QUESTION PERIOD — Foreign Affairs
Money Laundering
March 30, 2023
Government leader, let’s stay focused on the facts. You talk about all of the wonderful things this government has done with the economy. A few days ago in The New York Times, there was an article — written by our strongest friends and allies to the south — that gave a gold medal to Canada because the government has achieved some great things: We have become the world’s number one money-laundering nation in the world. Forty billion dollars per year is being laundered through Canada by criminal networks; oligarchs; terrorist organizations; and various other friends, families and agents of authoritarian regimes that are coming to influence our institutions and our nation. The new title for Canada, according to The New York Times, on March 25, is that we have become experts at “snow washing.”
Could you please answer me in simple English terms? What action, if any — I certainly haven’t seen any — has this government taken to mitigate this terrible activity that’s going on in our country?
Money laundering is a crime, and we have laws against those crimes. We have provincial police forces, the RCMP and the Attorneys General in all of the provinces to enforce those laws.
This is a serious issue that has been raised on a number of occasions in this chamber with regard to what specific steps might be taken outside of specific investigations of which, obviously, no comment can be, or should be, made. With regard to any further legislative measures, I will have to make inquiries.
This remains a serious problem in a number of different sectors, and this government, like all governments, is committed to addressing it.
You are absolutely right; it is a serious problem, government leader. The reality is that this government has done absolutely nothing, as I see from your answer.
All of these money-laundering operations are related to foreign interference. I have said it before, and I will say it again, this government has been completely ambivalent in addressing this particular serious issue.
In this chamber, we have Bill S-237 and Bill S-247 — calling for a foreign registry act. We’re calling to tighten up the Sergei Magnitsky law in order to go after friends and family who are doing this kind of money laundering on behalf of these regimes in our country, and your government has taken no mitigating action on this issue.
