Parliamentary Speeches
836 speeches by Christine Normandin — Page 17 of 17
Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, again last week, Quebec and the provinces asked the government to increase health transfers. The Prime Minister told them he would think about it after the pandemic. How many times do we have to go over this? We are in a health crisis. There need to be investments in health. This needs to be done during the crisis, not after. There is a fire to put out. Everyone but the Liberals under…
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Mr. Speaker, this government claims to be feminist. Eighty-two per cent of caregivers are women. The government is abandoning these women by refusing to increase health transfers. The government basically told them that they were on their own during the first wave. Now it is saying the same thing during the second wave. Now that vaccines are finally starting to arrive, these same women will be doi…
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Madam Speaker, I want to make sure that members understood what was being said. The Bloc Québécois never suggested that the solution was to prohibit members from wearing masks. The solution that was humbly submitted to the Chair was for members to wear a surgical mask. I want to make sure that members understood that the Bloc Québécois is not asking members to take off their masks when they are sp…
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Madam Speaker, the Bloc Québécois is not saying that quarantines are bad. We are saying the government is managing them badly. Quebec wanted travellers to be quarantined in hotels during the holidays. The government was unable to finalize the arrangements until the end of February. Even with that extra two months, it was not able to set up a hotline that works. Even with that extra two months, it …
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. He spoke about the importance of supporting the tourism industry, among others. Tourism also includes culture. We recall that in the past, in 2008-09, Mr. Harper's government made many cuts to culture. I would like to know the Conservative opposition's position on support for tourism and, more specifically, the cultural sector.
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Mr. Speaker, why on earth has this whole quarantine business turned into such a fiasco? All we want is for people to be able to follow the public health guidelines and be safe. All we want is a hotline that works. If TV talent shows can do it, I think the government should be able to, too. Cancelling quarantines in the middle of a pandemic is not the solution. What we need is a government that gov…
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to come back to the question from the member for Kingston and the Islands, who was asking why the Bloc Québécois was not proposing a motion on health transfers. I would like to ask my colleague from Jonquière if he remembers that the Bloc did introduce a motion on that topic in December and that the Liberal members were the only ones who voted against it.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his speech. From having often listened to him at the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, I know him to be very thorough. Nevertheless, I must correct him. The Bloc's motion on health care transfer payments passed on a vote of 176 to 148. Therefore, since it is the will of Parliament, it is only natural that we revive the debate in the House until …
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-206, introduced by the hon. member for Northumberland—Peterborough South. I will not keep anyone in suspense, as my colleague has already announced that the Bloc Québécois will support Bill C-206. However, people may be wondering why the Bloc Québécois is intervening on this bill, since Quebec actually already has its own carbon market a…
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Madam Speaker, plans to develop a vaccine in partnership with China and CanSino failed. On February 2, the Bloc Québécois asked the Minister of Health why the government had chosen China over Canada's own production capacity. She replied that “the decision about which candidates we should place our bets on was guided by the advice of the experts on the vaccine task force.” Yesterday, however, the …
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Madam Speaker, my question is on the recommendations and the fact that the government says it is relying on science, but scientists are publicly saying that this was not the case with CanSino. That is a big transparency problem. The government says it was guided by science when it refused to give $2 million to a very advanced Quebec vaccine project at Université Laval. It also says it relied on sc…
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Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-233, which was introduced by my colleague. First, I would like to remind members that the Bloc Québécois believes that the protection of French in Quebec requires an asymmetrical approach, which is why the bill is specifically tailored to Quebec with respect to the knowledge of French required to obtain citizenship. In a way, we are p…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Winnipeg North for his speech. He spent a large part of his time explaining how shameful it was that some opposition members were using today's motion to make the Prime Minister look bad. I understand where he is coming from. The problem is that he spent a good chunk of his time explaining how the Prime Minister has done a good job. In all of that I did not…
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question. There is obviously no denying that China is an economic partner. There is a lot of trade between the two countries, but that should not be a reason to completely ignore the convention. The two are not mutually exclusive. By maintaining an economic relationship with China, Canada can also exert international pressure over the matter of human right…
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Mr. Speaker, that is the very spirit of the conventions signed by many countries. In this case, the strength of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide lies in the fact that it was ratified by many countries. When facing a world power like China, we must present a united front, and this will also let us apply pressure with regard to other matters. We spoke about Ho…
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Mr. Speaker, it will not come as a surprise to anyone that I intend to fully support the proposal of my Bloc Québécois colleague, the member for Lac-Saint-Jean. In my opinion, it is definitely a step in the right direction. It is a position with diplomatic dimensions that would show Canada has no intention of bowing down. It can be done in a respectful manner towards athletes, as we do not want to…
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Mr. Speaker, it seems that was indeed the problem. I am terribly sorry. I was talking about the first criterion for recognizing genocide, that is, killing members of the group. A number of physicians have reported that as many as several million Uighurs have gone missing, and there is no documentation of their whereabouts. At least two years ago, some actors, including Nury Turkel of the Uighur Hu…
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Okay, Mr. Speaker. Can the interpreters hear me a little better now? I think I selected the right microphone on my device. Is the sound okay now?
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Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Pierrefonds—Dollard. I cannot wait to hear his speech, even though I expect we have somewhat different views. I look forward to potentially asking him a question afterwards. The matter before us today, recognition of the Uighur genocide in China, has come up in a number of committees, at times indirectly. I am a member of the Standing C…
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Madam Speaker, I too have a question for my colleague. Generally speaking, when looking at the parliamentary schedule, the parties agree to the number of speakers they wish to work on a bill before it is referred to committee. I gather that these discussions took place with respect to Bill C-10 in order to advance it so that it could be studied, or not, depending on the decision made by the House.…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from West Nova for his speech. I wonder if he could expand on the importance of French-language content, especially on platforms like Netflix. Does he have any suggestions for ways to increase it? Should quotas be imposed, or should we use a carrot rather than a stick and create financial incentives? Should the measures be more coercive or more incentive-based?
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Madam Speaker, they get a letter, but they also get a visa. The left hand does not know what the right hand is doing in this government. One department invites immigrants to Canada and another tries to kick them out. We also have one department telling people not to travel and another authorizing cheap trips to sun destinations. People are not talking to each other. How can the government be so la…
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Madam Speaker, the federal government's incompetence has put some permanent residents in an inhumane situation. The government is granting families permanent residency and giving them a visa to come to Canada. These families quit their jobs, sell their homes, get on a plane and come to Canada, but once they get here, border services tells them to go back to their own country. The Minister of Immig…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Mr. Speaker, I do not think that we need to carry out a study to find out how much time we would save. We already know that a recorded vote in the House normally takes about eight minutes. When we use Zoom, the vote takes about 45 minutes. Using the application we are considering now, the vote would take no more than five minutes. That is a little less time than it takes for a recorded vote in the…
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for her question. This is something that the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs has looked at. I was pleased to hear Professor Daniel Turp, among others, speak about prorogation and its legality. I would urge my colleague to listen to the House Leader of the Bloc Québécois and member for La Prairie, who will probably devote a large por…
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Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today to speak to the issue of the various options available to the House for reviewing its procedures. If I may, I would like to provide a bit of background. When I was training in the law, I went from one Code of Civil Procedure in my undergrad, to a new Code of Civil Procedure after I was called to the bar. In the interim, I had some difficulty understandin…
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Mr. Speaker, encouraging more women to join the House of Commons is about more than just voting. I think we have to look at the bigger picture. The Bloc Québécois had the novel idea of allowing members of its caucus with young children to sit only from Tuesday to Thursday. That allows them to spend more time in their riding, not to work in the riding, but to spend time with their children. The ren…
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Mr. Speaker, it is difficult for me to give an answer in just 30 seconds. I think we should not lose sight of the fact that the vagaries of the economy and the secession of Quebec from Canada should not be assessed in terms of the GDP alone. There are many other issues that must be taken into consideration such as border control and, as my colleague mentioned yesterday, supply management, which su…
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Mr. Speaker, I will once again take this opportunity to mention supply management, the jewel in our crown, which should ensure that agriculture is not negotiable in the different trade agreements. We hope that is also the case for culture and certain services. Once it becomes independent after a successful referendum, Quebec will be able to have its way in future international negotiations.
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Mr. Speaker, epidemiologists are sounding the alarm. The only way to control the pandemic is to ensure that most Quebeckers are vaccinated before COVID-19 variants spread across Quebec. Ontario public health officials revealed yesterday that not only is the British variant already well established, but it is expected to become the most widespread strain in the province by March. That is very bad n…
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Mr. Speaker, the bad news just keeps piling on. First we were told there would be no Pfizer doses this week. Then we were told there would be 50% less than expected after that. Then we were told there would actually be 70% fewer doses. The government keeps saying that it can still meet its targets for March, but of course people are losing faith. We currently rank 20th in the world in terms of vac…
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The hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé.
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The member for Berthier—Maskinongé on a point of order.
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To answer the hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé's question, I am being told that we have 16 minutes remaining. The hon. member for St. Albert—Edmonton.
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Mr. Speaker, I have the pleasure to rise today to speak to Bill C-18. I would like to begin by saying that I was particularly interested in two aspects of the process for passing this bill. The first is the way the Standing Committee on International Trade had to do its work with regard to the bill to bring CUKTCA into force. The second part of my speech will focus more on the historic aspect of t…
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Mr. Speaker, yes, I remember it well. I would of course be surprised if someone told me the day after winning a referendum that absolutely nothing would change, that it would be as if the vote never happened and that no negotiations were needed. After all, if we want to make an omelette we have to break a few eggs. However, I think it would be a case of just minor economic disruptions, not catastr…
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