Speaking Notes delivered by the Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion

Occasion: Appearance before the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage – Community Media Advocacy Centre

Ottawa (Ontario)
Date: October 7, 2022
Length: 5.5 minutes (799 words)
85% English 15% French

Mr. Chair, members of the Committee, good afternoon.

Thank you for your invitation to appear today, and for this opportunity to share my perspective on funding granted to the Community Media Advocacy Centre.

I am joined by Mala Khanna, Associate Deputy Minister, Canadian Heritage.

Tout d’abord, je veux répéter que le racisme n’a pas sa place dans notre société. Aucune forme de racisme n’a sa place au Canada.

Les Canadiens ont raison d’être choqués qu’un organisme ‒ lié à une personne qui fait des commentaires racistes ‒ ait reçu des fonds fédéraux. Moi aussi, je suis choqué. Je vous assure que je prends la question très au sérieux.

The antisemitic statements and other hateful slurs used by Laith Marouf are unacceptable. The fact that the Community Media Advocacy Centre (CMAC) received federal funding while employing Mr. Marouf is also unacceptable and should, quite frankly, never have happened.

So today, I’m pleased to be here to speak with you about the immediate actions we have taken and the work we are continuing to do to strengthen how we assess and vet projects.

Canadian Heritage is undertaking a comprehensive review of its funding programs that support Canada’s Anti-Racism Strategy.

This includes full review of how applications are assessed and enhanced vetting training for all program officers.

The Department is also introducing conditions in all funding agreements that will allow the federal government to take immediate action, should any organization or individual, be identified as having promoted or shared hate, racism and discrimination in any form.

Ms. Khanna and officials will also be pleased to provide you with more details on the specific actions being taken by Canadian Heritage to enhance its processes and vetting procedures.

Mr. Chair, I deeply regret that a situation like this was allowed to occur. It is a slap in the face to all Canadians but, in particular to the Jewish community in Canada, the Francophone community and many other groups as well.

I sincerely apologize to Jewish Canadians and to all those impacted by this situation.

Antisemitism remains an unfortunate reality in Canada.

Despite representing less than 1% of the Canadian population, Jews are the most likely religious group in Canada to be the target of hate crimes.

Antisemitic hate and disinformation continues to be spread, particularly through online and social media forums.

We have also seen a disturbing increase in antisemitic and anti-Zionist propaganda throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, pushing false and racist accusations that Jews or Israel either started the pandemic or is benefitting from it.

And the escalation of violence in the Middle East has given rise to a new wave of antisemitism in Canada and in other parts of the world.

Antisemitism cannot be tolerated. The Government of Canada has listened carefully to the Jewish community and we are fully committed to doing what is needed to end this kind of hate.

In 2019, Canada adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism as part of Building a Foundation for Change: Canada’s Anti-Racism Strategy.

The Federal Anti-Racism Secretariat (ARSEC) is using the IHRA definition of antisemitism to ground its engagement with Jewish communities and its work to tackle antisemitism.

In November 2020, Prime Minister Trudeau named the Honourable Irwin Cotler as Canada’s Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combatting Antisemitism. The strengthening of Canada’s implementation of the IHRA definition of antisemitism is a core component of his mandate.

One year later, the Prime Minister renewed Special Envoy Cotler’s mandate and appointed him the Prime Minister’s Special Advisor on Antisemitism.

On July 21, 2021, Special Envoy Cotler co-convened a National Summit on Antisemitism to identify ways in which organizations, communities, individuals, and the federal government can work together to increase public awareness, enhance community security, combat misinformation and online hate, and identify new measures necessary to combat antisemitism.

More recently, at the first in-person meeting of the IHRA since the beginning of the pandemic, Canada announced that it would double its annual contribution to the IHRA.

We are also contributing $20 million to support the redevelopment of the Montreal Holocaust Museum.

And we are supporting numerous projects under the Anti-Racism Action Program that specifically target online hate or promote digital literacy, where we know antisemitic messages continue to be spread.

This includes initiatives like the “Canada Task Force on Online Anti-Semitism”, a project by the Montreal Institute for Genocide Studies at Concordia University, and a project from the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs called “United Against Online Hate.”

We will continue to fight antisemitism here in Canada and around the world. We will learn from our mistakes. We will do better. We will do more.

Et nous cheminerons ensemble pour bâtir un Canada meilleur et plus sûr.

Thank you for your time. I’ll be very happy to answer your questions.

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