Government Orders
Madam Chair, there is no category for cultural genocide. Genocide is genocide. We cannot classify genocide. It falls under the UN Genocide Convention. Forcefully removing children from one group to another group, I would say, meets all the criteria that classify a genocide, although some argue with that. If we want to reconcile in this country then we need to own the truth. We cannot continue to m…
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Madam Chair, survivors, families and communities were shaken once again by the discovery of 215 children in unmarked graves in Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc at the Kamloops Indian Residential School: the largest school in the Indian Affairs residential school system. I want to extend my sympathies to the community, survivors and families. I lift you up today and every day. Unfortunately, this tragedy is …
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Mr. Chair, we have spoken a lot in the House lately about the impacts of systemic racism, particularly against indigenous peoples. Joyce Echaquan is an example of how systemic racism resulted in death, the same as the deaths that resulted from the genocide against indigenous children at residential schools. I wonder if my hon. colleague acknowledges that what happened in residential schools, and w…
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Mr. Chair, it is a privilege to ask a question in the House. The Prime Minister spoke a lot about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, but his government has been slow to act, including on calls to action 71 to 76. Also, in the midst of this debate, the government is fighting St. Anne's Indian Residential School survivors in court. It is a violent act that people who underwent the most genocid…
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Mr. Speaker, sitting here in the debate for a number of days now, and having to listen to the level of transphobia coming from the Conservatives, has been really disturbing. I would like to point out that the member tells stories that certainly fit her values, but she does not seem to acknowledge the many other stories that have been told. I wonder why the member continues to oppose something that…
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Mr. Speaker, once again residential school survivors, families and nations are mourning with the news of 215 children found buried in a mass grave at Kamloops Indian Residential School. In response to this tragedy, the UBC Indian Residential School History and Dialogue Centre is calling on the federal government to make immediate investments to assist nations in locating children who never returne…
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Madam Speaker, it is so unfortunate to hear my colleague make statements and quotes like “sexual behaviour counselling,” as if there is something inherently wrong in an individual living as who they are. I am curious to know why my colleague violently opposes this fundamental human right and continues to utilize stereotypes and language that certainly do not help with the identity of people in the…
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Madam Speaker, the government promised a 50% reduction in the average cost of child care by the end of 2022 and an average cost of $10 a day by 2025 and 2026. As we know, there is tremendous variation regionally and from city to city, so averages do not ensure affordability for all. We know the cost of living varies across the country. The government also did not explicitly tie the federal funding…
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Mr. Speaker, I want to expand on the comments of my hon. colleague. Manitoba is in a dire situation, with 23 people being sent out of province to ICUs, one who perished. Many are workers without paid sick leave. They are essential workers who have put their lives on the line. Some still have not been given proper immigration status. Could my hon. colleague expand on that?
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Mr. Speaker, the budget had no line for investment in, for example, VIA Rail. We know Greyhound is in the tank. These are critical and vital transportation links, particularly for remote communities. Many seniors, for example, use the bus and rail. I wonder if my colleague is supportive of making massive investments in VIA Rail and Greyhound?
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Madam Speaker, I would like to pick up on some comments that my hon. colleague made, in terms of provincial and federal mismanagement. I have mentioned before years of consecutive Liberal and Conservative cuts to health care. In Manitoba, we are in a crisis. In fact, our ICUs are so full that patients are now being sent to Ontario: five to Thunder Bay, two to Ottawa, two to Sault Ste. Marie, two t…
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Madam Speaker, budget 2021 does nothing for dental care. It does nothing in terms of going after offshore tax havens. The member talks about the climate emergency, but the budget does nothing to end fossil fuel subsidies. This is concerning, because who is going to pay for it? It is certainly not big oil or big corporations. It is people. Why is the burden of this debt going to be placed on people…
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Madam Speaker, the pandemic has exposed the flaws in our health care system, whether it is in vaccine supply or quantity or the quality of our long-term care facilities. Health care workers and seniors particularly have suffered direct consequences of years of underfunding to health care services under consecutive Liberal and Conservative governments, yet the budget announces no increased health c…
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Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague spoke a lot about being there for Canadians, particularly vulnerable Canadians. I disagree with that and I will give an example. In Winnipeg Centre, trench fever is a disease of extreme poverty not seen for 100 years. They have tried to work with the health minister on this health crisis. There was no response. It is an example of how the government is not here for…
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Mr. Speaker, nobody wants an election. I think we can agree on the fact that nobody wants an election. Certainly, in Winnipeg Centre, rather than looking to an election, I am still focused very much on trying to keep people in my riding alive. I am focused on making sure they have what they need, now that we are on complete lockdown and many families have lost their complete income during the pand…
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Madam Speaker, I find it peculiar that this member holds indigenous people to higher standards for democracy, with every indigenous person having to agree to pass anything. If we were held to the same standards, we would never have another government in Canada. My question relates to international trade law. As the member is aware, international trade law obligations require us to divulge any risk…
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my friend and colleague across the way for his tireless work in the previous Parliament to see this almost realized. I was really pleased to see Bill C-15 amended to include paragraph 18, to include the constitutional principle of the living tree doctrine, which confirms that aboriginal and treaty rights evolve and grow over time. As I mentioned at committee, I…
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Madam Speaker, it is almost like a hamster wheel. I hear this debate go on and on. This bill does not in any way imply that there is a veto. A veto is an absolute concept in law, whereas free, prior and informed consent requires one to consider all the facts and the law in any given circumstance and situation. I would agree with the testimony we heard at committee from Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond whe…
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Madam Speaker, it is an honour to rise today to speak to Bill C-15, an act respecting the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. I cannot reiterate strongly enough that this bill is long overdue. Canada was built on the violent dispossession of the lands and resources of indigenous peoples. It is the kind of violence and genocide that we see perpetrated against indigenous …
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Mr. Speaker, last week the government opened 50,000 permanent residency spots for essential workers, but the minister excluded many from applying, including refugee claimants, undocumented workers and many other temporary foreign workers. Essential workers in Winnipeg Centre and throughout Canada deserve better. They put their lives at risk every day. Why does the minister perpetuate a two-tiered …
Read full speech →Statements By Members
Mr. Speaker, today I wish to honour one of my heroes, my niece Hannah Turner. Hannah is a leader, courageous, kind, loving, wise, and at only 18 years of age, she has continued to rise in spite of uncontrollable life circumstances, losing her father at age 11, and supporting her mother, my courageous sister Sarah Gazan, through two bouts of breast cancer. She is a basketball star, an A-plus studen…
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Mr. Speaker, a national action plan to implement the calls to justice in response to the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls is almost two years late, and every time I try to get an update from the minister she tells me she is working on it. Another woman goes missing or murdered: “I'm working on it.” A girl goes missing, leaving her family searching for their lov…
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Mr. Speaker, I would agree with my hon. colleague that this started with the Conservatives gutting our ability to produce our own vaccines. Now we find ourselves in this situation. In my riding of Winnipeg Centre, we have a number of individuals who are not sheltered. As we know in Ontario, if we do not look after everybody in the circle, we are all at risk. I have been really concerned about the …
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Madam Speaker, anti-lockdown, anti-mask and anti-vaccine activists across the country have been reported to have direct and indirect ties to the far right. This issue is not just about access to vaccine. This is also about vaccine hesitancy that is being caused by these far-right groups. Entire communities are choosing not to be vaccinated, in part due to the efforts of these movements in promotin…
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Mr. Speaker, I heard a lot today certainly about the minister being the daughter of a steelworker. I also come from a family and a father who were in strong support of unions, who taught me not to be a scab, not to turn our backs on workers fighting for their rights. This seems to be a pattern with the current government. I will give an example: 2018, the postal workers, and putting in emergency l…
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Madam Speaker, it is unfortunate, particularly on this important National Day of Mourning, that the government is pushing back-to-work legislation and violating the rights of workers. This is really an unfortunate step, and it is certainly another indication of how the government privileges its corporate friends over even the rights of workers. I am wondering why the government, knowing all of thi…
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Mr. Speaker, if you seek it, I believe you will find unanimous consent for the following motion: That, in the opinion of the House, the government should introduce legislation and work with provincial and territorial governments and indigenous peoples to ensure that a guaranteed livable basic income (1) accounting for regional differences in living costs; (2) for all Canadians over the age of 18, …
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Mr. Speaker, the government is almost two years late releasing a national action plan to uphold the calls for justice of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. What do we see? Internal emails showing a continuation of a fragmented, uncoordinated response by the RCMP, a failure to address call for justice 9.5. COVID is not an excuse. Indigenous women and girls an…
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Madam Speaker, while the Liberal government fails to go after the ultra wealthy and those profiteering off the pandemic, it is choosing to go after individuals living in poverty who accepted the CERB payment, often due to lack of clarity by the government when it rolled out the program. This is an action that will result in members of his riding of Winnipeg North and my riding of Winnipeg Centre e…
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Madam Speaker, I work with my hon. colleague on the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities, where we just finished a housing study. In regard to housing, I know he talked about home ownership. One of the things we just reviewed was the urgent need for affordable, accessible social housing, particularly for indigenous people …
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
With regard to the compliance monitoring of the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy since its inception, broken down by level of risk of non-compliance with tax laws and by industry sector: (a) how many applications have been (i) approved, (ii) denied; (b) of the applications in (a), how many companies have a subsidiary or subsidiaries domiciled in foreign jurisdictions of concern as defined by the Cana…
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With regard to the payment of a one-off sum of up to $300 per child and the subsequent temporary change in the formula for calculating the Canada Child Benefit: (a) has the government assessed the additional number of families who would receive the payment whose net family income is above the threshold established in the previous formula, and if so, what is the result of this assessment; (b) has t…
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Madam Speaker, what we have learned during the pandemic is that, when we do not look after all people and when we fail to address social inequality and inequities, we place the whole population at risk. People are falling through the cracks. We know this. It is exacerbating the severity of the pandemic. This includes seniors, yet the Liberal government let their rich friends off the hook and chose…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, after 28 years of broken promises, the Liberal government announced plans to invest $30 billion into a national child care program. Today, I want to thank organizations such as Child Care Now and the Child Care Coalition of Manitoba for their efforts in this long fight; however, I am not holding my breath. It has been 28 years since the Liberal government promised a national childcare…
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Mr. Speaker, last week, the member for Winnipeg North sponsored a charter-violating petition for Mr. Tataryn, former president of the Manitoba Liberal Party and retired police officer, who is attempting to limit any criticism of police by making changes to the Criminal Code. The member claimed to support the petition in spirit, but according to parliamentary records, the member also supported the …
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Mr. Speaker, I agree with her, we absolutely need to protect people's data. I have the same sorts of concerns with the current government. I had the same concerns with the former Conservative government, as well, because it also failed to act and now people's private information is getting out in droves. Could the member respond to that?
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Madam Speaker, it provides us with another legal tool that we can use to protect indigenous rights in this country, which include treaties, international law, domestic law and indigenous law. It provides us with another legal tool we can use to affirm our rights. It does not take away from or impact our rights, it affirms the application of the minimum human rights standards articulated in UNDRIP …
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Mr. Speaker, it is such an honour to rise today to speak to this very important bill. I would like to start with commending all those who spent so many decades drafting the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the grassroots, leadership and civil society groups that have brought us here today. I would also like to thank those who introduced bills in support of the imp…
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Madam Speaker, I would like to say that indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, allies, need to unite. We need to unite. The bill is not perfect. It requires amendments, but it is a starting point. We need to stop fighting against ensuring that indigenous peoples have minimum human rights in this country and finally realize human rights for all.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to remind the House that Canada has signed on to international human rights obligations. We are signatories to human rights in the international community, yet the government has wilfully and intentionally violated the minimum human rights of indigenous peoples. We know indigenous peoples in this country, as a result of human rights violations, were already behind and w…
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Madam Speaker, it is important to recognize that there has been a normalization in this country of violating the rights of indigenous peoples, as we have seen globally. We need to move beyond decision-making that is made only when it suits our economic and political interests and brushing it aside when it does not. Human rights are human rights. Human rights are a non-partisan issue and need to be…
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Mr. Speaker, it concerns me because we had the first half of debate for second reading a couple of months ago yet the government continues to stall debate, and now once again we are forced into time allocation. I am wondering why the government has put off this bill knowing that in the last session of Parliament this bill ended up not being passed through the Senate because it did not have enough …
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Mr. Speaker, going back to my last point, the government promised to put forward the bill last year. Now, in the eleventh hour, it is being forced to put in a time allocation. I question if the bill really is a priority for the current government in the way that Liberals keep pushing the date back. We are in the eleventh hour. We are now putting in place a time allocation. I wonder how sincere the…
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With regard to Canada’s Poverty Reduction Strategy and the target of 20 per cent reduction in poverty from the base year of 2015: has the government met its target, and, if not, by how much has the poverty rate in 2020 fallen from the base year of 2015?
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Madam Speaker, my colleague mentioned how difficult the pandemic has been on families. The National Union of Public and General Employees has called on us to put in place a national child care system for Canada that is accessible, affordable and high quality. This means investing in a national workforce strategy, ensuring that people have professional wages and so on. Does the member's party suppo…
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague who spoke about how the Conservatives introduced the child tax benefit, a benefit with a discriminatory structure for families with precarious immigration status, including refugee claimants, who are prevented from accessing this critical benefit even if they are legally working and filing personal income tax. The recommendation from the Campaig…
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Mr. Speaker, in 1970, a national child care system was recommended by the Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada. Moving forward to 1993, the Liberals, in their platform, promised a national child care strategy. We have now been waiting 28 years for something that has been called for by child care workers across the country. How critical is it for the Liberal government to address this …
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Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the families of MMIWG2S, survivors of violence and advocates who have been fighting for years to see Velma’s House open in Winnipeg Centre this Friday. Velma’s House, named after the late elder Velma Orvis, who was a tireless supporter and advocate for women, girls and two-spirits, is a 24-7 low-barrier safe space that will be open 365 days a year to provide safety, com…
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Madam Speaker, it seems that the Liberal government moves swiftly on things like pipelines, but when we are talking about life-and-death matters related to seniors, there is nothing stopping the federal government right now from putting in place national standards and ending for-profit care for seniors across the country. As for the money aspect, when we are talking about people who have perished …
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Madam Speaker, I agree. Disability organizations from across the country have been very clear. They are denied their basic human rights every day, such as the right to adequate housing and health support. When we are talking about long-term care, we must first of all take profit out of long-term care, but that also needs to be coupled with an expansion of community-based care, such as home care to…
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