election to defeat Conservative candidates considered hostile to Beijing, and to help re-elect a minority Liberal government in Canada.
The procedure and House affairs committee is meeting Tuesday afternoon at the request of six of its opposition members.
In a letter to the committee’s Liberal chair, Conservative, New Democrat and Bloc MPs said they wanted to discuss the “troubling revelations” of the Globe and Mailwhich are attributed to secret files of the Canadian spy services.
In their letter, the MPs say the committee should address these troubling reports of Beijing’s interference in Canadian democracy, and consider how it can broaden the scope of its current review of the issue.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau argued last week that Canadian voters were the sole masters of the outcome of the last ballot, downplaying the suggestion that China tried to improperly influence the outcome of the election.
The Commons committee has been studying foreign interference in the previous federal election since last November, in 2019. Committee members have previously interviewed witnesses from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and Elections Canada.