OTTAWA – Information that China was targeting Conservative MP Michael Chong was sent to several senior bureaucrats, but was lost in a broken intelligence system, the prime minister’s national security and intelligence advisor told MPs Thursday.
Jody Thomas, who has been the prime minister’s national security advisor since 2022, was testifying Thursday morning as a parliamentary committee continues a study of what happened to Chong.
After media reports brought the subject to light last month, Chong was told that Beijing’s diplomats discussed gathering information about his family in Hong Kong, after Chong pushed for recognition of the Uyghur genocide in the House of Commons. The warnings from CSIS came nearly two years before they were brought to Chong’s attention.
Thomas described a system where intelligence is shared to just a handful of people, often part of large reading packages, with little broader insight into its value or direction to how the government should respond.
“My reading package on any given day can be somewhere between 150 and 100 pieces of intelligence,” she said. “We collect a lot of intelligence and assess a lot of intelligence but what we don’t do a good job of, is giving advice to the government.”
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Thomas wasn’t in her current job when the information from CSIS was shared. She said the memo didn’t specifically identify Chong, but a separate memo sent did identify him by name.
She said the information was sent to the then-national security advisor and the deputy ministers of foreign affairs and public safety. It was also sent to Thomas who was the deputy minister of defence at the time, but she said she was on vacation and didn’t see the information.
Thomas said working in the defence when she looked at daily reading packages she focused on issues like Afghanistan and Ukraine. She said she wanted to be transparent by revealing that the information went to her in her former role, she said while she was on vacation, had the Chong intelligence been about a defence issue like Afghanistan someone in the department would have read it.
She said intelligence is sent in government as “must read” or “should read,” and this would have been a should read.
Conservative MP Michael Cooper hammered Thomas on her insistence the prime minister wasn’t told or briefed on the issues with Chong or with NDP MP Jenny Kwan or former Conservative leader Erin O’Toole.
“This memo was sent to the Prime Minister’s department, the PCO and for two years, the prime minister did nothing, the government did nothing,” said Cooper. “It seems to me inconceivable that we have three, at least three, sitting members of parliament that were targeted by Beijing. including by an accredited diplomat, and that you didn’t know, and the Prime Minister, didn’t know.”
Thomas insisted the prime minister didn’t know, but also stressed that it has been made clear that regardless of what quality the intelligence is, if it is about potential interference or threats toward an MP it should be brought forward.
“The lesson learned out of this is that early reporting is better, even if the piece of intelligence that has arrived is not a credible piece, or cannot be verified.”
She said the intelligence policymakers and ministers receive often only tells part of the story and CSIS needs to offer more analysis and insight.
“It is rare that a piece of intelligence is a smoking gun. It is a story. It is built over time and it requires analysis and judgment on what to do with it.”
Thomas said she has brought in changes and continues to make changes to how intelligence is shared. She said in line with the prime minister’s remarks
“CSIS has been limited by their act. They are not able to share all of their intelligence except through a formal threat reduction measure and they are now using those more aggressively than they have in the past.”
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