Bill C-11 (Historical)

Online Streaming Act

An Act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends the Broadcasting Act to, among other things,
(a) add online undertakings — undertakings for the transmission or retransmission of programs over the Internet — as a distinct class of broadcasting undertakings;
(b) specify that the Act does not apply in respect of programs uploaded to an online undertaking that provides a social media service by a user of the service, unless the programs are prescribed by regulation;
(c) update the broadcasting policy for Canada set out in section 3 of the Act by, among other things, providing that the Canadian broadcasting system should
(i) serve the needs and interests of all Canadians, including Canadians from Black or other racialized communities and Canadians of diverse ethnocultural backgrounds, socio-economic statuses, abilities and disabilities, sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions, and ages, and
(ii) provide opportunities to Indigenous persons, programming that reflects Indigenous cultures and that is in Indigenous languages, and programming that is accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities;
(d) enhance the vitality of official language minority communities in Canada and foster the full recognition and use of both English and French in Canadian society, including by supporting the production and broadcasting of original programs in both languages;
(e) specify that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (the “Commission”) must regulate and supervise the Canadian broadcasting system in a manner that
(i) takes into account the different characteristics of English, French and Indigenous language broadcasting and the different conditions under which broadcasting undertakings that provide English, French or Indigenous language programming operate,
(ii) takes into account, among other things, the nature and diversity of the services provided by broadcasting undertakings,
(iii) ensures that any broadcasting undertaking that cannot make maximum or predominant use of Canadian creative and other human resources in the creation, production and presentation of programming contributes to those Canadian resources in an equitable manner,
(iv) promotes innovation and is readily adaptable toscientific and technological change,
(v) facilitates the provision to Canadians of Canadian programs in both official languages, including those created and produced by official language minority communities in Canada, as well as Canadian programs in Indigenous languages,
(vi) facilitates the provision of programs that are accessible without barriers to persons with disabilities,
(vii) facilitates the provision to Canadians of programs created and produced by members of Black or other racialized communities,
(viii) protects the privacy of individuals who aremembers of the audience of programs broadcast, and
(ix) takes into account the variety of broadcasting undertakings to which the Act applies and avoids imposing obligations on any class of broadcasting undertakings if that imposition will not contribute in a material manner to the implementation of the broadcasting policy;
(f) amend the procedure relating to the issuance by the Governor in Council of policy directions to the Commission;
(g) replace the Commission’s power to impose conditions on a licence with a power to make orders imposing conditions on the carrying on of broadcasting undertakings;
(h) provide the Commission with the power to require that persons carrying on broadcasting undertakings make expenditures to support the Canadian broadcasting system;
(i) authorize the Commission to provide information to the Minister responsible for that Act, the Chief Statistician of Canada and the Commissioner of Competition, and set out in that Act a process by which a person who submits certain types of information to the Commission may designate the information as confidential;
(j) amend the procedure by which the Governor in Council may, under section 28 of that Act, set aside a decision of the Commission to issue, amend or renew a licence or refer such a decision back to the Commission for reconsideration and hearing;
(k) specify that a person shall not carry on a broadcasting undertaking, other than an online undertaking, unless they do so in accordance with a licence or they are exempt from the requirement to hold a licence;
(l) harmonize the punishments for offences under Part II of that Act and clarify that a due diligence defence applies to the existing offences set out in that Act; and
(m) allow for the imposition of administrative monetary penalties for violations of certain provisions of that Act or of the Accessible Canada Act .
The enactment also makes related and consequential amendments to other Acts.

Reference to Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Madam Speaker, I too want to add my voice to the conversation we are having here today in this debate on privilege. The issue of a member's vote in this place is really what we are after today. Our ability to vote without influence from other countries is very important.

I would note that the vote in question had to do with the recognition of the genocide of the Uyghur people in China. The Beijing government has been focused on repressing the Uyghurs through things such as forced abortion, forced sterilization, re-education camps and concentration camps. Members may have seen the photos of Uyghur folks lined up at the bus terminals and being loaded onto the trains. We have stated often in this place “never again”, and here we are watching “never again” happen again.

That vote that took place in the House of Commons was historic. The Canadian Parliament was one of the first parliaments around the world that voted to recognize that. It was something many members had worked fairly hard on, and we had also felt pressure from various corners to ensure that we got that right.

What is fascinating is that the member for Wellington—Halton Hills voted for that motion while the entire Canadian cabinet did not. That is telling, perhaps, as to the weight of that vote. However, it also raises the question of foreign influence happening here in Canada. What kind of influence is that having on the Canadian cabinet, given the fact that we have discovered now that the government knew for over two years that the member for Wellington—Halton Hills' family was being harassed because of this particular vote? What was happening to members of the cabinet in their personal lives and how was that being influenced? That is what this whole debate is about. It is about the privilege of members of Parliament to be able to do their job.

Probably one of the most important things we do as members of Parliament is to vote from our seats in this place. That is what we are elected to do. We are elected to take our seats in this place to vote on things. Votes are a moment in time. Votes are a very binary thing. We vote for something; we vote against something.

In many cases, when we have a vote, those are weighty moments. Members must consider all the ramifications and impacts of the position they take on that. There is nothing that brings more clarity into a situation than having a binary vote on a particular piece of legislation because that is when we get to find out about who is affected, what the ramifications are and all of these kinds of things. Particularly if people are upset about that vote, we get to hear about it after we cast that vote. Our ability to vote in this place is incredibly important.

The member for Wellington—Halton Hills has been a stalwart defender of democracy. This may be due in part to his roots, as he comes from Hong Kong, so he has a firm understanding of the relationship with the Beijing government and the world. Just due to the nature of his heritage, the member has some fortitude when it comes to understanding how democracy works, and he has worked very hard in this place to ensure that democracy works better. He has a very good grasp of the history of this place and the history of our mother Parliament over in England. He worked on the Reform Act, which is an act that has empowered individual members of Parliament. That is something that the member has been passionate about.

He has argued for increased members' budgets. He has argued for more members of Parliament, so we have more representation for individual Canadians. His allegiance to democracy, parliamentary democracy and the House of Commons is unquestioned.

I want to thank him for that. I know his passion and diligence on these democracy issues are so important. That is perhaps the great irony of this particular situation. Of all members of Parliament for this to fall upon, the member for Wellington—Halton Hills has impeccable credentials in the defence of democracy. That is why it is so frustrating to see that the government sat on this information for over two years, only for us, as individual members of Parliament, to find out about this through the press. That goes to show why the freedom of the press is so important.

This is something the Liberal government has been undermining over the last number of years, just as we have seen with Bill C-11. We see how voices that may disagree with the government may be repressed online. We see that with the funding of journalism across the country. We see this with the subsidization of CBC, how that money influences the reporting that we get.

This particular instance shows that the freedom of the press, the ability for the press to be unencumbered by owing the government a favour of any sort, is necessary. We see, with The Globe and Mail and Global News, that if it were not for the work they had done, we would never know about this. We would never know that, for over two years, the government and the Prime Minister sat on the information that a member of the House and his family were being threatened because of a vote that had taken place here.

We have heard, over the last couple of days as we have been having this debate, over and over again how the Liberals are trying to spin this, and it is classic gaslighting. My working definition of “gaslighting” is that whatever someone is doing, they accuse their opponents of doing the same. I would like to address a couple of those things.

One of the things they say is that the Conservatives did nothing when they were in power. The fact of the matter is that the Liberals have done nothing to stop this. They have allowed it. They have watched it grow. They have watched the foreign influence grow in Canada and have done nothing to prevent it over the last number of years.

The other thing that is interesting is that, under Stephen Harper, there was a different leader in China. When Stephen Harper was the prime minister, there was a different leader. China had a different outlook on the world under the other leader. There has been a significant shift.

If someone wants to look it up, they can google “wolf warrior”. The current leader of China, Xi Jinping, has openly stated that China is moving into a wolf warrior pose in the world. Instead of biding its time, which was the previous leader's line, it is looking at being a wolf warrior. They are looking to be dominant in the world. There is no doubt about that. They are much more aggressive.

That is a completely different context. I know the member for Winnipeg North will probably stand up to talk about Stephen Harper and the great job Stephen Harper did when he was the prime minister. The point is that, when Stephen Harper was the leader, Canada was seen as a strong player on the international stage. We were convening meetings to take on ISIL. We were a valued partner of the Five Eyes. Australia, the United States and the U.K. looked to Canada to provide a leadership role in many of these discussions. Now we are ignored, sidelined and not trusted by the international community when it comes to dealing with things like China.

The Beijing government worked much more carefully. It was much more concerned about what Canada had to say about what it was up to. Today, we have a completely different context.

Today, we see the Chinese run roughshod over Canadian values and institutions. They have set up police stations on Canadian sovereign soil. We have seen this over and over again. We just know that a lot of this is about posture. We know that, under Stephen Harper, Canada had a proud posture on the international stage. We had a posture that said we were open for business but that we had rules that everybody had to follow. Canadian sovereignty was something we were very concerned about.

In fact, we spent a lot of time mapping the north. The entire search for the Franklin expedition was a mapping exercise to establish Canadian sovereignty in the north. This was a nation-building exercise. It was something that we told the Canadian people about. It was a source of pride for Canadians. However, we also said we needed to establish Canadian sovereignty in the north because of threats from China.

Threats from China were something that the Harper government took very seriously. It was something that we went into with both eyes open. We dealt with China, but we said that we knew it was a Communist country and that Communism is not something that is equivocal. We cannot make equivalencies between Communism and democracy, and therefore, the rules of engagement that we deal with when dealing with France, Germany, Holland or the United States are going to be different from those we have when we are dealing with China.

Because it operates on a different system, we need to ensure that we deal with China appropriately. To some degree, this comes back to ideas around humanity and whether people are basically good. Maybe it is postmodernism that the government really espouses, with ideas around equivalency, and we just have to basically trust that everybody is good. There are evil actors in the world. There are nefarious actors, and China is one of them. China has not been a force for good in the world over the last number of decades.

That is a major difference between Conservatives and Liberals. Liberals have a naive view. They want to equivocate. They want to say that it is a different system, but it is just as good. I would argue that this is not the case and that there are threats and nefarious actors in the world. These are threats and actors that we must take seriously and challenge. We must stand up for democracy and make the arguments for why democracy is better and why the Western systems are better.

Those are important things to do, and I do not think it is good enough to say, “You do it your way, and we will do it ours.” I think we should say, “This is the way we do it because it is better, because it is moral and because it is the right way to do things.” I see this postmodern idea that there is no truth, or that the truth is relative, as a failure of the current government. All of these kinds of things have really been worked into it.

The other area of gaslighting I see happen through this debate, particularly in questions from the Liberals, is how this is the member's fault and how the member should have known about this. Of course—

[Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, listen, if I had my way, there would be no dinners that are pay to play. There should be no $1,000-a-plate dinners. However, come on. Let us not pretend that the Conservatives do not do the same thing. Let us not pretend there is not fundraising being done on the backs of bills like Bill C-11, and that there is no politicization of them. That is not accurate.

In terms of making sure the government acts seriously, I have to say that I agree with the member on that. It feels to me like the government has had to be dragged to do the right thing, kicking and screaming. We brought the Minister of Foreign Affairs to the foreign affairs committee, and basically she had to be dragged kicking and screaming to do the things that are so easy to do, like expel this diplomat. Frankly, this diplomat is not expelled, of course. He has just been listed as persona non grata and is no longer protected. However, for these things the government should be taking action on, it is not. It is not acting fast enough. It is not participating in building a stronger democracy in ways I would like to see.

Canadian Heritage

[René Arseneault, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Mr. Speaker, last week, Bill C‑11 received royal assent. It was a painstaking process and, as we know, the Conservatives and their leader chose to support billionaires and web giants instead of supporting and defending the interests of our Canadian artists.

Now that Bill C‑11 has passed into law, can the minister tell us the impact it will have on our Canadian culture?

Budget Implementation Act, 2023, No. 1

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek, SK]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in this place and add my voice and those of the constituents I represent in raising concerns with both the budget and Bill C-47, the budget implementation act.

This bill is the legislation by which certain provisions in the budget will be implemented. We have already voted against the budget, which includes over $40 billion in additional spending that will have to be paid for by taxpayers through taxes. It demonstrates the abject failure of the government to address the affordability crisis it has created.

Earlier this week, I stepped into an elevator with a Liberal member of Parliament who, in making small talk, asked me, “How are things in Saskatchewan?” If I had had more time, I would have told him about my spring tour, which I held during our recent riding weeks. While we cannot go everywhere in two weeks, we visited 19 communities and toured a number of businesses. It was great to visit with hundreds of residents from Carlton Trail—Eagle Creek over a cup of coffee. If I had had more time, I would have shared with that MP the issues that were raised, over and over again, that relate to this budget discussion, but one floor up did not allow for all that, so I am going to share them now. I guess I could have given him the one-floor elevator speech, which is that the consensus in my riding is that everything is broken.

The first concern is the huge federal debt and the ever-present, ongoing Liberal deficits. People are absolutely blown away by the figure of $1.22 trillion in projected federal debt, a figure that has ballooned under the current Prime Minister, causing the highest inflation in 40 years by doubling the national debt. Additionally, people are gravely concerned by the $43.9 billion, which is the amount projected to be the cost of servicing Canada’s national debt this fiscal year, a figure that has almost doubled in one year. They understand that this amount is only likely to increase, as more of Canada’s low-interest debt matures and Canada is forced to renew those loans at higher interest rates.

Deficit spending, inflation and higher interest rates are a big deal to seniors living on fixed incomes, families struggling to make ends meet and young people desperately looking for an affordable place to live. Unlike the Prime Minister, who does not think about monetary policy, Canadians who do not have a trust fund are very engaged on the ramifications of the Liberal government’s poor management of Canada’s economy. The actions of the current government are having a direct negative impact on their quality of life, which brings us to the ever-present and ever-increasing carbon tax.

For residents of Saskatchewan, especially those living and working in rural Saskatchewan, this Liberal tax is a source of deep frustration. Besides increasing the cost of everything, the carbon tax is a symbol in the minds of rural Saskatchewanians of the incredible disconnect between the reality in which we live and the Liberal elites and their ideological policies.

They also understand that the carbon tax is a tax plan and not an environmental plan, which is why a commonly asked question I have heard is this: “With the Liberals having spent us into such a deep hole, will a future Conservative government be able to afford to cut the carbon tax?” While I do understand the question, I remind them that a Conservative government will absolutely axe the carbon tax.

I also had the opportunity to visit with mayors, reeves and councillors. They, too, noted the negative impacts of the Liberals' carbon tax and inflation-inducing policies on their budgets. They expressed concern over how federal infrastructure programs are designed with big cities in mind and with a win/lose lottery-style methodology. They confirmed that municipalities need stable, reliable funding programs enabling them to do their work rather than dictating the infrastructure priorities the federal government wants to fund.

We also discussed the housing crisis. CMHC data for January 2023 showed that new housing starts were at the lowest level since 2020, and while they are down in large urban centres like Toronto and Vancouver, we are feeling the housing shortage in smaller communities in Saskatchewan as well.

Constituents and elected representatives also brought up labour shortages, rural crime and the Liberals' soft-on-crime policies, as well as Bill C-11 and the government's unrelenting focus on controlling what Canadians watch and post online. I again want to thank the hundreds of residents for coming out to share their thoughts and concerns with me.

For the purposes of this evening's debate, I also want to address the mismanagement of our country’s finances, which has led to incredible waste at the expense of Canadians. Canadians are rightly asking what exactly the government has been spending their money on, and it is their money, as the leader of His Majesty’s loyal opposition pointed out. They are also asking what they are getting for the money the Liberals are spending, whether life is getting easier or getting better, and whether they are getting ahead. The resounding answer is no. Never before has a government spent so much to get so little.

Let us just take a look at a few examples. There were CERB cheques going to prisoners and organized crime, and $94 million was spent on hotel rooms for asylum seekers in the last eighteen months. There was a $237-million contract for ventilators given to a Liberal insider and $54 million for the “ArriveSCAM” app. There is the Phoenix pay system. It has been seven years since the Liberals launched the Phoenix pay system, and it has been a disaster.

In my role as the shadow minister for public services and procurement, it has become all too clear that the government has very little respect for Canadians and their tax dollars. While it is necessary for the issues with the Phoenix pay system to be fixed, there is an additional $1 billion dollars in the budget to continue to address the Phoenix pay system, and there is no end in sight. That is on top of the hundreds of millions of dollars paid out in damages for the government's mismanagement.

What was the Liberals' solution? It was to hire their friends at McKinsey, giving them a contract, which after three amendments, reached a value of almost $28 million. What was the result after McKinsey was contracted? The backlog increased.

The continually increasing outsourcing by the government while it rapidly expands the public service is incoherent. One would think that, if the public service is expanding, outsourcing would be needed less. Instead, it increased just as rapidly, and when we have asked for answers on the extent of the outsourcing in our efforts to ensure that Canadians are getting good value for money, we are stonewalled by Liberals on committee, ministers and their departments.

The Liberals have found great friends and partners in the NDP. At a time of record spending and 40-year highs in inflation, Canadians are struggling to pay their bills, while well-connected Liberal insiders have never had it so good. There are 1.5 million Canadians visiting food banks. One in five Canadians is skipping meals because food is too expensive. With mortgage payments and costs associated with buying a home doubling, home ownership is an elusive dream now for nine out of 10 young Canadians. Rent has doubled as well.

The reality is that the country is worse off after all the government's reckless and wasteful spending. Seniors, families, young people, farmers, business owners and workers all know this is true, and the NDP just keeps supplying the Liberal government with more shovels to dig a deeper hole for Canadians, all while claiming it is holding government to account.

As I said, Canadians are struggling, and they need hope. They can count on Conservatives to turn the hurt that the Prime Minister has caused into hope. It is time for a change, and we are ready.

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Madam Speaker, we often talk about budgets as if we are just talking about money, as if it is just a spreadsheet full of cash, but we have to take a step back and ask where that money came from and why it is being spent. The answer to that, of course, is people. The money came from people and is supposedly being spent in support of people. Interestingly enough, it is the same people who pay in as benefit.

When we talk about this, we are talking about the nation of Canada. We are talking about the people who call this place home. The government is entrusted to take their money and spend it on their behalf for things that are supposedly supposed to benefit them, so let us talk about the people.

When I think about the budget, I think about Raelene, one of my constituents. She goes to the University of Lethbridge. She studies really hard, takes a full-course load and works a part-time job. She is optimistic about her future because she is confident in herself. She is confident in her skills and abilities and in her work ethic, but when she thinks about her future in terms of finding a job or being able to purchase a home, she begins to have doubts, because the government has done little to nothing to remove the gatekeepers or to bring down the cost of living that would prevent her from being able to buy that first home.

I think about John, who is a local beef producer in my riding of Lethbridge. He lives in the county and operates with his sons. He hopes to pass his business down to his family and, in the meantime, is looking to not only make ends meet, but hopefully generate a bit of a profit and be able to provide jobs. That is not to mention that he is producing food not only for our area but for the world. When I think about John, I think about the red tape that has been put in place and the language that is used against him as a farmer. I think about the carbon tax and the implications that it has on him and his business. I think about the overall lack of gratitude and the misconceptions that are put toward him.

I think about Tannis. Tannis is a mom to two young children. Tannis just started a new business in the last few months and she is hoping to make a go of it, but she recognizes that the input costs are only going up. She wonders whether or not it is feasible to keep going, but she still dreams of big things and has a fantastic work ethic. She will continue to work hard and hopefully she will make a go of it, but she is worried. She is worried about affordability issues, whether it is putting gas in her car, being able to heat her home or being able to put groceries on the table for her family.

I think about James. James wrote to me with regard to Bill C-11. He is a digital first creator. He wonders about his future and whether or not he can make a go of it. He knows that under Bill C-11, the government is going to look to control what people can see and hear and post online. He knows that this is censorship, that it is a far overreach of the government. James is worried about his future because the government is, in effect, building a firewall around him and preventing him from being able to reach the global audience that he hopes to reach. James wonders about his future.

I think about Marj and John, an elderly couple who came into my constituency office not too long ago with their heating bill in their hands and tears coming down their faces. The image will forever be in my mind. Why? Because Marj and John are people, people who are trying to make ends meet on a fixed income. Marj and John are having to make a choice between filling their prescriptions, heating their home or eating proper meals. That is not a choice someone in their late seventies should have to make when they are supposedly supposed to be enjoying their golden years.

I think about Allan. Allan is a law-abiding firearms owner in my riding who enjoys hunting with his buddies. He enjoys putting deer in his freezer to be able to feed his family and maybe being able to share an elk steak with friends. I think about him and his responsible use of his rifle, and then I think about the government demonizing him, as if he is the criminal. Meanwhile, the government turns a blind eye to our borders and very basic security. I think about the fact that crime has gone up by 32% since the Liberals took government. I think about the fact that street gang murders have gone up by 92%, and yet Allan is the one being treated like a criminal.

These are just a very few of the people and faces that I think about when I consider this budget and its implications for Canada.

Budgets are about people. They are not about a spreadsheet. They are not about a number. They are not about a percentage. They are not about debt. They are not about GDP. Yes, all of those factor in, but at the end of the day, the budget is about people. It is about whether the government understands what is required to support the people of this country.

Imagine we have this wad of cash in our right pocket and someone comes along and takes it out and puts a few nickels and dimes into our left pocket, and they expect to be applauded as if they have just done us a favour when in actuality we are far worse off. Budget 2023 feels a little like that. It feels like the government is wanting accolades for taking a wad of cash out of the pockets of Canadians and replacing it with a few nickels and dimes, as if it has done the Canadian population a big favour.

Meanwhile, the affordability crisis continues. Meanwhile, the housing crisis continues. Meanwhile, crime continues to skyrocket. Meanwhile, business investment is being driven out of our country, yet the government stands back and says, “Applaud us. Look how well we have done.”

The government forgets where that money came from. It forgets it took it out of the right pocket to put it into the left pocket. Of course, not all of it went back into the left pocket; only a few nickels and dimes did. The government forgets the people who entrusted it to govern. In doing that, it has lost sight of the most important things.

In this budget, Canadians were looking for lower taxes. In this budget, Canadians were looking for spending to be reined in. In this budget, Canadians were looking for effective measures around housing prices and affordability. That is what Canadians were looking for in this budget.

Instead, what Canadians received was a government that decided to pour gasoline on a fire, and that fire is called inflation. We already have the highest rates of inflation in 40 years. That has to do with our Prime Minister and the fact he made the determination to incur more debt than every other prime minister combined. In all of Canada's history, all debt combined, our Prime Minister, the leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, managed to spend more, and so inflation continues to rise. As inflation rises, so does the cost of living, and as the cost of living rises, Canadians become less and less hopeful.

The government likes to brag about its grocery rebate. I suppose some might call it the sexy item of the budget. It is the thing the government was hoping would save it and Canadians would applaud the government for. Again, take a big wad of cash out of one pocket and put a few nickels and dimes into another. “Applaud us, applaud us,” the government says.

Let us talk about the grocery rebate, shall we? Let us talk about the fact that because of inflationary measures groceries are going up by about $1,100 per family this year. Let us talk about that grocery rebate and the fact it is less than $500 for that same family. Do the math. The government is making decisions that is driving up the cost by $1,100 and giving $500. Are Canadian families better off? Absolutely not.

“Applaud us, applaud us,” the government says. “Send accolades our way,” it says, while it takes the wad of cash from the right pocket and puts a few nickels and dimes in the left.

What the government does not understand is a healthy economy, where people are working, thriving and contributing, cannot be replaced with government spending. Canadians deserve so much more. They are the problem solvers, the solution makers and the wealth generators this country needs, and they are the ones—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

Order, please. I have the honour to inform the House that a communication has been received as follows:

Rideau Hall

Ottawa

April 27, 2023

Mr. Speaker,

I have the honour to inform you that on behalf and at the request of the Right Honourable Mary May Simon, Governor General of Canada, the Right Honourable Richard Wagner, Deputy to the Governor General, signified royal assent by written declaration to the bills listed in the Schedule to this letter on the 27th day of April, 2023, at 6:26 p.m.

Yours sincerely,

Maia Welbourne

Assistant Secretary to the Governor General

The schedule indicates the bills assented to were S-214, An Act to establish International Mother Language Day—Chapter 5; Bill C-228, An Act to amend the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act, the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act and the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985—Chapter 6; Bill C-233, An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Judges Act (violence against an intimate partner)—Chapter 7; and Bill C-11, An Act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts—Chapter 8.

Message from the Senate

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

I have the honour to inform the House that a message has been received from the Senate informing this House that, in relation to Bill C-11, an act to amend the Broadcasting Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other acts, the Senate agrees to the amendments made by the House of Commons to its amendments and does not insist on its amendments to which the Commons disagreed.

The Senate takes note of the Government of Canada's public assurance that Bill C-11 will not apply to user-generated digital content and its commitment to issue policy direction to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, accordingly.

Citizenship and Immigration

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

Madam Speaker, I would just note that, when the Liberal-NDP coalition was trying to shut me down on this, I was barely a minute into my speech. These members need to let me get to the point I am trying to make, instead of just trying to silence me, as the government is doing with its censorship bills. This is what we are dealing with here, being silenced.

Instead of debating the budget, as we are supposed to be doing, the NDP put something forward called a concurrence motion. That is what we are debating right now. The concurrence motion is to deal with a very tricky bit of Liberal-NDP machinations, which is actually really harming people and delaying the help that Bill S-245 would provide.

Instead of debating the budget, we are debating a concurrence motion on something that happened, and I want to break down what happened. Bill S-245 is an act to amend the Citizenship Act. It went through the Senate. It was introduced by Senator Yonah Martin to deal with a very narrow scope, dealing with something called “lost Canadians”. It was very narrow in scope, and because it was so narrow in scope, it sailed through the Senate, on the understanding that it would stay narrow and it would go through the Senate.

It came to the immigration committee. What ended up happening was that, first of all, before moving this in the immigration committee, the member for Vancouver East went and did a press conference, pre-positioning herself to do this.

The Liberal-NDP coalition got together and did two things. It moved a motion to extend amendments to the bill by 30 days, which delayed action for people who would have been impacted by the bill, and then it also moved a motion to extend the scope of the amendments that would be debated well past what was in the bill itself.

For those who are watching who may not understand what this does, it allows members, in a private member's bill, which is supposed to be very narrow in scope, to put forward any amendment they want. What that does, in effect, and the reason why I do not think we should have done that, is forces the bill to go back to the Senate yet again.

This is going to delay justice for the people who we had non-partisan, all-party agreement to deal with. That motion itself, to do what the NDP-Liberal coalition wanted to do, passed in the citizenship committee with its support. Even though it passed, it introduced this concurrence motion in the House of Commons today, and it is doing what? It is eating up time to debate the deficit budget issue because it doesn't want to talk about it.

If it is saying, oh no, nobody should talk about this and then we go back to the budget, we actually gave it an opportunity to go back to debate. My colleague from Calgary Shepard rose to move a motion about an hour ago to move on from the debate, yet it voted against that.

That is the agenda here. The agenda here is to curtail debate on the budget while it is supporting the passage of Liberal censorship bills Bill C-11 and Bill C-18. These are the types of tactics that we are going to see over and over and over again from this Liberal coalition because it does not want to stand up for what Canadians need, either in the budget or in Bill S-245.

When the Liberal and the NDP coalition decided that it was going to delay the passage of the bill through the committee and delay justice for people who were in that bill, who we all support justice for, and open up the scope of the bill, it forgot one thing. It forgot that, if it opened up the scope of the bill for its one issue, which the senator and the Senate did not want because they agreed to sail it through on a small amendment, it forgot that maybe other people would want to put forward amendments too, such as me and my colleague from Calgary Shepard.

It then had the audacity and the gall to stand in this place during this debate, which it did not need, and which it put forward to waste time on debate on the budget because it does not want to talk about how much deficit spending money it puts forward, which has caused an inflationary crisis in Canada, all while it is putting forward censorship bills. Because it does not want that debate to happen, it puts this debate forward.

Now it is saying that it is because the Conservatives want to put forward amendments to the Citizenship Act. Well, guess what? What is good for the goose is good for the gander.

If the NDP-Liberal coalition, which is supporting censorship bills Bill C-11 and Bill C-18 to shut down conversations in the Canadian public, are using a concurrence motion to shut down debate in the House of Commons, we are absolutely right that Conservatives will be putting forward motions beyond the scope of the bill. It is as simple as that.

If the NDP-Liberal coalition wants a statutory review of the Citizenship Act, then let us giddy-up and do it. I have a lot of great ideas, which I will definitely be bringing forward. This does nothing to help the people who could have been helped if the NDP had just let this go.

The other thing I can show is why we should not be delaying this bill and why the scope of the amendment should not be put through. It is not just because it delays justice for people within this bill; it is also because the NDP is propping up a government that has refused to do this in its own government legislation. If the government had actually wanted to do anything else, it has had nearly eight years to put forward, through its own government legislation, what my colleague from the NDP wants to do.

The NDP is actually in a coalition with the government. I do not know if the NDP wants to go to an election, but I know the Liberals do not. Considering what the polling numbers show today, I do not think there are a lot of people on the Liberal backbench who would want to go to an election today.

The NDP could be using that coalition agreement to say that, within a piece of government legislation, we need to do this. However, they do not actually have the leverage they claim to have over the government, so what they are trying to do is sneak through committee what they cannot get the government to do in the House.

To people who are watching and are impacted by this bill, I say that the Liberals delayed the passage of the bill because they did not understand what they were doing. That is brutal. It is terrible. I cannot believe it. I cannot believe they would not do what we all agreed to do in a non-partisan way, as the Senate did, which is to get Bill S-245 through.

Today, we are debating the concurrence motion and the substance of the motion, and we are using House of Commons time that we could have used to debate the budget. The Liberals moved this concurrence motion even though the bill has already passed through the immigration committee. They actually ate up hours of critical, precious House debate time, which we could have used to talk about the budget. This is a path to ruin that the government, the Liberal-NDP coalition, put us on by inflationary, deficit spending in the budget bill. That is critical.

People cannot eat. People in Vancouver, the member's home riding, are eating out of dumpsters because of the inflation crisis and the affordable housing crisis. Today, she moved a motion that would essentially cut off debate on the budget today, even though it has already passed through the House of Commons.

If my colleague wants to open up the scope of the bill so that it is going to have to go back to the Senate anyway, through her actions, not mine or those of any of my Conservative colleagues, then we will be putting forward other amendments as well. One of the amendments I would like to put forward, given that we are now reviewing the citizenship bill, has to do with the fact that the Liberals said they were going to do away with the need to have in-person citizenship ceremonies. This is something that has received wide, cross-party condemnation. I have an opinion piece published in the Toronto Star on April 10. The title is “I'm horrified by the suggestion of cancelling in-person citizenship ceremonies”. It goes through quotes from non-partisan people, including Adrienne Clarkson, a former governor general; a Syrian refugee; and others who are saying the government should not be doing away with the requirement for in-person citizenship ceremonies.

I would like to amend the Citizenship Act to ensure that, rather than doing away with the ceremonies because the government cannot figure out how to get services to where people want them, the government would actually be required to make sure new Canadians have the right and the ability to go to an in-person ceremony, take the oath with fellow new Canadians and be welcomed into the Canadian family in such a glorious way, instead of doing what it is doing now.

Members in this place have used up precious House time. I am speaking here because members of the Liberal-NDP coalition voted against a motion to end debate on this and move forward. They gave me an opportunity to speak. For once, instead of speaking on Bill C-11 or Bill C-18, the censorship bill, I am, they are darn right, going to speak in this place. I am certainly also going to be putting forward amendments. I do not know if they have forgotten how this place works or have forgotten that each of us has our own individual rights to work within the process that they put forward.

They stand up and say that one person can put forward an amendment that is completely out of scope, but they are going to use that to justify delaying justice for the people in the bill and use that to delay debate on the government's inflationary budget deficit crisis bill. Therefore, yes, I am going to put forward amendments that make sense for my constituents. My constituency is a diverse community in north central Calgary where the Citizenship Act matters. If the member for Vancouver East is going to use her Liberal-NDP coalition position to try to get the Liberal government to extend the scope of the bill and, in doing so, delay justice for people, while delaying debate on the budget, then yes, I am going to be putting forward amendments to amend the Citizenship Act.

To the people and stakeholders watching this, this bill could have been through our committee already. It could have been sailing through the House. However, what is the Liberal-NDP coalition doing? Instead of the government putting forward its own legislation to address any additional issues, the NDP is proposing a motion to extend this by another 30 days, plus have a statutory review of the Citizenship Act. It is plus, plus, plus. They did not think through the process. I am sure that when they were talking to stakeholders, they did not talk to them and were not honest with them about what could or might happen if this path were undertaken.

If I had been meeting with those stakeholders, I would have said that this is something we need to lobby the government for in different legislation, because the senator who put it forward in a private member's bill had agreement among her peers on a narrowly defined scope in the bill in order to get it through and get justice for people. If we do what the member for Vancouver East is suggesting, we would delay it for another 30 days. Then it would probably have to go back through the Senate. The Senate takes a lot of time to look at things. Then it would have to come back here again. That would be months and months of delay, when it could have been done maybe before June. Now we do not know when it is going to be done.

That is why I opposed the approach in committee. Frankly, it is why I oppose using all this time in the House to continue a debate that the NDP-Liberal coalition settled at the immigration committee, an unwise course of action, only to vote against it. They just voted, an hour ago, against moving forward. Also, as we saw at the start of this debate, time after time my colleagues were getting interrupted by points of order, with members saying we should not be allowed to raise the issue of the budget. Absolutely we should be able to raise the issue of the budget, after the NDP-Liberal coalition voted against a Conservative motion that would allow us to move forward to debate the budget.

However, here we are, and if members have given me the opportunity to speak by not moving on that, absolutely I am going to speak about it. Of course, the Liberal-NDP coalition does not want to talk about that inflationary budget, that big, expensive nothing burger that would cost Canadians more, that would lead to food inflation and that is not addressing the core issues facing this country, because it is an embarrassment. They do not want an election because they are all afraid of losing their seats. Canadians are on to them, just as I am on to them right now.

I am tired of this. I am tired of these games. We did not need to have this debate in the House. This could have gone forward to the immigration committee. What we have done, in effect, is delay justice for the people in Bill S-245, delay debate on the budget and, in doing so, delay justice for all Canadians, who are dumpster diving in Vancouver East to eat and who continue to not be able to afford places to live.

This is a hard truth. It is an inconvenient truth for everybody in this place. However, it is time coalition members are confronted with it. There are consequences for the actions of the coalition and its backroom dealings. They lead us into places like this, where they make mistakes on parliamentary procedures and where they do not explain the implications of their actions to stakeholders who are advocating for change in this bill. Again, the government could have done this.

Digital Charter Implementation Act, 2022

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am proud to rise on behalf of my privacy-loving constituents in Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke.

Bill C-27 is another piece of legislation that had to be resurrected after the Prime Minister called his superspreader pandemic election. Originally, this was supposed to be a long overdue update to the Privacy Act, and it has since morphed into Bill C-27, the data-grab act.

Everything about Bill C-27 should leave the Liberals feeling embarrassed. A Canadian's right to privacy is fundamental. Sadly, Canadians' privacy rights are not a priority for the government.

This bill has languished for years. It was first introduced immediately after the original online streaming censorship act was introduced. However, when the Prime Minister called his pandemic election and reset all legislation, what did the Liberals make a priority? Was it the privacy rights of Canadians? No. Was it securing Canadians' ownership over their data? No. Instead, what the Liberals prioritized was a bailout for big telecom and a bailout for the legacy media.

Not only does the government care more about padding the bottom line of Postmedia, but it also adopted Rupert Murdoch's false narrative about tech profiting off the content produced by the news media. Social media companies and search engines do not profit off the news media. They profit off us. These companies profit off our data, and the Liberals know the truth. Unfortunately, this legislation seeks to make it easier for companies to profit off our privacy.

If Bill C-27 is not significantly improved at committee, then together with Bill C-11 and Bill C-18, the government will have entrenched the surveillance economy in Canadians' lives. By combining the updates to the Privacy Act with the creation of a new artificial intelligence act, the Liberals have actually illustrated the brave new world we live in.

The Privacy Act and the way we talk about privacy even today are holdovers from the industrial era. We do not live in that world anymore. In the industrial economy, privacy rights were concerned with the ability to control what information could be shared. The goal was to prevent harm that could come from our personal information being used against us.

In effect, information was personal and an economic liability. We spent money on shredders to destroy personal information. The careless use of our personal information could only have a negative value, but then the world changed. Our personal information stopped being a liability and became an asset.

It started out slowly. Early examples were Amazon recommending a new book based on previous purchases and Netflix recommending what DVD rental we should next receive by mail. Google then began displaying ads next to search results. That was the eureka moment: Targeted ads were very profitable.

However, the targeting was pretty basic. If someone searched for shoe stores near them, Google returned search results alongside ads for shoes. Then it became ads for shoes on sale nearby. Then came Facebook and millions of people signed up. In exchange for an easy way to connect with friends and family, all someone had to do was share all their personal information, like who their friends were, how many friends they had and their geographical proximity to friends.

With the addition of the “like” button, the data harvesting exploded. If someone liked a news story about camping, they would start seeing ads for tents and sleeping bags. Every action Canadians took online, every single bit of their data, was commodified. Our privacy was turned into property and we lost both.

Not only does this bill not secure privacy rights, but it effectively enshrines the loss of our property rights with just two words: legitimate interest. Proposed subsection 18(3), entitled “Legitimate interest”, has this to say:

(3) An organization may collect or use an individual's personal information without their knowledge or consent if the collection or use is made for the purpose of an activity in which the organization has a legitimate interest that outweighs any potential adverse effect on the individual resulting from that collection or use

Is “legitimate interest” defined anywhere in the legislation? No. It is just another example of the vagueness found throughout the legislation.

Even if we accept the plain-language definition and that private business really somehow does have a genuine, legitimate reason to collect private information without consent, it is weighed against the adverse effect. However, this is industrial-era thinking. It views personal information only as a potential liability. Businesses have a legitimate interest in making money. With the Internet and mobile phones, much of our private information can be collected without any adverse effect. This legislation turns the private information of Canadians into the property of corporations and calls it legitimate.

I mentioned earlier that combining the privacy legislation with the AI legislation actually puts a spotlight on the issue of private data as property. However, as important as it is to highlight the connection, it is more important that these bills be separated. The artificial intelligence and data act has been slapped onto previously introduced privacy legislation.

With the privacy portion of the legislation, the devil is in the details. Overall, however, the bill reflects a general consensus developed over countless committee studies. That is not to mention the contributions to the privacy debate from the federal and provincial privacy commissioners. The issue has been well studied, and the minister has indicated that the government is open to responsible amendments. I am sure that the committee is well equipped to improve the privacy sections of this bill.

The same cannot be said about the artificial intelligence section of the bill. It seems rushed, because it is. It is intentionally vague. The Liberals claim the vagueness is required to provide them with regulatory flexibility and agility. The truth is, they do not know enough to be more precise. I have been trying to get a study on artificial intelligence in the defence committee for years, but there was always a more pressing issue. AI was treated like nuclear fusion technology, something that was always just over the horizon.

Since this bill was introduced 10 months ago, we have gone from ChatGPT to open-source GPT models, which any teenager can apparently run on their personal computer now. AI programs went from producing surrealist art to creating photorealistic images of the Pope in a puffy jacket. We have gone from short clips of deepfake videos impersonating real people to generating fictional people speaking in a real-time video. When we all started to learn Zoom in 2020, how many people thought the other person on the screen they were talking to could just be a fake? Now it is a real possibility.

The speed at which AI is developing is not an argument for delaying AI regulation; it shows that it is imperative to get the regulation right. Would this bill do that? The only honest answer is that we do not know. They do not know. Nobody truly knows. However, we can learn.

We should split this bill and let the stand-alone AI bill be the first legislation considered by one of the permanent standing committees, adding artificial intelligence to its official responsibilities. Artificial intelligence is not going away, and while much of the media attention has focused on chatbots, artistic bots and deepfakes, AI is unlocking the secrets to protein folding. This has the potential to unlock cures to countless different cancers and rare genetic diseases.

A paper was just published describing how an AI trained on data about the mass of the planets and their orbits was able to rediscover Kepler's laws of motion and Einstein's theory of time dilation. If we get this wrong, Canada could be left behind by the next revolution in science and discovery.

Given the government's track record on digital technology, Canadians should be worried about the Liberals rushing vague legislation through to regulate an emerging technology. Rather than modernizing the Broadcasting Act, they are trying to drag the Internet back to the 1980s. With Bill C-18, they claim that linking is a form of stealing.

The Liberals and their costly coalition allies do not even understand how broadcasting technology or the Internet works. They see people's personal data as the legitimate property of corporations, and now they are seeking the power to regulate a revolutionary technology. They did nothing while the world shifted below them, and now they are trying to rush regulations through without understanding the scope and scale of the challenge. Protecting Canadians' privacy and establishing property rights over their personal data should have been prioritized over bailing out Bell and Rogers.

Financial Statement of Minister of Finance

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Madam Speaker, I really appreciate my colleague, who is always fighting for those important artists and cultural curators in our country. The government absolutely failed. This is the most impacted sector in our economy from COVID, which was left hung out to dry. We have even been asking for the CEBA loan to be extended for many of them, but many did not even qualify for it, so the government failed.

We know Bill C-11 will bring forward some important funds and resources to support those artists, but it is not quick enough. In this budget, the Liberals should have been bridging the gap with some resources for that.

I am disappointed to not get a question from the Conservatives on housing, because their free market approach has failed Canadians. It has left them hung out to dry.

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Madam Speaker, I believe I answered the question adequately: Bill C-11 and the regulation of social media and newsfeed algorithms—

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Madam Speaker, I would say Bill C-11, with the new government policy of regulating social media newsfeed algorithms, is a very clear example of something the government has no need to do, no business doing and no need to even contemplate doing. If we were not so focused on Bill C-11 and social media newsfeed algorithms, a lot more federal civil servants could focus on issuing passports and doing the things that government should be doing.

I would also add the confiscation and buyback of hunting rifles and shotguns and the fertilizer restrictions on farmers. There are lots of things the government does that it does not really need to do.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech.

Clearly, we are not going to agree on certain things, such as Bill C‑11 and all the disinformation around it. No, Bill C‑11 will not infringe on freedom of expression. However, we do agree on the issue of security, and I am very interested in hearing her talk about that. For example, it is deplorable that there is still no independent inquiry on Chinese interference, which is quite serious. We might have expected an announcement about some action being taken on this issue. Concerning arms trafficking, there are no measures to strengthen the control of gun smuggling across the border. That is very worrisome.

I would like my colleague to talk about that.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is an honour to rise and speak to budget 2023, which is yet another high-spend budget that will likely make life more expensive for Canadians.

I have spent time over the last couple of weeks talking to people across my amazing riding of Fort McMurray—Cold Lake to hear their opinions on this budget. I have heard from families, individuals, businesses and organizations alike that are struggling to make ends meet due to record-breaking inflation, and they are really having a hard time right now. Their paycheques do not stretch as far as they used to, between the increased cost of heating, the skyrocketing grocery prices, and the overall cost of living, which seems to be ever-increasing. These hard-working people I have chatted with just want to see lower taxes. Specifically, the thing I hear resoundingly throughout Fort McMurray—Cold Lake is that they want to see the carbon tax axed because it is a tax plan, not an environmental plan. It is inevitably going to raise the price of everything, as the Parliamentary Budget Officer has shown it has already done and will continue to do as we go forward.

One thing I hear loud and clear from people across Fort McMurray—Cold Lake is their concerns about the ever-increasing crime. For far too many years, families and individuals across rural Alberta have been complaining about the revolving door of criminals being caught and released back into their communities without so much as a slap on the wrist. The catch-and-release policies of the Liberal government mean that more Canadians do not feel safe in their homes, their communities, their streets and their country. Recently, we have been seeing an ever-increasing rate of high-profile violent crimes in the news. These are now happening in cities and are random. There are random stabbings happening on transit and in the streets. This is not gang-related violence that is terrorizing everyday Canadians, but just random crime.

One thing that is so terrifying and that I have heard so many people say they are concerned about is the fact that many of these crimes were committed by people who were released on bail or out on parole. After eight years of the current Prime Minister and his soft-on-crime policies, our communities just feel less safe, and the Liberal government is doing nothing to stop it. Sadly, it is making it worse. Violent offenders are thrown back into the streets, sometimes within hours of their arrest.

Conservatives believe in jail, not bail for violent repeat offenders, and I think it is really important to stop this revolving door of catch-and-release criminals. In the eight years since the Prime Minister has taken office, violent crime has increased by 32%, and gang-related murders have doubled. Canadians deserve to feel safe in their communities. Conservatives will restore their trust in the legal system and ensure that violent repeat offenders stay behind bars, where they belong.

The people I talked to were also really concerned about government censorship. Specifically, their concerns were with respect to Bill C-11. They made it clear to me that they do not want the current government, or any government for that matter, making a decision as to what they can see or say online. We now have proof that the current Liberal government has unashamedly asked tech giants to make news articles that it does not like simply disappear. We have proof that this has been happening under the current government. Bill C-11 would make that much easier, and the government would be able to control more of what we can see and say online.

I am proud to say that a Conservative government will repeal Bill C-11 and protect the individual rights and freedoms of Canadians. It is a shame that the Liberals are more concerned with catchy talking points than addressing the real issues facing Canadians. They are more concerned with keeping their partners in the costly coalition happy than helping everyday Canadians.

Conservatives made three requests of the federal government in order to gain our support for the budget: one, lower taxes; two, end inflationary deficits that would increase the cost of goods; and three, remove the gatekeepers that would prevent more homes from being built, allowing home prices to drop. However, none of those conditions were met, not a single one of them. As such, it is pretty clear that Conservatives simply cannot support this big-spend budget.

It is truly time to speak out against the injustices we face under this current administration. With budget 2023, the Liberals are continuing their war on work and imposing higher taxes that are punishing hard-working individuals, rather than listening to the needs of real Canadians. It has never been so good to be a Liberal insider, and it has never been so bad to be an average Canadian. That is wrong, and it should not be the case in 2023.

The price of food and groceries has skyrocketed. I am not sure if the Liberal members hear the same thing I do when I am back home, but just about every person I talk to talks about how expensive gas is and how expensive groceries are. I constantly see posts on social media from friends of mine who have kids about how their grocery bill has gone up by another $100 this week.

Living in an isolated, rural community, I see even more expensive groceries than what many of my city counterparts would see, just by the nature of the fact that the groceries need an extra five hours to get to where I am, which is an end-of-line community.

The carbon tax actually adds a unique perspective. Not only are the farmers taxed to make the food, and then the people who produce the food are taxed on all the energy it takes to manufacture it, but the hard-working truck drivers who bring the food from distribution centres and farms to my community are also taxed. The grocery stores have additional carbon tax. That little bit of carbon tax, which is just a tax plan, is multiplied so many times over, and the farther Canadians are from a distribution hub, the more that has an impact on them.

The Parliamentary Budget Officer has made it very clear that Canadians will, in fact, pay more than they receive back in this carbon tax scheme. In fact, for the average Alberta family, the net cost of the fuel charge is $2,773. It is $1,723 to the average family in Saskatchewan, another $1,490 to the average family in Manitoba, an extra $1,820 to a family in Ontario, an extra $1,513 to a family in Nova Scotia, an extra $1,521 to a family in Prince Edward Island, and an extra $1,316 to a family in Newfoundland and Labrador.

I repeat those costs because it shows that families are not better off, if the average family in that many provinces is going to be paying that much more. Most of the families I have talked to over the last two weeks do not have an extra $2,700 lying around to pay for the extra cost of the carbon tax. They do not have it. They are already struggling. They are already making the hard choice of whether they are going to pay their heating bill, pay for gas so they can get to work, or put groceries on their table.

We have a record number of people skipping meals in this country: one in five Canadians is skipping meals. We have a record-breaking number of people visiting food banks right across this country every single month so that kids get nutritious food. We are in a crisis right now with affordability, yet the government seems to think that this is not really a huge problem. It did put forward a small win with a grocery rebate, but with the additional costs I cited, that will evaporate before a couple of months is up.

While it is definitely going to help in the short term, in the long term families will still be worse off than they were before. That is not even taking into account that because of all the extra spending in this budget, the average family is going to have an extra 4,200 dollars' worth of costs to pay for all the spending in this budget. Most of these families do not have that kind of money.

This is the part where I think there is a huge disconnect between the talking points and the reality. Canadians are struggling today and the solutions are not here. I will be voting against this budget.

Social Media Content

[Rachael Thomas, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

Madam Speaker, I rise in the House in order to make a request with regard to an emergency debate concerning revelations that the government has pressured social media platforms to edit or remove content that it considered embarrassing. These attempts at what can fairly be described as government censorship of the news, and the Internet more generally, came to public attention through a response that my colleague, the member for Niagara West, put forward in an OPQ.

The response, which has been tabled in the House of Commons, reveals that the government pressured social media platforms a total of 214 times over a 24-month time period and that this pressure was applied simply because the government did not want this information made public or it felt embarrassed by this information.

We know that there were many times when the platforms were able to successfully push back. However, we also know that Bill C-11 is currently in the Senate; if it should pass, it will actually legislate the government's ability to engage in this type of censorship going forward. One can imagine just how scary this is for many Canadians who count on the fact that we have a charter in this country that protects their freedom of speech, and therefore, freedom to access information that they wish to listen to or watch or access online. Therefore, given that we have now seen it come to light that the government applied pressure 214 times, we would ask that the House be able to engage in a debate with regard to this important matter.

I acknowledge that the Chair normally affords a wide latitude for contributions during the budget debate, which is the current debate taking place here today. I recognize that this type of request might not normally be granted under the emergency debate opportunity. However, I urge you, Mr. Speaker, to recognize that these issues touch upon one of our fundamental freedoms, which is freedom of speech, and further, that censorship of the news and Internet is decidedly not an economic question, as the budget is. Therefore, it could not necessarily be addressed through financial initiatives.

To suggest that this issue can simply be raised within the context of the current debate seems perhaps reckless, and so I would respectfully allow my question to stand: Could we be granted an emergency debate with regard to the government's decision to apply pressure 214 times to social media platforms across this country?