Bill C-57 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act

This enactment amends the Federal Sustainable Development Act to make decision making related to sustainable development more transparent and subject to accountability to Parliament.

The House resumed consideration of the motion in relation to the amendments made by the Senate to Bill C-57, An Act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act.

Federal Sustainable Development Act

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, like many of our colleagues, I listened to my friend across the way for a few hours. I guess we were in the other place, in the House of Commons, when the member started his speech. He has finally, to the relief of many, no doubt, concluded his remarks.

In his remarks, the member covered a fairly wide spectrum of concerns. One could list a series of questions, but I am going to limit it to one. Given the length and tenure of the debate from my friend across the way, could he give us an indication of what he believes the Conservative Party's approach on this legislation actually is, given that it seems to be the opinion of the member across the way that there might not be very many members who actually want to speak to it? Maybe that is one of the reasons he was so motivated to express himself.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I have just been accused by the member for Winnipeg North of being verbose. That is truly incredible. It is almost like when the Prime Minister accuses other people of standing by the wealthy. This is a pattern of the Liberals that we see in so many areas. After being critical of the length of my remarks, he asked what the Conservative approach was to Bill C-57, as if he had not heard my remarks at all.

Let me just say, in summary of those remarks, that we believe in the importance of a sustainable approach across the board, an approach that involves thinking about the impacts the decisions we take today will have on the future. That is why we believe in a balanced budget. We know that the government's deficits will lead to further attempts by the government to increase taxes. If it gets a chance to do that after the next election, we can be sure that it will take every opportunity to raise taxes.

All of the failures of the Prime Minister when it comes to balancing the budget, when it comes to thinking ahead, will have concrete costs for Canadians.

On this side of the House, our approach to Bill C-57, our approach to sustainability, is to look for ways to ensure that Canadians can get ahead over the long term.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

Madam Speaker, I listened to my colleague's speech relatively closely. He talked about many things in that speech, all of which was accurate and precise. The member across the aisle did not hear it, obviously. I would like the member to repeat some of the failures of the government and tell us what it is actually going to cost the constituents in my riding and Canadians right across the country.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, finally, a good question. There are so many failures of the government we could talk about. I spoke about many of them in my remarks, but I will focus on one, and that is the failure of its so-called environmental policy.

The government does not have a plan for the environment. It has a plan to use the discussion of the environment as a tool to raise taxes. It is imposing a carbon tax. It will continue to increase the level of that carbon tax. We know that it will not improve the situation of the environment for the reasons, in particular, I talked about. The government is collecting GST on top of that.

This failure to have a real plan on the environment is costing everyday Canadians more. It is not costing everyone more, because the government has given a break to the largest emitters. It has given a break to those with well-placed lobbyists who could advocate for one. However, the government has not given a break to everyday working people in our constituencies. This is the clearest mark of the failure of the government. It is something we need to change. We need to get rid of the carbon tax so that we can help Canadians who are trying to get ahead have more money in their pockets to do just that.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, there was so much misinformation provided by my friend across the way. He talked about sustainability. As a part of that, he talked a great deal about taxation, yet when it really came down to the government of the day putting a special tax on Canada's wealthiest, the Conservatives voted against it. When it came time for a tax break for Canada's middle class, the Conservatives voted against that too.

When we talk about sustainability of the family and trying to ensure that families have prosperity, we can look at the Canada child benefit. Again, that was enhanced by this government and opposed by the Conservatives.

On the one hand, the Conservatives try to fool Canadians by saying that they are standing up for the middle class, when in reality there is only one party that is standing up for Canada's middle class. It is this Prime Minister and it is the Liberal Party of Canada.

[Randy Hoback, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

What colour is the sky in your world? What does la-la land really look like?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I wonder if the member opposite can explain the hypocrisy that seems to be among the Conservative Party when it comes to taxation policy.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I just want to remind the member for Prince Albert that I am sure that his colleague, who is going to have the floor in a couple of minutes, is very well able to answer the questions that the parliamentary secretary just asked. I would ask him to hold back on any comments or questions he may have during that time.

The hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I truly have missed the member for Winnipeg North over this long break. His interventions are such a source of amusement.

He talked about the Canada child care benefit. The Liberals changed the name of the universal child care benefit. They finally realized that parents were not going to use this money for beer and popcorn, which was progress for them. They had previously said not to give money to parents, because they will use it for beer and popcorn. On this issue at least, the Liberals came around to our way of thinking to some extent, but they have a lot further to go to come around to our way of thinking.

What they did at the beginning was put forward a proposal that made various changes to tax rates. The same measure also reduced the amount that Canadians could put aside in a tax-free savings account, which we know statistically is the preferred savings vehicle for Canadians who are in the middle class and for those working hard to join it. Canadians are struggling to get ahead and want to get ahead, yet they face more and higher taxes from the government. However, we can tell from the rhetoric of the member that the Liberals do not want to admit it.

Every time they try to increase our taxes, they try to do it in a way that is as surreptitious as possible. They want to change the deductions so that a person would have to pay more on benefits received in the workplace. They want to impose a carbon tax to increase the cost of everything we buy, without being transparent about the cost. They black out the information about how much the carbon tax costs. It is the carbon tax cover-up.

I say this to the member across the way: If he is actually proud of his approach to taxing Canadians, then will he end the carbon tax cover-up and tell Canadians how much it will actually cost them?

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, on my 400th intervention in this Parliament, I just want to say how much of an honour it is to rise in this new place that we will call home for the next 10 years.

I had the opportunity to listen to this member from the beginning of his speech. He started it off quite a while ago by talking about failures and the failures of this government, but by his measure, when we look at this, we see that Canada now leads the G7 in terms of economic growth. We have the lowest unemployment that we have ever had since we started recording it. How is it possible that a Conservative member would judge that record and say that it is a failure? I just do not understand it.

Can the member explain what he means when he talks about a failure, in light of the fact that we have had the best growth that this country has had in a long time and that we have the lowest unemployment rate since we started recording it?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, under the Conservatives, at the time of the last election Canada had the lowest unemployment, the highest rate of growth, the best job creation record in the G7 and a balanced budget. We were able to deliver the goods with a balanced budget.

My colleague across the way is laughing. Let me tell members this: His constituents are not laughing, because they are struggling to get ahead. They know that the out-of-control deficit spending by the government will mean higher taxes for them. It is already meaning higher taxes and it is going to lead to further higher taxes.

If the member cares about how much his constituents pay, I wonder if he will commit to the government's not raising the carbon tax after the next election. We know that if it has a chance to raise the carbon tax, it will certainly do so. We have to stop it.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to take a few seconds to say how pleased I am to be back here in this new place. I am very happy to see all the work that has been done over these past years to build this new House of Commons. I commend everyone who worked on it, because it is amazing. I hope that it will help us have useful discussions and debates that will benefit our constituents.

Today, we are examining a bill pertaining to the Federal Sustainable Development Act, and as the NDP environment critic, I am obviously very pleased to rise in the House to talk about sustainable development, the environment, ecology, the future and what we will leave our children.

We urged the government to be more transparent and engage in more intergovernmental coordination to ensure better planning and accountability with respect to sustainable development in Quebec and Canada. I believe that this is an approach to economic development that has unanimous support in Canada today. We would have liked to see Bill C-57 go further in some respects, but, at every step, the NDP supported the government's policy direction on this matter as well as the progress made on this bill.

We could have gone much further. For example, we would have liked to see the United Nations' 17 sustainable development goals included in this bill, which would have strengthened the federal government's commitment to those UN goals. It is unfortunate that they were not included. We suggested it, but the government declined.

Today, however, we need to debate and vote on the government motion in response to the three amendments proposed and adopted by the Senate. The government agrees with amendments 1 and 3 from the Senate, but it disagrees with amendment 2. That is the fly in the ointment. We in the NDP cannot understand the Liberal government's attitude. Let us look at what amendment 2 says:

2. Clause 8, page 5: Add the following after line 30:

“10.2 Performance-based contracts with the Government of Canada, including employment contracts, shall, where applicable, include provisions for meeting the applicable goals and targets referred to in the Federal Sustainable Development Strategy and any applicable strategy developed under section 11.”.

The Senate is basically suggesting that federal government contracts awarded to companies and subcontractors take into account the goals and targets of the federal sustainable development strategy. This is something I do not say very often in the House, but I agree with the Senate. The representatives of the upper house have made an excellent suggestion.

The NDP does not understand why the government disagrees with Senate amendment 2 in its motion. Why does the Liberal government want to prevent the contracts in question from having to meet the objectives of the federal sustainable development strategy? How will that help build a greener country that is more respectful of future generations and our ecosystems?

It would not have cost the Liberal government very much to be consistent and agree to the Senate's amendment. It would not cost anything to require that contracts comply with a framework set out in the national sustainable development strategy, which includes certain objectives and principles. Why does the government want to sidestep that requirement? It seems as though the government is giving itself some wriggle room, creating a grey area so it can do what it wants when it awards contracts.

The NDP opposes the government's motion because it rejects that amendment, which seems completely reasonable, coherent and consistent with a comprehensive vision of sustainable development.

There is a lot to say about the Liberal government's coherent and ambitious vision for the environment. This is such an important issue for all Canadians, their children and their grandchildren, but we are once again dealing with a government that says one thing and does the opposite. The government's hypocrisy, its Jekyll-and-Hyde approach, is completely mind-boggling.

In December, I went to Poland for COP24, a major gathering of the United Nations focusing on the rules for implementing the Paris Agreement. I attended a number of meetings and round tables.

The Minister of Environment and Climate Change delivered a speech to the delegates at the plenary hall in Katowice. There were 20,000 people there from about 185 countries, and not just government representatives. There were also people representing unions, businesses, investors and environmental groups. The Minister of Environment delivered an absolutely outstanding speech. I was there, I heard the speech, and I applauded along with everyone else. I applauded out of politeness, but also because the speech was very good. The speech laid out a vision that New Democrats and most environmentalists can get on board with. I myself would have wholeheartedly endorsed the text.

The problem is that the Liberal government's decisions have nothing whatsoever to do with what was said in the speech. On the international stage, they are all about making themselves look good, patting themselves on the back and saying all the right things, but there is a lot they are hiding and would rather not talk about. That hypocrisy is a real shame. There are countless examples of how the government says one thing but does the opposite.

A report was presented at COP24 assessing the performance of the 60 richest, most industrialized nations—and obviously that includes Canada—when it comes to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. People in Canada often like to brag about our strong performance in various areas. For instance, Canada ranks pretty high on the United Nations human development index. Where does Canada rank in terms of greenhouse gas reductions? Canada ranks 54th out of 60 countries. That is nothing to be proud of. The Liberal government does not keep its promises, and greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise.

I actually just read an interesting statistic. The only year in which greenhouse gas emissions decreased in Canada was 2008, and that was because of the economic crisis and recession. Every other year, greenhouse gas emissions have continued to rise inexorably. We are getting further away from our targets. Let us move forward together, and not fall backwards.

In 2030, we are supposed to have reduced our greenhouse gas emissions to 517 megatonnes. That is our target. The Liberal government did not make much of an effort considering that was the Harper government's target. The Liberal government simply copied the targets set by the government of Stephen Harper, known friend of the environment and ecosystems. The Liberals are so ambitious that they decided to adopt the same target as the previous government and they are not even going to reach that.

According to the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, we are going to miss the 2020 and 2030 targets. Every year we see the gap between our achievements and our targets getting ever wider.

According to the December 2017 report, if the Liberal government continues down the same path, it will fall 66 megatonnes short of the target. It will fail to meet the Harper government's target by 66 megatonnes.

What did we learn from the December 2018 report a few weeks before Christmas? We learned that we will fall 79 megatonnes short. That is 13 megatonnes more than what was predicted in 2017.

As the years go by, we are falling further behind our 2030 target. Instead of moving forward, we are moving backwards. The Liberal government's results continue to fall further and further behind the Conservative target for greenhouse gas emission reductions. The Liberal government's performance is really nothing to be proud of. Despite its claims, the government does not seem to realize the urgency of the situation.

Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations, quoted the IPCC, which submitted a truly exceptional report last year. He told us that we have 12 years to act; we have 12 years before it is too late.

After that, we will not be able to stop or fix global warming and climate destabilization. This will lead to some massive environmental crises. Climate refugees will have to leave their homes, their communities or islands. These islands will be swept into the ocean because we were unable to take action and we did not take global warming and climate destabilization seriously, even though they are the greatest challenge of our generation. It is absolutely catastrophic.

Failures like the ones at COP24 are worrisome. Sure, some progress was made to encourage countries to be transparent, to share information about their greenhouse gas reduction plans and to compare these plans.

However, we all know that we will not be able to meet the Paris target to avoid a 2°C rise in temperature with the existing plans some countries have put forward. The target was to have just a 1.5°C rise in temperature. We will not reach the 1.5°C target or 2°C target with the plans and strategies that have been put forward by western countries and the major developing countries.

There were discussions in Katowice about setting more ambitious targets. They focused on recognizing how, even if we manage to meet our targets, it will not be enough and how we need to be more ambitious. Rather than reducing our greenhouse gas emissions to 517 megatonnes by 2030, Canada may need to consider reducing them to 490 or 480 megatonnes.

We need to make a decision about what to do. If we do not and we stick with the work plans that are on the table right now, the earth's temperature could increase by 3°C or 4°C by 2050. That would be catastrophic in many respects. It would result in natural disasters, such as droughts, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes and forest fires. Last summer, British Columbia experienced more forest fires and bigger forest fires than it has in years. Montreal had a heat wave. It was 35°C in Montreal and people died because it was too hot and their bodies could not cope with the heat. This sort of thing is going to happen more and more often. Our targets are not good enough to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement. They are not good enough to prevent global catastrophe and climate deregulation that will lead to human suffering, displaced populations, war and reduced economic prosperity.

We will not meet our targets, and we cannot even acknowledge that we should have aimed higher and seen the bigger picture, that we need to take responsibility.

Aurélien Barrau is a French astrophysicist I really like. He is the kind of scientist who sometimes dives into these discussions because he feels that, as a scientist, he has a duty to get involved and sound the alarm. A few months ago, he delivered an absolutely brilliant talk that is available on the Internet. He talked about how global warming is a threat to life as we know it.

In a recent interview on French television, Mr. Barrau said something I found devastating but true: a few years from now, our children will view us as criminals. That really got me thinking. Many of us here and at home have children and grandchildren or have friends who do. I would not want my sons and daughters to be going through hard times a few years from now and blaming us because we failed to step up, do the right thing, and make the green transition happen when it needed to happen. That time is now. We have 12 years.

Humanity faces no greater challenge than the fight against climate change. It will take a monumental effort to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. Rather than put in that effort, what has the Liberal government done besides making fine speeches at international conferences? It bought a pipeline. It took $4.5 billion of our money and bought a leaky 65-year-old pipeline so it could triple oil production, which also means more greenhouse gas emissions. We are going backwards.

If we have the money to buy a pipeline, could we not use it to invest in renewable energy instead and create jobs for the many communities that need them? Renewable energy is not just the way of the future, it is the way to prosperity. It means jobs for today and tomorrow. Kinder Morgan thought it was too risky to hang onto the Trans Mountain pipeline, so it decided to sell it, but it could not find a buyer. Not one private company wanted to buy it, because of the multiple risks involved. Then along came the Liberal government. It decided to drop $4.5 billion of our money on a pipeline no one wanted, and then it decided to spend $7.4 billion to triple oil production and make the pipeline even bigger.

This pipeline crosses 800 rivers and waterways in British Columbia. Today we have learned that it is going to endanger a threatened species, the southern resident killer whales. The team that made a submission to the National Energy Board wrote that, because of marine shipping, the project is going to have significant adverse effects on the ecosystem and habitat of the killer whales. That is understandable, since tanker traffic will increase by 700%.

The government is spending money to say it is going to protect our oceans and the B.C. coast, but at the same time it buys a pipeline that will increase marine traffic, endangering a species that is already threatened. As for the coast, the oil we are talking about is heavy oil. In the event of an oil spill in a river, a lake or the ocean, which would be even worse, no one knows exactly how that type of oil will behave. There is a good chance that after a certain period of time the oil will sink to the bottom, and it will be nearly impossible to clean it up. These are important factors.

Last November, an Equiterre report gave us some insight into this government's choices. The Liberal government is investing 12 times as much money in the oil and gas sector as it is in renewable energy. We propose doing the opposite, investing in solar, wind, tidal and geothermal energy, as well as in electric cars, to change the way we think about the economy so that we have a new clean, green economy that will create good jobs for Canadians.

Export Development Canada alone gives at least $10 billion to the oil and gas sector. Last year, it was more than $10 billion, since we have to include the $4.5 billion that was invested in the purchase of the Trans Mountain pipeline.

We have a collective responsibility that goes beyond the re-election of a government or an MP. We have to have the courage to do things differently and make the shift that we have been slow to make here. That is why 300,000 people signed the Pact for the Transition and have decided to make an effort. They will compost and recycle their waste and eat less meat, for example. Why is the Liberal government unable to follow the public's example and make the right decisions for the future?

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, we have had the opportunity this morning and this afternoon to listen to interventions from both the Conservative Party and the New Democrats on this particular piece of legislation as it relates to sustainability. We witnessed that the Conservatives talk only about the economy. That is the only thing that matters. They never really mention the environment. We see from the NDP only discussion about the environment, never talking about the economy.

I spoke in the emergency debate that we had on the intergovernmental report on climate change, and I cannot recall if that member was here. It was a passionate discussion.

I think we can all come to the conclusion that, if we are going to be successful at this, it will be in a way that will not jeopardize our economy. Based on everything that has come from the NDP, it sounds as if it would jeopardize the economy if it means trying to get this right, but in reality that would only put us back and not advance the issue forward.

I wonder if the member could at least comment on whether he thinks it is important to bring these two issues together.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question, but I do not think he listened to my whole speech. I talked about jobs, for today and tomorrow, at least 12 times.

All reports and estimates show that millions of jobs in sustainable development and renewable energy will be created around the world. By investing in fossil fuels, we are failing to remain competitive with other countries. We could be leaders in certain areas of expertise and create jobs for Canadians, but we are failing miserably. This is what the Liberal government does not understand. It insists on investing in yesterday's energy sources, when we want to invest in the energy sources and jobs of tomorrow.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, one of the problems with the New Democratic Party is that it seems to send inconsistent messages. Let me give a tangible example. The NDP government in Alberta supports many of the issues related to the expansion of pipelines, taking into consideration indigenous people, the environment and the different stakeholders. The Alberta NDP government supports that.

The LNG in British Columbia is the biggest private sector–government investment that we have seen in the history of Canada. Svend Robinson, a prominent New Democrat, says it is a bad idea. The NDP leader says it is a good idea. It seems to me that the NDP does not know what to say about the environment, especially if it happens to be in government in Alberta or B.C.

Where is the consistency? Is Jagmeet right or is Jagmeet wrong? Canadians would like to know, in regard to the LNG. I think they would also like to know his thoughts about British Columbia versus Rachel Notley.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Jagmeet Singh is coming here, Madam Speaker. That is one thing I know.

I thank the parliamentary secretary for his question.

The New Democrats have always strongly supported workers, while still being environmentally and ecologically responsible. The Liberals get all worked up and cry about how we need to save the planet and how it would be catastrophic to do nothing, but they do nothing. All they have done is invest more in the oil and gas sector, buy an old pipeline and triple oil production. They managed this file so poorly that the courts quashed the project. They are not able to move forward, primarily because they did not respect indigenous communities and their rights. It is ironic that the parliamentary secretary brought this up, since they have been so incompetent with Trans Mountain that the courts stopped the project.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie for his activism in fighting for the environment and the economy.

What is clear in this debate is that the Liberals cannot manage the environment or the economy. The example that the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie cites is very striking.

We have a government that is willing to splurge $15 billion for the Trans Mountain pipeline, which is a money-losing pipeline that they tried to pretend was actually earning money. This leads to a net job loss in British Columbia because of the closure of the Parkland refinery as a result of the Trans Mountain pipeline. Therefore, we are talking about net job losses even before we talk about the threat this project represents to the fishery and tourism industries in British Columbia. It is threatening thousands of jobs.

We have a Liberal government that cannot manage the environment, is incapable of fighting back against climate change and at the same time has made a complete and utter mess of any sort of economic basis for the Trans Mountain pipeline.

Does my colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie feel that the Liberals have in any way managed effectively either the environment or the economy?

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent question. I do not believe he will be surprised to hear me say that the Liberals have done a very poor job of managing environmental and economic issues, especially the taxation file.

We were told that they would abolish the loopholes for CEOs, which cost us hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Four years later, the loopholes are still there. We were told that it was unacceptable for people to put money in tax havens because they are not paying their fair share of taxes. However, new tax agreements were signed with more tax havens. We were told that major corporations must contribute. Do Netflix and other web giants pay taxes? No. When it comes to taxation, the Liberals have failed miserably.

As for environmental stewardship, it is nothing but words. You would think you were listening to Dalida. It is rather ironic, but absolutely nothing has changed. As my colleague from British Columbia mentioned, it is true that purchasing the Trans Mountain project has caused job losses. Moreover, as environmentalist Mike Pearson pointed out, some habitats, such as salmon habitats, are already at risk or have been destroyed. He stated that during the preliminary work, and even before the project was blocked by the court, salmon habitats had already been damaged or destroyed because of this government's decisions.

[Marjolaine Boutin-Sweet, NDP, Hochelaga, QC]

Madam Speaker, let us come back to amendment 2 made by the Senate, which the government rejects and the NDP supports.

Imagine that I am the Government of Canada and that I want to award contracts for major projects. It seems to me that I would have the upper hand. It would be pretty easy to award the contract to the lowest bidder, but I could also decide to award it to the bidder who offers the best chances of achieving our greenhouse gas emissions targets.

Why does the government not make the most of this advantageous position to promote environmental protection in order to eventually reach the targets we hope to achieve?

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am not an inspector, investigator, or police officer, but I know the old question: who profits from crime? Why is there some sort of loophole? Why would we allow those who sign contracts with the government to get around the criteria for achieving the objectives of the national sustainable development strategy?

It is only logical for those people to have the same obligations as the rest of us so that we can all move together in the same direction. However, that is not the case. It seems like the government is giving companies and subcontractors a gift, some sort of free pass. It is not like me to say that, but the Senate is telling us that this needs to be included in the bill. A simple amendment to section 10.2 would ensure that all companies involved are subject to the same obligations, which would prevent any one subcontractor or company from having a competitive edge. They would all be required to move in the same direction and meet the criteria under this government's sustainable development strategy.

Why are the Liberals not doing that? It makes no sense.

The House resumed consideration of the motion in relation to the amendments made by the Senate to Bill C-57, An Act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act.

[Celina Caesar-Chavannes, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Madam Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to stand in our new chamber to speak to Bill C-57 and to continue to represent the people of Whitby, who have graciously allowed me to be here and who I know are very interested in the environment and issues that relate to the sustainable development goals.

I be splitting my time with the member for Rivière-des-Mille-Îles.

The bill responds to a number of recommendations from the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development. I would like to thank the committee members in this place and the other place for ensuring we have legislation that focuses on ensuring increased accountability by departments and agencies for setting and achieving a very ambitious sustainable development target, one that promotes close collaboration with all agencies through a whole-of-government approach. It sets a higher bar with respect to transparency, with improved reporting, oversight and continued conversations with indigenous peoples and individuals right across Canada to respect diversity and gender parity. It provides improvements through our robust and wholesome look at a federal sustainable development strategy, ensuring it incorporates the different views of Canadians across our country.

We have released the draft 2019-2022 federal sustainable development strategy. It is open for comment by Canadians until April 2. We want Canadians to help make the strategy stronger, so I would invite individuals to provide their commentary on that. The sustainable development goals data hub is on the Statistics Canada website.

I get a lot of questions from young people. Millennial kids, for example, email me and are seized with what we are doing as a government to ensure we keep on top of our commitments around sustainable development, particularly the environment, and to ensure we leave a world that is better for them, our children and grandchildren.

I happened to be part of the delegation that went to the UN last year with the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development, at which Canada gave its voluntary national review on sustainable development. It was a great moment for Canada to be there to express its commitment to a whole-of-government approach to sustainable development.

Today we are talking about the amendments that came from the other place. We accepted amendments 1 and 3. I know that other colleagues have questioned why our government did not accept amendment 2 to have incorporated in some of the contracts the sustainable development goals and targets. We have not supported this amendment because it goes beyond the policy intent of the legislation, which purpose is to make decision-making related to sustainable development more transparent and subject to accountability to Parliament.

I want to reference the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and member of Parliament for Central Nova. Last year, he spoke to the legislation quite passionately. In his comments on amendment 2, he spoke to the 2018 report, a progress report that shows that we are on target to meet many of the targets set forth in the 2016-2019 development strategy. In particular, in December 2017, he spoke to the fact that almost 8% of coastal marine areas were being conserved or were on track to reach our target of 10% by 2020.

He also referenced reducing greenhouse gas emissions from federal government buildings and fleets. We have achieved a 28% reduction in GHG emissions relative to 2005, more than half way to our target of 40% by 2030. The progress report highlights that we are well on our way to achieving this target. When we talk about protecting terrestrial areas and inland waters, we are not moving fast enough. Through having a whole-of-government approach and legislation that focuses on ensuring we are measuring those targets, we are able to see where we are doing well.

I mentioned our marine and government approach to reducing GHGs and where we could improve. We saw that we were not moving fast enough to protect our terrestrial and inland waters. Therefore, in budget 2018, we invested $1.3 billion in biodiversity and conservation to help us bolster that target and ensure we keep on track.

I would like to outline some of our government's accomplishments. We have heard others in this place talk about what we have done on the environment and our environmental stewardship, as well as putting a price on pollution, our insistence that polluters pay for the damage they do to our country. However, more important, we cannot just look at climate change in a silo.

One of the principles of the legislation is to ensure there is a whole-of-government approach. We have taken initiatives to ensure that climate change does not negatively or disproportionately impact individuals in our society who may not have a lot of means. We introduced Canada's first-ever poverty reduction strategy. That is built upon previous investments from the Canada child benefit, our national housing strategy, our public transit investments and our investments in the Canada workers benefit. We know that individuals who are working to become part of the middle class tend to be more negatively impacted by climate change, so we have to put in buffers. We have to put in place the means to ensure those individuals are well protected.

We know women and children are often the first to feel the brunt of the impact of climate change. We have a strategy around gender equality, ensuring we are looking at the legislation that comes before us through a gender lens and ensuring that women are given the opportunities they need to thrive in Canada and do so successfully.

For our indigenous population, we are working toward ensuring long-term water advisories are lifted by March of 2021. We are well on our way to doing that.

A number of initiatives need to be put in place to ensure we are not looking at the impacts of climate change in a silo. We have taken leadership around ensuring our climate plan is secure. However, we have also put forward different initiatives to ensure all Canadians, no matter their means, no matter their diversity, are able to have a sustainable future in our country. While we look to protect our environment, we also need to have the capacity to grow our economy and have good, well-paying jobs not just now but in the future.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Madam Speaker, the Federal Sustainable Development Act actually articulates a policy, a principle, of intergenerational equity. Effectively, intergenerational equity is that we do not deprive future generations of prosperity and wholesomeness by spending money wildly for the current needs of the nation. Intergenerational equity is about understanding that future generations have a right to supply and serve their own needs without a burden being imposed upon them by previous generations. However, we have seen the government embark upon huge deficits, when it promised small deficits. The Liberals promised that they were going to balance the budget. They have now said that no, they are not going to balance the budget by 2019 as promised. They are going to do it in 2040, and by doing so they will impose a tax burden and a debt burden on future generations.

How does the member square her government's performance on this file, an appalling performance, with the intergenerational equity principle articulated in the Federal Sustainable Development Act?

[Celina Caesar-Chavannes, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Madam Speaker, if nothing was more important to the Conservative members, they would understand that climate change is real. It impacts our generation now and will impact future generations. If we do not take it seriously, they will be living with the repercussions of our inaction. If the Conservatives were really taking this question seriously, they would have a plan. For 200-plus days they have said that they would have a plan, but they do not.

When it comes to looking after our children and grandchildren, we have put in place a number of initiatives, including a price on pollution to ensure that polluters pay, looking at a national poverty strategy to ensure that we are lifting children out of poverty with our CCB and ensuring that we have a plan that is comprehensive, holistic and whole-of-government and allows our children and grandchildren to have a prosperous future in this country.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech.

I could talk about how the Liberal government will miss its greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets, but I will talk about the government's motion.

The Liberals agreed to Senate amendments 1 and 3, but they rejected amendment 2, in which the Senate suggested that federal government contracts should adhere to the targets in the federal sustainable development strategy.

Why is the Liberal government refusing to ensure that such contracts include provisions related to its own federal sustainable development strategy? I do not understand.

[Celina Caesar-Chavannes, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Madam Speaker, as I mentioned, we accepted amendments one and three. We rejected amendment two, because it fell outside the policy intent of this particular piece of legislation.

This particular piece of legislation is to ensure that across governments, through a whole-of-government approach, we have a collaborative and coordinated effort toward improved oversight and reporting and continued conversations with indigenous people and Canadians about how to ensure that our strategy is robust and will look to improve the lives of Canadians now and in the future. It has increased accountability for departments and agencies in setting and achieving very ambitious sustainable development targets and ensures that we have leadership and can reach our goals.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am delighted to be back in the House of Commons. I am especially pleased to have the privilege of speaking in this new chamber.

I rise today to speak to the Senate's amendments to Bill C-57, an act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act. I want to thank the hon. senators for their time and efforts in reviewing this bill.

I would like to take this opportunity to provide a brief overview of how this bill aligns with the government’s commitments around delivering real results, pursuing goals with a renewed sense of collaboration, and setting a higher bar for transparency. I will continue with a discussion of the amendments adopted by the Senate.

This bill is a reflection of the Government of Canada’s commitment to sustainable development and safeguarding the interests of future generations. We all want a sustainable future for Canada, for our children and for our grandchildren. This bill clearly shows that sustainable development and the environment are at the forefront of government decision making.

This bill ensures that federal organizations bound by the act contribute to the development of federal sustainable development strategies and progress reports. In developing sustainable development strategies, federal organizations are to consider a number of principles, including the principle of intergenerational equity.

The bill indicates that targets must be measurable and include a time frame. That and the inclusion of the principle of results and delivery will help MPs, senators and the general public to keep track of the government's progress in meeting the goals and targets set out in each strategy every three years. This would incorporate the government’s strong focus on results into legislation.

The federal sustainable development strategy and its progress reports are a collaborative effort involving many departments and agencies. Bill C-57 would contribute to an integrated, whole-of-government view of activities supporting environmental sustainability. One way in which this would be achieved is by extending the Federal Sustainable Development Act’s coverage to over 90 federal organizations and enable further expansion of coverage over time.

The sustainable development strategies developed by these federal organizations will support the Federal Sustainable Development Act’s commitment to make environmental decision-making more transparent and accountable to Parliament.

Going forward, parliamentarians and relevant standing committees in both houses would have a greater ability to hold the government accountable for these sustainable development goals and targets. This would give committees a comprehensive view of what government organizations are doing with respect to sustainable development and the results achieved.

This bill received strong support from all parties of the House of Commons, where it was unanimously passed, and I hope that it will continue to be fully supported in the message we will send to the Senate.

I would now like to talk about the Senate's amendments.

First, the Senate agreed to some consequential amendments to bring the Auditor General Act in line with the changes made to the Federal Sustainable Development Act in Bill C-57. This reaffirms the commissioner's role under the Federal Sustainable Development Act and is supported by the government.

A second amendment was made to broaden the mandate of the Sustainable Development Advisory Council and not limit its advice on sustainable development matters to issues referred to it by the Minister of the Environment. Prior to this amendment, the bill stated that council members were to advise the minister on any matter related to sustainable development that is referred to the council by the minister. It is standard practice for ministerial advisory councils to provide advice on issues referred to them by the minister in charge. Defining the mandate of the Sustainable Development Advisory Council within the bill was meant to set clear parameters of its work. Although this amendment goes beyond our original intent, the government can accept it.

The third amendment would reinsert a section of the act that was removed. The current wording of the act stipulates that performance-based contracts with the Government of Canada must include provisions for meeting the applicable goals and targets referred to in the federal sustainable development strategy and the departmental sustainable development strategies.

It is the government's view that this section pertains to procurement. The alignment of procurement to environmental objectives is already included in the Treasury Board’s policy on green procurement, and that is why the government decided to repeal that section.

Also, Bill C-57 introduces section 10.1, which states that the Treasury Board may establish policies or issue directives applicable to designated entities governed by the Federal Sustainable Development Act in relation to the sustainable development impact of their operations. This explicitly recognizes the Treasury Board's role with respect to the impact of government operations on sustainable development.

On top of the fact that it is not appropriate to reinsert this section as written, the amendment further specifies that performance-based contracts include employment contracts and that they should include provisions for meeting the applicable goals and targets referred to in the federal sustainable development strategy as well as any applicable strategy developed under section 11.

The government does not support this amendment as this bill is not the appropriate legislation to prescribe what should be in employment contracts. Employment contracts are not easily defined, given their broad and wide-ranging nature. Moreover, this change is beyond the policy intent of a bill whose purpose is to make decision-making related to sustainable development more transparent and subject to accountability to Parliament.

Given all the provisions in the bill that strengthen other accountability measures, including identifying a minister responsible for each target in the federal sustainable development strategy, and explicitly indicating that the Treasury Board Secretariat may establish policies or issue directives applicable to one or more departments in relation to the sustainable development impact of their operations, the government does not see the benefit of this amendment.

The additional transparency and oversight measures included in this bill will provide enhanced accountability measures for the results achieved. That is why I agree with the minister and I support sending a message to the Senate agreeing with two amendments and disagreeing with the change to clause 8.

Madam Speaker, I welcome the debate on this amendment and your decision.

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

Madam Speaker, since we are talking about sustainable development and Canada's environment, I am wondering if my colleague opposite can tell us what price elasticity assumptions the government used in calculating its carbon tax and by how much it will reduce Canada's emissions by the end of this year. I would also like her to talk about how that compares to the opportunity costs many Canadians are incurring by taking on a carbon tax that does nothing to reduce Canada's emissions but makes their lives more expensive. As well, can she explain to Canadians why she thinks it is fair that Canadians should pay for the mistakes of this Prime Minister?

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for her question.

I am sure she knows that I am from Quebec. The price on pollution in Quebec is widely accepted and has been in place for a long time now. People do not understand why we are not going even further in that respect.

I am back in the House after spending six weeks in my riding. The environment is probably the biggest issue people are talking about. What can we do to go even further, to help our children and grandchildren? The member surely knows that I used to be a member of the Standing Committee on International Trade. We held consultations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The number one concern for people in the Far North is the fact that climate change is already happening. We really need to do even more.

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

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech.

I do not want to interpret her comments, and that is why I am asking my question. According to her explanation, Senate amendment 5 was rejected by the government because it did not reference the right act.

My question is very simple. Does the member accept the spirit of this amendment? Does the government agree with the spirit and is it simply saying that it is not in the right act?

If that is the case, in what legislation will it be included to ensure it becomes an integral part of the progress we want to make in fighting climate change?

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague. I am glad to see he was really listening.

The reason we do not need to go further is that it is already included in the procurement harmonization.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am sure my colleague is aware of the announcement made last week by the Leader of the Opposition to the effect that the Conservative government's primary objective would be to stop pollutants from being dumped in our waterways. That is a clear commitment for Canada's environment.

The member said earlier that the carbon tax would likely go up. Can she give us any details? Just how high will the Liberal carbon tax go if, heaven forbid, those folks over there are re-elected in a year?

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my honourable colleague. I see that he is not very well rested after spending six weeks in his riding. I find him to be a little off.

Quebeckers believe that we must fight climate change and put a price on pollution. My colleague is from Quebec and has known for a long time that we are already environmentally conscious and that we want to go further, just like British Columbia.

I know he cannot answer this question, but I would like to know whether the Conservative Party has a plan to fight climate change. I have not seen one yet and there is nothing forthcoming. I am thinking of my children and my granddaughter.

I would like to hear what my colleague has to say, but he cannot ask me any more questions.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

The member for Louis-Saint-Laurent had the opportunity to ask a question. He will have to wait for another opportunity, if one presents itself, to ask another question.

It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, Health; the hon. member for Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, International Trade; and the hon. member for Essex, International Trade.

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

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased today to stand in the House to talk about sustainable development and Canada's environment and to point out the vast swath of hypocrisy that the government has undertaken in its time in office. Regardless of political stripe, regardless of where someone is in terms of environmental policy in this country, everyone agrees that the Liberals in this Parliament have a woeful and inept track record of doing anything for Canada's environment.

Let us start with the carbon tax. A colleague from the Liberal caucus just stood and said that the carbon tax should be higher. She said that in response to a question I asked about whether a carbon tax would actually do anything to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Canada.

Why did she try to spin that question and show the Liberals' true agenda? It is because we know the carbon tax that Justin Trudeau has put in place on Canadians will do nothing—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I want to remind the member she is not to mention, during her speech, individuals' names who are sitting in the House.

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

It is the new environment, Madam Speaker. One gets very excited about the carbon tax and fighting it and fighting the perpetrator of the carbon tax. I hope Canadians will forgive me for that. It was a slip of the tongue.

The carbon tax has been imposed by the disastrous Liberal Prime Minister. Canadians have to pay for his mistake of putting in place a carbon tax and not reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Let me explain this.

If somebody in Canada wants to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, that individual has to first realize that Canada has an agricultural-based economy. We also have a natural resource-based economy and a manufacturing-based economy. All of these industries are carbon intensive. They take energy to run. It is cold here in Ottawa. Just taking a few short steps outside the House of Commons today makes one realize that we need energy to heat our buildings in the middle of January.

The reality is that many Canadians have to drive to work. Canada does not have the same sort of public transit infrastructure that a small European country has. When we put all of those things together and look at the economic context of Canada, we understand that the price the Prime Minister has put on carbon will do nothing to change the demand for carbon.

People who have to drive to work in downtown Calgary from my riding of Calgary Nose Hill, after the disastrous failure to build the green line in my riding that my former government committed to, need to fill up their cars. They do not really have a choice of how to commute to work. The price of gas does not matter as they have to put gas in their cars. If it is more expensive, that means more money coming out of their pockets. The only way they can change their behaviour is by saying it is no longer affordable for them to drive to work. In that case we would see an economic reduction instead of what the Liberals always talk about, which is growing Canada's economy and balancing the environment.

Under our former Conservative government we saw for the first time in Canadian history a decoupling of economic growth. We saw the economy grow and greenhouse gas emissions drop. Why was that? It was because we told each of the major emitting sectors in Canada that we would put regulations in place such that they would have to adapt to a lower carbon emitting standard over time. That resulted in a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions with respect to passenger vehicles and the coal-fired electricity sector. All those regulations were put in place under the Conservative government.

The carbon tax is just a consumption tax. It is like the Liberals have added another GST to Canada's economy. It is not going to do anything to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. As somebody who cares about this issue, it is so devastating for me to watch their uninformed environment minister be completely unaware of any of the realities of the failed economic model of this situation.

My colleague who just made a speech spoke to their hidden agenda. She said the carbon tax is not high enough and that we need to make it higher. Anybody who watches the Liberal government knows that it cannot resist raising a tax. Anybody who thinks that the carbon tax is bad now, should know that it is going to go up.

The government has no plan on how to grow the economy. It only has a plan to build a deficit. What does that mean? Today's deficit is tomorrow's taxes. We have a carbon tax that is not going to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and we have huge growing deficits. For the amount of money that the Liberal government has spent on nothing that has materially impacted the lives of Canadians in a positive way, we could have sent a gold-plated rocket ship to the moon.

Canadians do not see anything for these deficits, but they will see increased taxes. Canadians are tired of paying for the Prime Minister's ego, his love for himself and his failed policies. That is why we cannot trust Liberals on any sort of policy related to sustainable development, but I want to build on that case.

We know the carbon tax is a failure, but there is something even bigger in terms of hypocrisy. The government has done everything possible to undermine the workers in the energy sector and the industries that are part of the energy sector across this country. It has done everything possible to call their jobs dirty. The Prime Minister even said in Paris that he wished they could phase out the energy sector faster.

The people on this side of the aisle support transporting Canada's energy products in the most environmentally responsible way, which is pipelines. The Liberals across the aisle are content to let our energy products be transported by rail, which has both environmental implications and implications on our agriculture sector. They are saying they should use rail and not pipelines or they should shut the energy sector down, but at the same time, what are they doing?

Let us talk about a pipeline, one of the few pipelines that the Liberal Party loves, and that is a pipeline of fecal matter. That is right. The same Liberal government that says it does not like pipelines got behind the former mayor of Quebec and approved the City of Montreal dumping billions of litres of raw sewage into the St. Lawrence River.

People in the energy sector are told on a daily basis that their jobs are dirty and that pipelines are not environmentally sustainable. One has to appreciate the level of frustration and anger at the hypocrisy of the environment minister telling them their jobs are dirty and the government is working against pipelines. I believe her chief of staff made an entire career out of fighting pipelines. It is “no pipelines for the energy sector”, but what did the Liberals do in their first months in office? On the minister's sixth day in office, when a top priority was to turn the lights on in the office, the environment minister approved a plan for the City of Montreal to dump billions of litres of raw sewage into the St. Lawrence River. There are concerns about pipelines in Quebec, but not about fecal matter pipelines. Fecal matter pipelines are okay. Job-creating energy pipelines are not okay. That is sustainable development under the Liberal government.

It gets worse. I am not sure what other word I can use for “fecal matter” in the House that is parliamentary, but viewers at home can imagine and insert the word appropriately here. The Conservative government said we should not be developing a pipeline of fecal matter since there were a lot of concerns about fish habitat and the terrible precedent that this decision would create for the future. We wanted to ensure that all of the appropriate actions and research had been done and we actually named a panel to review the plan. In October of 2015, the former Conservative government mandated an independent science review panel to review the proposed discharge of the raw sewage of Montreal. This was a very important step.

What did the sustainable development-loving environment minister, the “Alberta has dirty jobs” environment minister, the “no energy pipeline” environment minister do on her sixth day in office? She said, “No Alberta pipelines, but Montreal can dump away. Dump all of that fecal matter into the river. We do not need a fish habitat. Dump it in. Set that precedent. That is great.”

That is sustainable development under the Liberal government. We have a carbon tax that will not reduce greenhouse gas emissions and we have the Minister of Environment jetting around the world to climate action panels and cocktail receptions fully understanding that the government is never going to meet its own self-imposed greenhouse gas emissions target.

At the same time, the environment minister calls the jobs of the people in my riding dirty, tells the rest of Canada that we cannot put in place energy infrastructure, which is one of the most sustainable ways to transport energy products around the world, and signs off on a plan that had no review to dump billions of litres of fecal matter into the St. Lawrence River. I wonder how baby beluga felt about that.

This is why the government has no credibility whatsoever on sustainable development. It is one of the areas where the New Democratic Party and the Conservative Party can actually unite and say that there is no credibility there. However, it is even worse, because rather than talking about policy, government members just stand up and frankly repeat falsehoods. They are trying to buy the votes of Canadians with their mumbo jumbo while at the same building pipelines of billions of litres of raw sewage.

I want people to visualize a full porta-potty after the end of a summer fair, then multiply that by one billion and dump that into the St. Lawrence River. That is what we are talking about. That is what the environment minister did on her sixth day in office, yet the jobs of the people in my riding are dirty and we should phase out the energy sector. Pardon me if I have some level of skepticism about the government's sustainable development plan.

I thought we could not possibly go into the lead-up to the federal election and not deal with the Montreal raw sewage issue. The Liberals could not possibly stand by this, yet they are. That is their sustainable development priority. I am so proud that the leader of my party stood up and said that a Conservative government would not allow this. It is not something we think is sustainable development.

I look at some of the things the government could have done over the last several years. In 2017, 250 billion litres of raw sewage was spilled or leaked into our waterways without being treated. This is the equivalent of 86,000 Olympic-size swimming pools. Again, we can try to visualize that in terms of the volume of a porta-potty. However, pipelines with energy projects are not okay. The Liberals would rather they not happen. For pipelines, which are subject to the most rigorous environment assessments in the world, no, we cannot do that, but 86,000 Olympic-size swimming pools full of fecal matter are good to go. That is the Liberal Party's sustainable development agenda.

In 2016, under the government's watch, only 159 out of 269 municipalities reported their sewage leaks. Why is the Liberal government not concerned about these missing reports? Why is the government not helping these municipalities upgrade their sewage infrastructure to ensure that no raw sewage is spilled into Canadian waters?

On this issue I am pleased to say that the former Conservative government set the stage in 2012 with the first wastewater regulations as a means of cleaning up 150 billion litres of untreated or under-treated wastewater or sewage that is dumped into waterways each year. Again, where is the Liberals' action on the environment? It is making Canadians pay for the Prime Minister's mistake, his failed legacy of any sort of environmental standard whatsoever, at the pump or on their tax bills.

A lot of Canadians are waking up to the hypocrisy of the government across a majority of issues. It is very exciting to see. I was able to travel across British Columbia this month. I travelled into some ridings, such as Cloverdale—Langley City. We had a town hall and about 250 people showed up. I thought it was going to be an interesting room. There was a Liberal member of Parliament there who won by a considerable majority. I heard people stand up in that room and say that they voted for the Prime Minister and he betrayed them.

This is why the Conservative Party is rolling out a plan of pragmatism. It is why we have opposed government bills like Bill C-69, the no-more-pipelines bill, which would do nothing to practically clean up the Canadian environment but would do everything to make it harder for Canadians to work on a daily basis.

That is where we have to wonder what the current government is managing to. If it is managing to taxing Canadians more but getting fewer results, what is in it for Canadians? Why do they have to pay for the Prime Minister's mistakes? What are the motives of every person across the aisle who votes in favour of these bills that do nothing to help the Canadian environment or the economy but make lives worse for Canadians? Why are they doing this? They could be doing it because they have not actually reviewed this legislation and are not doing their jobs. That could be one matter.

When I watch the Prime Minister and the environment minister and what their priorities are, such as going to Tedx conferences and different conferences around the world, where they are spouting their talking points to international audiences, as opposed to looking at home and doing their jobs here and then reporting back to the world on success, I wonder if it is more about their egos and seeking power for power's sake as opposed to doing something that actually matters.

Members do not have to take my word for it, although I would like it if they did. The reality is that the Commissioner for the Environment and Sustainable Development talked about some of these issues in his report this year. It is important to highlight this, because it talks about the fact that the measures to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions contained in the government's framework have yet to be implemented. That is on top of the carbon tax the government has put forward, which is probably going to do nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions but is going to make Canadians pay for the Prime Minister's mistakes. The report is quite shocking for a government that had an environment minister dressed up as a climate crusader for Halloween and put it on Twitter. One would think a climate crusader could get a better report from the environment and sustainable development commissioner than that.

I want to close with this. The Liberals can stand up, obfuscate and put all these pretty talking points forward. At the end of the day, their priority and track record has been a carbon tax that makes life more expensive for Canadians and does nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. They have stymied energy infrastructure in this country and have prioritized billions of litres of fecal matter going into the St. Lawrence River.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change]

Madam Speaker, to begin, I would question the relevance of the member's entire submission on this point, given that we are debating the Senate amendments to Bill C-57, which she did not touch on.

In any event, she spent a good portion of her time on waste water. I would like to point out some of the inaccuracies throughout her speech. She indicated that the Conservatives took a regulatory approach. What they did not have was an infrastructure plan to allow municipalities to deal with their waste water problems, which we are doing right now.

She suggested that this whole side of the House is somehow opposed to the energy industry. Nothing could be further from the truth. I personally spent about five years working in the city of Calgary, the same city the member represents. I can tell her that this side of the House does have supporters of the sector who are working hard to ensure that we develop our resources in a responsible way.

When it comes to our plan to put a price on pollution, we have to start by saying that climate change is a problem. The Conservatives have yet to pitch a single idea for what they are going to do to address the threat posed by climate change.

On this side of the House, we do not think pollution should be free. We have sought the advice of the world's leading climate economists. They have all come back to the same point, which is that the most effective thing we can do to combat climate change is to put a price on pollution and return revenues to citizens. That is what we are doing.

My question to the member opposite is this. Why are she and the Leader of the Opposition committed to taking Doug Ford's approach to climate change and taking money from their constituents to make pollution free again?

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

Madam Speaker, my colleague mentioned relevance. I think it is fairly relevant to the sustainable development of Canada to talk about billions of litres of fecal matter being poured into the St. Lawrence under the watch of the environment minister.

The member talked about infrastructure. The only infrastructure dollars that have been prioritized by the current government were for the infrastructure minister's office renovations at the front of this Parliament. Canadians have seen virtually no movement of the billions of dollars of deficit for infrastructure across this country. For a man to say that he worked in Calgary's energy sector and to then vote time and again on bills to support the Trans Mountain pipeline or to get energy workers back to work, we have one word for that in Calgary. That is “traitor”.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I would ask the hon. member to ensure that she watches the words she uses in the House of Commons. There are words that should not be used in the House, and we need to be respectful of other members. We may not be in agreement as to what they are saying or what their positions are, but we should be very careful of the words being used.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, I think we are starting to see where the Conservatives are going to be posturing themselves with rhetoric as we head into the next election. That is fair enough. They have a good reputation for talking about things that are full of fecal matter. Therefore, this is right up their alley.

The member referenced what the environment minister was forced to do six days after our government came into power. Why was the environment minister forced to do that? It was because in the preceding 10 years, there was absolutely no work done by the previous Conservative government with respect to building up the infrastructure so that the City of Montreal did not have to do what it had to do. It is quite simple. It is literally a pool of fecal matter, and it is a matter of whether we can properly process what is in there before it enters the St. Lawrence. If the proper infrastructure had been in place, the environment minister would not have had to do that six days after we came into government.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

The hon. member is very capable of answering the question. I would ask all other members to hold their thoughts.

The hon. member for Calgary Nose Hill.

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

Madam Speaker, once again, I will point out the fact that the government has racked up so much deficit and has increased Canadian taxes and has done nothing for infrastructure in Canada. Under our former Conservative government, Canada's aged infrastructure was reduced significantly. We had huge investments in infrastructure under a balanced budget and the lowest federal tax burden in over 50 years. That is a concept the government has no idea of whatsoever.

The member can stand up and be glib about this, but the reality is that he is actually making excuses for Montreal dumping billions of litres of sewage into the St. Lawrence River. Now he is saying that they did not have a choice. If they actually cared about infrastructure, why did they approve this plan? I am not sure any scientist would actually say that this was a great thing. Where was their infrastructure support? That is the problem.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

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

The government has had three years to do anything on any of these files, and it has done nothing except spend money and raise taxes, and now they have to account, because Canadians are tired of paying for the Prime Minister's mistakes and failed policies.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I want to remind members again that when someone has the floor to be respectful. The hon. member for Kingston and the Islands had the opportunity to ask his question, and I would ask him to allow the person who has the floor to have the opportunity to respond without being interrupted.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Edmonton Strathcona.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Madam Speaker, when the Conservatives were in power, much to their credit, they brought back the eco-energy retrofit program, which was a great program that actually gave money to families or small businesses to retrofit their buildings so they could save on their energy bills. In fact, when I was on the public works committee, I actually brought forward the idea of looking at how much taxpayer money could be saved if the federal government invested in a major way in energy efficiency. In the end, we had a fabulous report, by the way, from a majority Conservative committee.

The Conservatives brought in this plan. It was over-subscribed. People loved it, and the Conservatives killed it. Why did they kill it? They wanted to bring down their deficit before the election.

Does the member not believe that a good initiative for sustainable development is to support Canadian families so they can do their part too and reduce their energy costs through a home energy retrofit program?

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

Madam Speaker, one of the primary responsibilities we have in this place is to be wise stewards of taxpayer dollars.

Unfortunately, that principle is sometimes lost on parties that are to the left of the Conservative Party of Canada. When we are in a deficit situation, we should be looking at ways to return the budget back to balance. This is something the Liberal government has no intention of doing. That is quite clear at this point in time.

When we look at the record, the words that I twigged into with my colleague's question were doing things to help Canadian families make ends meet. I look at some of the things that none of the other parties in this place support, like common sense tax initiatives like income-splitting, that allowed people to value the labour of people who might have lower income in a relationship.

I think about all of those measures that many Canadians used to get by that were cancelled, that were not supported by any other party in this place. I will give the member's party credit. I think her former leader probably would have governed to the right of the Prime Minister. However, that said, nobody else here ever talks about balanced budgets or deficit. To me, that is walking away from the principle that we have for managing taxpayer dollars efficiently and effectively.

Sometimes we have to talk about the fact that we have to live within our means, even in government. I am very proud to say that our government left Canadians with a balanced budget, the lowest federal tax burden in over 50 years, and that is a good thing.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Madam Speaker, we keep hearing that the best way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is to put a price on pollution, what I like to call the Liberal carbon tax.

A two-year study in Quebec on the carbon exchange found that pricing pollution did not reduce greenhouse gas emissions in any way. In fact, a slight increase was observed.

I would like to hear the hon. member's thoughts on the fact that the Liberals want to tax people when the Quebec experience shows that the outcome is completely uncertain.

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

Madam Speaker, the reality is that carbon in Canada is a good that is relatively inelastic. There is not a lot of substitute goods for it. Therefore, when the price of carbon is increased, we will not see a lot of behaviour changed, but we will see a restriction or a constriction on economic growth, as well as the ability of Canadians to make ends meet.

That is why this will not work, the $40 price on carbon. One of my colleagues from Quebec boldly said that they really wanted to increase this tax. The government has not been able to show at what price behaviour would change in Canada and it has not been able to show when the carbon tax it has introduced would actually meet the emissions targets.

That is why the carbon tax is such a fallacy and it is something the Liberal government should be walking away from.

The House resumed consideration of the motion in relation to the amendments made by the Senate to Bill C-57, An Act to amend the Federal Sustainable Development Act.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise to speak, whether in the chamber of our traditional House of Commons or the new chamber we are debating in today for the first time. When answering his first question, the Prime Minister commended all the individuals involved in making this transition possible and recognized the fine work and efforts that so many people have put in to realize the day that is finally upon us.

Having said that, I have listened to a few interesting speeches over the last number of hours on what is a very important principled piece of legislation. I would really encourage members of the Conservatives, as well as my New Democrat friends, to try to get a better understanding of what this legislation is all about. I have heard a wide range of debate. I will try to address the many different issues raised during the debate, but it covered a lot of territory, from taxation policy to immigration policy. There was a bit of stuff on the environment, as well as other issues.

I want to start by trying to express what many viewers might have been confused about with the previous speaker on what I believe is a very important issue, which is sustainability and the whole idea that when we move forward we need to look at sustainable development and establish those goals and objectives. When legislation empowers the right approach by the different stakeholders, the many different federal agencies that will all fall under this legislation, we need to recognize it as a positive piece of legislation, not only for the environment but also for Canada's economy.

I heard a great deal about Canada's economy and how it is performing. The Conservative opposition tries to give what I would argue is a false impression, as if the Canadian economy is not doing well. In fact, the numbers do not lie. The numbers are very much favourable over the last few years. We have seen progressive legislation brought in by this government. Some ideas have been generated from stakeholders, Paris and right through all regions of our country that understand the importance of the environment. We have been able to encapsulate the ideas that will push our economy forward, while at the same time recognize the importance of our environment.

I would suggest that the principle of working the environment and economy together is something this government understands. That is where I would like to start my comments on this legislation. We have the Conservatives, who are the official opposition, who tend to want to forget about the environment. They try to give the impression that the Harper government truly cared about the environment and had economic, legislative or budgetary policies to protect Canada's environment. In fact, not only did the former prime minister fail to meet the standards and expectations of Canadians with respect to the environment, the Conservatives did a poor job on the economy too.

When listening to the Conservatives talk about this legislation, whether today or back in November or December, one would think there has been no change and that Stephen Harper is still the leader of the Conservative opposition party.

It is interesting. Is it Stephen Harper? Some have made the suggestion today that it sounded more like Doug Ford was running the Conservative Party. Who is running the Conservative Party today? Is it Doug Ford? Is it Stephen Harper? Maybe it is Jason Kenney out in Alberta. Who is running the Conservative Party? When it comes to our environment, it is really difficult to tell.

The Conservative Party really has no plan. In one of the questions today, the Prime Minister said something like it has been 270 days and we are still waiting for that plan. Canadians deserve to see a plan. The Conservative Party has no plan.

I am going to talk about the Liberal plan very shortly, but before I do that, let me talk about my New Democrat friends. On the one hand, the Conservatives are very much focused on the economy. The environment really does not matter to them and they do not have a plan when it comes to the environment. My New Democrat friends, on the other hand, have a multitude of plans dealing with the environment. Everything is about the environment. Some would think they are trying to out-green the Green Party on environmental policies. They forget about the economy. It is hard to understand what the NDP's position is. After all, we have Jagmeet Singh saying one thing, while another prominent New Democrat is saying another thing. We have the NDP here in Ottawa saying one thing, while the NDP provincial governments are saying something completely different.

What about the LNG project? It is a multi-billion dollar project. Every Canadian in every region is directly or indirectly going to benefit from the LNG investment. Every Canadian will derive some direct or indirect benefit from this multi-billion dollar investment. The New Democrat government in British Columbia and the government here in Ottawa have recognized the value of that development. However, now we have Svend Robinson, the prominent New Democrat who wants to be back inside the House, saying that it is a bad idea, and even going further in terms of wanting to shut down any sort of development of our natural resources.

The NDP here in Ottawa is saying that pipelines and the exportation of oil is a bad thing. If we listen to New Democrats speak in the House, we hear that they do not want to see any new pipelines at all. That seems to be their line, yet the NDP government in Alberta is begging and pleading that we recognize the importance of the oil industry for all Canadians.

On the one hand we have the New Democrats, who are all over the place on the issue of the environment, with a multitude of different plans, but who are not listening and being sensitive to the needs of Canada's economy. Then we have the Conservatives on the other hand, who do not have the sensitivity and do not recognize the need to work with the many different stakeholders to consider the environment when developing our natural resources or commodities.

Let us use a very specific example. Stephen Harper, the former prime minister, was prime minister for 10 years. How many pipelines did Stephen Harper actually construct or provide with the opportunity that would see those pipelines move forward, which would have taken our resources to Asian markets, to the coastline? The answer is zero, not one. There was not one inch of pipeline from the Conservative Party.

If we listen to the Alberta members of Parliament, we would think they were building four or five pipelines a year, as if they truly cared about them. However, for the 10 years they were in government, they did not build one inch of pipeline. Within months of this government taking office, it put into place—

[An hon. member]

That's not true.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

That is the truth. If we look at the first few months of this government, after being elected in 2015, we started to put into place a process that respected the environment, that ensured indigenous people would have a voice, that there would be a process that would allow for the expansion of getting our resources to market. The Conservative Harper government failed at doing this.

Why should we listen to the Conservatives when it comes to a pipeline when they failed so miserably on it? We do not need to be lectured by the Conservative members about the jobs in the province of Alberta. This is a government that cares about what is happening in all regions of our country, including my home province of Manitoba, the province of Alberta, the province of Quebec and all the different provinces in Atlantic Canada. We are concerned about all provinces and territories. We encourage economic growth wherever we can. We have been very successful.

Stephen Harper was the prime minister for 10 years and his government created somewhere in the neighbourhood of just over a million jobs. In the last three years and a few months, in working with small businesses and Canadians in all regions of the country, we have seen 800,000-plus new jobs created in Canada. In good part it has a lot to do with the budgetary announcements we have brought forward.

The member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan talked about the issue of taxation and how it had an impact on sustainability in Canada, referring to the Canadian economy. This government has done more to cultivate and encourage the growth of our economy. From day one, we have been a government focused on Canada's middle class and have taken policy initiatives that would enhance and give strength to the middle class. We understand and appreciate that the stronger and healthier Canada's middle class is, the healthier our economy will be, not to mention the many different social aspects.

The previous speaker talked about waste, the environment and how in Montreal a considerable amount of waste unfortunately had to be dumped into the St. Lawrence. There is a reason why it had to be dumped. Before I go into that reason, let me assure the members opposite that it is not the first time waste has been dropped into a waterway. Even under Stephen Harper, it was dropped into the waterways. What did Stephen Harper do to deal with that issue? It was unlike this government that has invested and made commitments of billions of dollars to build Canada's infrastructure.

By building our infrastructure, we are going to be in a better position in the future to prevent the dumping of sewage in any form into our waterways. That is a very difficult decision. However, to try to give an impression that this government caused it is somewhat disingenuous and misleading.

For the first time, we have a government in Canada that is committed to building the infrastructure of our country and recognizing that if we want to have sustainable development in the future, a part of that sustainable development is investing in our communities, our capital infrastructure. In the last few years, this government has invested millions of dollars in water treatment centres in different areas of our great nation, so not only do we talk about it, but this government has taken specific actions. Many of those actions can be found in the budgets that have been presented by the Minister of Finance on behalf of the Government of Canada.

Other initiatives like the one we are talking about today are brought in through ministers to make changes to legislation. The process in bringing in this legislation has involved a great deal of background work and consultation, from consultation the minister's staff conducted prior to introduction and first reading, to the debate process, to the committee proceedings and to third reading. Ultimately it went to the Senate, where we received more feedback, which some of my colleagues have commented on.

The legislation before us today is very positive. It is something all members should reflect on and support. Federal sustainable development strategy, objectives and reports are all positive things. Canadians expect government to look at ways in which we can encourage sustainable development in the future.

The legislation we are debating today is part of what we talked about in the last federal election. This is yet another piece of legislation that fulfills a commitment the Prime Minister made to Canadians and that the Liberal Party made to Canadians.

We recognize that there is always room to improve and ways in which we can do better. I want to pay attention to this issue, because the Conservatives in particular have raised the issue of the price on pollution. We have had so much direction not only from within Canada, but outside as well. Countries around the world have recognized the importance of assigning a price on carbon.

The first jurisdiction in Canada to move forward on this issue was in Alberta. It was the Progressive Conservative Party that moved in this direction. However, the Conservative Party in Ottawa still does not understand it. This is where the current leader falls behind Stephen Harper. Some of the people Stephen Harper had around him recognized the value of having a price on pollution, but not the current Conservative Party.

Patrick Brown was another individual who talked about the price on carbon. I am sure my colleagues remember that individual, who was a part of the Stephen Harper government. Even though the Conservative Party associates so closely with Stephen Harper and Doug Ford, it is reminiscent of the Conservative-Reform days. Maybe that is the direction they are trying to go.

I look forward to 2019 when we are going to be able to tell Canadians all the wonderful progressive measures that we have taken, everything from tax breaks to protecting our environment to enhancing social programs. There is so much more we would like to be able to do and maybe Canadians will allow us to continue.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I really enjoyed that member's speech, as humorous as it was.

In the Federal Sustainable Development Act there is a provision that deals with intergenerational equity, which effectively says the current generation will not steal from future generations. The current generation will not impose a burden on future generations in order to meet its present-day needs. Presumably by supporting this particular piece of legislation and the underlying legislation, that member supports intergenerational equity, yet his government is doing the very opposite, running huge deficits when it promised to run small deficits.

The Liberal government failed to deliver a balanced budget this year, in 2019, despite the Prime Minister's solemn promise. He is on record as saying he would balance the budget by 2019. He never did it. When the budget is not balanced and huge deficits are run, there will be huge debts in the future that future generations will have to pay as well as all of the interest on it that future generations will have to pay. The current generation is stealing from the future generation. How is that intergenerational equity?

How does the member square his government's appalling performance on the economy and on debt?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we need to recognize that the Conservative government allowed for a huge infrastructure deficit and we need to look at the reality of the cost of that infrastructure deficit. As a result of the Harper government choosing not to invest in Canada's infrastructure, there are going to be long-term cost ramifications for future generations. That is one of the reasons why our government, months into taking office, made a commitment to Canada's infrastructure. We can go beyond that and talk about some of the social infrastructures, programs in particular.

While the Conservatives would give cheques to millionaires for their children, our Canada child benefit is giving millions of dollars to Canadians. In my riding of Winnipeg North alone, it is like $9 million a month to families that really need it. They are spending that money, which improves their disposable income.

I can justify the expenditures of this government. What I cannot justify is the lack of commitment that the Harper government had towards our infrastructure and that is—

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Vancouver Kingsway.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his very long and very loud speech. He touched on a number of things but two of the most important to Canadians are the economy and the environment.

We all just returned from break and I want to share some of the feedback that I received from my constituents. I think many other members in the chamber have heard the same thing and some alarming facts.

Just last week it was reported that 46% of Canadians are $200 away from insolvency. That does not sound like an economy that is working well for a lot of people. My hon. colleague talked about the middle class. I have not ever heard the Liberals talk about the working class. There are millions of Canadians in this country that are not doing well.

The member quoted the same figures that the Conservatives used to quote, those large macro numbers about how well Canada is doing compared to the G7. It reminds me of the phrase that when Bill Gates walks into a bar everybody is a millionaire, on average. That is not the reality here in this country. There are gaping holes between the wealthy and the poor and between the working class in this country.

I want for a moment to turn to the issue of the environment. Nobody is opposed to natural resources or the oil industry. People are concerned about climate change and carbon emissions. With the alarming report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change telling us we have 11 years to make a 45% reduction over 2010 levels, we do not have time to waste. Expanding fossil fuel infrastructure at a time when we have to be reducing carbon emissions is something that many Canadians, me included, have a hard time understanding.

What does my hon. colleague have to say to those almost one in two Canadians who are $200 away from going bankrupt? What does he have to say to the younger generation that is concerned about—

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

The hon. parliamentary secretary to the government House leader.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

In short, Mr. Speaker, I would say they have a government that is listening to what Canadians are saying.

The Prime Minister has mandated and constantly reminded members, at least on this side of the House—and we would encourage all members to do what the member said he did—to work with constituents to get a better sense of what their constituents expect from Ottawa and then bring that information to Ottawa. When that has happened, at least on the Liberal benches we have seen the development and enhancement of programs that have made a difference.

How can the member not recognize that the Canada child benefit program has lifted literally hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty? How can the member not recognize that the enhancement to the guaranteed income supplement for seniors has lifted literally thousands of people out of poverty, including the poorest seniors? As I alluded to a few minutes ago, Winnipeg North gets approximately $9 million every month because of the children who live there, and that money enhances their living. This is a government that truly cares, and that is why we are developing positive, progressive social policies.

[Kim Rudd, Liberal, Northumberland—Peterborough South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I very much support my colleague's remarks.

We have heard a lot about deficits and we cannot forget that in nine years, Stephen Harper added $160 billion to Canada's debt when we had the lowest growth since the 1930s, and in addition to that deficit, he left a huge infrastructure deficit, as my colleague mentioned. As the minister announced today in question period, there are over 4,000 infrastructure projects under way in this country. My riding happens to have two of them, in waste-water treatment, one just completed and the other under way, worth $2 million. It is allowing businesses like Danby and Weston to grow and expand and allowing rural communities to grow.

I would like the member to respond to the infrastructure deficit and the opportunities that we are providing communities by answering that deficit.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague and friend is right on with regard to the importance of infrastructure, and she cited some very specific files within her own riding. Infrastructure has been enhanced in all regions of our country, again because this government, even going into the election, recognized the serious infrastructure deficit that Canada is facing, primarily as a direct result of the policies of Stephen Harper. That is why we had to make the types of investment and commitment that we made. If we invest in infrastructure and in Canadians, we will have a much healthier environment for all.

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I do not agree with what the member opposite said about seniors. Yes, Liberals increased something, but they took a lot away from them. Seniors no longer have a tax credit to take buses. Also, the carbon tax increases the cost of their groceries, heating, everything.

When I visited a seniors home last week, a very important thing they told me is that their grandkids and kids are going to suffer because the government is going to make them pay for all the debt and mistakes the Liberal government has made.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I have a few quick points. First and foremost, I recognize that it was this government, within months of being in government, that dramatically increased the guaranteed income supplement, lifting tens of thousands of the poorest seniors in all regions of Canada out of poverty. It was this government, within months, that reversed the Harper decision and returned the age of retirement from 67 to 65. Independent reports commented on how many seniors would have been put in poverty had we not made that change. We could talk about the CPP agreement between Ottawa and the provinces, ensuring that future seniors will have better retirements.

This government has done so much, and we will continue to look at ways to improve the quality of life for seniors. After all, this is the Prime Minister who appointed the first Minister of Seniors.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I really enjoyed listening to the speech of the member for Winnipeg North. It was all about spending, and the Liberals talk about that a lot. They spend, spend, spend. There was nothing about fiscal control. There was nothing about economic sustainability, being able to afford the things we paid for. There was nothing about reducing the tax burden on Canadians.

Therefore, it is a real pleasure to talk about the Federal Sustainable Development Act and the amendments that have been proposed. When we actually compare the provisions of the act and what the act requires against the performance of the Liberal government, we will find that this tax-and-spend Liberal government has been found wanting.

The underlying purpose of the act is to find the appropriate balance between our natural environment, our social environment and economic environment. Unfortunately, the current Liberal government does not understand where that balance should lie. In fact, if the Liberals went to section 5(b) of the act, they would find that there is a notion of intergenerational equity that requires current governments to take into account the welfare of future generations. Intergenerational equity, one of the key principles of the act, requires governments not to steal from future generations to pay for their current needs or demands.

However, when we look at the performance of the Liberal government, what does it do? It praises the Federal Sustainable Development Act, but then it incurs huge deficits when it promised not to.

I remember the last election when the Prime Minister went across the country saying he was going to run small deficits of $10 billion. By the way, he went on to promise he was going to balance the budget by 2019, which happens to be this year. However, we know that today, in 2019, there is no balanced budget and we know that it is going to take over 20 years to balance our budget based on the direction the government is going. That does not take into account additional spending that the Liberal government is going to undertake during the election year.

What happens? There is no intergenerational equity. What the Prime Minister is asking us to do is to pay for his mistakes.

Then we have a Liberal government that is hell-bent on phasing-out Canada's oil and gas industry. The Prime Minister has deliberately wiped out projects like the northern gateway pipeline and the energy east pipeline. He has imposed additional regulatory burdens, upstream and downstream impact requirements with which foreign oil does not have to comply. Therefore, these investments are fleeing the country. Over $100 billion of investment has fled our country over the last couple of years. Again, the Prime Minister is asking us to pay for his mistakes.

We remember the small business fiasco. We are talking about economic sustainability, social and environmental sustainability. Let us talk about small businesses. It was the Liberal government that introduced a policy that was going to harm small businesses by increasing the tax rate on those businesses to 73%. There was no apology in the House for suggesting that was what small businesses could bear. In fact, it got so bad that the Prime Minister referred to our small business sector as tax cheats. We have one million small businesses across the country and all the Prime Minister could do was to call them tax cheats. I have spoken to hundreds of them and they are angry at a prime minister who is asking them to pay for his mistakes.

I will talk a little about trade policy, because trade policy is about sustainability. It is about providing an environment in which Canadian companies can thrive within the global marketplace.

When our Conservative government finally left office in 2015, we turned over the reins to the Liberal government. At that time, Canada had strong diplomatic and trade relationships around the world.

As trade minister, I could pick up the phone and call my counterpart in pretty well any country to say we have a problem and ask if we could sit down and fix it. We could have that discussion. What does that look like today? Today, we have a trade agenda wasteland. Our diplomatic relationships around the world are in tatters. When did it start? Let us talk about it.

In Vietnam, where the Trans-Pacific Partnership was supposed to be signed, 12 countries agreed to expand trade. Eleven countries showed up in Vietnam. Everybody promised they were going to sign that agreement there. Who did not show up? There were two chairs that were empty at that meeting. Canada's trade minister did not show up. Canada's Prime Minister did not show up. What an embarrassment. Can the Prime Minister go back to Vietnam? It would be very difficult. It does not want him back there. None of the partners in the TPP want him back.

Then we see the Prime Minister travelling to China. He was going to start trade negotiations with China. Do members remember that? Unfortunately for Canada, the Prime Minister went there with a bunch of preconditions that had nothing to do with trade and told China that it was going to have to comply with these preconditions, otherwise we were not interested. China was very upset. It basically gave him a swift kick in the rear and sent him packing with his tail between his legs. What an embarrassment that was.

It did not stop there. Let us remember when he travelled to the Philippines. Canada is not a member of the East Asia Summit. The East Asia Summit was taking place in the Philippines. Our government asked to be invited, so the Prime Minister got an invitation from the President of the Philippines. He arrived on the ground there and the first thing our Prime Minister did was embarrass the Philippine president in his own country. Rather than using traditional diplomacy to raise the very serious issue of human rights, he embarrassed the president of that country in front of his own people. Do members think he is welcome in the Philippines now? That diplomatic relationship was torn asunder.

It goes on. Do members remember the Twitter diplomacy that founded our relationship with Saudi Arabia? At that time, we had tens of thousands of Saudi Arabian students studying in Canada, many of them for four and five years. While they lived here, what did they do? They would pick up many of the principles of freedom, democracy and human rights. When those students would go back to Saudi Arabia, many of them became great proponents and champions of human rights, democracy and freedom.

The Prime Minister thought it was a great idea to attack Saudi Arabia on its human rights record, and it does have a shabby human rights record, but he chose Twitter to do it, unlike our previous government, which used traditional diplomacy and tact in doing it. That relationship was torn asunder. It is costing our economy billions of dollars a year in lost revenue. The current Prime Minister wants to make you, Mr. Speaker, and all of the other Canadians across this country, pay for those mistakes.

It got worse. Do members remember the NAFTA negotiations? The Prime Minister embraced Donald Trump's offer of renegotiating NAFTA when in fact Donald Trump's ire was directed at Mexico, not Canada. Then the Prime Minister had the audacity to promise Canadians that when he was done renegotiating NAFTA we would have a better deal than we had before. What happened? The Prime Minister totally failed us. All the experts now acknowledge that the NAFTA deal that we have today is a much lesser deal than we had before the Prime Minister got started.

It is another failure, another mistake the Prime Minister wants us to pay for. The sad thing is this. The Prime Minister had an opportunity to address the steel and aluminum tariffs that Donald Trump had imposed on Canada through these negotiations on NAFTA. Do members think he got that done? No. Those tariffs are still in place, costing Canadians hundreds of millions and perhaps billions of dollars a year.

Was the softwood lumber agreement resolved in those NAFTA negotiations? The Prime Minister had that opportunity. It never got done. It was a failure, a mistake the Prime Minister wants Canadians to pay for. What a shame.

Let me return to China. We have seen the China relationship deteriorate to the point that it is the worst it has ever been over the last 40 years. We have a Prime Minister who cannot manage this relationship. He sends his own friend, John McCallum, to be the ambassador there, and then Mr. McCallum embarrasses Canadians by interfering in what should be an arm's-length legal extradition process for Meng Wanzhou, a Huawei executive. Our ambassador in China undermined the rule of law in Canada and undermined our ability to defend that rule of law here at home and abroad. Who suffers? It is people like Michael Kovrig, who is in prison in China for bogus reasons.

I know my friend here from P.E.I. is mocking us, but my own constituent, Robert Schellenberg, who is on death row in China, is the one who is going to have to pay for the Prime Minister's mistakes. It is all the same: failure after failure.

I could talk about our immigration system, because that is part of the social sustainability piece of this legislation. What do we have in our immigration system? We have eroded public confidence, because the Prime Minister will not enforce the law. What has happened here is those who obey the law are waiting in line while others jump the queue, costing the federal, provincial and municipal governments—for example, the City of Toronto—millions upon millions of dollars in additional housing, law enforcement and other costs, and the Prime Minister wants us to pay for his mistakes.

Let us talk about the environment. The Prime Minister was elected on a platform that said he was going to come forward with a pan-Canadian climate change plan. I remember being in Vancouver. The Vancouver declaration was signed by everyone except Brad Wall. The Prime Minister promised we would meet the Paris targets. By the way, I was in Paris too when that agreement was signed. People were expecting the Prime Minister to meet those targets. Today we know that the Liberal government is nowhere close to meeting its Paris targets. It talks a big game on the environment. Our environment minister gets up pretty regularly in the House and proclaims what a great job the Liberals are doing on the environment and that they are going to meet their Paris targets, when the Parliamentary Budget Officer says they will not meet the targets, when Canada's Commissioner of the Environment says they will not meet the targets, when the United Nations itself says Canada will not meet the targets. It is a failure, and who pays for that? We pay for the Prime Minister's mistakes.

I say all of this because this is of course an election year. Sustainability is a critical piece of what we do in Canada. We do have to find the right balance between our social environment, our natural environment and the economic environment in which we all operate and on which our families depend.

We cannot afford another four years of this Liberal government's failures. We saw what happened in Ontario with 15 years of the Kathleen Wynne and Dalton McGuinty governments driving their economy into the ground and driving up electricity costs to the highest level in North America. Is that what we want to repeat in Canada? No, we do not. That is why we cannot afford another four years.

What a lot of Canadians do not know is that the same crew who ran Ontario for 15 years and ran Ontario into the ground, many of that same crew are in the Prime Minister's office today, starting with Gerald Butts. Do we trust him to get our economy right? Do we trust him to get sustainability right? No, we do not. The problem is, if we have four more years of failure and four more years of a Prime Minister who wants us to pay for his mistakes, we will have a disaster.

We have not had a government as incompetent as this for many, many decades. Canadians should expect more. They should expect better.

I say this to Canadians: As we approach October, measure the Prime Minister against the promises he made. Did he actually deliver on his promises or is the road littered with broken promises? Balanced budgets was a broken promise. What about electoral reform? Remember how the last election was going to be the last one under first past the post? How did that go? It was a broken promise.

As we approach this election in October, Canadians need to take note of what the Prime Minister has actually done in this country to undermine our economic prosperity. He has effectively shut down our oil and gas sector. He has effectively shut down our pipeline construction. We have seen General Motors bailing out of Canada, and General Electric bailing out of Canada. What is happening? Why does the rest of the world not have confidence in Canada the way it used to under the former Conservative government? We had lots of investment coming into Canada.

Today, as I said earlier, we have lost about hundred billion dollars of investment, just over a period of a couple of years. That flow of investment out of Canada into places like the United States and elsewhere around the world is going to hurt job creation in this country. We are going to see that happen. It is going to require governments to raise taxes. Who pays those taxes? It is not only this generation. If we have deficits and if we have debts, future governments are going to have to continue to raise taxes to pay off those debts and deficits, and the interest on those debts.

I am coming right back, full circle, to the notion of intergenerational equity. It is something that is basically the linchpin of the Federal Sustainable Development Act. It ensures that future generations will continue to have the opportunity for prosperity and a clean environment that our current generation has had. The Prime Minister is undermining all of that through high taxes, high deficits and high debts. Who is going to pay for those mistakes? The Prime Minister wants us to pay for those mistakes.

[An hon. member]

Oh, oh!

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

I hear some chirping from the corner here from P.E.I. The Liberal members continue to do this. At the end of the day, who suffers from all of this heckling from the Liberal side? It is Canadians. It is future generations of Canadians. That is the sad choice that we have before us.

Let me wind up by saying this. Canadians do have an opportunity to get sustainability right. They will not get it right under the Liberal government but they will have an opportunity to make a decision in October whether they want to elect a Conservative government that is going to take seriously the fiscal challenges, economic challenges and competitiveness challenges that face our companies, including our small businesses, take seriously the environment challenges that face our country and face the globe, and take seriously the social challenges that this Liberal government is not addressing in any way.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Mr. Speaker, one would think that was an election speech, because what we heard from the Conservatives was a lot of misinformation. If that party wants to talk about facts, Stephen Harper added $150 billion to the national debt.

In terms of small business, look at the last fall economic statement, whereby we faced head on the challenges from the United States and increased capital cost allowances so that businesses in this country could move ahead.

The member talked about the CPTPP. I would ask the member this. Who signed and negotiated it at the end of the day? Who did the final agreement on the CPTPP to accept that agreement and negotiate a good agreement, which the Conservatives failed to negotiate? It was the minister on this side of the House who did that.

The future in this country is going to be a result of the Liberal government. Do not listen to the malarky we hear from the members on the other side, because they are just playing politics and giving false information, which I am surprised to hear from that member.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is pretty rich coming from the member for Malpeque. I was the trade minister when the TPP was negotiated. All the key elements of the original TPP were incorporated into the final agreement. When the United States bailed out, the other 11 parties said it was worthwhile moving ahead and finalizing it.

The Liberals want to challenge us on trade. When our former Conservative government was elected in 2006, how many trade agreements did we have with countries around the world? We had trade agreements with five countries: the United States, Mexico, Israel, Costa Rica and Chile. When we were finished 10 years later, we had completed the most ambitious and successful trade agenda this country had ever seen. We had trade agreements with 51 countries around the world, including CETA and including the TPP, which was a Conservative negotiation that took place successfully.

We will not take any lessons from the Liberals on trade.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have been following this debate and the level of hypocrisy is over the top. I recall all those trade deals that the Conservatives signed. What did they erase? All of the environmental provisions. I worked for the original environment commission in Montreal. I will note that in the new trade deal with the U.S., the Liberals undermined the environment in that deal too. There is a lot of hypocrisy here about genuinely acting on the words.

I would actually like to speak to Bill C-57. I know it might come as a surprise, as everybody is doing his or her electioneering here. What is important is that it is one thing to bring forward a bill and it is another thing to enact it. However, it is another thing to actually deliver the mandate and responsibilities under that bill.

The previous Liberal government and the previous Conservative government, as well as the present Liberal government, have all abjectly failed to deliver on the responsibilities of sustainable development. It is not me saying this. It is the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, who is appointed and retained in that position by the current Liberal government to review how well the government is delivering on its responsibilities.

It is also important to point out that in addition to the Sustainable Development Act, there is a second law. I would remind this place that a cabinet directive is binding law. We proved that with the Friends of the Oldman decision which involved a directive by cabinet on environmental assessment before we had the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. We proved in the Supreme Court that cabinet directives were legally binding.

There has been a cabinet directive in place on environmental assessment of policy, plan and programs for decades. However, successive Conservative and Liberal governments have abjectly failed to deliver on that as well. That comes in the reports from the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development.

The Liberals, of course, signed on, yet again. They love to go to these international meetings. They signed on to the sustainable development agenda 2030, with 17 goals. They signed onto that in September 2015. Maybe it was the Conservatives who did that. They committed to 169 targets and 230 indicators.

There were a lot of goals in that international agreement. We need to note here that despite an amendment that I tabled at committee, the government refused to incorporate any reference to the UN commitment in the bill we are discussing today, the sustainable development 2030 agenda. So much for the commitment.

I had wanted to raise this with a number of the speakers who stood, the Conservatives criticizing the Liberals, the Liberals criticizing the Conservatives. Since 2015, and I am only starting at 2015, the commissioner has delivered failing grades in her audits of government commitments to actually deliver on the responsibilities, both under the Sustainable Development Act and the cabinet directive.

In the fall of 2015, she found abject failure by four departments audited to even apply the cabinet directive, zero assessments delivered for 488 proposals to the fisheries minister and only one out of over a 1,000 proposals to the minister of agriculture. In 2016, she found only 23% of proposals audited had submitted the required strategic environmental assessment. In 2017, she found a mere 20% compliance by federal departments.

Last year, in 2018, the commissioner's latest report found that the Government of Canada, the Liberal government, had failed to even develop a formal approach to implementing the 2030 agenda and the goals, including a very narrow interpretation of sustainable development. We heard that today in the debate, a pretty narrow discussion of what was actually in there. There is no federal government structure, and we are not going to see it in the bill either.

Interestingly, the bill continues to give responsibility to the Minister of Environment and yet it is another minister who goes off to the UN to speak to the bill as if it is his responsibility. There is a lot of confusion out there among Canadians about who in the government is actually responsible for delivering on the responsibilities for sustainable development.

The commissioner found there was very limited national consultation and engagement, no national implementation plan, few national targets and no system in place to measure, monitor or report on national targets for sustainable development.

We have heard a lot of blathering in here today from the Liberals about how important the environment and the economy are. However, where is the commitment to actually deliver on those responsibilities?

Eventually we are going to have a debate on the bill. Interestingly, a good number of the amendments that are coming forward from the Senate to this place are exactly the same amendments that I put forward, which the Liberals rejected. So much for “we're all in this together” in committee.

I would note one amendment that is most interesting. The Senate presented to this place a series of three amendments, two of which were accepted. The third one the Green Party and I actually tabled as an amendment to the bill because the government, in its wisdom, talks about being environmentally thoughtful in its spending, in procurement, but it would remove the requirement that is in law right now that the government actually consider sustainable development when it is procuring.

Let us think about that. It was almost $5 billion to buy a pipeline. We might think that the government thought about whether it was a wise investment economically and environmentally. Where is the strategic environmental assessment for that purchase? How about the many infrastructure banks the government is setting up for private enterprise here and in other countries? Did it do a strategic environmental assessment as per the cabinet directive? No.

The question here is this: Where is the real commitment by the government of the day to generally deliver on these big promises it made to Canadians and the big promises it makes when going to UN meetings?

I attended the consultation at the UN, the big summit last summer. The government sent a big delegation. At the last second, it invited youth but there was only a handful who could afford to come. Therefore, we had a call for better consultation and engagement across Canada so that everybody can participate in this discussion. However, when we look at the goals, we are not just talking about the economy or the environment. When we look at those 17 goals, they cover everything. They cover indigenous rights, women's rights, agriculture and water. I am not hearing any debate in the House about the breadth of what we have committed to in the 2030 goals. The Liberals refused to reference those in the bill before us.

There is a second matter the Liberals refused to reference, despite the amendments I tabled at committee. They have refused to incorporate into the bill the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which is one of the goals under the 2030 sustainable development goals. They abjectly refused to specifically reference that international commitment, despite the fact that the former justice minister and attorney general actually committed before the Assembly of First Nations that, going forward, her Liberal government would ensure that the United Nations declaration would be incorporated into every federal law. Therefore, they have broken that promise too.

It is all very nice that we have some amendments coming from the Senate, but they are basically pro forma. They are simply saying that we need to update the bill so that it is the same as the current Auditor General Act. However, when it comes to substantive measures, like being required to actually consider sustainable development when we are making major procurement decisions and when making major recommendations to cabinet, then no, they are abjectly failing. I would have liked to hear anybody in the government of the day stand up and say that, going forward, they were going to finally deliver on their responsibilities. However, I did not hear that once today.

To conclude, it was my honour to speak to the bill again. I remain committed to actually having a government in Canada that is sincere about delivering on its international commitments.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

Question.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

In my opinion the yeas have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Call in the members.

During the ringing of the bells:

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I ask that the vote be deferred until tomorrow at the end of Government Orders.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

Accordingly, the recorded division is deferred until tomorrow at the end of the time provided for Government Orders.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I suspect if you were to canvass the House, you would find unanimous consent to see the clock at 6:30 p.m.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

Is it agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.