While some MPs may have lacked judgment or acted unwisely, none of them have betrayed Canada, the prime minister’s national security adviser told the inquiry into foreign interference Wednesday.
Nathalie Drouin told the inquiry that the special report of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians in Canada (NSICOP) on foreign interference, made public in June, left her uncomfortable. The committee’s report found that some parliamentarians (it didn’t name them) had wittingly or unwittingly participated in foreign interference.
“That is not what I see,” she told the inquiry Wednesday. “As I said earlier, I have seen inappropriate conduct, I have seen lack of judgment, I have seen individuals who I would perhaps have less confidence in, but I have not seen any MP in our Parliament who spied, sabotaged, who really put the security of Canada at risk.
“I remain extremely confident in the current members of Parliament and to give another impression is to equip foreign countries in their quest to reduce the confidence Canadians have in our democratic system.”
Drouin said the intelligence indicates complacency on the part of some people who had connections they shouldn’t have had, and suggests some people boasted that they could share information they didn’t have.
“The information that NSICOP used does not allow me to arrive at the conclusion that there are traitors in Parliament,” she said.
In response to a question from Justice Marie-Josée Hogue, who is leading the inquiry, Drouin said she has access to the same information that the committee had, as well as subsequent updates.
Drouin praised the work of NSICOP but said its report focused on parliamentarians, while the focus should be on foreign actors.
The inquiry was set up following media reports which accused China of interfering in the 2019 and 2021 federal elections.
In her initial report, made public in May, Hogue found that while it was possible that foreign interference occurred in a small number of ridings, she concluded it did not affect the overall election results.
More later …