Bill C-69

Budget Implementation Act, 2024, No. 1

An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 16, 2024

Part 1 implements certain measures in respect of the Income Tax Act and the Income Tax Regulations by
(a) denying income tax deductions for expenses incurred with respect to non-compliant short-term rentals;
(b) exempting from taxation the international shipping income of certain Canadian resident companies;
(c) exempting from taxation any income of the trusts established under the First Nations Child and Family Services, Jordan’s Principle, and Trout Class Settlement Agreement;
(d) doubling the volunteer firefighters and search and rescue volunteers tax credits;
(e) extending the eligibility for the Canada child benefit in respect of a child for six months after the child’s death;
(f) increasing the cap on labour expenditures per eligible newsroom employee from $55,000 to $85,000 and increasing, for four years, the Canadian journalism labour tax credit rate from 25% to 35%;
(g) extending eligibility for the mineral exploration tax credit by one year;
(h) providing a refundable tax credit to small and medium-sized businesses in designated provinces by returning a portion of fuel charge proceeds from the province;
(i) providing a refundable investment tax credit to qualifying businesses for investments in certain clean hydrogen projects;
(j) providing a refundable investment tax credit to qualifying businesses for certain investments in clean technology manufacturing property;
(k) amending the definition “government assistance” to exclude bona fide concessional loans with reasonable repayment terms from public authorities;
(l) implementing a number of amendments to the alternative minimum tax;
(m) increasing the home buyers’ plan withdrawal limit from $35,000 to $60,000 and deferring the repayment period by three additional years;
(n) excluding the failure to report under the mandatory disclosure rules from the application of the section 238 penalty;
(o) introducing a $10-million capital gains exemption on the sale of a business to an employee ownership trust; and
(p) implementing a number of technical amendments to correct inconsistencies and to better align the law with its intended policy objectives.
Part 2 enacts the Global Minimum Tax Act , a regime based on the rules of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The global minimum tax regime will ensure that large multinational corporations are subject to a minimum effective tax rate of 15% on their profits wherever they do business. It sets out rules for the purposes of establishing liability for the tax and also sets out applicable reporting and filing requirements. To promote compliance with its provisions, that Act includes modern administration and enforcement provisions generally aligned with those found in other taxation statutes. Finally, this Part also makes related and consequential amendments to other texts to ensure proper implementation of the tax and cohesive and efficient administration by the Canada Revenue Agency.
Part 3 amends the Excise Tax Act , the Excise Act , the Excise Act, 2001 , the Underused Housing Tax Act , the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act and other related texts in order to implement certain measures.
Division 1 of Part 3 amends the Excise Tax Act by repealing the temporary relief for supplies of certain face masks or respirators and certain face shields from the Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax.
Division 2 of Part 3 amends the Excise Act , the Excise Act, 2001 and other related texts in order to implement changes to
(a) the federal excise duty framework for tobacco products by
(i) increasing the excise duty rates for tobacco products, including imposing a tax on inventories of cigarettes held by retailers and wholesalers,
(ii) changing the process by which brands of tobacco products for export are exempted from special excise duty and marking requirements,
(iii) allowing certain information to be shared for the administration or enforcement of the Tobacco and Vaping Products Act , and
(iv) requiring the filing of information returns in respect of tobacco excise stamps;
(b) the federal excise duty framework for vaping products by increasing the excise duty rates for vaping products; and
(c) the federal excise duty framework for alcohol by
(i) extending by two years the two per cent cap on the inflation adjustment on beer, spirits and wine excise duties, and
(ii) cutting by half for two years the excise duty rate on the first 15,000 hectolitres of beer brewed in Canada.
Division 3 of Part 3 amends the Underused Housing Tax Act and the Underused Housing Tax Regulations by, among other things,
(a) eliminating filing requirements for certain owners;
(b) reducing minimum penalties for failing to file a return; and
(c) introducing a new exemption for residential properties held as a place of residence or lodging for employees.
Division 4 of Part 3 amends the Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act by providing authority, in certain circumstances, for the sharing of certain information amongst federal officials and for the public disclosure of certain information by the Minister of National Revenue.
Part 4 enacts and amends several Acts in order to implement various measures.
Division 1 of Part 4 amends the Budget Implementation Act, 2022, No. 1 to delay the repeal of the Prohibition on the Purchase of Residential Property by Non-Canadians Act for two years.
Division 2 of Part 4 amends the National Housing Act to increase the in-force limits for guarantees issued by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) in respect of mortgage-backed securities and Canada Mortgage Bonds and for mortgage default insurance provided by CMHC from the temporary $750 billion to the permanent $800 billion. It also amends the Borrowing Authority Act to avoid the double counting of liabilities related to Canada Mortgage Bonds that are guaranteed by the CMHC and have been purchased by the Minister of Finance, on behalf of the Government of Canada, in the calculation of the maximum amount of certain borrowings under that Act.
Division 3 of Part 4 authorizes the making of payments to the provinces for the fiscal year beginning on April 1, 2024 respecting a national program for providing food in schools.
Division 4 of Part 4 amends the Canada Student Loans Act and the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act to expand eligibility for student loan forgiveness to early childhood educators, dentists, dental hygienists, pharmacists, midwives, teachers, social workers, psychologists, personal support workers and physiotherapists.
Division 5 of Part 4 amends the Canada Education Savings Act to, among other things,
(a) authorize the Minister responsible for that Act to open a registered education savings plan in respect of a child born after 2023 who is eligible for the payment of the Canada Learning Bond and is not the beneficiary under such a plan, so that the Minister may pay a Canada Learning Bond in respect of the child; and
(b) increase, from 20 to 30 years, the maximum age of a beneficiary under a registered education savings plan in respect of whom a Canada Learning Bond may be paid on application.
It also makes consequential amendments to the Income Tax Act .
Division 6 of Part 4 amends the Bretton Woods and Related Agreements Act to increase the maximum financial assistance that may be provided in respect of foreign states.
Division 7 of Part 4 amends the Bretton Woods and Related Agreements Act to increase the amount of the payment that the Minister of Finance may provide to the International Monetary Fund in respect of Canada’s subscriptions. It also amends the International Development (Financial Institutions) Assistance Act and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development Agreement Act to provide for new financial instruments that the Minister of Foreign Affairs or the Minister of Finance, as the case may be, may use to provide financial assistance to the institutions referred to in those Acts.
Division 8 of Part 4 amends the International Financial Assistance Act to, among other things, provide that foreign exchange losses in relation to programs referred to in that Act must be charged to the Consolidated Revenue Fund and provide for the making of payments to Development Finance Institute Canada (DFIC) Inc. in relation to programs referred to in that Act out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund.
Division 9 of Part 4 amends the Export Development Act to lower the limit for total liabilities and obligations referred to in subsection 24(1) of that Act from $115 billion to $100 billion.
Division 10 of Part 4 amends the Financial Administration Act to broaden the application of subsection 85(2) of that Act to other Crown corporations.
Division 11 of Part 4 amends the Financial Administration Act to require certain banks and other financial institutions to disclose prescribed information for federal payments accepted for deposit.
Division 12 of Part 4 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act to enhance the Canada Health Transfer for qualifying provinces and territories.
Division 13 of Part 4 amends the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985 to require that the Superintendent of Financial Institutions publish certain information relating to pension plan investments. It also amends the Pooled Registered Pension Plans Act to require that plan administrators provide specified information by written notice to certain persons when they become members of a pooled registered pension plan.
Division 14 of Part 4 amends the Canada Pension Plan to, among other things,
(a) provide for a death benefit of $5,000 in cases where no other Canada Pension Plan benefit, with the exception of the orphan’s benefit, has been paid in respect of the deceased contributor’s contributions;
(b) create a new child’s benefit for dependent children aged 18 to 24 who are in part-time attendance at school;
(c) maintain eligibility for the disabled contributor’s child’s benefit if the disabled contributor reaches the age of 65;
(d) allow for the deeming of an application for a disabled contributor’s child’s benefit on behalf of a child to have been made at an earlier date under the Canada Pension Plan ’s incapacity provisions;
(e) preclude entitlement to a survivor’s pension if an individual has received a division of unadjusted pensionable earnings in respect of their deceased separated spouse; and
(f) clarify the determination of the payee of the disabled contributor’s child’s benefit.
It also makes a consequential amendment to the Canada Pension Plan Regulations .
Division 15 of Part 4 amends the Public Sector Pension Investment Board Act to provide for the payment of certain amounts into the Consolidated Revenue Fund by the Public Sector Pension Investment Board.
Division 16 of Part 4 enacts the Consumer-Driven Banking Act , which establishes a consumer-driven framework for individuals and small businesses to safely and securely share their data with the participating entities of their choice.
It also makes related amendments to the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada Act to establish the position of Senior Deputy Commissioner for Consumer-Driven Banking who is responsible for consumer-driven banking matters and to provide for, among other things, the supervision of participating entities.
Division 17 of Part 4 amends the Bank Act to, among other things, clarify the definitions “deposit-type instrument” and “principal-protected note”.
Division 18 of Part 4 amends the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Act to increase to $100,000,000 the maximum amount that expenditures made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund to defray the expenses arising out of the operations of the Office may exceed the Office’s total assessments and revenues.
Division 19 of Part 4 amends the Bank of Canada Act to clarify that the Bank of Canada may enter into repurchase, reverse repurchase and buy-sellback agreements.
Division 20 of Part 4 amends the Canada Business Corporations Act to
(a) harmonize fines for a corporation guilty of an offence related to the collection or sending of information regarding individuals with significant control; and
(b) set separate fines and imprisonment terms on the basis of a summary conviction or a conviction on indictment for a director, officer or shareholder of a corporation guilty of an offence related to individuals with significant control.
Division 21 of Part 4 amends Parts I to III of the Canada Labour Code to, among other things,
(a) provide that a person who is paid remuneration by an employer is presumed to be their employee unless the contrary is proved by the employer;
(b) provide that if, in any proceeding other than a prosecution, an employer alleges that a person is not their employee, the burden of proof is on the employer; and
(c) prohibit an employer from treating an employee as if they were not their employee.
Finally, it also includes transitional provisions.
Division 22 of Part 4 amends the Canada Labour Code to, among other things, set out certain employer obligations relating to policies respecting work-related communication and clarify certain employee rights and employer obligations relating to terminations of employment. It also includes transitional provisions.
Division 23 of Part 4 amends the Employment Insurance Act to extend, until October 24, 2026, the duration of the measure that increases the maximum number of weeks for which benefits may be paid in a benefit period to certain seasonal workers.
Division 24 of Part 4 amends section 61 of An Act for the Substantive Equality of Canada’s Official Languages in order to add a reference to subsections 18(1.1) and (1.2) of the Use of French in Federally Regulated Private Businesses Act in subsection 19(1) of that Act, which An Act for the Substantive Equality of Canada’s Official Languages enacts.
Division 25 of Part 4 authorizes a corporation that is to be incorporated as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Canada Development Investment Corporation to provide loan guarantees as part of an Indigenous loan guarantee program and authorizes the payment out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund by the Minister of Finance of amounts that are required in respect of those guarantees.
Division 26 of Part 4 authorizes the payment of up to $1.3 million to entities or individuals involved in the government’s engagement in a pilot project for the creation of a Red Dress Alert.
Division 27 of Part 4 provides that the subsidiary of VIA Rail Canada Inc. incorporated with the corporate name VIA HFR - VIA TGF Inc. is, as of the date of its incorporation, an agent of His Majesty in right of Canada and may enter into contracts, agreements and other arrangements with His Majesty as though it were not such an agent.
Division 28 of Part 4 amends the Impact Assessment Act , in response to the majority opinion of the Supreme Court of Canada on the constitutionality of that Act, to, among other things,
(a) align the preamble and purpose provision with the primary objective of that Act, which is to prevent or mitigate significant adverse effects within federal jurisdiction — and significant direct or incidental adverse effects — that may be caused by the carrying out of physical activities;
(b) replace the definition “effects within federal jurisdiction” with “adverse effects within federal jurisdiction” and, in doing so,
(i) restrict the definition to non-negligible adverse changes,
(ii) limit transboundary changes to those involving the pollution of transboundary waters and the marine environment, and
(iii) include, in respect of federal works or undertakings and activities carried out on federal lands, non-negligible adverse changes to the environment or to health, social and economic conditions;
(c) ensure that the impact assessment process applies only to those physical activities that may cause adverse effects within federal jurisdiction or direct or incidental adverse effects;
(d) ensure that, in deciding if an impact assessment of a designated project is required, one factor that the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada must take into account is whether another means exists that would permit a jurisdiction to address those effects;
(e) amend the final decision-making provisions to provide for an initial determination as to whether the adverse effects within federal jurisdiction and the direct or incidental adverse effects are likely to be, to some extent, significant, and then, if so, provide for a determination as to whether those effects are justified in the public interest; and
(f) improve cooperation tools to better harmonize the impact assessment process with the processes for assessing effects that are followed by provincial and Indigenous jurisdictions.
Finally, it also includes transitional provisions.
Division 29 of Part 4 amends the Judges Act to increase the number of salaries authorized for judges of superior courts other than appeal courts. It also reduces in a corresponding manner the number of salaries authorized for judges of provincial unified family courts.
Division 30 of Part 4 amends the Tax Court of Canada Act to provide that, if a party to a proceeding under the general procedure of the Tax Court of Canada is not an individual, that party must be represented by counsel, except under special circumstances.
Division 31 of Part 4 amends the Food and Drugs Act to, among other things, authorize the Minister of Health to
(a) establish rules for the purpose of preventing, managing or controlling the risk of injury to health from the use of therapeutic products, other than the intended use, or the risk of adverse effects on human beings, animals or the environment from the use of a drug intended for an animal;
(b) exempt any food, therapeutic product, person or activity from the application of certain provisions of that Act or its regulations; and
(c) deem, on the basis of decisions of, information or documents produced by, a foreign regulatory authority, that certain requirements of that Act or its regulations are met in respect of a therapeutic product or food.
Finally, it also includes a transitional provision.
Division 32 of Part 4 amends the Tobacco and Vaping Products Act to authorize the provision of customs information to the Minister responsible for that Act for the purpose of the administration and enforcement of that Act and to authorize that Minister to disclose information to other federal ministers for certain purposes.
Division 33 of Part 4 amends the Criminal Code to broaden the criminal interest rate offence to prohibit a person from offering to enter into an agreement or arrangement to receive interest at a criminal rate and from advertising an offer to enter into an agreement or arrangement that provides for the receipt of interest at a criminal rate. It also repeals the provision that requires the consent of the Attorney General prior to commencing proceedings related to the offence.
Division 34 of Part 4 contains measures that are related to money laundering, terrorist financing and sanctions evasion and other measures.
Subdivision A of Division 34 amends the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act to, among other things,
(a) permit information sharing between reporting entities for the purpose of detecting and deterring money laundering, terrorist financing and sanctions evasion;
(b) authorize, subject to certain conditions, the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) to disclose certain information to provincial and territorial civil forfeiture offices and to the Department of Citizenship and Immigration;
(c) authorize FINTRAC to publicize additional information pertaining to violations of that Act; and
(d) extend the application of that Act to cheque cashing businesses.
It also makes consequential amendments to the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act and the Cross-border Currency and Monetary Instruments Reporting Regulations .
Subdivision B of Division 34 amends the Income Tax Act and the Excise Tax Act to allow provincial or superior court judges, a judge of a superior court of criminal jurisdiction or a judge as defined in section 552 of the Criminal Code to grant on application by a Canada Revenue Agency official the authorization to use device or investigative technique, or procedure or otherwise do any thing provided in a warrant, for purposes of tax investigations.
Subdivision C of Division 34 amends the Criminal Code to provide for an order to keep an account open or active and for a production order to require the production of documents or data that are in a person’s possession or control on dates specified in an order that fall within the 60-day period after the day on which it is made.
Division 35 of Part 4 amends the Criminal Code to, among other things,
(a) create new offences in respect of motor vehicle theft, including an offence concerning the possession or the distribution of an electronic device suitable for committing theft of a motor vehicle, and in respect of criminal organizations; and
(b) add, as an aggravating factor, evidence that an offender involved a person under the age of 18 years in the commission of an offence.
It also makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Division 36 of Part 4 amends the Radiocommunication Act to, among other things, prohibit the manufacture, import, distribution, lease, offer for sale, sale or possession of certain devices specified by the Minister of Industry. It also amends that Act to establish as an offence or a violation the contravention of that prohibition.
Division 37 of Part 4 amends the Telecommunications Act to, among other things, require telecommunications service providers to provide their subscribers with a self-service mechanism that allows them to cancel their contract for telecommunications services or modify their telecommunications service plan and to inform those subscribers before the expiry of their fixed-term contract, as well as in other specified circumstances, of other service plans that those providers offer. It also amends that Act to prohibit the charging of certain fees.
Division 38 of Part 4 amends the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to, among other things,
(a) provide that the Correctional Service of Canada is responsible for implementing any arrangement — approved by the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness — entered into by the Commissioner of Corrections and the Canada Border Services Agency with respect to the support that the Service may provide to the Agency to assist in the exercise of certain powers or the performance of certain duties and functions;
(b) control the access of the inmates of a penitentiary to a designated immigrant station adjacent to the penitentiary and the access of the immigration detainees of a designated immigrant station to a penitentiary adjacent to the station; and
(c) provide that, in exigent circumstances, staff members of the Service may provide additional support to detention enforcement officers of the Agency to assist them in the exercise of certain powers or the performance of certain duties and functions.
It also amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to define the term “immigrant station”, to provide that an area of a penitentiary may be an immigrant station only if it is designated under the Corrections and Conditional Release Act and to set out the circumstances under which a person detained under that Act may be detained in a designated immigrant station.
Finally, it provides for the repeal of those amendments on a specified date and includes a transitional provision.
Division 39 of Part 4 contains measures related to public debt and the borrowing of money.
Subdivision A of Division 39 amends the Financial Administration Act to clarify that certain regulations and directions do not apply to contracts related to the borrowing of money entered into by the Minister of Finance.
Subdivision B of Division 39 amends the Borrowing Authority Act to increase the maximum amount of certain borrowings.
Division 40 of Part 4 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act , the Bank Act and the Insurance Companies Act to require certain financial institutions to make available information respecting diversity among directors and members of senior management.
Division 41 of Part 4 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act , the Bank Act and the Insurance Companies Act to extend the period during which federal financial institutions governed by those Acts may carry on business.
Division 42 of Part 4 amends the Federal Courts Act to provide that the Federal Court has jurisdiction to hear applications for judicial review of decisions of the Social Security Tribunal on the extension of time to make a request for review or reconsideration under the Canada Disability Benefit Act . It also amends the Tax Court of Canada Act and the Department of Employment and Social Development Act to, among other things, provide the Tribunal with jurisdiction to hear appeals of decisions made under the Canada Disability Benefit Act and require that matters related to income raised in those appeals be referred to the Tax Court of Canada.
Division 43 of Part 4 amends the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act to repeal provisions related to the ministerial power to exempt supervised consumption sites from the application of that Act. It also amends that Act to allow for the making of regulations respecting authorizations for supervised consumption and drug checking services and includes transitional provisions.

Criminal Code

[Leslyn Lewis, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. My app malfunctioned for the first vote, on Bill C-69 in the third reading, and I am asking for unanimous consent to have it recorded as no.

Budget Implementation Act, 2024, No. 1

[The Speaker, Liberal, Greg Fergus]

It being 3.34 p.m., the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion at the third reading stage of Bill C-69.

Call in the members.

The House resumed from June 18 consideration of the motion that Bill C-69, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 16, 2024, be read the third time and passed.

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

Madam Speaker, my colleague began his speech by talking about the importance of balancing the budget and cutting the government's unnecessary spending.

Bill C‑69 includes a nice oil subsidy for so-called green hydrogen. It is a tax credit of 15% to 40%. Last year, the federal deficit was about $40 billion. The subsidies and tax credits for oil companies totalled about $30 billion. We could reduce the federal deficit by 75% in one fell swoop.

Is that not something interesting for my colleague to think about?

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

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her speech. I have the pleasure of serving with her on the Standing Committee on National Defence.

She began her speech by talking about the fact that we are having to debate an omnibus bill. By definition, an omnibus bill contains anything and everything. This one includes 23 tax measures and 44 non-tax measures.

We are going to vote against it because some of it is completely unacceptable. However, we can still see our way clear to agree that some other measures are acceptable and even good. One example is having the Canada child benefit continue for six months after a child's death.

I would simply like to hear her speak to any measure in the bill she considers worthwhile, or to know whether she thinks Bill C-69 is a total write-off.

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

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise on behalf of the health-conscious constituents in the riding of Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke.

For anyone tuning in tonight, one may be wondering why we are talking about health products, even though the bottom of one's screen says this is a debate on Bill C-69, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget.

The short answer is that the Prime Minister broke his promise to end the use of omnibus bills. Like a living, breathing “hold my beer” meme, these Liberals clearly thought the last government was not omnibusing hard enough. This bill is so obese, it is even cornering the market in Ozempic.

Ironically, this budget implementation bill would give the Minister of Health, and of anti-tourism, brand new powers to make Ozempic illegal for weight loss for everyone else. Since the Liberals started bragging about taking away people's drug plans and forcing everyone into a one-size-fits-all, Ottawa-knows-best, Soviet-style drug plan, I have had one question.

When Canada finds itself in the next drug shortage, how will the Liberals decide who lives and who dies? Not a single member from the socialist coalition has been willing to address the question, but the budget implementation bill's division 31 provides a sinister answer. The government will do whatever it wants.

Here is what the weighty omnibus bill says:

the Governor in Council may make any regulations that the Governor in Council considers necessary for the purpose of preventing shortages of therapeutic products or foods for a special dietary purpose in Canada or alleviating those shortages or their effects, in order to protect human health.

If one takes the word of the officials from Health Canada, all they are seeking is the power to import baby formula without bilingual labelling. If that were true, if the government's real intent was for a temporary emergency measure, the amendment would have been limited in scope and time. Instead, the government went with the kind of language, which maximizes power and minimizes oversight.

Here is the language the government originally sought for the therapeutic products:

if the Minister believes that the use of a therapeutic product, other than the intended use, may present a risk of injury to health, the Minister may, by order, establish rules in respect of the importation, sale, conditions of sale, advertising, manufacture, preparation, preservation, packaging, labelling, storage or testing of the therapeutic product for the purpose of preventing, managing or controlling the risk of injury to health.

Credit goes to the members of the finance committee for adding an amendment to insert the words “on reasonable grounds” into that section, but it does not matter.

The bill also says, “The Minister may make the order despite any uncertainty respecting the risk of injury to health that the use of the therapeutic product, other than the intended use, may present.”

That is quite a power grab. The NDP-Liberal government is literally saying that it does not need evidence to support its radical policy. In fact, the Liberals are saying that any evidence that contradicts their policy can be ignored. This is not the Liberal government gagging scientists. This is the Liberal government gagging science, handcuffing science, taking science out back and executing it gangland-style.

If we take the word of the bureaucrats from Health Canada, the minister needs these extraordinary powers to prevent teenagers from consuming nicotine pods. If that were true, if this were only about preventing nicotine addiction amongst youth, what explains the very next section? It reads, “An order made under subsection 30.‍01(1) or 30.‍02(1) that applies to only one person is not a statutory instrument within the meaning of the Statutory Instruments Act.”

The “minister of unhealthy road trips” will have the power to pass a regulation to prevent a single person from promoting a health product, and not just promoting. The minister could regulate a single person with respect to “importation, sale, conditions of sale, advertising, manufacture, preparation, preservation, packaging, labelling, storage or testing” of the drug.

Even more concerning is that these regulations targeting a single individual would not be considered regulations under the Statutory Instruments Act. Between this section and the section on uncertainty, the government has essentially neutralized the rights of Canadians to appeal these regulations to the federal court. This is an unprecedented power grab by the technocrats at Health Canada.

Given the arrogance on regular display by the car-phobic Minister of Health, it would not take much to convince me that he is the one seeking the radical, non-reviewable powers. Whether his lust for power is rooted in the repeated childhood traumas of station wagon vacations with his parents is not for me to say, but if this language were included in a Conservative bill, the minister would be among the first to accuse us of having a hidden agenda.

With just the flick of a wrist, the current Minister of Health or the next one could ban any drug based on some vague concern about health. As a parliamentarian, I oppose giving any government, Liberal or Conservative, that level of unchecked power. Health Canada's technocrats will claim that this is the same as the regulations limiting alcohol and tobacco advertisements. It is not. This law would give the Minister of Health the power to shut down a single podcaster or TikToker who advertises health products. It could shut down an Instagram influencer who talks about Chinese herbal remedies.

The government has not gone so far as to give itself the power to issue secret orders. Instead, it just gave itself the power to issue an order against a single person, not disclose the person's identity, not disclose the actual health risk and not have to publish it in the Gazette. Health Canada could destroy a person's livelihood by publishing a single sentence in an obscure web page buried deep in some government website. If anyone doubts that the socialist coalition is capable of that, let us remember that these amendments to the Food and Drugs Act are buried deep in the budget implementation bill.

The changes were not even given a mention in the budget. Instead, the government promised it would spend $3.2 million to update Health Canada's supply management capacity over the next three years. It takes a special kind of Liberal arrogance to believe the government can manage a supply of drugs for over 40 million people. The Liberals cannot manage passports. They cannot manage to recruit anyone into the military. They cannot manage an app for collecting travellers' information. They cannot manage the graft at Sustainable Development Technology Canada. They cannot manage the self-dealing within the local journalism initiative. The Prime Minister cannot even manage a cabinet. As a former Liberal cabinet minister said last week, the government has been drinking from a fountain of “socialist bafflegab”.

The technocrats who have been advising the finance minister believe Canadians would be happier if Canadians were taxed at over 50%. The only thing socialists can manage are breadlines. With the median age around 40, that means nearly half of Canadians were born after the collapse of the last socialist empire. They do not know about breadlines. They do not know that Soviet-style socialist drug plans mean Canadians would have to line up for life-saving medicines. The well connected and the wealthy could pay people in line to wait for them. The poor and the marginalized would have to take a day or two off work and wait in line at the government pharmacy.

Just as in the Soviet Union, when reality fails to conform to Communist ideology, the government will ratchet up repression. If rebellious reporters speak up about the drug shortages, the government can accuse them of putting the health of Canadians at risk and issue an order silencing them. The reporters could take the minister to court, but when the judge asks the government lawyers how certain they are that the censorship will protect public health, the government can reply, “Not certain at all, Your Honour”, and the judge will have no choice but to rule in the government's favour.

If members think this sounds unconstitutional, they would be right, but it would not matter. The Liberals would use their favourite notwithstanding clause, called section 1. We saw it time and time again during the pandemic. Governments issued unconstitutional orders, citizens took the government to court and judges ruled that they were not health experts and would defer to the government's experts.

With the precedent set, the technocrats at Health Canada saw it as a green light to seek more power. The Department of Health already has the power to ban a drug, recall it or place any number of conditions on its sale. It already has that power, but it was not enough. Like our Prime Minister, who admires the Communists who control China, the technocrats want the kind of power that only Communism can grant them.

[Dan Vandal, Liberal, Minister of Northern Affairs]

Madam Speaker, it is a great honour to rise in this chamber to talk about Bill C-69, the budget implementation act, which is focused on strengthening the foundations for a good middle-class life, especially for young people so they do as well as or even better than their parents. This is our commitment to Canadians, and we are committed to doing it in a fiscally responsible way.

I will get into a bit about the structure of Canada's economy, the bones of our economy.

The economy in Canada is resilient, and we will deliver the strongest economic growth in the G7 next year. Despite everything we have been through, with almost four years of the pandemic and the disruptions it has caused, like supply chain disruptions and inflation, Canada will continue to lead the G7 in growth.

Our debt-to-GDP ratio is among the best within the G7, and more than 1.1 million more Canadians are employed today than before the pandemic. If we let that sink in, we realize that it is an incredible statistic. Our unemployment rate remains at record lows, and with our fiscally responsible approach to the budget, our AAA credit rating is assured.

At the same time, too many Canadians are not feeling this growth. Too many Canadians are struggling with inflation, the high cost of everything, like groceries, and the lack of housing, which they cannot afford.

Our growth is undoubtedly a strength, but we need to follow a responsible path to ensure that everyone benefits from this growth and that young people can get ahead and find their place in the world.

As I mentioned, one of our biggest challenges is the housing crisis. Most people will agree that the best way to bring home prices back down within reach is to focus on increasing supply and to do it quickly. That is exactly what we are doing. This budget would enable significantly more apartment blocks to be built across Canada. In fact, our caucus was in Winnipeg recently to announce $120 million for the City of Winnipeg from the housing accelerator fund. We are cutting red tape to help homeowners get shovels in the ground quicker, and we are unlocking public lands for residential housing.

Budget 2024 has a long list of targeted relief to make housing more affordable. By collaborating with builders and leveraging the resources of the federal government, in partnership with provinces and municipalities, we will build close to four million new homes by 2031. We are addressing the housing crisis head-on, with solutions to build homes faster, while continuing our commitment to Canada's middle class.

Inflation has fallen dramatically over the last two years. In fact, inflation went down several weeks ago, the Bank of Canada announced. Two years ago, remember, it was 9%, and the Bank of Canada predicts that we will return to the target rate of 2% by 2025.

While the numbers on paper are positive, our government knows that affordability is still a real issue for Canadians. To lower costs for families, we have expanded our social safety net.

Our $10-a-day child care will save Manitoba families over $2,600 a month per child this year alone. Also, we are bringing in dental care. It will save families hundreds of dollars every year. In fact, in Manitoba alone, in 2023, 28,300 children benefited from the Canadian dental care program. The next time the Leader of the Opposition says this program is not real, that it does not do anything, we have to call him out on that. By the summer, people aged 65 and up and those under 18 will be covered by the dental plan. By 2025, nine million uninsured Canadians will be covered.

We also know that too many kids go hungry at school, which is a barrier to their success. Our government is launching the national school food program, which will help 400,000 more children have the food they need to succeed in school. This is how we support fairness for every generation. The Conservatives have already voted against this. They will continue to vote against this. Our government understands that we need to look ahead to the future and keep supporting families.

I want to focus on the Prairies, as minister of PrairiesCan. We know that the $23 million of direct funding from budget 2024 to the department of PrairiesCan will support completion of the world-leading research infrastructure at the University of Saskatchewan's centre for pandemic research, the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization, in the great city of Saskatoon. VIDO is getting $23 million. The result will be better preparedness to tackle the next pandemic, with expertise from Saskatchewan.

Budget 2024 will also invest $20 million over three years to support performing arts organizations in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, and it proposes another $3 million over two years for the operations of the RCMP Heritage Centre in Regina. The Conservatives, of course, will vote against all of this, but the result will be a more vibrant cultural industry in communities all across western Canada.

The regional development agencies, including PrairiesCan, would share over $200 million over five years to build on Canada's AI advantage. The result will be more real support to help start-ups across the Prairies to bring new technologies to market, something that will benefit key sectors like agriculture, the clean-tech economy and manufacturing.

We also have critical investments for innovative housing solutions, such as the design and upscale of modular homes, the use of 3-D printing, mass timber construction and panelized construction. The result will be more targeted funding for PrairiesCan to invest in more innovative homebuilding in communities big and small in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. This all means new possibilities.

Our government is also empowering entrepreneurs to take their space in Canada's economic success. I am particularly proud of the work PrairiesCan is doing with regard to inclusion in the small business sector, ensuring that no one is left behind as we move forward.

Take our Franco-Manitoban community, for example, which is a major contributor to Manitoba's prosperity. PrairiesCan is actively engaged with 15 bilingual communities in Manitoba, building strong relationships and helping them develop their economic opportunities. In Manitoba, it pays to be bilingual.

With the support of our government, PrairiesCan helps develop and implement funding programs and develops projects that have an impact on Franco-Manitobans. Part of PrairiesCan's role as an investor and facilitator is to create opportunities and provide financial support to for-profit and not-for-profit organizations facing economic challenges in Manitoba. For example, the Economic Development Council for Manitoba Bilingual Municipalities received funding to provide services that help with training, access to capital, mentoring or information services, networking and marketing advice.

Another important project is the $1.2 million in funding that PrairiesCan is giving to the Association of Manitoba Bilingual Municipalities to strengthen the labour market in Manitoba's rural municipalities.

There is much for the north as well. Budget 2024 would provide $23.2 million this year for the nutrition north subsidy program to lower the cost of healthy food and other essential items that people use every day. Food security is key in the north and the Arctic. That is why we are committing over $100 million to support the harvesters support grant and the community food programs fund to promote indigenous communities in implementing locally led solutions to food insecurity. Nutrition north will be further expanded to include the market food component, called the community food programs fund, with an additional $20 million per year over three years.

Based on feedback from indigenous partners, recent improvements have transformed nutrition north into a broader and more inclusive program that respects and responds to the unique food security issues of indigenous and northern communities. By the way, indigenous and northern communities co-developed the harvesters support grant, something that provides country food and traditional food to Inuit and northerners in the Arctic. We know nutrition north alone will not solve food insecurity in northern communities, but it is constantly evolving with feedback from northerners from across the region, and we are committed to making it more efficient and effective.

Another one of my priorities for the north, which is covered by budget 2024, includes measures to help clarify and reduce timelines for major projects by advancing the principle of one project, one review. It commits to engagement with partners, northern premiers and indigenous governments. The budget is about how government can do great things for the people it serves.

To me, the bottom line is that we are driving economic growth across the country, including for northerners and people living and working on the Prairies, to ensure that every generation of Canadians can reach their full potential. That is why we must pass Bill C-69 and continue the momentum.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to stand and speak to the budget bill, Bill C-69, here in the House today.

I think budgets are an opportunity for us to examine the values that we have as a nation. To many people in this House, government can be a force for good, but others, and I am thinking of my Conservative colleagues, view government as something to be feared, something to be shrunk and something to be incapacitated. We, on the New Democrat side, believe that government plays a vital role in Canadian society to deliver services that Canadians individually cannot and that the market is also unable to provide. Others in this House, and again, I think of my Conservative colleagues, believe that individuals ought to be left to fend largely for themselves, to sink or swim as they may.

On this side of the House, in the New Democrat caucus, we believe that government can be a force to build a fairer, more equal society. Others in this House do not share that value. They believe that politics is a dynamic that exacerbates division or that aggrandizes differences. In the New Democratic Party, we believe that good politics focuses on what is working well in society, and we look for ways in which we can harness optimism and collective strength to make things better. Others in this House, and again I look across the way to my Conservative colleagues, sell a line to Canadians that everything is broken, exploiting fear and insecurity.

I am reminded of President Joe Biden's famous dictum, which he actually stated well before he was ever president, where he said, “Don't tell me what you value. Show me your budget, and I'll tell you what you value.” I think this budget provides a great opportunity to show Canadians what the various values are of the various parties in this House.

New Democrats know that millions of Canadians are really struggling right now from coast to coast to coast. The cost of living is up dramatically. It is getting much harder to pay the rent or the mortgage, if one is lucky enough to own a house, to buy food and to pay one's bills. At the same time, we know that large corporations and the well-off in this country are doing better than ever in some cases. There are certain sectors, like the oil and gas sector and the grocery sector, that are making record profits, profits higher than they have ever made in the history of their operating in this country, while at the same time often gouging Canadians with sky-high prices, either at the pumps or in the grocery aisles. Even with corporate profits soaring, the investment of the business community in this country in Canadian workers, in machinery and equipment, in technology, and in the Canadian economy is declining. Major shareholders and top executives are often reaping enormous benefits without the promised trickle-down to workers, communities and consumers that right-wing economists promised us some 30 to 40 years ago.

The New Democrat caucus has used our power in this minority Parliament to deliver results for people. In this budget alone, we have compelled our partners in the Liberal government to build more homes, to preserve existing affordable housing and to protect renters. We used our power to bring in universal single-payer pharmacare, setting the stage for the biggest expansion of our health care system in a generation, starting with contraception and diabetes medication and devices. We pushed to establish a groundbreaking national school food program. We are the only country in the G7, and one of only a handful of countries in the industrialized world, that does not have some form of universal access to school nutrition, something that hurts our kids and puts an added cost on families that are struggling to pay their bills. This budget reverses damaging cuts to indigenous services. It invests in accessible, high-quality, non-profit child care. It establishes a dedicated youth mental health fund.

This is the work of New Democrats, who used our values to try to bring in policies and programs and to allocate resources to Canadians in need in this country. We did not sit and just tell Canadians that we think everything is broken. We rolled up our sleeves and came up with policies that would make things better for Canadians. My colleagues on the Conservative side of the House have done none of this, but instead just preach a narrative that everything is broken and that nothing can be done about it. That is not a value that we share.

While these achievements illustrate in part what a New Democrat government could accomplish, the 2024 budget does not fully reflect our party's vision. This is not an NDP budget, but it is a budget that was influenced by the NDP. Likewise, Bill C-69, the budget implementation act, includes many positive measures that the NDP was able to compel the Liberals to implement. However, we want to underscore that this legislation does have several shortcomings. There is much, much more, in our view, that the federal government can do to make life easier for people and to provide opportunities for generations to come. New Democrats will not stop working to deliver results for people.

I just want to talk briefly about some of these positive aspects. The national school food program would be in place as early as this fall and would help some 400,000 children access food that they need to grow up healthy. This is an important first step toward establishing a national program that we hope and envision will provide universal access to nutritious food for all elementary students, some 2.8 million kids in this country in grades 1 to 8.

Across Canada, nearly one in four children does not get enough food, and more than one-third of food bank users are children. These are shocking statistics in a G7 country. According to Children First Canada, there has been a 29% increase in food insecurity in children in the last year alone. A national school food program would not only give students in Canada access to nutritious food, helping them learn better, but it would also make healthy eating a daily lesson for our kids. Countries with national school food programs have documented better academic performance, improved short- and long-term health for children, help for family budgets and improved efficiency in the health care system. This is something that Conservatives are voting no to.

Bill C-69 includes measures to make housing more affordable. I want to touch on a few of the measures. It would enhance the homebuyers' plan by increasing the withdrawal limit from $35,000 to $60,000 and temporarily adding three years to the grace period before repayments to that RRSP are required. It would crack down on short-term rentals, hopefully to unlock more homes for Canadians to live in, by denying income tax deductions on income earned from short-term rentals that do not comply with provincial or local restrictions. The bill would continue the ban on foreign buyers of Canadian homes for an additional two years to ensure that homes are used for Canadians to live in and not as a speculative asset class for foreign investors.

I am always struck by my colleagues in the Conservative Party, who tell us to just wait until they are in government and then they will fix housing. The New Democrats are not waiting for that day, which we hope will not come. We are working now, because we know that Canadians need help with decent housing now, not a year or two or three from now. We also, by the way, are mindful of the Conservative record. When the Conservatives were in government, they did not build any affordable housing in this country at all. In fact, it was the Mulroney government in 1992 that took the federal government out of social housing for a generation, leading, in large part, to the crisis that we experience today.

Bill C-69 has a myriad of other measures that would make life more affordable for Canadians in important ways. It would make it easier to find better deals on Internet, home phone and cellphone plans by amending the Telecommunications Act to better allow Canadians to renew or switch between plans and to increase consumer choice to help them better find a deal that works for them. We know that Internet use and cellphone use now are consumer staples. They are really essential utilities that every Canadian needs to stay connected and function in their communities, in their homes and at work.

This budget would crack down on predatory lending by strengthening enforcement against criminal rates of interest to help protect vulnerable Canadians from harmful illegal lenders.

It would make it easier to save for children's education by introducing automatic enrolment in the Canada learning bond, to ensure that all low-income families receive the support they need for their children's future.

It would also launch Canada's consumer-driven banking framework to provide Canadians and small businesses with better, secure access to more financial services and products. Again, these are measures that the Conservatives are voting against.

Finally, Bill C-69 includes measures to support workers by protecting gig workers and by strengthening prohibitions against employee misclassifications in federally regulated industries. It would establish an important first historic right to disconnect to help restore work-life balance for workers. It would extend additional weeks of employment insurance for seasonal workers in 13 targeted regions. It would advance employee ownership trusts to enable employees to share in the success of their work by encouraging more business owners to sell to an employee ownership trust.

Before I leave the positives, I just want to comment that there are disappointments in the budget. One of the primary ones, for me, is the Canada disability benefit. The Liberal government promised to bring in a Canada disability benefit for which the New Democrats have been pushing for years. The Liberals said the benefit would lift people living with disabilities out of poverty; that is what they promised.

However, the Liberal government's plan announced in the budget is to provide a maximum of $200 a month. That is based on holding a disability tax credit certificate, which applies to only a fraction of the Canadians who need such assistance. At present, a single adult with a disability will live below the poverty line if they receive funding from any of the provincial programs across Canada, and an additional $200 a month is not enough to bring them above the poverty line. Over 1.5 million people with disabilities currently live in poverty across Canada, yet the plan would be accessible only to an estimated 600,000 people. It will not lift even them out of poverty.

New Democrats are deeply disappointed to see the lack of investment and, frankly, a colossally broken promise to people who need it the most. A $200-a-month maximum benefit going to fewer than half of those who need it is simply unacceptable in this country. We will continue to push the government to significantly increase the benefit to make sure that all Canadians living with disabilities receive the money they need to truly lift them out of poverty.

Now I want to talk a little about tax fairness. In the 1960s, the Carter commission spent four years looking at Canada's tax situation. It came to some very important conclusions, one of them famously summarized by the phrase, “A buck is a buck [is a buck]”. That means that no matter how people receive their income, it should be taxed the same. Now, unfortunately, through successive Liberal and Conservative governments, we have built a tax system where that principle has not been respected at all.

We heard today at the finance committee from the Canadian Labour Congress economist who authored a report entitled “Canada’s shift to a more regressive tax system, 2004 to 2022”, which found that overall, Canada's tax system is only moderately progressive through the bottom half of the income distribution and is regressive at the top of the distribution, due to several sources of untaxed or lightly taxed income, such as capital gains, inheritances and bequests and employer-provided benefits, which predominantly go to top earners.

The report found that in 2022, the total tax rate for the lowest household income decile, that is the bottom 10% in Canada, was 35%, whereas the total tax rate for the top 1% in Canada is 24%. In other words, the top 1% pay taxes at a rate 11% lower than the poorest 10% in this country. Moreover, the report found that the top 5% paid a lower rate in 2022 than the bottom 95%, with the top 1% paying an even lower rate.

Canadians should ask themselves why Canada's tax system imposes a higher total rate on the lowest-income households, versus the top 5%. Can anybody in the House go back in their communities this summer and explain why, in Canada's tax system, the top 1% of households pay the lowest total tax rate of any income group? I cannot explain that.

According to the report, a comprehensive tax review in the United Kingdom concluded that a good tax system must be both progressive and neutral. That is to say that it can raise the revenue government needs to achieve its spending and distributional ambitions while minimizing economic and administrative inefficiency, keeping the system as simple and transparent as possible and avoiding arbitrary tax differentiation across people and forms of economic activity. It reads, “A fair tax system should be based on...‘horizontal equity’: the principle that two people with the same amount of income in a given year pay the same rate of tax regardless of the source of that income.”

Bay Street accountant Kenneth Carter, who headed the important Royal Commission on Taxation in the mid-1960s, captured that notion, yet since the 1960s, we have built a tax system in this country, again, through Conservative and Liberal governments, that fails to achieve a tax system based on horizontal equity, despite the recommendations of the Carter commission.

I will turn back to the issue of the capital gains matter, which the Conservatives have raised with such furor in the House. The capital gains tax was first brought into this country in 1972, and it was brought in by a Liberal government at the rate of 50%. However, it was the Conservatives who raised the capital gains inclusion rate, in 1988, to 66.6%. They then raised it again in 1990, to 75%.

Therefore it is really something to hear the Conservatives rail against a measure today that would set the capital gains inclusion rate in this country at 50%, the lowest it has ever been, for the first $250,000 of capital gains, and then to 66.6%, a moderate amount, which they themselves raised all capital gains to in 1988.

I will read from a couple of very important witnesses who appeared at the Finance Committee today. Dr. Jim Stanford from the Centre for Future Work said this: “A capital gain results not from producing and selling a product or service, but rather from acquiring and reselling an asset. It reflects speculation, not production. Other forms of income (like wages) must be fully declared. Granting asset traders this unique preference is morally unfair, and fiscally wasteful.”

I cannot say it any better than Bea Bruske, the president of the Canadian Labour Congress, who asked why we tax a worker who flips burgers for a living at 100% of her income, but someone who flips stocks for a living, who is wealthy, we tax at only 50% of their income.

That is the principle that faces Canadians today, and it is something that I challenge Conservatives to explain to Canadians. Why do they believe that workers like mechanics, teachers, servers and cleaners have to pay tax on 100% of their income because they get it in the form of wages, but wealthy people, or people who are declaring a capital gain of over a quarter of a million dollars, have to pay on only 66.6%? By the way, the measure that is being announced in the budget would still permit one-third of all capital gains that anybody has in this country to be tax-free, and still the Conservatives are apoplectic.

As well, there is zero evidence that the rise of the capital gains inclusion rate through the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s had any negative effect on business investments in this country, nor is there evidence that the reduction of it in the year 2000, back to 50%, had any positive influence on investments in this country. There is zero evidence, but of course my Conservative colleagues are more interested in rhetoric than facts. I think Canadians will understand this when we come to talk to them in the summer about fair taxation and why the wealthy should pay their fair share of tax in this country, just like the working people of this country have always done.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Madam Speaker, after that 15-minute break to discuss Bill S-224, I am going to return to my speech on Bill C-69. I want to focus on the division that creates the federal framework for the open banking system and centralizes powers.

As I said before the break, under this bill, banks under federal jurisdiction would have only one set of regulations to follow, whereas an institution under provincial jurisdiction, like Desjardins, would be caught between two governments: the Government of Quebec, for its general operations, and the federal government, for its technological interactions with customers. The fact that these institutions will be subject to two uncoordinated regulatory bodies could be downright dysfunctional and give banks an egregious advantage over co-ops, trust companies, credit unions, Alberta Treasury Branch Financial, and so on. Why always favour Bay Street? This is unacceptable.

Bill C‑69 places Quebec in a dilemma in which there are no good options. If we refuse to join the federal framework, our institutions will stay trapped in the 20th century while their federal competitors step into the technological 21st century. Maybe we could let our financial institutions opt in to the federal framework, but then Quebec would have to waive the right to apply its own laws to their activities that come under the open banking system, which is unacceptable, especially with the Civil Code, consumer protection laws and so forth.

Then there is the worst-case scenario. In order to survive against its federal competitors, an institution like Desjardins could choose to stop being a Quebec institution within the meaning of Quebec's Cooperatives Act and become a federal institution under Canadian co-operative bank legislation. Trust companies would face the same choice. Since the open banking system could eventually be expanded to cover insurance, all of our insurance companies could switch over to federal regulation. That is what is at issue in Bill C‑69.

If this worst-case scenario comes to pass, the entire financial sector and all of its activities will be completely outside Quebec's jurisdiction. That is a serious threat to Montreal's status as a financial hub. In short, by using its power over banks to regulate all companies that interact with them, Ottawa is trying to force Quebec and the provinces out of the financial sector, which it failed to do when it was trying to regulate securities.

Rather than taking the unilateral, centralist route, Ottawa should have chosen co-operation. It could have called a federal-provincial finance ministers' working meeting on open banking. It could have encouraged them to release a joint statement at the end of this meeting in which the governments announce their intention of developing a common regulatory approach with a clear deadline, such as 2025, and possibly setting up a federal-provincial office. It could have sent a clear message to all financial institutions, not just banks, telling them to agree on a common technology, such as a secure data transfer protocol, because open banking is coming. It could have worked on common regulations on accreditation rules for fintech companies, security standards, clarification of financial liability, and consumer and data protection.

We asked the government to take out the division on open banking that centralizes the sector exclusively at the federal level, to take a few months to coordinate with the various players and the provinces and then to come back in the fall with a framework that respects jurisdictions and does not put provincially regulated institutions at a disadvantage. This government rejected our proposal, so now we are going to have to build this new system on a very bad foundation.

Another concern is that, in Bill C‑69, the government delegates the administration of the framework to the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada, an agency that mainly promotes financial literacy and does not have any of the required expertise. In committee, FCAC representatives acknowledged that they did not have expertise in sharing financial data in a way that minimizes the obvious cybersecurity risks. They also told us they do not currently have a plan for developing the expertise needed to oversee the security aspect of open banking.

We also asked several questions that the FCAC representatives said they were unable to answer. For example, since fintech companies are not banks, they are not federally regulated.

Did the government obtain the consent of the provinces, particularly Quebec, which has its own civil laws, before introducing this bill? They are unable to answer.

During the briefing on the notice of ways and means preceding the bill, it was my understanding that provincially regulated financial institutions could opt in to the federal framework provided that the province consents and declines to regulate those activities involving the open banking system. Is that the case? They do not know. They are unable to answer.

Which provincial laws will have to take a back seat to federal laws? They cannot answer this, either.

Who will be tasked with certifying the technology companies? Will it be Ottawa or the Autorité des marchés financiers? They are unable to answer.

Will Quebec's Consumer Protection Act apply to the activities of the open banking system? They are unable to answer. In the event of fraud or damages, will it be possible to launch a lawsuit or class action under the Civil Code or the Consumer Protection Act against a fintech company? Once again, they are unable to answer that question.

Will the sharing of financial liability between the financial institution and the technology company necessitate changes to the financial institutions' prudential standards? Will the Autorité des marchés financiers need to change its rules to comply with the federal framework? Again, they are unable to answer.

None of this is surprising. The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada is not well placed to administer this framework. It learned it would be receiving this role the day before the budget was tabled. When it comes to behaving like amateurs and making things up on the fly, this government takes the cake.

To avoid a disaster or some risky backpedalling, we asked the government to remove this division from Bill C-69. We suggested reworking it this summer and coming back with a good bill this fall. The government refused.

We are opposing this bad bill that sets this entire sector up on a terrible foundation. It is unacceptable.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-69, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 16, 2024, be read the third time and passed.

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Madam Speaker, Bill C‑69 is a budget implementation omnibus bill that creates or amends 67 different acts. The government promised never to use this type of thing, but for the past several years, it has continued to do so.

Bill C‑69 enacts, among other things, the consumer-driven banking act, which establishes that it is the federal government alone that regulates this sector and that the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada acts as the regulator.

We asked the government to take this division out of Bill C‑69 and correct some of its shortcomings over the summer so it could come back this fall with a framework that does not give Bay Street an unfair advantage over other financial institutions, that respects the jurisdictions of Quebec and the provinces, and that will be administered by a competent body. However, the government just voted against our request. The government is not working well. It is not listening, it is being partisan, and it is undermining Quebec. That is why we will be voting against this bill.

I am going to talk more about the open banking system, beginning with some context. As things stand, all financial services are based out of financial institutions that people do business with directly. These institutions are legally and financially responsible in the event of fraud or data theft, so they are fiercely protective of our personal data. Under an open banking system, financial institutions will have to share our data with platforms that will enable us to access all our accounts with one click. It would be a minor revolution. Ultimately, we can envision a system in which financial institutions essentially just create financial products, with client relations being handled by tech companies that do not themselves provide financial products, but act as intermediaries and data aggregators. That calls for a framework.

People want the flexibility an open banking system offers. That is why financial technology or fintech companies have already started coming on line despite the legal limbo. They are not well regulated, so they find other ways to evolve. Users themselves provide their credentials. The app goes into a user's account, extracts data from the screen and stores it. Financial institutions' secure networks get regular visits from actors outside the financial sector, and that makes them vulnerable. The more advanced these strategies get, the greater the risk.

We know that the level of risk varies. An aggregator that scans public data to show us mortgage rates at all financial institutions in one click is low risk. When it collects our personal data to give us a detailed picture of our financial situation, that carries more risk for the protection of sensitive personal information, namely financial information. If the app can be used to perform transactions, which implies that it places orders, that opens up a whole new level of risk, the risk of fraud. Let us also not forget that a series of orders quickly placed with the help of an AI system could completely destabilize all financial institutions. What about the principle of needing to know the customer? That principle is the foundation of our anti-money laundering laws. How can a financial institution apply this principle when it is communicating via an app?

Lastly, an important part of risk is the financial capacity to take on risk. Without that, the consumer could lose everything. Prudential regulations have to adapt. What we need is a clear framework with clear obligations and responsibilities.

The financial sector is a shared jurisdiction. The federal government has authority over banks and federally incorporated financial institutions. Financial institutions that are not banks, namely credit unions and trust companies, fall under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. Financial intermediaries, such as investment dealers and financial advisers, fall under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. Tech companies in the financial sector are not currently regulated, but they are likely similar to financial intermediaries.

There are different models in all this. There is the Interac approach. The Interac system, which enables exchanges between institutions and allows us, for example, to use our debit card everywhere, was developed by the financial companies themselves. These companies agreed on a common technology and standards to ensure that transactions are secure. Companies that adopt and comply with the common standards can join the system and offer Interac. This is the approach taken by the United Kingdom. In Canada, it is the approach that was favoured by the Advisory Committee on Open Banking in 2021.

The advantage of this approach, which is the simplest and most flexible, is that each government retains full regulatory power and adopting the open banking system does not result in any transfer of power. The disadvantage is that it is a form of self-regulation. The standard adopted may very well be aimed primarily at developing the sector rather than protecting citizens. Personal information, financial risks and fees come to mind. The banks, which initially advocated self-regulation, realized that squeezing out the legislator would not work and that co-operation would be a more realistic option.

Another approach, the one that we advocate and prefer, is the securities approach. Securities fall mainly under provincial jurisdiction, but Ottawa has laws governing federally incorporated companies. The Supreme Court of Canada has also recognized federal jurisdiction over systemic risk in the financial sector. In Quebec, the Autorité des marchés financiers is the regulator. To ensure that businesses could raise capital across Canada and that registrations in one province would be recognized everywhere, governments decided to coordinate. That is why Quebec's corporations legislation is very similar to the federal corporations legislation and to the corporation laws of all the other provinces. The same is true for all legislation governing the various aspects of securities. Quebec retains its legislative powers. The Quebec act may be stricter in some respects. For example, Quebec is the only province that requires a French version for all corporations registered with the Autorité des marchés financiers. However, this version must comply with the common standard adopted by all governments.

For years now, the federal government has wanted to centralize securities regulation in a single commission and concentrate the entire financial sector in Toronto, to the detriment of Montreal in particular. Quebec and the Quebec business community have always opposed this. In 2021, my party successfully amended the budget implementation bill to close the federal office responsible for creating a single securities commission. It was a really nice moment in a committee meeting over Zoom. I remember it clearly. The model of co-operation between governments, which has survived repeated attacks by the federal government, is still going and is working well. As I was saying, the securities model is the approach that my party and I favour for the open banking system.

However, in Bill C‑69, Ottawa is opting for unilateralism and centralization. As I was saying earlier, Bill C‑69 enacts the consumer-driven banking act, which would make the federal government the sole regulator of this sector, with the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada serving as the regulator. That is a problem, too. The agency does not have the qualifications to do that at all. Since fintechs are not under federal jurisdiction, Ottawa has opted to regulate them indirectly by regulating how banks can transact with them.

Specifically, Bill C‑69 provides that banks and other federally regulated financial institutions will be covered by the new act. They will be required to co-operate with fintech companies, but they may do so only in accordance with federal rules and standards. Institutions that are not federally regulated will be ignored. They can opt in voluntarily with approval from their province, which would then have to waive the right to apply its own laws to the portion of their activities that comes under the open banking system. For now, Bill C‑69 does not affect insurers, because of the sensitive nature of the medical data they hold, or intermediaries such as brokers, but the framework will likely expand to cover them in the future.

The specific rules and standards that will apply to the sector, particularly in terms of consumer protection and financial liability, will be set out in another bill that is due out in the fall, but the decision to make it exclusively federal is being made now, in Bill C‑69.

In practical terms, the Quebec Consumer Protection Act and the Quebec act respecting the protection of personal information could cease to apply to financial institutions for any activities related to open financial services. That is no small thing.

We are getting ready to pass this bill at third reading in the House, but the impact of an exclusively federal open banking system on the prudential obligations of Quebec financial institutions, as set out by the Autorité des marchés financiers, is still unclear.

In addition to forcing Quebec to transfer legislative power to Ottawa, Bill C-69 puts Quebec's institutions at a disadvantage with respect to federal institutions. While banks will have only one set of regulations to follow, under this bill, an institution like Desjardins would be caught between two governments: the Government of Quebec, for its general operations, and the federal government, for its technological interactions with customers. That is ridiculous.

The fact that Quebec institutions will be subject to two uncoordinated regulatory bodies could be downright dysfunctional and give banks an egregious advantage over co-ops and trust companies. That is unacceptable.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Madam Speaker, the budget implementation measures in Bill C-69 are full of interference in the jurisdictions of Quebec and the provinces. Whether it is a question of housing, health, education or the banking sector, the fiscal imbalance really is on full display.

I would like to know what my colleague thinks.

[Rechie Valdez, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

moved that Bill C-69, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 16, 2024, be read the third time and passed.

The House resumed from June 17 consideration of Bill C-69, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 16, 2024, as reported (with amendments) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.

The House resumed consideration of Bill C-69, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 16, 2024, as reported (with amendments) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.