Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I would simply say in response that I think the more pressing issue to protect our political process and our democracy is for the government to expeditiously and forthwith implement the foreign influence transparency registry, which I think would counteract the single biggest threat to our democracy, which is Beijing's foreign interference.
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague's question allows me to point out in greater detail that the Canadian government was not as successful in negotiating this trade agreement with Indonesia as the United Arab Emirates or the European Union were. The United Arab Emirates secured a 10% price preference in Indonesian procurement tenders and enhanced access for U.A.E. businesses to Indonesian government pr…
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Mr. Speaker, Canadians elected a minority government, and Conservatives fully respect the democratic will of the electorate. That is why, as His Majesty's loyal official opposition, we will carry out our constitutional responsibilities within the House. On some matters, we will oppose the government as the official opposition, which is a constitutionally mandated role in a Westminster parliamentar…
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Mr. Speaker, this is not a new approach. I enumerated five bills that we already supported in the last year of this Parliament, Bill S-2, Bill S-3, Bill C-4, Bill C-5, Bill C-12, and now, in addition to that, Bill C-14 and the bill that is now in front of the House, Bill C-18. We have been supporting some pieces of legislation to move ahead. The government would like to present a narrative that th…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, Beijing's foreign interference is the biggest threat to the security of Canada; that is what the Prime Minister told Canadians last spring. Less than a year later, the Prime Minister has entered into a so-called strategic partnership with Beijing, yet we still have no foreign influence transparency registry. When the bill was being debated, the government said it hoped to have the reg…
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question about importing goods made with forced labour. That is a major problem. I think the crux of the problem is this. Canadian law bans the importation of products produced from forced labour. This was first agreed to in the Canada-U.S.-Mexico trade agreement and then, subsequently, implemented in Canadian law. Importing products into Canada via forced…
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Mr. Speaker, the last budget, of two years ago, had a fiscal anchor of a deficit of less than 1% of GDP in future years and constantly declining debt-to-GDP ratios in subsequent years. This budget has a fiscal anchor of deficits averaging 2% of GDP over the next number of years and a rising debt-to GDP ratio. Will the finance minister confirm that his fiscal anchor is weaker than the last finance …
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Mr. Speaker, it is inexplicable that the government did not use the leverage it had in this situation to advocate for and get a deal for the some 120,000 Canadians who are receiving an unindexed U.K. pension. I want to thank my colleague for raising that question in the House. It is inexplicable. For much of the past 20 years, there was no opportunity to use leverage with the United Kingdom govern…
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Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my hon. colleague from York—Durham. For most of Canada's history, the United Kingdom was Canada's largest trading partner. As late as 1941, the United Kingdom, not the United States, was Canada's largest export market. For those watching who wish to find this data, I found it in a Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce publication entitled “Canada'…
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Mr. Speaker, I agree that not all the problems are related to the tax system. Part of the problem has to do with our rules around ports and commercial infrastructure. We are facing a major challenge when it comes to increasing our exports to Europe and Asia because of the lack of port capacity in places like Montreal, Halifax and Vancouver. Forestry products, for example, compete with other export…
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Mr. Speaker, I will reply to the hon. member's question by simply repeating the facts, which were obtained from Statistics Canada. Canada's exports, expressed as a percentage of our GDP, were 44% of our GDP in the year 2000. They were 32% of our GDP in the year 2024. By any analysis, that is a precipitous drop.
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, in the last election, during the debate, the Prime Minister was asked to name the biggest threat to the security of Canada. He answered in one word: “China”. Now the foreign affairs minister is talking about a strategic partnership with Beijing, including security. These two things seem contradictory. Can the minister reconcile these two things, or is this another example of the Prime…
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Mr. Speaker, another question about what the Prime Minister called the biggest threat to the security of Canada relates to foreign interference. In the last election, some candidates were vetoed for interference and others were targeted, and millions of Canadians continue to live in fear because of threats from foreign interference. The foreign influence transparency registry was passed into law l…
Read full speech →Private Members' Business
Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from the Bloc Québécois for bringing this bill forward. I think it will give us an opportunity to talk about the treaty process here in Canada and in the House of Commons. The first multilateral treaty negotiated and signed by Canada was the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. The first bilateral treaty negotiated and signed by Canada was the Halibut Treaty be…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, this year, in Wellington County, the Township of Puslinch celebrates its 175th anniversary. Older than Confederation, Puslinch was established in the Province of Canada in 1850 under the municipal corporations act of 1849, which had been introduced by the great ministry of Robert Baldwin and Louis-Hippolyte LaFontaine. Named after a place in England, the township is filled with histor…
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Mr. Speaker, not only did the statement post a $62 billion deficit, but also, it revised 2025 growth down, and it revised 2025 unemployment up. The Prime Minister has failed to recognize the gravity of the moment. He is focused not on Canadians, but on himself. His government is in utter and complete chaos. When will the Prime Minister realize that the end is here, that his government and this Par…
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Mr. Speaker, who is in charge of the clattering train? The Prime Minister has lost the confidence of Canadians, and now he has lost the confidence of his MPs and his cabinet. He is focused not on Canadians, but on himself as he clings to power. Yesterday, the government posted a $62 billion deficit, blowing through the guardrails. The government is careening out of control. Things are in complete …
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Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has lost control. He has lost control of the economy. He has lost control of immigration. He has lost control of so many files. He has now lost control of the government. It is long past time for an election. The Prime Minister has sat too long here for any good that he has been doing. In the name of God, will he go to Rideau Hall, call an election and end the chaos…
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Mr. Speaker, the Globe also reports that the finance minister and the Prime Minister are “at odds” over all this new spending. It reports that the Prime Minister's Office has viewed the finance minister as “ineffective” at communicating. It also stated that a senior Liberal said that the current dynamic appears to be similar to what happened to Bill Morneau before he resigned in 2020. John Turner …
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Mr. Speaker, the Finance Minister said that the government would not crash through the deficit guardrail. The Globe and Mail reports today that all the Prime Minister's new spending is upending the deficit target and that finance officials view it as “unwise” and “making little sense.” Tonight, we vote on $24.8 billion in new spending. Will the Finance Minister tell us why we should vote for somet…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Madam Speaker, Reverend Peter Barrow passed away at age 92. He was the beloved husband of Carol and the devoted father of Trish, Jane and Maggie, as well as the cherished brother of Margaret. Reverend Barrow served as minister of Knox Presbyterian Church in Georgetown and Limehouse Presbyterian Church in Limehouse for 32 years. A lifetime member of the Masonic Lodge, Reverend Barrow was Georgetown…
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Mr. Speaker, it has been eight months since fiscal year end. How are we supposed to vote on billions in spending and taxation without the deficit number? Speculation is that the government has blown through its fiscal anchor despite the finance minister promising that “This is our fiscal anchor—a line we shall not cross, and that will ensure that our finances remain sustainable so long as it remai…
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Mr. Speaker, here is what Stephen Poloz, the past governor of the Bank of Canada, said just two days ago, “I would say we're in a recession, I wouldn’t even call it a technical one.” The past governor says that we are in a recession and the current deputy governor of the bank says that it is an emergency. When will the government start listening to the experts and understand that its policies on i…
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Madam Speaker, the government did not answer my earlier question on a very serious issue, so I will ask it again. U.S. border patrol released alarming data. CBS Boston reports that 155 suspects on the terror watch-list were encountered on the southern U.S. border this year, but 361 suspects on the watch-list were arrested on the northern border, more than double the number. Now Canada is threatene…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, never has so much effort been put into renewing Parliament as has been over the past decade. Over $5 billion is being spent on renovating Parliament Hill. Centre Block, with its iconic Peace Tower, has been shuttered since December 2018 so that magnificent building can be restored. Tonnes of rock have been blasted out of the Canadian Shield. Some 40,000 truckloads of rock have been …
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Madam Speaker, the Constitution of Canada is the only constitution we have in Canada. It may not be perfect, but it is all we have. That is the reality. We are therefore going to respect the Canadian Constitution. In my opinion, the Constitution has a lot of issues. Maybe we will be able to improve it in the future, but we have to respect the Canadian Constitution, because the rule of law is a fun…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, I go back to the 1991 case during the government of then prime minister Brian Mulroney, where the government of the day said that it was not going to hand over the documents related to the Solicitor General because of privacy concerns. The House ordered the documents be handed over, and the government complied at the following meeting of the Standing Committee on Justice and the Sol…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, quite simply, it is because the Treasury Board Secretariat's policy on government security would require the leader to sign a certificate or an undertaking to not reveal any information to anyone else under threat of criminal prosecution. This is a security clearance process that the Prime Minister himself has not gone through. That is why the leader of the official opposition has s…
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Madam Speaker, last month, National Bank said, “GDP per capita has fallen by around 4.0% cumulatively since 2022, which is unprecedented outside a recession.” Now the economy is threatened with 25% tariffs, which the Canadian Chamber of Commerce says could shrink Canada's GDP by another 2.6%. The bigger decline in GDP would come from the government's policies, not from potential tariffs. That is b…
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Madam Speaker, Statistics Canada just released data showing a sharp decline in per capita GDP last quarter. This is the sixth consecutive quarterly decline. This is a made-in-Canada, per capita recession caused by a government that stubbornly refuses to listen to everyone, from the Bank of Canada to private sector economists. When will the government start listening to the experts, heed common sen…
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Madam Speaker, that was a tax cut on consumption, not investment and income. The U.S. border patrol has released alarming data. CBS Boston reported on November 11 that a total of 155 suspects on the terror watch-list were encountered at the southern U.S. border in 2024, but double that number were encountered on the northern border and arrested, 361. Now Canada is threatened with 25% tariffs becau…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, in answer to the first question, the word “appears” is used, because the only restrictions on Parliament's absolute right to order the production of documents are that those documents be present in Canada, not extraterritorially, and that they exist. That is why they use the word “appears” in the previous sentence. With respect to the question about the U.K. case, it was a legal opi…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, the answer is simple. We do not believe that this information should be kept secret. It has to be made public so that, when the next election comes around, Canadians have the information they need to make an informed choice based on the contents of this report. We do not believe that this information should be secret. We believe that it should be made public. We believe that Canadia…
Read full speech →Emergency Debate
Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles. Let us go back 10 years ago, to 2014. On April 30, 2014, The New York Times published an article entitled “Life in Canada, Home of the World’s Most Affluent Middle Class.” The article stated that “median income in Canada appears to have surpassed median income in the United States, based on more than t…
Read full speech →Emergency Debate
Madam Speaker, the member is utterly wrong. Here is an analysis from National Bank Financial by Matthieu Arseneau and Alexandra Ducharme, from several weeks ago. They say, “Consequently, GDP per capita has fallen by around 4.0% cumulatively since 2022, which is unprecedented outside a recession.” Speaking of investments, I will quote the Governor of the Bank of Canada, Tiff Macklem, who was in fro…
Read full speech →Emergency Debate
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question and I note that he represents the former riding of the Right Hon. Paul Martin. I would like to respond by saying that it is clear that we need to attract domestic and international investment in the Canadian economy. We have to start by lowering taxes on investments. The government is doing exactly the opposite by taxing capital gains, which red…
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Madam Speaker, it is really important for Canada to ensure that our approach to climate change is integrated with that of the United States. Our economies are integrated, from autos to food manufacturing and from energy to services. We cannot have a regulatory environment here that is substantially different from that of the United States. It is really important that we ensure that there is a redo…
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Madam Speaker, on a quick point of order, I misquoted an Economist article title. I would like Hansard corrected so that the correct title of the article is in Hansard. The title of the article, dated September 30, 2024, was, “Why is Canada’s economy falling behind America’s? The country was slightly richer than Montana in 2019. Now it is just poorer than Alabama.”
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Mr. Speaker, there is an easy way for the government to end the filibuster in the House. In fact, there is only one way to end the filibuster and that is for the government to hand over the documents. I quote yesterday's Globe and Mail editorial entitled “A Parliament that is dead on the inside.” It reads: “There are a few ways this could end. But there is only one right way, and that is for the L…
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Mr. Speaker, I will quote another expert, relative to Canada's position with the United States. Last week the Governor of the Bank of Canada said, “foreign capital, even some Canadian capital, is going to the United States because they can get faster regulatory approvals.” Two years ago in Washington, the finance minister in her speech said, “Canada must—and will—show similar generosity in fast-tr…
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Mr. Speaker, there has been more bad news from experts. Last week, economists at National Bank released an analysis that said, “GDP per capita has fallen by around 4.0% cumulatively since 2022, which is unprecedented outside a recession”. This is a made-in-Canada, per person, per capita GDP recession caused by a government that has hiked taxes on everything: energy, housing, banks and investment. …
Read full speech →Emergency Debate
Mr. Speaker, I have seen no credible reports of the State of Israel's violating either international humanitarian law or customary international law. The number of civilians who have been, unfortunately, killed in this conflict is not an arbitrary determinant as to whether a state is complying with international law. I remind this House that the Allies during the Second World War killed 400,000 Ge…
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Mr. Speaker, the Bank of Canada has become the first central bank to cut rates because Canada has become the first leading economy to go through an economic contraction. Again, the Financial Times, for which the finance minister once worked, said, “Canada’s GDP per capita has been [shrinking] 0.4 per cent a year since 2020, the worst rate” for any developed economy in the top 50. Does the governme…
Read full speech →Emergency Debate
Mr. Speaker, I disagree with the premise of my hon. colleague's question. I have seen no credible reports that indicate the State of Israel has contravened international humanitarian law. I have also seen no credible reports that the State of Israel has violated customary international law—
Read full speech →Emergency Debate
Mr. Speaker, we have to do this because this is a major war between democracies and authoritarian states.
Read full speech →Emergency Debate
Mr. Speaker, since the Peace of Westphalia was concluded in 1648, the international system has developed into modern nation states and international law. In the almost 400 years since those treaties were established, the world has created nation states that conduct relations based on international law. That international system further developed after 1945, a period during which Canada was instrum…
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Mr. Speaker, of course Canada is a democracy but, at the same time, we are not perfect. We have plenty of problems. The same can be said of other democracies around the world, like Israel; it is not a perfect democracy. There are internal problems there, but it is not for us to speak to the issues that exist in other democracies. There are problems in the great democracy of southern North America,…
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Mr. Speaker, I am going to quote one of the world's most credible news organizations on financial and economic matters. A headline from the Financial Times of London on May 10, 2024, reads: “'Breakdown nations' like Canada have a lesson for the world: Canada leads nations which have suffered a sharp decline in per-capita GDP”. I have a simple question: Does the government agree that Canada leads n…
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Mr. Speaker, nine years ago, we warned the government about joining the Beijing-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and so did the Obama-Biden administration. Last year, news about the Chinese Communist Party's infiltration of the bank forced the government to initiate a boycott and to begin a review. The boycott has now been 15 months. Canada still has its shares and Beijing still has the n…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, the member has done a lot of very good work on the issue and at the public inquiry, and she rightfully points out something, which is that it has been reported that up to 10% or so of the documents the government has submitted for the second phase of the inquiry have been redacted and that other documents have been withheld from the public inquiry. After reading the NSICOP report of…
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