Liberal MP Michael Ma’s apology for confronting an academic witness about whether her evidence on forced labour in Chinese aluminum supply chains could be “hearsay” coincides with a highly sensitive moment in Canada’s ongoing trade war with the Trump administration.
After some of the tariffs Canada faced were struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this year, United States Trade Representative Jamieson Greer embarked on a series of investigations to implement a Plan B: using Section 301 of its Trade Act to levy new tariffs based on a country’s unfair trade practices.
Canada’s been included in a probe of countries suspected of allowing commodities or finished goods made with forced (slave) labour to enter its supply chain, to compete with and potentially displace goods from the U.S. (or Canada, for that matter) — jurisdictions where higher labour costs are priced into the finished product.
“Despite the international consensus against forced labour, governments have failed to impose and effectively enforce measures banning goods produced with forced labour from entering their markets,” Greer’s announcement said.
At a parliamentary committee on Thursday, Liberal MP Michael Ma asked Margaret McCuaig-Johnston of the China Strategic Risks Institute if she has personally witnessed forced labour in China. ‘I work closely with Human Rights Watch where researchers did witness it,’ McCuaig-Johnston said. Correction: The description for this video originally said Michael Ma asked about forced labour in Xinjiang, China. In fact, he was asking about Shenzhen.
The risks of this U.S. investigation — which could result in tariffs of up to 25 per cent on Canadian exports — were among the concerns Margaret McCuaig-Johnston was laying out for MPs on the industry committee on Thursday when Ma decided to challenge her credibility.
As a result of a deal struck during Prime Minister Mark Carney’s trip to Beijing in January — a trip that Ma joined — up to 49,000 electric vehicles annually could now be imported from China at a tariff rate of 6.1 per cent. Chinese state-owned brands like BYD, however, aren’t as transparent about their supply chains as other global automakers.
“Human Rights Watch has done a very detailed report on Chinese EVs and the aluminum in them that’s made with forced labour: dozens of parts in each car,” McCuaig-Johnston told CBC News.
With the Americans’ investigation now underway, “they’re going to assess us on how strong our forced labour implementation is,” she said.
“This is not the time to be dropping the ball.”
The Canada-U.S.-Mexico Trade Agreement (CUSMA) also requires Canada to work with American officials to ensure goods manufactured using forced labour are prohibited in the North American market. Any perceived failures on this front could become issues in this year’s mandatory review of the deal.
Long-standing enforcement concerns
Cross-border tensions over Canada’s track record on keeping suspect goods out aren’t new. In 2021, CBC’s Marketplace probed evidence of forced labour in the supply chains for clothing originating in North Korea and tomato products from Xinjiang, the region in northwestern China where Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities have been subjected to mass detention, surveillance and torture by the Chinese government.
American officials said at that time the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) wasn’t cutting it.
Earlier that year, Canada’s Parliament unanimously voted to condemn this treatment of Uyghurs by Chinese Communist Party officials as a genocide, although Justin Trudeau’s cabinet abstained from the vote.
Ma’s aggressive questioning of McCuaig-Johnston was called out by Conservative MPs, both on Parliament Hill and on social media. A procedural fight ensued at committee over whether he should apologize to the witness, which he initially refused to do.
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“My job as a parliamentarian is to protect Canada, not to protect a foreign hostile country,” said Windsor, Ont., Conservative MP Kathy Borrelli, as she pursued a line of questioning to draw out more testimony from McCuaig-Johnston about the ramifications of the Liberal government’s choice to part company with U.S. trade policy and drop its 100 per cent tariff on Chinese EVs.
By Thursday evening, Ma posted an apology on social media that said his aggressive line of questioning referred to Shenzhen, a global hub for Chinese EV manufacturing, but not Xinjiang, where the aluminum at issue in the Human Rights Watch report originates.
“I condemn forced labour, in all its forms. Canada has amongst the most rigorous forced-labour import laws in the world, and I am proud to support the government’s work to eradicate forced labour from supply chains and enforce Canada’s import prohibition,” his apology to both the witness and other committee members concluded.
The government distanced itself from Ma’s comments on Friday afternoon.
“Canada unequivocally condemns forced labour, in all of its forms, everywhere,” Huzaif Qaisar, a spokesperson for International Trade Minister Maninder Sidhu, said in a statement.
“Mr. Ma’s comments as reported are not reflective of the government of Canada’s position on the incredibly serious issue of forced labour.”
Earlier Friday, asked about Ma’s comments at an unrelated announcement, Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson pointed out that the day Canada reached an agreement lifting restrictions on Chinese EVs, Beijing put in an order for $4 billion worth of Canadian canola, as well as other wins he listed off for reporters.
“That’s good for Canada, and that’s what we’re focused on,” Hodgson said.
“We don’t need to have public discussions about where we disagree. We make that clear to our friends in China.”
In a letter to the prime minister, Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong wrote that Carney’s position on the forced labour of Uyghurs in China is one of several issues that now require “urgent clarification.”
“Do you assess that Uyghur forced labour has and is being used in the [People’s Republic of China]? Did you proactively raise the issue of human rights with PRC officials during your recent visit?” Chong asked, noting that a document tabled earlier this month had suggested the contrary.
“Are you committed to upholding the rules-based international order, including our trade agreements, which requires that the government prevent the importation of products produced using forced labour?”
‘Tainted’ supply chains hard to track
Ma’s attempt to differentiate between China’s regions obscures what human rights watchdogs have reported about forced labour as a contributing factor in the often cheaper prices of Chinese EVs.
Human Rights Watch reports that the Xinjiang region, because it doesn’t have the capacity to process metal from its aluminum smelters into the more sophisticated alloys used in the automotive industry, instead produces “unalloyed” ingots — blocks of unprocessed metal for shipping.
“Once an aluminum ingot has been melted and mixed with other materials, it is impossible to determine whether or how much of it came from Xinjiang,” the watchdog’s report cautions.
The report says that unlike other global automakers which responded to questions about forced labour risks in their Chinese supply chains, BYD offered no transparency — something that may give rights-conscious consumers in Canada pause.
Tesla makes cars for export in its gigafactory in Shanghai. The same report said that Tesla was more responsive, and “in several cases,” it had mapped its supply chain back to the mining level and had not found evidence of forced labor.
“[Tesla] did not, however, specify how much of the aluminum in its cars remains of unknown origin and so could be linked to Xinjiang,” the report said.
McCuaig-Johnston attempted to give Ma a copy of this report after the committee meeting, but he refused to take it.
“He told me that he doesn’t believe in reports,” she told CBC News later. “He said that he only believes things that he can see with his own eyes and that he and I should go to Xinjiang and see if there’s any forced labour there.”
She scoffed at the suggestion.
“Number one, they would never show him forced labour,” she said. “Number two, I’ve been sanctioned by China for my work with the Uyghurs on forced labour and other things. So I’m not going to China.”
‘Recklessly naive’
With BYD poised to get a toehold in Canada’s EV market, companies that manufacture automotive parts using fairly traded Canadian aluminum and steel have more to lose than just market share.
Joint ventures with Chinese manufacturers could boost economic growth in Canada. But unless meticulously policed, the risk of reputational harm to Canada’s automotive industry remains.
“It’s recklessly naive to assume that Western standards in labour rights and materials sourcing are being upheld in China’s auto sector,” said Flavio Volpe, the president of the Automotive Parts Manufacturers Association.
“It has been an issue for years that is only now coming home because Chinese-branded exports are landing in Canada’s market.”
Whether the CBSA will prove any more capable of tracking and rejecting aluminum car parts than it performed on clothing or tomato sauce five years ago remains an open question.
Canada’s Fighting Against Forced Labour and Child Labour in Supply Chains Act did strengthen the government’s investigative powers. That law passed in 2023, after the Trudeau government was accused of dragging its feet with months of consultations.
But the government’s approach to reporting on forced labour appears to tiptoe around calling out China specifically. The 2025 annual report required by that law only mentions China once, in a short quote, from an unnamed organization that purchases supplies.
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