Bill C-282

An Act to amend the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Act (supply management)

This enactment amends the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Act so that the Minister of Foreign Affairs cannot make certain commitments with respect to international trade regarding certain goods.

[Phil Dykstra, President, P & D Dykstra Farms Inc.]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Ladies and gentlemen, thanks for having me here.

I want to update you a little on what we're doing. I think you were briefed earlier—maybe last year—by the Ontario Pork Producers' Marketing Board in terms of the situation on Ontario hog farms. You will be well aware that, 10 years ago, we lost Quality Meats. That has moved a lot of hogs to Quebec in the last couple of years. Olymel closed a couple of hog-packing plants, which has essentially dispersed Ontario hogs: 25,000 hogs a week are now being sent to other places, mostly to the U.S., while some go to Manitoba.

Anyway, the freight bill is significant. We're exporting into the U.S. ourselves, now. We feel there's been a loss of jobs and added value, and we also feel we're subject to trade and border risks as our live animals cross. We know we've seen trade action on live hogs. Probably every 10 to 12 years, we see something, whether it's MCOOL or anti-dumping, you name it. There are certainly going to be a lot of eyes on the presidential election next week to see how that plays out. Certainly, discussion around Bill C-282 and some of these things gives us pretty big concerns.

What has happened now is that a number of us primary producers—15—have joined together and purchased a small plant just outside of Arthur, Ontario, called Domingos Meat Packers. Domingos Meat Packers was a small provincial plant harvesting 1,900 hogs a week. We now have that business running up to 3,000 hogs a week. We are in the process of pushing dirt, pouring concrete, laying down footings and building a new federal plant just outside of Arthur, Ontario. The goal of this new federal plant will be to harvest, at its capacity, 12,000 hogs a week on a single shift. That, plus the small provincial plant, will bring us to a total of 15,000 a week. We have made a significant investment.

I'm the son of an immigrant farmer. I have a couple of sons farming with me. My wife and I are fortunate to have six grandchildren. God willing, a couple of them will stick around. However, this whole strategy is about sustainability, integrating our business and making sure we're relevant in years to come. Collectively, we put down $25 million of hard capital. We're in the process of drumming up more cash to put in, and we have leveraged Farm Credit Canada for a sizable loan. All of this is to invest in a new $60-million facility that will add value to our pork, reduce our transportation costs by $13 million and reduce our border risk. We're going to add 300 direct jobs in the area of Waterloo and create another 20 management positions. We are feeling pretty grateful and blessed that we can move ahead with a project like this, that we have been able to leverage some good people at Farm Credit Canada, and that we have a good place in Ontario to grow.

We still have a few more priorities that need some attention. We probably won't be able to get those done near-term. We're wondering if there are ways and means we can work together to build, perhaps, a water treatment plant, which would help us reduce the need for water and recycle water. We're looking at things like truck washes to minimize disease risk and enhance our biosecurity. We're in the process of setting up a training centre. We're likely going to need to invest about $500,000 to train people over the next three years, so there's a lot going on.

Anyway, I don't know how much time I have used. Everyone talks very fast at these meetings. It's pretty impressive. I'll just say that, if there are any questions afterwards, I will be happy to entertain them. I could talk about this all day.

Again, thanks for welcoming me here and letting me share this opportunity we're working on.

[Tyler Fulton]

Thank you.

Absolutely, the beef sector relies very heavily on export markets, on trade agreements. We export roughly 50% of our cattle, or beef, abroad. We are very focused on all aspects that could influence that, not the least of which is, for example, Bill C-282. That's a big concern to our industry. But we are also concerned about carbon border adjustments.

Specifically, you mentioned methane. What I can speak to is a protocol that is designed to allow ranchers and cattle producers to benefit if they can show a reduction in methane production. There are a lot of good, technological, advanced products that we can point to that actually help to reduce that, but it's important that those incentives are aligned with.... Producers can't afford to spend the money on that technology without somehow realizing a benefit.

In general, we identify the fact that we need to do our part, and that's why I would point to the grasslands and the fact that we use these natural environments that sequester carbon as our places of work, where we produce that beef. We have a great story to tell, and we can talk more about it.

[Gayle McLaughlin, Senior Manager, Government and Industry Relations, Canadian Canola Growers Association]

Thanks, Dave.

In regard to trade, the 2026 review of CUSMA looms large for our farmers. The U.S. is our largest export market, and Mexico is our third-largest export market, with exports valued at $8.6 billion for the former and $1 billion for the latter in 2023.

We have now heard clearly from both U.S. presidential candidates that they view 2026 as a renegotiation, not a review. Given this context and a new administration in Mexico, Canada should be prioritizing this agreement and ensuring that we do nothing domestically to antagonize this critical relationship. CCGA was in Washington, D.C., last week for the 33rd Tri-National Agricultural Accord and heard loudly that Bill C-282 will cause damage to our trading relationships and the CUSMA review, in particular with the U.S.

The CUSMA region will be even more important for our farmers given the significant trade challenges we will face with canola seed going to China, given our government's action on EVs and other imports. We exported five billion dollars' worth of canola to China in 2023.

In regard to Bill C-59, our sector needs clarity around this bill. Canadian farmers are among the most sustainable in the world, and part of our global competitiveness is being able to tell our story to a global audience. The intended and unintended consequences of the greenwashing provisions and the very low threshold for bringing forth a complaint raise serious concerns among farmers.

Finally, regarding business risk management, these tools are important to farmers and provide them with support when they face significant production or income losses. The risk profiles and priorities of today's farmers have changed compared to 20 years ago, when the basic design of these programs began. Closer collaboration with farmers and their associations is needed to ensure that these programs meet the needs of farmers now and into the future.

Thank you.

International Trade

[Alain Therrien, Bloc, La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, guess who has not yet said a word about Bill C‑282, which is being blocked by two senators? I am talking about the Prime Minister himself.

He has never asked Peter Boehm or Peter Harder to do their job. He has not said a word. He is too busy pulling all the knives out of his back. Not only is he the one who appointed those two senators, but one of them is even a friend, specifically, Peter Harder, whom he often calls for advice.

Could he pick up the phone now, call his buddy Peter and tell him to do his job?

[Marie-Claude Bibeau, Liberal, Minister of National Revenue]

Mr. Speaker, enough is enough.

It has been explained several times that we appointed independent senators. They are independent. I know that the Bloc Québécois understands that concept.

Seriously, we have been telling these senators loud and clear that Bill C‑282 was supported by the vast majority of members in the House. We are asking them to move swiftly and send the bill back to us as soon as possible.

The message seems clear to me.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Peter Boehm and Peter Harder are two senators who want to undo the elected members' vote on Bill C‑282, which would protect supply management in trade agreements.

These two Liberal appointees say they fear that this will take power away from negotiators. News flash: that is the point. That is the whole point of Bill C‑282. It stops negotiators from sacrificing supply management again, after trading it away in three agreements, including two negotiated under the Liberals, with Europe, Asia and the United States.

The members on this side of the aisle are protecting farmers. The ones on that side are protecting the right to sacrifice them.

Will the Liberals tell their rich little friends to get their priorities straight?

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Mr. Speaker, farmers from across the country came to Ottawa yesterday to support the Bloc Québécois's Bill C‑282 on supply management, which is currently stuck in the Senate. All the parties turned out as well to ask two senators, Peter Boehm and Peter Harder, to stop flouting the will of elected members.

Everyone was there except for one person who still has not spoken on the issue. That person is the Prime Minister, the very person who personally appointed the two lords almighty who are blocking everything.

When will the Prime Minister finally ask his two appointees to stop standing in the way of democracy?

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Senator Boehm said he cannot study the supply management bill because, in case people had not noticed, there are a few wars going on. He and Mr. Harder, our two future Nobel Peace Prize winners, are going to start by ending war. Then, if they have any time left, they will use their superior intellect to take a closer look at the supply management bill. Now that is what I call arrogant.

Enough with the nonsense. Will the government call Mr. Harder and Mr. Boehm to order and push Bill C-282 forward immediately?

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, some senators even came here this morning to apologize for the Senate's conduct, and rightly so.

Two senators, Mr. Harder and Mr. Boehm, who were appointed by the Prime Minister—not elected—are undermining the democratic process. These two senators are more easily swayed by the arguments of big lobbyists than by the will of the people's elected representatives. To do nothing is to allow democracy to be flouted.

What does the government intend to do to get Bill C‑282 on supply management, which was passed by a majority vote, out of the Senate?

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, farmers from all over were in Ottawa this morning. They came from Quebec, Ontario, Saskatchewan, the Northwest Territories, everywhere. They came to show their support for Bill C‑282. Representatives from all parties were there, too: the Greens, the NDP, the Conservatives and the Liberals. Everyone was there to support the Bloc Québécois bill, which has become a bill everyone can get behind.

Everyone, that is, except Mr. Boehm and Mr. Harder, two unelected senators crusading against our farmers.

Who is going to bring them into line?

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food]

Mr. Speaker, once again I was so pleased to be at a rally supporting supply management with my colleagues today on the Hill. It is important to note that supply management was initiated by a Liberal government just over 50 years ago. Then, we supported supply management, and today, we support supply management. Being a dairy farmer in Prince Edward Island, I am fully aware of the value of supply management, and I urge the Senate to pass Bill C-282.

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Salaberry—Suroît, QC]

Mr. Speaker, for years now, the Bloc Québécois has been calling for the Senate to be abolished. It is an outdated institution and there is nothing democratic about it. We said it was useless, but we were wrong. It is not useless; it is harmful.

To the Senate, the will of elected representatives does not matter. Senators can decide not to respect that will without any problem or consequence. Bill C‑282 has the support of all the parties in the House. However, two unelected Liberal senators are subverting democracy by blocking the bill.

When will the Liberals call them to order?

Reference to Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I heard the beginning of the speech given by my colleague from Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères in which he put enormous pressure on me to deliver a quality speech. I will do my best not to disappoint him.

Honestly, there are several reasons why I am happy to speak on this subject today. First, it affords me the opportunity to comment on the question of transparency, accountability and the moral duties we must carry out when we agree to serve our constituents in the House of Commons.

Maybe I was naive, but when I decided to get involved in politics, I had principles and values, among them respect for institutions. I am convinced that we 33 Bloc Québécois members share this value and the desire to do our jobs while respecting institutions. Imagine that, a sovereignist Bloc member is saying that we are here to do our job while respecting the rules of the Parliament of Canada.

One of these rules is that it is up to the House to decide certain things, for example, the documents it wants to have in its possession, the documents it wants to obtain in various situations. Regardless of the situation, the fact remains that it is up to the House to determine the relevancy and necessity of obtaining some document or another. This is not a decision that the House may take and the government can treat as it sees fit. It is incumbent upon the government to respect the will of the House.

The Liberals are arguing that the RCMP says that this would be injecting politics into a police investigation, and that if it wants documents it has the means of requesting them. There is truth in that, but what we are asking for and what we agree on is that an order by the House Speaker be respected. Regardless of the Liberal members' arguments on this motion of privilege, the fact remains that it boils down to a ruling by the Speaker following a request by the House of Commons and its members.

I do not understand why they insist on obstructing. I do not understand why they keep doing as they please and determining what is and is not relevant in the Speaker's rulings. Honestly, I fail to understand the strategy.

Maybe they have something big to hide. Maybe they are trying to protect something big. Who knows. I do not even care to get into the theories about the scandal. The Conservatives have led the way on that, but they are in no position to lecture anyone about such things. If it is something they are trying to hide, it must be one whale of a secret. They are risking the survival of their fragile government, and they are delaying proceedings that could help them gain a friend until the holiday season.

This will hardly come as a scoop but there are currently two Bloc Québécois bills being used as preconditions for the Bloc's support of the Liberal government. The clock is ticking on both bills, and time is running out. If passed and implemented by October 29, they could guarantee the Bloc's support of this government until at least the holiday season, because both bills would be good for seniors aged 65 to 74 in Quebec and across Canada. I am talking about Bill C‑319, introduced by my colleague from Shefford, which has the support of all seniors groups. In a Canada-wide survey, 79% of respondents supported this Bloc demand. I do not understand why the Liberals are stubbornly dragging their feet on these important proceedings.

The other piece of legislation, every bit as important and another of the Bloc's demands in exchange for supporting the government—until the holidays, anyway—is Bill C‑282, which seeks to exclude supply management from any future trade negotiations. The bill is currently being blocked in the Senate by senators Boehm and Harder, whose arrogance defies comprehension.

One of the senators went so far as to insult my colleague, the member for Berthier—Maskinongé, when he appeared before the Senate committee two weeks ago. The senator called him “special”, but not in a very flattering way. This unelected senator criticized the hard work of a member who has worked for years with farmers and agricultural producers in the supply management system to craft a quality piece of legislation. It was insulting. Both senators are blocking the democratic process, and that is shameful. I make no bones about it, I find that shameful.

When we ask the Liberals questions in the House, they respond as though we were born yesterday and have just fallen off the turnip truck. They say they have no control over senators they appointed to the Senate, that these are independent senators. Sure. No one thinks that Liberal appointees to the Senate are purely independent.

Frankly, I do not get their strategy, especially since the last time I checked the polls, the Liberals were at 22% nationally and were projected to capture 53 seats. That means that if the numbers hold up, 107 Liberal members will be gone after the next election. If it were me, I would want to work with the people reaching out and extending a hand, but I will not try to get inside their heads. It is a shame that we find ourselves today with a question of privilege that prevents us from advancing important work for seniors and farmers, not just in Quebec but in Canada as a whole. I do not understand.

Today we are discussing an issue of transparency, respect, jurisdiction and accountability that is an obligation for any public office holder and, by extension, a government. These are concepts the Liberals have a lot of difficulty with.

This is a government that has not come to terms with its minority status, as my colleague from Pierre‑Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères mentioned earlier. It has no respect for parliamentary rules and traditions. There is no better illustration than the number of times it has invoked closure to restrict parliamentary privileges in the House since 2021, at the beginning of its alliance with its NDP friends. I did a quick search up to the beginning of June, and it is not even up to date. At the start of June, we were up to 48 closure motions since the NDP-Liberal marriage. These 48 closure motions allowed the Liberals to circumvent 72 bill stages.

I hear the Conservatives say it is wrong for the government to have gagged them 48 times. I would caution them against complaining too loudly, because between 2011 and 2015, the Harper government invoked closure 104 times. It imposed a gag order on the House 104 times to push through its ideas and bills at the expense of democracy.

As an aside, the most odious part of all this, the worst example, the worst denial of democracy, the worst shirking of parliamentary rules was the indefinite imposition of a hybrid Parliament. Normally, this is something that is done by consensus, with frank, non-partisan discussions among the parties. Traditionally, changes that are so important to the workings of Parliament are made through consensus.

However, the Liberals decided once again to bargain this away in return for some sort of support for some sort of project, because I am guessing that some members preferred watching parliamentary proceedings from their home computer in their comfy clothes, while throwing another load of laundry into the washing machine and making spaghetti sauce for dinner. I find that sad. We deserved a healthy, thoughtful debate on how to improve the way we do things here in the House of Commons.

In short, I find it absurd that we keep talking, talking, talking about transparency with a government that is on its last legs and that we will remember for issues such as WE Charity, for which it went as far as proroguing Parliament to prevent us from getting to the bottom of things. We do not even know how bad the scandal was; we can only imagine. We had so much trouble getting answers about the laboratory in Winnipeg. We still remember that. ArriveCAN was not that long ago. The government gave over $60 million to two dopes working out of their basement. It is crazy. That is financial mismanagement.

At the same time, the fiscal imbalance means that Quebec and the provinces are having an even harder time, year after year, fulfilling their obligations, financing their health care and education systems, and providing housing for newly arrived immigrants and asylum seekers.

The situation is untenable. There are more and more scandals, each of which costs taxpayers a fortune. Frankly, the situation is unjustifiable and inexcusable.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Mr. Speaker, what I am hearing in the House today is not particularly edifying. I get the impression that both sides are simply trying to capitalize on the obstruction. I can confirm that it was my Conservative colleague who talked about lies. I would actually like to point out that a big one was told, specifically that the carbon tax applies in Quebec. We have a party on the other side that refuses to hand over documents and refuses to co-operate with the House.

Farmers are on the Hill today because we need to move several issues forward in the coming weeks, including protecting supply management with Bill C‑282. There is also Bill C‑319, which seeks to increase OAS by 10% for people aged 65 to 74. We have work to get done in the House. Members on both sides should stop standing in the way and shirking their responsibilities. This does nothing to advance democracy.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

All right. Thank you.

Mr. Currie, you mentioned Bill C‑234 in your opening statement. At the beginning of the meeting, we talked about bills C‑280 and C‑282, and the trouble they're running into in the Senate. Bill C‑234 was reported back to the House with an amendment, but it still includes a grain drying exemption.

What do you want to say to the elected members of Parliament? Should we pass the bill as is or send it back to the Senate, knowing full well that it won't come back?