Former Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole said Wednesday he is considering expelling Conservative members from caucus over concerns the senators may be engaging in foreign influence.
Testifying in Ottawa ahead of the foreign interference inquiry, O’Toole said a local mayor had told one of his councillors that a Conservative senator was actively working for a Chinese state-owned enterprise.
“It has been reported by a Member of Parliament that a member of the Senate has directly or indirectly promoted or lobbied the interests of a Chinese state-owned enterprise in an Ontario constituency,” O’Toole said in the inquiry.
“Previous reports about sponsored trips and other matters have caused me serious concerns given some of the topics we have been discussing within the party. However, it was an issue of a possible financial interest claim in a town in Ontario that has forced me to make a decision about my concerns regarding that member.”
O’Toole said the senator had “fairly extensive travel” to China, which had been the subject of media coverage.
O’Toole said he felt it was “completely inappropriate for a senator to assert commercial interests linked to a foreign company in his Canadian constituency.”
“I was very concerned about this member at the time, given that we were having very serious discussions about our relationship with China, the situation of the two Michaels, the plight of the Uighurs and Hong Kong,” he added.
O’Toole said he could have sought the help of experts from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and other government intelligence agencies but did not have access to them.
O’Toole was warned about racism claims
“I was considering removing this member from the caucus, but the challenge was that I didn’t have intelligence support,” he said. “I had suspicions that I couldn’t verify. I had no warning from the intelligence community that they were aware of the suspicions.”
“And the concern that some members of my caucus expressed to me was that if I made a rash decision to expel a member, I could be accused of being a racist.”
O’Toole said he had failed to consult government security and intelligence experts and so compromised by having the Senate Conservative leader “severely reprimand” the senators in question.
O’Toole did not name the senators he is concerned about.
A Conservative source who spoke to CBC News said in his testimony that O’Toole was referring to former Conservative senator Victor Oh, who was appointed by former prime minister Stephen Harper and retired in June.
Speaking to CBC News, Oh said no one in the Conservative party had spoken to him about their concerns about China or “what I’m doing to promote China.” He said he thought O’Toole was “confused.”
“I’ve never promoted an Ontario Crown corporation,” he said. “I never would. And even if I did, it was for economic reasons to help the country.”
O’Toole’s surprise testimony on Wednesday came as the foreign interference inquiry, led by Justice Marie-Josee Hogue, continues its second phase of hearings.
The inquiry was set up following media reports accusing China of meddling in the 2019 and 2021 federal elections.
In his first report, released in May, Hogue concluded that there may have been foreign interference in a small number of precincts but that it did not affect the overall election outcome.
The second phase of the investigation will focus on the extent to which the government is prepared to counter foreign interference in elections and how that capacity has evolved over time.
More details to come…
