Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, last week the minister bragged about her visit to the Saskatoon “out-of-Service Canada” office, yet, after her visit, the daughter of my constituent, Viktoriia, still cannot get a passport, because they lost her birth certificate. By contrast, the Bangladesh High Commission sent six people to Saskatoon on the weekend, and they processed 800 passports in two days. How is it that a fore…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, that is a very good question. This is kind of the heart of what we are talking about here today. Conceptually, it is easy to say this person can speak and this one cannot, but in reality it is very difficult to do that. Who is the person who is going to decide that? We all know there is content on the Internet that is wrong and that is incorrect. We know there is content that is tru…
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Mr. Speaker, despite all that, the horrors of the out-of-service Service Canada office in Saskatoon continue. Margaret is 86 years old and the nicest lady you can find. She was struggling to get through on the phone, so she went to the Saskatoon office in person. The staff refused to meet with her for not having booked an online appointment. Our seniors, and indeed all Canadians, deserve better th…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I am proud to be speaking on behalf of the constituents of Saskatoon West. We are a diverse group of citizens from many backgrounds and with a variety of different views. They have called me and emailed me over the past year, asking about stopping online censorship. They wanted to be free from government overreach back then, and they feel the same way now. The people of Saskatoon We…
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Madam Speaker, sometimes these things are hard to hear, I understand, but what Gerald Butts said is, “If you’re getting your news from outlets whose primary purpose is to divide you from your neighbours, the topic doesn’t matter. It’s long past time we figured this out.” Is this what we can expect under Bill C-11: big government telling us what news is fact and what is misinformation when it does …
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Madam Speaker, that is a good question. Absolutely, we want to support culture in Canada. We want to support our content creators. There is always a fear by certain members of this House to actually let our people free in the world. Our content creators, our talent in Canada, are second to none. We have great producers, actors, everybody. We have a lot of talent. We should not be ashamed of that. …
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Madam Speaker, it is up to the House to put this committee. Last time this bill went to committee, there was a very important provision that was removed, which caused a lot of stress. It caused a lot of reactions in my office, for sure. The committee will do its work when the time comes, and would add or strengthen or do whatever needs to be done to the bill. At the end of the day, we have to be v…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, Viktoriia and her two daughters moved from Ukraine to Saskatoon West. Two months ago they received their Canadian citizenship. One of the first things Viktoriia did was apply for a Canadian passport. However, between Passport Canada and the Saskatoon Service Canada office, all she got was hours queued up in lines and the runaround from staff. My office had to intervene directly with O…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, on April 1, about 25 people in my riding of Saskatoon West lost their jobs because of an imposed federal vaccination requirement. Their employer, Maple Leaf Foods, is federally regulated by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, and as such must follow federal rules. On April 4, Shawn, who lost his job, wrote to me wondering how he was going to put food on the table and provide for his …
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, it is an honour to rise today on behalf of petitioners from Saskatoon West. This petition is in regard to the unprovoked war on the people of Ukraine. Of course, we know that the war has triggered a human rights, humanitarian and displacement crisis, and the petitioners are calling for the implementation of visa-free travel. In my riding and in Saskatchewan there is a large continge…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I also have a petition today, which I am pleased to present, in support of Bill S-223. This bill is about organ harvesting and trafficking, making it a criminal offence for a person to go abroad and receive an organ taken without the consent of the person. I note that this has been passed in the Senate unanimously three times, and for 13 years it has been in the House and the Senate. …
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, I want to comment on a couple of things the member raised. One is that the current government's history is that if an idea comes from the opposition, it is not a good idea. The previous speaker mentioned the same thing. I am pleading with the governing Liberals to see that this is a good idea. May they please take it and use it. We are willing to give it to them and let them do what…
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Madam Speaker, it is a great pleasure to rise in this House today to speak to this concurrence motion on the grave situation before us in Ukraine. My constituents in Saskatoon West know that I sit on the House of Commons immigration committee. On this committee, we have been focused on several issues of importance, but none more so than the horrid war in eastern Europe and the humanitarian crisis …
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for his statement. There may be a number somewhere that says two weeks, but my information comes directly from people we have talked to: people I have talked to and our office has talked to. It is actually quite fascinating. I was in my office last week and my office manager was speaking with a woman in Canada who is Ukrainian. She was speaking with her family. As…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, that question points out the reality that is being faced right now. I have heard many stories of people who are wanting to get biometrics done, for example, and these biometrics are supposed to take a short time. When they call the office, they do not even have the ability to book an appointment because they are all booked for the next six-plus weeks. There is a tremendous problem w…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, that question is one that we have asked multiple times at the immigration committee. I hear it from people every day. The simple reality is that when one has finite resources and one adds more work to the pile, something will not get done. That is just reality. All of us who have been in the real world have experienced that. We experience that in our own homes: If there is too much …
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question. First, according to the current government, money does not seem to be an object for anything, so I do not think we can say that money is an object. The Liberals have found ways to print money. I am not suggesting that is a good thing, but it seems to be the mode the Liberals operate in, so I would be surprised if they said that money was an obj…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, when lifting COVID mandates in my home province of Saskatchewan, Premier Moe said the following: “It's time to heal the divisions.” Premier Moe recognizes something the Prime Minister simply cannot, that a leader must unite Canadians. Instead the Prime Minister is using every opportunity to divide Canadians based on vaccination status. Dr. Tam has stated that the science supports a re…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, ironically, the very next line in my speech is that “the government really knows how to waste time”. I think that was just a great example of it right there. I want to assure colleagues that I am not going to waste the time of my constituents in Saskatoon West. I am going to dive into this piece of legislation and speak about why I am voting against it. Then I am going to talk about…
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Madam Speaker, this really highlights how some MPs lack the ability to understand how the world works and how business works. We do not have to mandate things. We do not have to tell companies or countries to do things. We have an opportunity. We know there is an opportunity to supply oil and natural gas to the world. The world is asking us for this. We need to supply that. If we allow the market …
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Madam Speaker, on the issue of dental care, a lot of Canadians have that coverage. Certainly there are some groups that would benefit from that, and that is why we believe that a targeted approach to those who need it is much more prudent. However, we have to be very careful about how we spend money. We have to use extreme caution in committing to programs that are going to put debt onto our child…
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Madam Speaker, there are so many ways to answer that question, but I think I am going to focus on this: Did we need to spend money during the pandemic? We did. Was that money well spent, as the member asked? I would say in many cases it was not. I have seen many examples of organizations that received more money than they needed and businesses that received more money than they needed. We have lot…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, it is a privilege to speak in the House again. Today is March 28, 2022, and we are debating the government's fall economic update, an update that was given in the House in December of 2021. Yes, we are actually debating budgetary measures that this government introduced over 100 days ago. In that time, Canada and the world have changed. With COVID, we saw omicron come and go, provin…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, the member spoke about some of the things that he wished were in the legislation. I want to speak about something that I wish was in his speech. The government has spent tremendously on all kinds of different programs that have added billions and billions to our debt. In fact, our accumulated debt has more than doubled under the Liberals' watch. I would ask the member if he feels th…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
With regard to the Chinook software program operated by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), broken down by fiscal year and country of origin: (a) what is the acceptance rate of immigrants by (i) immigration class, (ii) official language of Canada spoken, (iii) ethnicity, (iv) acceptance rate, (v) rejection rate; (b) what are the criteria, keywords or phrases used by IRCC for makin…
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With regard to the Chinook software program operated by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), broken down by fiscal year and country of origin: (a) what keywords and phrases are used by IRCC officials to sort visa applications; (b) what is the occurrence of keywords and phrases that are used by IRCC officials to sort visa applications; and (c) based upon the use of these keywords an…
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Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to present a petition today on behalf of Canadians regarding conscience protections for medical professionals. The petitioners note that, during testimony at the Special Joint Committee on Physician-Assisted Dying, witnesses stated that the protection of conscience should be included in the government's legislative response to Carter v. Canada. Therefore, the petitioners …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, Canada is a tale of two governments. Provincial governments use real science to make decisions and have lifted their COVID mandates, but here in Ottawa, the NDP-Liberal government relies on political science and refuses to end COVID mandates, making some Canadians second-class citizens. These Canadians cannot fly, cross an international border or keep their jobs in the military simply…
Read full speech →Statements By Members
Mr. Speaker, since the election, I have been speaking about the NDP-Liberal coalition government. Well, today it is official. My constituents in Saskatoon West know the dangers of the NDP and its love affair with propping up tired Liberal governments. These champagne socialists, who care more about their expensive cars and shutting down economic development on the Prairies, are now officially on t…
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Mr. Speaker, I asked the Liberals about inflation in Saskatchewan, and the government confirmed the negative impact of inflation on the poverty line throughout my province. In fact, the poverty rate increased 1.2% in Saskatchewan and it is only going to get worse. That means an additional 13,000 people in Saskatchewan are falling into poverty every year, simply because inflation is driving their c…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time today with the member from Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River. It is a sad day to be speaking here on behalf of the constituents of Saskatoon West. When I first ran for office two and a half years ago, I never thought I would spend most of my time representing my constituents during a time of COVID-19. When I ran for re-election just six months ago, I ne…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, if Ottawa has an incompetent mayor who could not get the job done, I do not think it is incumbent on the federal government to take a sledgehammer with the Emergencies Act to come in and try to fix that problem. That is a problem for the City of Ottawa. If the City of Ottawa could not handle it, then the province should step in. The laws that were currently in place could have gotte…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, there were a lot of questions. For the businesses in downtown Ottawa, it has been difficult, but I must remind the member that there have been two years of difficulties for business owners in this country. For two years, businesses have not been able to open. It has been difficult for everybody. I also want to remind the member that the bridges that he referred to opened up prior to…
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Madam Speaker, there are significant consequences. I want to particularly highlight the people I have been talking to. For example, an older lady called my office in tears because she had donated a small amount of money to the convoy and was worried that her bank accounts would be frozen. Businesses' bank accounts are now frozen because of the imposition of the Emergencies Act. This is having very…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I just want to remind the minister that it is the official opposition, the Conservatives, who have been calling for this for many months. It was even in our election platform. Even the government's coalition partner, the NDP, has been asking for this, too. I heard just a few moments ago the minister and the parliamentary secretary both talking about how, when they were first appoint…
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Mr. Speaker, last Friday, the Prime Minister said that the Ottawa police had enough resources to deal with the protesters, and on Monday he calls for emergency measures. Boy, that escalated quickly. He had 17 days to act, and after hiding in his cottage on his MacBook for the first week, he did nothing but divide and stigmatize. My constituents in Saskatoon West want to know this: What changed in …
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Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure, as always, to speak to this important motion today, and I am proud to be speaking on behalf of Saskatoon West. Saskatoon is the economic engine of Saskatchewan. For example, in January, there were 6,000 jobs in Saskatchewan and 4,000 of those were created in Saskatoon. My riding is west of the river in Saskatoon and includes the downtown commercial district with all…
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Mr. Speaker, I am not a spokesman for the Government of Saskatchewan, so I cannot comment on that. I can say that, obviously, water is a key component of agriculture in our province. I indicated in my speech how important agriculture is to everything we do in the province of Saskatchewan. Obviously, we need good solutions for water and we need reliable solutions for water. I know the project my ho…
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Mr. Speaker, of course, rail is, as I mentioned, very critical to many of the things we do in our province. Our province is a resource-based province, whether we are talking about oil, minerals, potash or agriculture. All of these things require various forms of transport. The best way to transport oil is, of course, through a pipeline if we can. We would love to have pipelines built to allow us t…
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Mr. Speaker, I was not present when the hon. member was speaking about Asquith, but that is adjacent to my riding so I know the area well. What is critical in Canada are jobs. We need jobs in our country and we need employees to fill those jobs. The way we get those jobs is by encouraging healthy competition, healthy businesses and strong corporations. Yes, they need to pay their taxes and they ne…
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Mr. Speaker, there are many things. He mentioned the environment and that is a key one. We need to be able to work together. We need to be able to recognize our unique situation with agriculture being so key and our ability to store so much carbon in the ground. Agriculture needs to be recognized with the federal government. That is something we need to work on. Also on the agriculture file, we ne…
Read full speech →Statements By Members
Mr. Speaker, my heart was saddened to hear the news of four people from India losing their lives last month after becoming lost in -35°C weather during a blizzard. This is a tragedy made worse by the news that it was allegedly human traffickers who put these people in harm’s way. Human trafficking causes real harm. No matter what someone may say, it is never safe to cross the border illegally. Hum…
Read full speech →Speech from the Throne
Mr. Speaker, it is always a privilege to get up and speak in the House on behalf of the constituents of Saskatoon West. Nearly six months ago we had an election call, and the Liberal Party leader said that this was the most important election since World War II. It has taken him months to swear in his cabinet and recall Parliament. It has been 69 days since the throne speech, and MPs are still her…
Read full speech →Speech from the Throne
Mr. Speaker, the protests we saw in Toronto were about denouncing Israel, and unfortunately we never saw anything about that on the news. Apparently that is not important to our media. The real question is, will this end? Is it possible to make this end? I would submit that large problems require creative solutions. If we do nothing, then the member is exactly right: This will never end. We will r…
Read full speech →Speech from the Throne
Mr. Speaker, there is no question that our health care workers and our health care providers in this country deserve medals of honour. They have been working extremely hard. I think all of us in this House would salute them. What it is really showing is that we have a deficiency in health care in our country. Our budgets need to get higher in this area, because we do not have enough resources. Our…
Read full speech →Speech from the Throne
Mr. Speaker, first of all, I am not saying that we should not follow public health measures, but I am giving a perspective from Saskatchewan. We have taken a bit of a different approach. We have had fewer lockdowns and fewer restrictions, and the results have been similar, so there are ways that we could manage through this by using our creativity. We can do this.
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
With regard to the impact of inflation on the Market Basket Measure (MBM) and the poverty line: (a) what is the current, or latest, MBM for the reference family and various poverty lines in each of the MBM geographic areas in Saskatchewan; (b) what was the 2018-base MBM for the reference family and various poverty lines in each geographic area in (a); (c) what percentage of individuals living in e…
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With regard to the Temporary Foreign Workers Program, broken down by province and territory, and fiscal years from 2018 to present: (a) how many work permits have been processed by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, and are expected to be processed for 2021-22; (b) of the permits in (a), how many of those migrants have come to Canada to fill jobs; (c) what employment sectors have those …
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With regard to the Temporary Foreign Workers Program, broken down by province and territory, and fiscal years from 2018 to present: (a) how many Labour Market Impact Assessments has Employment and Social Development Canada (i) undertaken, (ii) completed; (b) what was the average processing time for the applications in (a); (c) how many jobs has the program filled within the heavy trucking sector b…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, I also have the honour to rise today and present a petition in support of Bill S-223. The petitioners are excited about this bill because they want to see forced organ harvesting and trafficking stopped. This bill would make it a criminal offence to do that. It has passed the Senate unanimously three times before, and this bill has been put forward for over 13 years. The petitioners…
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