Prime Minister Mark Carney and his former company, Brookfield Asset Management (Brookfield), are enmeshed with Communist China (CC), a Conservative MP suggested during a meeting of Parliament’s Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, alongside investigative journalist Sam Cooper.
The hearing unfolded amid what critics describe as Canada’s decades-long struggle with Chinese Communist (CC) infiltration into politics and industry.
Conservative MP Michael Barrett inquired about a report that indicated Carney’s former firm, Brookfield, held more than $3 billion in "politically sensitive" China-linked investments, connected to businessmen with Beijing’s United Front networks and supported by the Bank of China. It is alleged that Carney, while serving with Brookfield, met with Chinese President Xi Jinping over corporate dealings.
“Mr. Carney also traveling to China to meet with senior Communist Party officials around the timing of the Bank of China, you know, assisting Brookfield with the real estate investment—that would certainly, in my mind, raise, you know, the questions around access and influence,” said Cooper.
In November 2024, Brookfield secured a 15-year onshore loan of roughly $276 million (about US$250 million) from the Bank of China at a four-per-cent annual interest rate. The funds were used to refinance debt on a Shanghai office-tower complex originally acquired in 2019.
Allegations of Chinese infiltration in Canada date back to donations linked to the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation, including a 2015 pledge of $200,000 from Chinese billionaire Zhang Bin — later returned amid questions about Beijing’s involvement.
Canadian intelligence agencies later concluded that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and state-linked networks interfered in Canada’s 2019 and 2021 federal elections through undisclosed donations, candidate connections and coordinated disinformation campaigns.
In the lead-up to the 2025 election, the Joe Tay case drew national attention — a Conservative candidate placed under a Hong Kong police bounty and allegedly targeted by a transnational repression operation. Ottawa also determined that a Chinese-language news account on WeChat amplified narratives about Mark Carney during the April 2025 campaign, part of a CCP-linked information operation.
Beyond politics, the CCP has been accused of operating illegal police stations in Canadian cities, allegedly to monitor and intimidate Chinese Canadians and immigrants critical of Beijing.
Despite growing concerns, the Liberal government says Canada remains in a working partnership with China.
On October 21, Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand said Canada maintains a “strategic partnership” with Beijing — meaning Ottawa will not let “individual irritants” derail the broader relationship.
A Global Affairs Canada backgrounder described China as a key yet complex partner in trade, investment and supply chains, while warning of risks including opaque regulations, intellectual-property theft and diversion of dual-use goods.
The document situates China policy within Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, emphasizing pragmatic economic engagement alongside human-rights and national-security concerns.
Anand acknowledged ongoing “challenges in any relationship,” but said cooperation with China remains vital to Canada’s commercial and diplomatic interests.
Allegations against Carney and Brookfield have not been tabled or tested in court.