Conservative MP Michael Chong says the Prime Minister is the only person in the country who doesn’t have to obtain a national security clearance to see classified information because he is leader of the government, giving him the right to reveal classified intelligence.Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau suggested Wednesday that Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre must have something to hide by refusing to obtain a national security clearance to learn the names of Conservative parliamentarians and party members engaged in or susceptible to foreign interference by unnamed hostile powers.
But the Conservative Leader accused the Prime Minister of trying to gag him, and the party’s foreign affairs critic, Michael Chong, urged the Liberal government to table the names of all compromised MPs in every party in the House of Commons.
“The Prime Minister is playing politics with national security,” Mr. Chong said in an interview. “It suggests he has something to hide because he is not willing to release all the names.”
In last week’s testimony before the public inquiry into foreign interference, Mr. Trudeau said he had received highly classified intelligence that Conservative Party politicians and members were involved in or were susceptible to foreign interference. He later acknowledged that Liberals and members of other political parties were also compromised.
Mr. Trudeau told the Commons on Wednesday that he would like to share the names of Conservative Party members with Mr. Poilievre but his opponent refuses to get a national security clearance to be briefed by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.
The clash came an hour after Mr. Trudeau faced down a mutiny from 24 Liberal MPs who pressed him in caucus to resign.
“Canadians should be alarmed by the Conservative Leader’s choosing to ignore risks to his own party and to our country,” Mr. Trudeau said. “If he has nothing to hide, what is he afraid of? Why will he not get his security clearances?”
Mr. Poilievre replied he does not want to undergo the process of obtaining a national security clearance because he would be bound by secrecy laws and could not criticize the government.
“It is because this Prime Minister will not gag me the way he is gagging his 24 Liberal MPs,” Mr. Poilievre said. “He has turned our country into a playground for foreign interference.”
Mr. Chong, in his interview, which was held after the clash in the Commons, noted the Prime Minister is the only person in the country who doesn’t have to obtain a national security clearance to see all classified information and he has the authority to publicly reveal this intelligence because he is the head of government. This gives him the right to reveal classified intelligence as he did about India’s alleged role in the murder of Sikh separatist leader Hardeep Singh Nijjar in B.C. last year.
Mr. Trudeau’s National Security and Intelligence adviser Nathalie Drouin and deputy minister of Global Affairs David Morrison shared classified information with the Washington Post recently about Indian government agents’ links to homicides, extortions and other violent criminal activities in Canada.
Mr. Chong said about Mr. Trudeau that “no other person in the land has that kind of authority” to reveal publicly classified information. Mr. Trudeau is “essentially wanting to gag the Leader of the Opposition because you have to sign an undertaking to never divulge that information to anyone else under threat of criminal prosecution.”
He said there are numerous other ways for the Prime Minister to reveal this information to Mr. Poilievre.
“He can do it on the floor of the House of Commons like he is happy to do when it suits his purpose,” he said. “The Prime Minister can reveal this directly to Mr. Poilievre or have one of his designated persons reveal it directly to Mr. Poilievre based on the Prime Minister’s decision to reveal classified information.”
Mr. Chong said security clearances involve a rigorous process that includes background checks on family members, credit and criminal checks and intrusive questions about one’s sexual partners or whether they ever used drugs. The Conservatives fear any personal and family information obtained through this process could be used by the government for politically motivated purposes against Mr. Poilievre.
“I don’t trust this Prime Minister,” he said. “It is a sign of a desperate Prime Minister who is willing to go to any lengths to stay in power.”
But former CSIS director Ward Elcock said that security-clearance information from a political rival would be kept from the Prime Minister by officials – who would object if he asked to see it.
“It would set so many alarm bells ringing. I can’t imagine anyone in the PCO [Privy Council Office] saying to the Prime Minister that’s a good thing,” Mr. Elcock said. “There are so many checks and balances that that information would never be provided to the Prime Minister.”
He said whatever its faults, “Canada is not a police state” and he doesn’t understand why Mr. Poilievre would not seek to be briefed on intelligence about his party. “I can’t really think of a good reason for why not to do it.”
With a report from Campbell Clark