Bill C-24 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Salaries Act and to make a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act

This enactment amends the Salaries Act to authorize payment, out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund, of the salaries for eight new ministerial positions. It authorizes the Governor in Council to designate departments to support the ministers who occupy those positions and authorizes those ministers to delegate their powers, duties or functions to officers or employees of the designated departments. It also makes a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act.

Second Reading

[Ken Hardie, Liberal, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Mr. Speaker, by the member's description of what she did and what she accomplished in her time as the minister responsible for western economic diversification, she worked hard, applied her knowledge and her skills, and had some really good results. We will not debate that part of it, but did she get paid as much as other ministers in that cabinet?

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I was appointed as a minister of state. I was not appointed as a full minister and I understood that going into my position.

The minister of state position has a certain level of salary attached to it and a full minister position has a certain level of salary attached to it. It would be like me being hired as the VP of a company, but expecting to be paid as the president of a company. I had the responsibility of a minister of state, which I think I exceeded, and I was paid accordingly. I was very proud of the fact that I was a minister of state in the past government. I think I did a fantastic job. I do not like being humble so I was awesome, it was great and I was paid accordingly.

The point is that I did not try to say I should be paid equal to my peers without having the responsibility of my peers. If my colleague opposite truly felt that I should be paid at the level as his female colleagues in cabinet should be, then I should have full rights to bring memorandums to cabinet. I should have a deputy minister and have the accountability of an entire department.

Given my managerial expertise, my CV, and my political experience, I would expect that had we formed government, I would have been appointed as a full minister, and I am happy to say that here, and I should have been paid accordingly. However, for that level of responsibility, I was paid to what my responsibilities were. That is not sexist; that is the way it is. Sexist is trying to claim that women are paid one way, but do not have the responsibility of their peers. That is embarrassing and disgusting.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Calgary Shepard.

I am thankful to be speaking to Bill C-24, an act to amend the Salaries Act and to make a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act. However, it is late at night and the government has made it clear that it is not interested in hearing further input from the opposition parties. Once again, it is shutting down debate and sending it to committee where, based on what it has done with other bills, it will not accept any of the amendments. Therefore, I am not sure what kind of an impact I will have tonight. However, I will go ahead and make a few points about the concerns I have with Bill C-24.

My first concern has to do with the elimination of the six regional development agency ministers. We have heard other people speak to it, but I will provide my thoughts on that. Also, the creation of three entirely new mystery ministers is of concern to me.

Amending the Salaries Act to legislate equal pay for all ministers concerns me. All of this has already been done. We heard testimony earlier that at the very beginning, once everybody discovered the Prime Minister had put women in junior minister roles and paid them less than other ministers, there was an outcry and it was immediately fixed via the estimates. The Liberals had already ridded themselves of the regional ministers. Therefore, I am not even sure why we have to talk about it if they have already done that, especially when the government has failed on its legislative agenda, is having us sit late at night, and is now bringing forward items on which action has already been taken. Therefore, whatever we say here tonight is kind of irrelevant.

With respect to regional economic development, I want to share why I think that those six positions were important.

One of the things we need in our country is to create jobs. We need to get that economic growth happening. Every region has different industries, different constraints, and different provincial and municipal regulations. There is a lot to know about.

Sarnia—Lambton had a southwestern regional minister who was familiar with the industry in Sarnia—Lambton, in London, in Windsor, and did a lot of work to help start our bio-economy, helped get us into advanced manufacturing, and helped us partner in the water industry. Time is required to get to know the industries and the economic opportunities in the area, coming with a voice in government to advocate on behalf of those opportunities, and then help the wheels of government turn to get that money out in a timely fashion. For example, when we are trying to start up a new bio-industry or trying to get into a new business, time is of the essence.

I have heard similar stories when I look to the Atlantic provinces. I have a lot of connections there, so I hear about what is going on there, I hear about what is going on in Quebec, and the importance of these regional ministers. Therefore, it is extremely concerning to have those eliminated. The departments have not been eliminated, which is of some comfort. That means the government recognizes the need to have that local and regional information. However, there is nobody to direct the ship other than the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development. He is a great guy, but he is a busy guy. He does not have enough time for the oversight. He has to be in the House and he has responsibilities in his municipality as well.

These are some of the things the minister is responsible for. In addition to all of the economic growth in the different regions across the country, he is also in charge of the rural Internet initiative, which is really important. We have a huge need for that in the north. There is a huge, ambitious program under way, which I appreciate. He is also the one who is trying to initiate the superclusters. That involves developing a plan and that is a huge change. It requires a lot of coordination of different players. He is responsible for the census. He is responsible for the innovation agenda. He is also trying to launch new areas like artificial intelligence. He is trying to advance us in green technology, while maintaining our leadership in the aerospace and automotive industries. If we look at all the things involved there, they are all important. If we take focus away from them, then we will not make progress as quickly.

That is why these six ministers were so important. It was because they could spend the time to look at what the opportunities were and move those forward, and now we are missing that.

We have heard complaints. I have heard complaints from Quebec that things are not moving quickly now that those ministers have been removed. I have heard in the Atlantic provinces the same thing that the member for Calgary Nose Hill shared, that there are delays of 12 and 18 months. It is taking three times as long to get things approved. When people are in the innovation space trying to take ideas and turn them into jobs, time is of the essence. This whole idea is not good.

With respect to the mystery ministers, nobody here was able to say who they are. Maybe they will come up eventually. Is it really a priority to talk about things that may or may not happen in the future and to pick three of them that might happen in the future? It just speaks to the government's lack of openness and transparency. We have seen all kinds of evidence of this in the refusal to answer questions in the House of Commons. We see that on a dally basis. We see, when we try to get access to information, that they black out the costs of the carbon tax for the taxpayer. We see that they are trying to rearrange the parliamentary budget officer so that members of Parliament cannot get information out of him. I could go on, about partisan appointments and all the other things that the current government is doing that are not open or transparent.

Clearly, these three mystery ministers are something that does not exist, and if it does exist and there is a hidden agenda, then it is just another example of what I am talking about.

That brings us then to the discussion on the salaries and whether the salaries of the women who are serving in these junior minister roles should be equal. Certainly, as the chair of the status of women committee, I am somebody who firmly believes in gender equality and in pay equity. I was on the pay equity committee and sat endless hours talking about what we could do, and made recommendations to the government on which it has done nothing in budget 2017. For all the talk of being a feminist, there is absolutely nothing happening from that point of view.

I would also say that in my career I have experienced discrimination as a woman so I am probably an extra advocate for trying to make sure that things are done fairly. One of the things that is important when we talk about pay equity—and they can even Google this on the government web page—is that when we try to figure out whether jobs should be paid equally, an analysis is done. The analysis looks at skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions.

When we compare some of these junior positions, for example the Minister of Sport with the Minister of Finance, let us look at the budget that the Minister of Sport handles versus the budget that the Minister of Finance is handling. Let us think about the Minister of Democratic Institutions, now that we are not going to do any electoral reform because we broke that promise. If the minister of electoral reform does not do a good job, what is the consequence of that versus the Minister of Public Safety not doing a good job? There is a huge difference there. Let us think about what the responsibilities of the Minister of Status of Women are versus the defence minister, for example. She has a $38-million budget.

When we do a pay equity analysis we are going to see that in fact there is a different level of responsibility in these positions, so I do not personally think that they should have been restored to a full minister's salary because I do not believe they have the same responsibility. They clearly do not have the same effort and in some cases the skill level that has been put into these roles is actually troubling. The government House leader is a rookie with no experience with parliamentary Standing Orders, and we have seen how that has jumbled the government's agenda and made for all the filibustering and the delays that have resulted in our sitting this late.

These are my main concerns with the bill. Obviously, it does not really matter what I say because all of these changes have been put into effect anyway, and I expect there will be no amendments at committee.

[Francis Drouin, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is important to talk about math because they are very focused on math on that side. I recall in 2006 when Prime Minister Harper said he was going to start with a tiny cabinet. It was about 28 members and then the cabinet grew to 41 members. When the Conservatives talked about saving money and being really good with the taxpayer dollars, we know that was the wrong approach.

What we have decided to do and the path we have chosen is to say that women deserve equal pay for an equal voice at the cabinet table. I do not understand what is wrong with an equal voice at the cabinet table with equal pay. Does the member not support that?

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the government's own procedures on how pay equity should be implemented say that having the same voice at the cabinet table in terms of a vote is not part of responsibilities, skills, efforts, and working conditions. It is one small element of that whole equation.

While I agree that women should be paid equally to men in the same job, I have just given a number of examples of why that is not true. I will tell the House about one position, a minister, that has changed with the focus of the government on infrastructure. That would be the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities, who has now been given $180 billion to spend over the next 10 years, with only $2 billion for rural of course.

That responsibility has changed, because of the focus of the government on the responsibilities, efforts, and skills required to do that job. The minister has the infrastructure bank, and that is going to be a big schmozzle that will take a lot of time. In that case, I can see a reassessment of what the job is worth based on what is being put into it.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech. It is always interesting to hear her thoughts.

I must admit that I would prefer to be discussing a real bill on pay equity. Then we could have really made some progress. In a past career, before I got into politics, I fought for the cause of pay equity in the Quebec school system. Before equity could be achieved, we spent months and years comparing job descriptions to make sure that the positions in question required the same skills and involved the same duties.

Are we really expected to believe that the Liberals will manage to solve the problem overnight and until the end of time simply by declaring that everyone will have the same salary?

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question.

Definitely, the government has had every opportunity to take an excellent example from the folks in Quebec who actually testified at our committee on pay equity, about the legislation that was brought in that rapidly closed the gap between men and women, and what they were paid.

The government has had 18 months to do something about it. We see no legislation. We see nothing in the six pages of the gender statement of budget 2017. It has certainly missed an opportunity there.

[Deb Schulte, Liberal, King—Vaughan, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have been sitting here listening to my colleague across the way. I know she is an engineer, and has professed many times that data should guide, facts should be what informs us and helps us make our decisions. I have been listening to her speech, and I am really quite shocked. What she is quoting is not at all the experience that I have had with the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development. We have seen amazing work coming forward. We have not seen a slowdown.

The member has been quoting that there have been some delays and lots of problems. I would like her to tell us where this data is coming from. It certainly is not the experience that I am having. I am confused. I would like to hear her explain where that data is coming from.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will just give one example, and that is from Sarnia—Lambton. In November 2015, the minister agreed to provide funding. By the time we got it out the door, it was a year and a half later.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad I am debating at so late an hour. It is not quite midnight, but we are getting there.

Like I mentioned before during the questions and comments of other members, I made comments that, really, we should be renaming the bill “the pay raise for Liberal cabinet ministers”. I really do feel that way. I know some people say that the pay was adjusted before. Then the logical question is, why are we considering this legislation if it is just to change a bunch of titles? The Liberals could have done that before. They really did not need to do anything. They could have just scribbled all over their notepads and on their business cards, and got it done.

They come into the House, consuming so many hours of the debate that supposedly, they said, was to improve the middle class. I do not really see how the Liberal cabinet getting a higher pay raise improves the fate or the economic ability of the middle class.

As for the content of the bill, I am looking at it and I have read through it several times now. It formalizes its eight new Liberal cabinet ministers. These are so-called full ministers, but as we heard from the member for Calgary Nose Hill, they actually will not be full ministers because they will not be able to bring MCs directly. They will still have to ask the ministers that they report to in order to be able to do that.

They are also asking for three new cabinet ministers yet to be named. I will be referring to these as the mystery cabinet ministers, and a good deal of my speech will focus on them, because what the Liberals are asking us to do, just like the member for Calgary Rocky Ridge said, is to give them a blank cheque. They want these three new cabinet ministers to be appointed some time in the future, so I have a bunch of suggestions on roles they could fill on their side in areas in which I feel they need desperate help. They need reinforcements to actually get their agenda through.

I do have a Yiddish proverb. It will come up very soon, because I know several members are looking at me, expecting one ready.

As for raises for salaries of junior ministers to cabinet ministers, like I said before, every time there is talk of openness and transparency in this place, it seems to cost the taxpayers ever more money. Why are the Liberals raising cabinet ministers' pay? Why not lower all pay? I see some ministers in the House are probably very worried when I mention this, but that would be the right thing to do for taxpayers when we have a nearly $30-billion deficit we are rolling through and for which the Liberals will be punishing the taxpayers of the future, who will have to pay for it.

This would be a great way to treat everybody equally: just lower everybody's pay. It is equal. It is fair to everyone. It is open. It is transparent. It is generous. Why not? Like I said, we could do the opposite. That would just require a minor amendment on the government side. Why is it always more money, more expenses, a car, a deputy minister, more exempt staff, more ability to travel. It is always more money, more money from the taxpayers. It always winds up being that way.

The Yiddish proverb I wanted to use is, “A wise man hears one word, but understands two”, and I feel like that wise man when I say, “Read the legislation”, because there is much more at stake here than simple pay. There are these three mystery cabinet ministers the Liberals will be introducing. It is not as if they do not have enough cabinet ministers already. We see week after week so-called ministers not delivering on their press releases, not delivering on their mandate letters. In fact they had cabinet shuffles, and I fully expect another cabinet shuffle in the future and certain ministers to be moved around, especially after the week they have had with the failure to appoint a Commissioner of Official Languages who will be fair to all parties in the House and with the true consultation of all members in the House.

Let us talk about these mystery ministers, because I think that is the right terminology. If the Liberals had amended the legislation and called them mystery ministers, I might even have considered voting for it, just a little bit.

Now who among the Liberal backbench has worked hard enough to join and become a mystery minister? What kinds of positions could they hold? Who has distinguished themselves the most? I have wondered that, and I have a few suggestions. However, let us go to those new portfolios first.

I think we should have a minister for balancing budgets, because I can see the Minister of Finance suffers terribly in the House not being able to follow through on what he believed when he was in the private sector working for Morneau Shepell, for a company that worked in human resources, a well-known EAP. I worked in human resources before with many HR professionals. It was the company that was involved in it. It was considered an expert in the field. Now they need to help. A full minister responsible for balancing the budget could find those savings all across government, and they would not even need to rely on the Minister of Finance to accomplish that.

Now I think they also need a minister for the tabulation of Liberal broken promises. I say that tongue in cheek, but there is just so many of them, it would be a full-time job. It would probably mean overtime and many late hours of tabulation. I also think they could use a minister for strategic photo-ops, or photo bombs, as the member for Calgary Rocky Ridge likes to say, maybe Instagram as well, because that seems to be an all-consuming passion of the Prime Minister. Why not make it a full ministry while we are at it?

The minister for seniors is a very serious suggestion. There is no minister for seniors, but I have a colleague here who was the minister of state for seniors. That is the seriousness of what we are doing for seniors and the growing seniors population in Canada. There are many members on our side of the House that advocated for the government actually appointing a person, a champion, an advocate for seniors in government to bring those issues forward. That one is far less tongue in cheek. That would have an actual impact on government legislation and government regulation, and their focus areas as well.

I will suggest another one: a minister for anti-corruption. We have had Liberal cabinet fundraising on the cocktail circuit, and really iffy appointments being brought before the House for an official languages commissioner, which is now pulled. Many other ones have come through for ACOA and for other organizations in government. We are still waiting on those judges to be appointed.

How about a minister for procurement to actually fix what is happening on that side of the House. Between the Minister of Public Works and the Minister of National Defence, they just cannot get it done, and they will not get it done. Why not appoint a person whose sole job in this government will be to procure equipment for our Canadian Armed Forces, for the Coast Guard, and throughout government? Just appoint someone, and not the Minister of Public Works. Obviously, she cannot get it done.

How about we appoint a minister dedicated to holding the President of the Treasury Board's hand to actually follow through on his mandate letter that says he will go ahead and amend the Access to Information Act, which he has now said he will not do. They are not following through on those reforms. They have no intention of doing it anymore. Why not actually have meaningful transparency and fulfill a campaign promise, one of which I thought was not a bad idea? Why not do it?

I have been on the receiving end of ATIP and how it does not work. Right now I have an access to information request with a government department for what I think is the fictional orphan drug framework. I have been basically told that I will not get it for another eight years. It is a very reasonable access to information request, but they told me they would use the extension provisions in the act to prevent me from getting what I am a actually asking for, the thousands of documents, until eight years from now. That is far beyond the mandate of a member of Parliament.

How about a minister for sock selection? That is more tongue in cheek. Obviously, we have seen there are lots of different permutations they could have.

Mr. Speaker, you do not have interesting socks like the Prime Minister does. I am sorry to see that.

Like my colleague for Perth—Wellington said, the government is all socks, no action. We seem to spend way more time talking about the Prime Minister's socks than his achievements. What has he actually done? What has he actually achieved almost two years into this mandate? There is barely any achievement, any legislation passed, a massive deficit, a huge debt, a carbon tax, and really no plan. Actually they are forcing carbon taxes on every single province whether the population wants it or the government wants it.

I will say that there are lots of good members on that side of the House who could make it into these mystery ministerial portfolios. I am looking at one gentleman whom I am sure would desperately want to get one.

How about the member for St. John's East, a member I travelled with on the Canada Post review committee through Atlantic Canada, or the member for Malpeque, who has an independent streak?

I will end on this one point, I think the last ministerial position they could appoint, from one of my very favourite shows, is the minister for administrative affairs. I am sure Paul Eddington, Nigel Hawthorne, Derek Fowlds, and Diana Hoddinott would be supremely pleased by such a title in this government because I think Yes Minister represents exactly the fulfilment in this government of everything they are able to achieve, which is very little, blocked by the bureaucracy that seems to love them very much, but is unable to actually achieve any of the goals they were elected on, unable to actually follow through on any of the goals set out in the mandate letters, and actually have achieved very little in the past two years. Except now, we have a late evening sitting and we are debating cabinet raises, pay raises for cabinet ministers as opposed to the Cannabis Act or maybe balancing the budget or actually any number of the other pieces of legislation before the House that could have been brought forward by the government. They have chosen not to.

It is just a poor piece of legislation and I will not be voting for it.

[Francesco Sorbara, Liberal, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, would the member not agree with me that when we look at the five portfolios, such as science, something that we believed in and I think the past government really did not believe in, science and looking at facts and evidence and making decisions based on facts and evidence, they should each be a full ministry? Status of women is the same thing. How about small business and tourism? It is the backbone of the economy. Tourists are coming to Canada in greater numbers. Small businesses are growing and our economy is growing.

Is it not important that these great members of our government who serve their residents and serve Canadians have the authority of our full ministers and are paid equally? Again, I correct the record that there are no salary increases with C-24. I would like to let the member know that.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the bill does not achieve any of those goals. All it does is set different pay levels for cabinet ministers. All of the ministers already have a voice at the table. They are already working on files. The problem is that they do not have the same responsibilities. They cannot present directly to cabinet. As the member for Calgary Nose Hill said, they do not have the ability to push MCs without the approval of their lead ministers. They do not have the same pay because they do not have the same responsibilities. It really has nothing to do with their gender.

I made a point earlier and posed this question when other members spoke. How about pay for performance? How about we pay them based on their performance, their ability to meet their mandate letter requirements? That would be a great way to pay cabinet ministers.

[Francis Drouin, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I hate to disappoint the member, but in the previous government, no ministers had decision power because they had to go through the kids in short pants.

I will bring the member back to what the ministers of state were under the previous government. I recall a minister losing some power under her senior minister. Her crime was that she gave $400,000 to the Toronto gay pride parade. That was the state of those ministers under the previous government.

Again, I go back to having an equal voice at the cabinet table and equal pay. What does the member not understand about equal pay for equal work?

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the member said “kids in shorts pants”. I would rather kids in short pants than kids in Prada pants.

I believe the member worked for Dalton McGuinty. I worked as an exempt staffer for Gordon O'Connor when he was in national defence. Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones, either. We should not slag those in our profession who are now occupying exempt staffer positions in ministers' offices. I do not do it to those who served in the Conservative government. I also do not pick on staff in the different ministers' offices.

The Prime Minister's Office is very different. Everything runs through Gerald Butts. How about that? Nobody seems to want to talk about that as much. On this side of the House, we mention that all the time. It seems that everything is decided by the Prime Minister's staff at the highest levels, not the Prime Minister.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, different governments have different priorities. We have been very clear. The Prime Minister was very clear right from the beginning when cabinet was first appointed that the ministers would be on an equal footing. This is bringing that about. We have set out our priorities clearly for each one of them: the francophonie minister, the small business and tourism minister, the status of women minister, and the science minister, and I am missing one. Each one is a priority. We have been transparent, we have been clear, and the bill will set the record straight and put things where they should be. Why does the member not understand that these are the priorities of this government?