Tories halt all-night vote marathon
But intend to maintain focus on Trudeau’s trip to India
OTTAWA — The Conservatives vowed Friday to employ new tactics next week to force testimony from Justin Trudeau’s national security adviser over the prime minister’s recent trip to India.
The Tories made the pledge after ending a marathon overnight voting session that began Thursday and kept members of Parliament answering roll calls in the House of Commons for nearly 21 hours.
Conservative House leader Candice Bergen called a halt to the procedural stunt after MPs had voted on hundreds of motions deemed confidence measures. After she did, the calendar on the clerk’s desk finally flipped over to Friday and the sitting wrapped up.
Bergen thanked parliamentary staff, from the Speaker to security guards to cafeteria workers, for hanging on through the prolonged sitting.
Soon afterward, the bleary MPs — some clad in sweats and clutching pillows and blankets — emerged from the chamber pumping their fists in the air in a victory gesture.
At issue was the Liberal government’s refusal to support a Conservative demand that national security adviser Daniel Jean be called to testify before a Commons committee about a briefing he gave journalists during the prime minister’s illstarred visit to India.
Jean suggested to reporters covering Trudeau’s trip last month that rogue factions in the Indian government had sabotaged the visit. Since then, Opposition MPs demanded that Jean explain his reasoning about how onetime Canadian Sikh separatist and convicted attempted murderer Jaspal Atwal was invited to a Trudeau event in India.
Atwal’s appearance, and Jean’s statements about the Indian government, have harmed Canada-India relations, said Conservative foreign affairs critic Erin O’Toole.
“We’ve already seen the Indian government express outrage, raise tariffs,” said O’Toole.
“We’ve angered a major Commonwealth partner … and the prime minister clings to this conspiracy theory that directly contradicts his own MP, Randeep Sarai.”
While Trudeau has defended Jean as a professional, non-partisan, veteran public servant who only says what he knows to be true, Sarai, an MP from Surrey, took responsibility for getting Atwal on the guest lists for Trudeau events in India after Atwal said he requested an invitation.
Only one of those two scenarios can be true, said O’Toole: either Atwal was invited by a Liberal MP or he was an Indian government plant and Jean should be allowed to testify so he can clear the air over the controversy.
But Liberal House leader Bardish Chagger said it was entirely up to MPs on the national security committee — the majority of whom are Liberals — to decide whether Jean should be called to testify.