Government Orders
Mr. Chair, does the minister want to capture potential differential interest rate savings between capital and operational financing?
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Mr. Chair, that was a very specific question. Is the minister capturing differential interest rate savings?
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Mr. Chair, given what we have witnessed here tonight, where should Canadians get the confidence that Canada will maintain its AAA rating?
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Mr. Chair, Canada's debt-to-GDP ratio has risen from 2014's 80.5% to 110.8% in 2024, the largest increase in the G7. When does the minister project a balanced budget?
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Mr. Chair, the Liberals say they want to supercharge our economy, yet they are responsible for continued trade irritants with the Americans. Is the minister aware of the existence for 70 years of the binationally governed and binationally funded Great Lakes Fishery Commission?
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Mr. Chair, the answer is we cannot find it in the main estimates. We can find, however, on one line, the International Joint Commission because it flows through the Global Affairs budget. Does the minister agree, supported by independent legal opinion, that flowing funds from the Canadian treasury through the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to the fishery commission and then having the Departme…
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Mr. Chair, is the minister aware of the internationally governed and internationally funded International Joint Commission?
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Mr. Chair, public debt-servicing charges are forecast to increase from this year's $46.7 billion to $49.2 billion, then up to $55 billion by 2029. Are these projections based on a stable interest rate?
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Mr. Chair, that is an excellent answer. I will come back to that. Where would one find in the main estimates how much money flowed to the Great Lakes Fishery Commission?
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Mr. Chair, the Great Lakes Fishery Commission is binationally funded through your treasury. Are you aware of it?
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Mr. Speaker, as this is my first substantive opportunity to rise in this Parliament, I want to thank the residents of Chatham-Kent—Leamington for the honour once again. By population, it is now the second-largest riding in Canada, and summer in Chatham-Kent—Leamington is a special experience. Whether camping and boating on Lake St. Clair in Mitchell's Bay or frequenting the beaches and birdwatchin…
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Mr. Speaker, with the extended prorogation period and then an election campaign, I found myself missing some things about this place, and other things not so much. Earlier in the day, there was a 20-minute intervention by my friend, the member for Winnipeg North. I did listen to his intervention, and I gathered from those 20 minutes that the Liberal Party supported the consumer-facing carbon tax w…
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Madam Speaker, it is good to see you in the chair. As this is my first time rising in this chamber, I thank the constituents of Chatham-Kent—Leamington for allowing me this opportunity. As someone of Mennonite faith and heritage, I want to thank the member across the way for his references to the New Hamburg sale, the community and the community spirit. In fact, if someone in my community wanted a…
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Mr. Speaker, I move that the 26th report of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, presented on Friday, May 10, be concurred in. I am going to be splitting my time with my colleague and friend, the member for North Okanagan—Shuswap. Before I get into the substance of my remarks, and as we move to the end of this session, I want to extend Christmas greetings to my …
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Mr. Speaker, the substance of the issue is at the very heart of what we have spent two months doing here. We are talking about accountability. There was not accountability within the Department of Fisheries and Oceans in respecting the will of the chamber and transferring the funds from the Treasury to the international commission that was created by treaty. Canada was not living up to its obligat…
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Mr. Speaker, indeed, we have both received that award. While not a sitting member of that committee, I have certainly subbed in because this issue is so very important to me. Have we solved this issue? We have had indications that the government is going to transfer the machinery of government. What we have not seen yet is evidence that the monies are going to flow directly from the Treasury to th…
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Mr. Speaker, the issue of why it should retain so much control was actually raised by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, because it claimed it had a lot of influence on exactly the question that my hon. colleague from the Bloc raised. The reality is that the setting of fish quotas and access is a provincial jurisdiction and not done by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.
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Mr. Speaker, on the same question of privilege, I want to add first-hand testimony. I too was trying to access my office that morning. I was prevented access to the building by the Parliamentary Protective Service. I was intending to go to my office to meet with stakeholders. I did make my way around to the back, through the basement, and as previous interventions have outlined, a number of stakeh…
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I rise on the same point of order, Madam Speaker. “A promise, not a threat,” is what I just heard in the background as well. It is a pattern of behaviour, a pattern of threats. Again, at the foreign affairs committee yesterday, the leader of the NDP threatened every member for voting and then misrepresented the motion. It is the same pattern of behaviour.
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Madam Speaker, the collective western history of wealth creation has largely followed the history of energy densification. What do I mean? First, we cooked our food and kept ourselves warm with wood and then charcoal, followed by coal, fossil fuels. We now have today's options of nuclear and there are tomorrow's possibilities of hydrogen, etc. Each progressive fuel is denser and has less of an env…
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Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour and a pleasure to bring the voices of Chatham-Kent—Leamington to this chamber. My colleague before me lamented the fact that he had to speak twice on this. I will add to the lament, as this is my third time rising, because the government is not listening to ordinary Canadians as they are represented in this chamber. Before I get into the substance of my speech, …
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Mr. Speaker, yes, there were 186. I think the fear is that this is just the tip of the iceberg, once all of the documents have been provided. I have been fortunate in my life to be part of several different organizations. What really, truly, is a fact, is that the culture of an organization often comes from the leadership shown at the top. There are 186 conflicts of interest here. I did not have t…
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Mr. Speaker, the member for Winnipeg North used the word “contempt”.
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Mr. Speaker, yes, Canada does need to build an awful lot of housing. We have our own ideas about that as well. However, the topic of discussion today is actually the sustainability development fund. If the member was listening to my speech, he heard that this is where we could be investing and making our processes more efficient to provide fuels to the world in a way that actually addresses the cl…
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Mr. Speaker, when we talk about coal, we have to be very careful about whether we are talking about metallurgical coal or thermal coal. They are two different entities. Metallurgical coal goes into the production of steel. We need steel. Ideally, we would be making more Canadian steel. As I said in my speech, the progression of technologies through the densification of energy and their resultant l…
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Mr. Speaker, there are so many ways I could go in response. Let us start with trees. The government has addressed climate change by planting two billion trees. I would ask every member with a phone here to go to Google and ask, “How many trees does Canada have?” The government's plan to address climate change was to plant two billion trees. It is nowhere close to that, but it wants to add two bill…
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With regard to the former chair of the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority (WDBA) Board of Directors, Tim Murphy, leaving his post to become Executive Vice President and Chief Strategic Affairs Officer at Aecon: (a) was there a conflict-of-interest process put in place by the WDBA, and did it include a ban preventing Tim Murphy from engaging in further dealings with the WDBA; and (b) if so, what were…
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Mr. Speaker, there are several things I do support. I have spent time in food security, and I support food security for Canadians and indeed for all peoples of the world. I am trying to remember what the other question was. I support my colleagues who have done great work with the indigenous files as well, and the next government will actually have bold and innovative plans to deal with reconcilia…
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Mr. Speaker, he said, “borderline contempt”. Even Richard Nixon turned over the tapes, and then he resigned. Is that why we are not seeing the documents? Is that why the government is standing in contempt of Parliament and of the Speaker's office? The government needs to turn over the documents.
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With regard to the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority: (a) what was the final contract value paid to CIMA+ for their work on the Gordie Howe International Bridge project; and (b) what was the date of each payment made to CIMA+?
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Mr. Speaker, on this question of privilege, the Conservative Party would like to review the points raised, come back to the House and express our opinions on it in due course.
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Madam Speaker, Sun Qian has been imprisoned by the People's Republic of China. She is a practitioner of Falun Gong, which is the traditional Chinese spiritual discipline of meditation, exercise and moral teachings based on the principles of truthfulness, compassion and tolerance. Tens of thousands of such practitioners have been imprisoned, and Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting has sponsored…
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Mr. Speaker, the member referenced that a game is being played. Let us end the game. There are two ways to do so. Power resides on that side of the House. If the Liberals hand over the documents, the game will be ended. If they do not want to do that and are afraid of foreign interference, let us go back to Canadians. Let us have an election. We are prepared to end the game and continue the work o…
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Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to bring to the House the voices of Chatham-Kent—Leamington, in particular those of your sister-in-law and your brother, whom I thank for his service to our country and to our community. Recently I spoke to the amended privilege motion regarding the SDTC scandal, or as it is better known as now, the green slush fund. Today we are speaking to the subamendment to…
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Mr. Speaker, that is why I tried to relate some of the terms in my intervention to what so many Canadians are struggling with, be they young or otherwise. What is the equivalent value in the form of groceries of the money being corrupted away? Absolutely, responsibility, especially responsibility to fiscal management of taxpayer resources, needs to come back to the House. Often in round tables at …
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Mr. Speaker, “cornucopia” is another good one. I asked where the accountability is. Indeed, the witnesses should be compelled to come before the committee to provide Canadians with the documents and the answers they seek. Since my first intervention, I have not gotten a satisfactory response to the question I asked: Where is the accountability? I will therefore continue along in the similar line o…
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Mr. Speaker, I was not here then. I am part of the proud 2019 cohort. I will head off a question from across the way. I do not need any help in the other legislation being debated that has come up in earlier interventions. I look forward to having an election now. To the question that was asked, let us put accountability back to the Canadian people. Anyone who has breached ethics, shown corruption…
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Mr. Speaker, I do not understand the party in fourth place in this Parliament. It wants to represent Canadians and says it is working for Canadians, yet it has missed so much time in this chamber. It has missed 24 shifts while we are doing this. I cannot understand why the New Democrats are propping up the government. They say they are not going to prop it up, but they prop it up and do not come t…
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Mr. Speaker, I just checked through my notes and do not recall speaking about foreign interference. I thought I was talking about generalized corruption. However, I do not mind addressing the question. Will I take on some responsibility here? Absolutely. I am going to work very hard so the Leader of Opposition becomes the Prime Minister of Canada. Then he will receive these briefings without any c…
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Mr. Speaker, I rise today to shed a public spotlight on what Canadians are already feeling in their wallets. The “food professor”, Sylvain Charlebois of Dalhousie University, has forecast that inflationary pressures, including the carbon tax, on the growing, processing and transporting of food will increase the cost of wholesale food for Canadians by 34% by 2025. Food affordability is becoming out…
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Mr. Speaker, I was not complete and I acknowledge that. I forgot Frank Baylis and the respirators. My colleague mentioned carbon tax Carney. I also did not mention carbon tax Carney. I must give my hon. colleague credit. For a week, he has been responding with the same arguments that have been disproven over and over again. He mentioned former prime minister Stephen Harper and the Senate scandal, …
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Mr. Speaker, first of all, I do want to acknowledge that we on this side of the House do want to govern. We do want to bring fiscal accountability and common sense and trust back into the stewardship of our government finances. I will take the member at his word that he also will support efforts to bring back trusted stewardship to public finances and to get to the bottom of all of these scandals.…
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Mr. Speaker, the question is in a similar vein as the one the member's colleague asked. What the member is asking for are proper processes with proper oversight and proper accountability. Absent in the government has been any sort of government ministerial accountability. Should there be proper processes in place so funds are not misappropriated? I absolutely, fully agree with that. I can count on…
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Mr. Speaker, if my memory serves me correctly, and this is going back a week or more, the Speaker's ruling was to turn over all the documents. We are here because the government has not turned over all the documents. That is the business of the House and the business of the loyal opposition. We do want justice for Canadian taxpayers. We are not directing the RCMP what to do with those documents; t…
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Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour and a pleasure to bring your sister-in-law's voice to the chamber, along with the voices of all the other constituents from Chatham-Kent—Leamington. The Speaker has made a ruling that House business must be suspended until the government hands over all documents related to the SDTC scandal to the RCMP. The Auditor General of Canada found that the Prime Minister …
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Mr. Speaker, I do so retract. As The Economic Times reported at the time, “[So-and-so's] time in India was criticised for its lack of official business, not to mention the excessive photo-ops and insensitive overuse of Indian clothing.” Canadians were once again on the hook for what appeared to be more of a lavish family vacation than a diplomatic bilateral meeting. The fiasco included having his …
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Mr. Speaker, I have been admonished by the Speaker for being too long-winded, so let me just say yes, but—
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Mr. Speaker, I am going to crawl into the DeLorean for a moment. There have been a number of references to the sponsorship scandal as a marker or a comparator. If I recall that era, a former Liberal cabinet minister, David Dingwall, stated, “I'm entitled to my entitlements.” Is that what is going on here? Has this now been extended to government appointees, not just to cabinet ministers and prime …
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With regard to the awarding of the contract to CIMA+ for the site pre-engineering contract, of which one project included the bury of the transmission and distribution lines on the construction of the Gordie Howe International Bridge project: (a) why was CIMA+ chosen to replace the original design consultant Stantec for the Gordie Howe International Bridge pre-engineering contract; (b) if CIMA+ wa…
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