Orders of the Day
Mr. Speaker, the member for Dufferin—Caledon makes a great point. When I talk to my constituents back home or to any Canadians, when I meet them all across Canada, I hear that the NDP caucus has been singularly focused on one issue this fall. The New Democrats have been completely, 100%, working extremely hard on it. It has not been housing affordability. It has not been getting rid of the carbon …
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Mr. Speaker, I think the NDP leader will go as far as he needs to go. There is only a singular issue that the New Democrats could be counted on to vote for, and it is on behalf of not all Canadians, but one Canadian. They have been singularly focused on ensuring that their leader is eligible for that pension. No other Canadians in Canada believe anything they have to say. I would not be surprised …
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Mr. Speaker, this week we mark Yalda, an old Aramaic word marking Show Chilla Hanari. It marks the winter solstice, an ancient practice celebrated for thousands of years across Iran and surrounding states. It is also called pomegranate night by Kurds from Rojhelat. Yalda falls on the longest night of the year and symbolizes the renewal of light over darkness, a time for reflection and hope. Yet in…
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Mr. Speaker, on the day of the fall economic statement, the parliamentary secretary is again engaging in more talking points; the Liberals are in it for themselves. It is not us saying it. It is the now former deputy prime minister and finance minister, who suddenly resigned and shut the door. She said in her resignation letter, “They know when we are working for them, and they equally know when w…
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Of course, Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right. He read directly from the finance minister's resignation letter. The government is in complete free fall on the day of the fall economic statement, which the Liberals have been touting as a restart and the answer to all that ails them. The only things that ail them are their polling numbers, which are really the only thing that they are looki…
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Mr. Speaker, I was hoping that the parliamentary secretary would perhaps begin with less partisanship. This is quite a solemn day, with the Deputy Prime Minister now having resigned. I will note we are not playing politics; in fact, it is the member's government playing politics. In the same Deputy Prime Minister's resignation letter, we read, “They know when we are working for them, and they equa…
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Mr. Speaker, the member asks an interesting question. In fact, hundreds of millions of dollars were corruptly spent via the green slush fund, by appointees of the Liberal government. Hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes were taken away from constituents of mine and his as well, so they could be corruptly dispensed. We see the potential that, later today, the fall economic statement will show b…
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Mr. Speaker, the member said that the Prime Minister has failed, the Deputy Prime Minister has quit and the housing minister has quit. Still, when it comes time to vote on confidence in the government, we know that the member and his entire caucus will again vote to support a crumbling government.
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Mr. Speaker, I caught your eye right away so that I could rise and speak to this issue once again and raise matters that are of great importance to the residents of my riding, Calgary Shepard. They care about government accountability and the efforts of the government to continue to hide nearly 30,000 pages of blacked-out, redacted documents that the House and a majority of members of Parliament h…
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the Speaker for recognizing that fact. I was indeed there because I was hoping to be drawn with the high number so I could put forward another private member's bill, perhaps on the disability tax credit or on bereavement leave, which was something the House was able to agree on in Bill C-3, so let it not be shown that we cannot reach some type of accommodation. It actually hap…
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Madam Speaker, today, we are continuing to ask about the immigration levels plan. I want to draw the attention of the parliamentary secretary to annex 4, this loose-leaf piece of paper that was added to the annex. It was actually a separate document. There was a printed document and a bunch of loose-leaf pieces of paper from a photocopier. I want to draw the attention of the parliamentary secretar…
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Madam Speaker, the parliamentary secretary said that the border was secure. Perhaps he would like to comment on this headline from The Globe and Mail that reads, “Jordanian terror suspect deported from the U.S. had crossed the Canada-U.S. border illegally twice”. This person crossed illegally into Canada in 2017, made a refugee claim and was rejected for that refugee claim at the same refugee bord…
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Madam Speaker, I thank the member from Quebec for that great question. That is exactly what the Premier of Alberta did. She said that Alberta's provincial police forces were ready to step in and ensure border control, since the federal government seemed incapable of enforcing the law, exercising its power or resolving threats along our border. It has also failed to stop organized criminals from br…
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Madam Speaker, as I was saying, I am talking about report 8: “Pandemic Preparedness, Surveillance, and Border Control Measures”. The border control measures are the most important and are of great interest to me, because today is an opposition supply day. We now know, both from public media reports and from statements by the incoming U.S. administration that will be swearing its oath next month, t…
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Madam Speaker, as we were so rudely interrupted by the member for New Westminster—Burnaby, allow me the opportunity to rise and speak on behalf of the residents of the riding of Calgary Shepard on the eighth report of the public accounts committee, for which I was briefly the chair. The report is entitled “Pandemic Preparedness, Surveillance—
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Madam Speaker, there were 26% more border guards between 2006 and 2015. There were 1,000 more FTE employees; the member did not hear that. There was a 45% higher budget between 2006 and 2015. Most importantly, it is the New Democrat member and his party, which kept supporting the Liberal government, that have led to the crisis of today. What really breaks Parliament is when an opposition party los…
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Madam Speaker, the member needs to understand that between 2006 and 2015 there was a 45% increase to CBSA's budget. There were 1,000 more full-time equivalent employees at the agency and 26% more border agents assigned at the agency. Those are the numbers.
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Madam Speaker, I move that the eighth report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, presented on Tuesday, February 8, 2022, be concurred in.
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Madam speaker, the NDP leader says he is fighting for Canadians, but his actions speak louder than his empty promises. After 24 votes in obedience to the Prime Minister to hike the inflationary carbon tax and hike grocery bills, and record-breaking food bank lineups, it is all to protect a $2.2-million pension. The luxury Maserati Marxist does not come cheap. ConsumerAffairs says, “Maserati upkeep…
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Mr. Speaker, this is commentary on what I just heard from the member for Kingston and the Islands. Members in the House come from different parts of the country. Many members have constituencies that are very large with lots of varying issues that people really care about. This Parliament would not be paralyzed if the government would just hand over the documents in their unredacted form. Because …
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Madam Speaker, with all respect to the parliamentary secretary, he did not answer the question, so I am going to follow up on a different part in the immigration levels plan. There is a specific line item now for those people who claim asylum from Canada, and the government has put a target. Part of the target is that the people who apply at the Immigration and Refugee Board get approved. Not gett…
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Madam Speaker, I am rising again to follow up with the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Immigration on a similar issue. It is on immigration levels and the immigration levels plan. I want to draw his attention to comments made by a senior member of the Liberal Party who is deeply involved in the Prime Minister's economic planning. Of course, I mean the former Bank of Canada governor, Mar…
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Mr. Speaker, the public safety minister said yesterday that bolstering CBSA powers to secure our borders is “not a priority.” Meanwhile, three million temporary resident visas are set to expire at the end of next year. Illegal border crossings are rising, and the newly elected U.S. president-elect is threatening a 25% tariff on all Canadian goods, which is an economic challenge we cannot ignore. W…
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Mr. Speaker, after nine years of the Prime Minister's breaking the immigration system, do we trust the guy who did it? There are 260,000 unprocessed asylum claims right now, a record high. That is a 2,502% increase since 2015. There are around half a million people in Canada illegally, and there is a 630% increase in U.S. border control encounters of people illegally attempting to get into the Uni…
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Madam Speaker, the government has no border plan and no immigration plan. While the minister is busy rage-tweeting and name-calling, he has no answer for how to manage over three million temporary residents before the deadline, no strategy for removals and no serious border enforcement measures in place. The minister's antics are not just embarrassing; they are reckless, risking chaos at our borde…
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to request a recorded division.
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Mr. Speaker, “Canada's 3M temporary migrants do not appear poised to leave 'voluntarily'” is the headline from a major Canadian newspaper. The immigration minister naively expects they will leave voluntarily. Migrant advocates admit they have no such plans. This sets the stage for mass overstays and more illegal border crossings into the United States. This strains our relations with the newly ele…
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Mr. Speaker, the minister had no answers at committee when I asked him the same questions. He does not know his numbers because he has no plan. It is really simple. The lack of a plan threatens the integrity of our immigration system. It wreaks significant diplomatic damage with this newly incoming U.S. administration. Is the government deploying more police to the border? The Liberals do not know…
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Mr. Speaker, government documents show that about 1.1 million temporary resident visas will expire by the end of next year, yet when asked at committee how his department would ensure these individuals leave once their visas expire, the immigration minister had no plan. After nine years of mismanagement, the minister's only solution is to hope people leave voluntarily. At committee, he deflected, …
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Mr. Speaker, we are talking about this SDTC scandal and nearly $400 million of taxpayer funds corruptly directed to companies and the board members, all appointed by the Liberal minister at the time, profited directly. These were companies they controlled or were actively participating in. We are talking about $290 million. It is an incredible amount of money. We could have axed the carbon tax for…
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Mr. Speaker, during my colleague's speech, which started yesterday, the Minister of Environment rose today to table the details of an announcement that the government made. When we look at the details, we see that nearly $6 billion is being added to Canada's national debt. The surplus that the government promised in 2015 is nowhere to be seen. We know that there will be a bit of tax relief for Can…
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Mr. Speaker, I request a recorded division.
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Madam Speaker, we are talking about close to $400 million that was corruptly spent by at least nine directors that the Auditor General identified as having participated in at least 186 corrupt decisions out of a sample size of about 400 that were looked at. I am wondering if my colleague could perhaps describe what we could have done with the close to $400 million that was corruptly spent. Could w…
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Madam Speaker, the Liberal government has destroyed Canada's immigration system. I want to draw the parliamentary secretary's attention to the Institute for Canadian Citizenship, which just completed a survey of 20,000 newcomers and immigrants. It found that one in four newcomers are planning to leave Canada. The likeliest of those newcomers to leave are the economic class immigrants. The top reas…
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Madam Speaker, I am rising to follow up on an immigration question I had asked the minister just a few weeks ago. I want to quote directly from the immigration levels plan that was tabled. It states on page 8, “Canada is in the midst of a housing crisis – highlighted by the insufficient supply of rental units and family homes. In this context, any population growth, which generally necessitates a …
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Madam Speaker, the member is correct. My dad was a member of the Solidarity movement. His father, being one of those who was arrested, probably ranks quite a bit higher in the esteem of many in the Polish-Canadian community because, especially if they were not a shipyard worker, but one of the mine workers, they were especially oppressed by the communist regime, the People's Republic of Poland. Ho…
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Madam Speaker, I do not entirely agree with what my colleague says about the time when Mr. Harper was in government as prime minister. It has been over nine years that another government has been in power. I would like to talk to her about the health of this particular fund. The Auditor General of Canada, year after year, has given the fund an excellent report card because all the processes that h…
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Madam Speaker, “particularly reasonable” might just be a slogan I run on in my riding. I will credit him if it does happen in the next election. We want the documents. We are talking about close to $400 million in corruptly allocated funds from SDTC, the green slush fund. The public has a right to know how their money was misspent and corruptly spent. What we are asking the government to do is pre…
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Madam Speaker, I am glad I caught your eye so I could rise again to speak on this amendment. We are in a situation now where Parliament has been paralyzed for multiple weeks because of the Liberal government's unwillingness to release all of the unredacted documents to the public. I spoke to the original main motion and the subamendment on this matter. I then told my constituents about the depth o…
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Mr. Speaker, I want to start by recognizing that the member for Winnipeg South Centre used a Yiddish term. I am really pleased that we are using more Yiddish in the chamber. Will the member join me in kvetching a little and complaining about the government? Almost $400 million was corruptly spent, which is what the documents are related to. What the Auditor General reported was that the figure was…
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Madam Speaker, the member for Bow River is exactly right. In the sample size that the Auditor General used to verify the process of spending and how decisions were made, she identified 186 particular situations where there was a conflict of interest or an apparent conflict of interest. These are situations where board members of the green slush fund should have recused themselves from the decision…
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Madam Speaker, I invite the member to review the Hansard blues for my intervention. I am almost certain I did not use any abbreviations or the so-called slogans she is referring to. I have a worry, like my constituents do, about how government spends money. I think all opposition parties agree, because we all voted together for the production of the documents, that Liberal government corruption is…
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With regard to Immigration and Refugee Board hearings on refugee claims, in 2021 and 2022: (a) for accepted written hearings, (i) what is the total number of persons on all applications, (ii) what is the amount of applications that had one person's name attached, (iii) what is the amount of applications that had more than one person's name attached, (iv) what is the amount of applications that had…
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Mr. Speaker, the third petition draws the attention of the House to the continued practice by the CCP to persecute Falun Gong practitioners with transnational repression, including in Canada. The petitioners are drawing the attention of the House to the fact that the European Parliament passed a resolution condemning organ harvesting abuses in the PRC and has called on the Government of China to i…
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Mr. Speaker, the second petition is from folks in my riding, made at the time of the Stampede. I am tabling it a little late on their behalf. The petitioners are asking for the House to hold another non-confidence vote and, should that vote be successful, to hold an election within 45 days.
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With regard to Canada Border Services Agency tracking of travellers exiting Canada, broken down by year and by quarter: (a) what is the total number of people who have exited Canada by commercial air travel since June 25, 2020, broken down by (i) country of citizenship, (ii) country travelling to, (iii) age, broken down as follows (I) 0-18, (II) 18-65, (III) 65+; and (b) what is the total number o…
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Mr. Speaker, today is All Saints' Day, a tradition shared by many European cultures and various churches, especially the Catholic, Orthodox and Apostolic traditions. Central to this holy day is remembering all the saints and any believer who has accepted the Christian faith through Jesus Christ. Tradition calls us to visit cemeteries at sundown, to light candles and lay flowers, and to pray and sh…
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Mr. Speaker, I have three petitions to table today. The first petition is on medical assistance in dying or euthanasia and is from constituents in my riding. The petitioners are asking for the Government of Canada to stop the expansion of medical assistance in dying or euthanasia to those whose only underlying condition is mental illness.
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Mr. Speaker, Canadians are struggling with skyrocketing costs on everything from groceries to gas, and now we see the toll it has taken on our economy. Statistics Canada confirms what families already know: The NDP-Liberal coalition is not worth the cost. GDP per person has dropped in eight out of the last nine quarters. Meanwhile, in the U.S., GDP grew by nearly 3% last quarter. Why is this? It i…
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With regard to family reunification measures for Yazidis who have been resettled to Canada, broken down by year: (a) what is the total number of applications that (i) have been received, (ii) have been accepted, (iii) have been rejected, (iv) have been withdrawn, (v) are still in process; (b) how many dependents are associated with these applications in each of the categories in (a); (c) what is t…
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