Former Conservative Party leader Erin O'Toole speaks to the media on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, in 2021.BLAIR GABLE/Reuters
Former Conservative leader Erin O’Toole said Canada’s spy agency has told him he was the target of a misinformation and voter-suppression operation by the Chinese Communist Party – demonstrating what he called an “orchestrated campaign of foreign interference” leading up to and during the 2021 federal election.
Mr. O’Toole rose on a question of privilege in the House of Commons Tuesday to reveal what the Canadian Security Intelligence Service told him during a briefing this past Friday. He said he was limiting how much detail he would provide to ensure he was not revealing national-security secrets.
He said CSIS identified four categories of threats against him aimed at interfering with his job as leader of the Official Opposition and as the leader of the Conservative Party in the 2021 election. They range from Chinese funding of misinformation directed at him to an active campaign of voter suppression against himself and the Conservative Party.
Mr. O’Toole is asking Speaker Anthony Rota to rule on whether his “privileges as a member and officer of Parliament were infringed by the government’s unwillingness or inability to act on the intelligence related to foreign interference.”
“Canadians cannot rely upon the government, the executive branch, to discharge its role as defender of the realm,” he told MPs Tuesday.
“The problem does not lie with our proud, hard-working intelligence agencies. It lies in the willful blindness of senior figures in this government and in the senior offices that advise it.”
The Conservative MP, who is retiring from federal politics this summer, is one of three opposition MPs who has been told by CSIS that they were targets of China for their criticism of Beijing’s human-rights abuses.
Mr. O’Toole said the first category of threats CSIS identified was that the Chinese Communist Party, using Beijing’s United Front Work Department, paid funds to create “specific products of misinformation on me as a member of Parliament and leader of the Conservative Party of Canada.”
Canada’s Department of Public Safety, in a declassified briefing note from 2020, said China uses the United Front Work Department to “stifle criticism, infiltrate foreign political parties, diaspora communities, universities and multinational corporations.”
Mr. O’Toole said he was informed that the United Front Work Department, used by China for foreign-interference operations, also “organized and directed” groups of people working for, or aligned with the UFWD to “amplify misinformation efforts” against him.
The third category identified by CSIS involved WeChat, the Chinese-language, social-media platform used by many in Canada. Mr. O’Toole was told the platform was used “to “spread misinformation to undermine and discredit my work as a member of Parliament and leader of the Opposition.”
Lastly, he said CSIS told him that “intelligence indicated an active campaign of voter suppression against me, the Conservative Party of Canada and a candidate in one electoral district” during the 2021 general election.
“The numerous examples also demonstrate that there was an orchestrated campaign of foreign interference during the 43rd Parliament and into the 2021 general election,” Mr. O’Toole said.
“Each of these threats were intended to discredit me, promote false narratives about my policies and to severely obstruct my work as a member of Parliament and as the leader of the Opposition.”
He said CSIS warned him he remains a target of Chinese foreign interference. “In fact, CSIS advised me that I will remain a target of Beijing’s influence operations long after I leave this House this summer.”
The Conservative Party’s platform in the 2021 election included several policies that were critical of China, including the promise of a foreign-agents registry that would require individuals and companies acting as agents of foreign powers to register.
The Conservatives also pledged to withdraw from the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, ban Huawei from Canada’s 5G infrastructure and further investigate the company’s role in providing surveillance capabilities used against the Uyghur people and other persecuted minorities in China.
Mr. O’Toole raised the question of privilege as the House of Commons began debate on an NDP motion to ask former governor-general David Johnston to step aside as the government’s special rapporteur and set up a public commission of inquiry into foreign interference. A vote on the motion is expected later this week.
In early May Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ordered CSIS to start briefing MPs about any intelligence on threats to them or their families. His directive came after national-security leaks to The Globe and Mail about the effort to intimidate Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong and his family in Hong Kong. NDP MP Jenny Kwan revealed Monday she too has been warned by CSIS she is being targeted by Beijing.
In Question Period on Tuesday, Mr. Trudeau defended Mr. Johnston as leaders of the Conservatives, Bloc Québécois and NDP pressed for his removal as special rapporteur.
“David Johnston is an eminent Canadian who has served this government and this country for decades,” Mr. Trudeau said. “It is unfortunate that the opposition parties are choosing to play politics around this issue.”
Mr. Johnston was asked by Mr. Trudeau in March to lead an investigation into foreign meddling in the 2019 and 2021 elections. His report last week said such interference is an “increasing threat to our democratic system,” and China is “particularly active.” He concluded, however, that because intelligence about Beijing’s activities is highly classified, it could never be openly discussed with Canadians in a public inquiry.
Mr. Trudeau said he would abide by Mr. Johnston’s recommendation not to call a public inquiry.
On Tuesday Ms. Kwan criticized Mr. Johnston for saying it would have been easy for him to have called for a public inquiry.
The Vancouver MP said it would have been a harder decision to recommend an independent inquiry “because he would be saying point blank to the Prime Minister that the process he had chosen is categorically wrong.”
Ms. Kwan said Mr. Johnston does not have the confidence of the three main opposition parties in the minority Parliament. She noted he hired as chief counsel Toronto lawyer Sheila Block, who has only donated to the Liberal Party.
“That should surely have been flagged,” Ms. Kwan said, adding the opposition parties do not believe Mr. Johnston can be independent and non-partisan.
“The person who is looking at these [secret] documents has to be a person that everyone has trust in and I am sorry to say Mr. Johnston does not enjoy that trust,” she told MPs.
Mr. Johnston wrote an article in The Globe and Mail Saturday in which he said “I would not be dissuaded” from completing his work for the government on foreign interference. “I feel obligated to complete it to the highest possible standards,” he wrote.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre joined in the debate, criticizing the government’s lack of action to combat foreign interference despite warnings from CSIS that China had targeted the Conservative Party in the 2021 election.
“They interfered in two elections. In the most recent election, intelligence confirms that they wanted to see the Prime Minister win and defeat the Conservatives,” Mr. Poilievre said. “They did this by intimidating the Chinese diaspora – people who were otherwise going out to vote patriotically were told and indicated they had to stay home and avoid voting.”
Bloc Québécois MP Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe said Mr. Johnston can’t be taken seriously as a non-partisan special rapporteur because of his long friendship with the Trudeau family and the fact he served as a member of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation after he retired as governor-general.
Liberal MPs accused the opposition of smears against Mr. Johnston and noted he was appointed governor-general by former prime minister Stephen Harper.
“We have seen character assassination of an outstanding Canadian,” Liberal MP Kevin Lamoureux said.