Just read this article from the Globe and Mail entitled “Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation returning donation with link to China“.

The first paragraph states:

A non-profit foundation dedicated to the memory of Pierre Elliott Trudeau is returning a large financial gift from a Chinese billionaire after The Globe and Mail reported that the largesse was part of a Beijing-directed influence operation to curry favour with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Actually, this is not a “non-profit foundation”. It is a registered charity that holds about $170 million in assets.

Paragraph 3 says:

“We cannot keep any donation that may have been sponsored by a foreign government and would not knowingly do so,” Ms. Fournier said. “In light of these recent allegations, the foundation has refunded to the donor all amounts received with respect to the donation pledge.”

This makes no sense. If the funds were from Syria or Iran, which are listed by the Canadian government as state supporters of terrorism, then I get it.  Canadian charities receive billions of dollars from abroad and including from individuals, corporations and foreign governments. If this was “gift” (and not some conditional gift) then it is typically completely inappropriate for the registered charity to return the funds. If the Chinese billionaire was part of some inappropriate operation, why are we rewarding him by giving him the money back? Can’t they find a charity that does good work to gift the funds to? That is assuming that the funds are so tainted that they need to be disgorged.

There are many problems with the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation. The notion that a large sum of Canadian government money (about $125 million in 2001) should be put into a foundation in the name of a former prime minister is questionable, but most importantly, when one of his sons decided to enter politics, the name should have been changed. It is not too late to change the name. If the foundation decides to keep the name then that will result in more confusion from the public about the foundation’s intentions and also undermine the charity sector and public trust in charities. If we have a new Conservative government one day, will we see a $200 million “Stephen Harper Democracy Foundation”? I sure hope not.

In another paragraph, it notes:

The source said the diplomat instructed Mr. Zhang to donate $1-million to the Trudeau Foundation, and told him the Chinese government would reimburse him for the entire amount.

Can we just agree that if you are going to reimbursed for funds given to a charity then it is not a gift or donation!

Another paragraph notes:

The Prime Minister’s Office said Monday that Justin Trudeau “withdrew his involvement in the affairs of the foundation for the duration of his involvement in federal politics.”

His brother Alexandre is on the foundation board. I will not be surprised if Justin Trudeau joins the organization again if he ever loses an election or resigns.  He is listed as a “Succession Member” with an asterisk next to his name that says, “Note: Inactive member. The Rt Hon. Justin Trudeau has withdrawn from the affairs of the Foundation for the duration of his involvement in Federal politics”. Charities seem to be good places for politicians to hang out after being defeated, retired and plotting their next move

The close association of this registered charity with political figures such as Pierre Elliot Trudeau or Justin Trudeau don’t help the reputation of the charitable sector.

In this note, I am not commenting on the work of the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, just the unfortunate juxtaposition of a charitable foundation with partisan politics. If the work of the foundation is important, then even more important to distance itself from partisan politics.

The website is at WWW.TRUDEAUFOUNDATION.CA. The website says that it is “an independent and non-partisan charity established in 2001 as a living memorial to the former prime minister.” Interesting that it needs to state that it is non-partisan, and when you have a son who is prime minister, it is going to be hard to disentangle this organization from partisanship while it retains its name.

One other matter. The Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation mentions a number of times on its websites that it is a corporation under the Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act (“CNCA”).  So, it appears that the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation is aware that it is under the CNCA.

Here is its corporate profile report and I will comment on it below:

Federal Corporation Information