Bill C-15

Budget 2025 Implementation Act, No. 1

An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on November 4, 2025

Part 1 implements certain measures in respect of the Income Tax Act and the Income Tax Regulations by
(a) expanding the rollover for small business corporation shares;
(b) expanding the list of expenses recognized under the Disability Supports Deduction;
(c) exempting the Canada Disability Benefit from income;
(d) aligning the taxation of investment income and active business income earned and distributed by controlled foreign affiliates with the rules that currently apply to Canadian-controlled private corporations;
(e) extending the deadline for making certain charitable donations eligible for tax support in the 2024 tax year;
(f) increasing the limit under the Lifetime Capital Gains Exemption so that it applies on up to $1.25 million of eligible capital gains, applicable to dispositions that occur on or after June 25, 2024, with indexation of the limit to resume in 2026;
(g) exempting the first $10 million in capital gains on the sale of a business to a worker cooperative and amending the corresponding exemption for sales to an employee ownership trust;
(h) removing the tax-indifferent investor exception to the synthetic equity arrangement anti-avoidance rule;
(i) improving the efficiency of the Home Accessibility Tax Credit;
(j) implementing the Personal Support Workers Tax Credit;
(k) enhancing the SR&ED program by increasing the annual expenditure limit and taxable capital phase-out thresholds for the enhanced 35% SR&ED credit, extending the enhanced credit to eligible Canadian public corporations and restoring the eligibility of SR&ED capital expenditures;
(l) extending the Mineral Exploration Tax Credit for individuals who invest in eligible mining flow-through shares for two years to March 31, 2027 at the current rate of 15%;
(m) expanding the eligibility of the Critical Mineral Exploration Tax Credit to bismuth, cesium, chromium, fluorspar, germanium, indium, manganese, molybdenum, niobium, phosphate, tantalum, tin and tungsten;
(n) amending the Canada Carbon Rebate for Small Businesses;
(o) extending the full credit rates for the Carbon Capture, Utilization and Storage investment tax credit to 2035;
(p) expanding the eligibility for the clean technology investment tax credit to support the generation of electricity and heat from waste biomass;
(q) expanding the eligibility for the clean technology manufacturing investment tax credit to investments in eligible polymetallic projects and to additional qualifying materials;
(r) providing a refundable investment tax credit to qualifying corporations and trusts for investments in certain clean electricity property;
(s) amending the alternative minimum tax to exempt certain trusts for the benefit of Indigenous groups;
(t) precluding a corporation from qualifying as a mutual fund corporation where it is controlled by or for the benefit of a corporate group;
(u) extending the period during which agricultural cooperatives can distribute tax-deferred patronage dividends paid in shares to their members until the end of 2030;
(v) narrowing the rules related to reporting by trusts;
(w) providing the Minister of National Revenue with the authority to waive the withholding requirement for payments to certain non-resident service providers;
(x) allowing the sharing of information for the purposes of administering and enforcing the Canada Labour Code as it relates to the misclassification of employees;
(y) reforming Canada’s transfer pricing rules;
(z) reinstating the accelerated investment incentive and immediate expensing for certain qualifying assets;
(z.1) providing an accelerated capital cost allowance of 10% for new eligible purpose-built rental projects;
(z.2) providing immediate expensing for new additions of property in respect of productivity-enhancing assets;
(z.3) introducing a temporary non-refundable tax credit applicable where an individual’s non-refundable tax credit amounts exceed the first income tax bracket threshold; and
(z.4) implementing a number of technical amendments to correct inconsistencies and to better align the law with its intended policy objectives.
It also makes a related amendment to the Excise Tax Act .
Part 2 repeals the Digital Services Tax Act and the Digital Services Tax Regulations and makes consequential amendments to other legislation.
Part 3 amends the Excise Tax Act , the Underused Housing Tax Act , the Select Luxury Items Tax Act and other related texts to implement various measures.
Division 1 of Part 3 implements certain measures in respect of the Excise Tax Act and a related text by
(a) clarifying that supplies of osteopathic services rendered by individuals who are not osteopathic physicians are taxable under the Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax;
(b) extending the Enhanced (100%) Goods and Services Tax Rental Rebate to qualifying cooperative housing corporations and student residences built by universities, public colleges and school authorities; and
(c) allowing input tax credits for redeemed coupons to be available only for payments made exclusively in the course of commercial activities.
Division 2 of Part 3 amends the Underused Housing Tax Act to end the underused housing tax in respect of 2025 and future calendar years. It also subsequently repeals the Underused Housing Tax Act and the Underused Housing Tax Regulations .
Division 3 of Part 3 amends the Select Luxury Items Tax Act to end the luxury tax in respect of subject aircraft and subject vessels. It also makes the Select Luxury Items Tax Regulations to provide greater clarity on the tax treatment of subject items.
Part 4 amends the First Nations Goods and Services Tax Act to, among other things,
(a) establish an opt-in framework for interested Indigenous governments to levy a value-added sales tax, under their own laws, on fuel, alcohol, cannabis, tobacco and vaping products within their reserves or settlement lands; and
(b) make process-type improvements and machinery of government changes to streamline the administration of taxes under that Act.
It also makes consequential amendments to the Excise Tax Act and to the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act .
Part 5 enacts and amends several Acts in order to implement various measures.
Division 1 of Part 5 enacts the High-Speed Rail Network Act , which establishes a legislative framework to facilitate the implementation of a rail network that allows for the carrying of passengers at high speed between Quebec and Ontario. That Act, among other things,
(a) deems the construction of the railway lines that are to be part of the high-speed rail network to have been approved under section 98 of the Canada Transportation Act ;
(b) provides that the construction, operation, decommissioning and abandonment of each segment of the high-speed rail network, and any incidental physical activity, is subject to the Impact Assessment Act ;
(c) permits certain land to be subject to a notice of right of first refusal or a notice of prohibition on work;
(d) amends the expropriation process in relation to the high-speed rail network;
(e) provides that Indigenous knowledge that is provided in confidence in relation to the high-speed rail network is treated as confidential; and
(f) makes certain Parts of the Official Languages Act applicable to certain entities, including those that operate a railway that is part of the high-speed rail network.
The Division also makes a consequential amendment to the Access to Information Act .
Division 2 of Part 5 amends the Canada Post Corporation Act to repeal the power to make regulations prescribing rates of postage and the terms and conditions related to the payment of postage and instead provide the Canada Post Corporation with the authority to establish those rates and terms and conditions and provide for exceptions.
Division 3 of Part 5 provides, among other things, that an aggregate amount not exceeding $11.5 billion to fund the operations and activities of Build Canada Homes and an aggregate amount not exceeding $1.515 billion as a contribution of capital to, or to purchase shares in, Canada Lands Company Limited may be paid out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund.
Division 4 of Part 5 amends the Canada Infrastructure Bank Act to increase the aggregate amount that the Minister of Finance may pay to the Canada Infrastructure Bank to $45,000,000,000.
Division 5 of Part 5 amends the Red Tape Reduction Act to, among other things, authorize, subject to certain conditions, ministers to grant temporary exemptions from the application of provisions of certain Acts of Parliament and instruments with the aim of facilitating the design, modification or administration of regulatory regimes to encourage innovation, competitiveness or economic growth in the clean technology or financial technology sector.
Division 6 of Part 5 amends the Public Service Superannuation Act to, among other things, expand the eligibility for early retirement available to certain contributors employed in operational service to new groups of contributors.
Division 7 of Part 5 amends the Public Service Superannuation Act to authorize certain contributors to exercise a temporary early retirement option during a period for which a workforce reduction initiative is in effect. It also makes a related amendment to the Income Tax Regulations .
Division 8 of Part 5 amends the Farm Credit Canada Act to, among other things, provide for a review of the provisions and operation of that Act within five years after the day on which the amendment comes into force and every 10 years after that.
Division 9 of Part 5 repeals the Consumer-Driven Banking Act and enacts a new Consumer-Driven Banking Act to ensure that individuals and businesses can safely and securely share their data with the participating entities of their choice. That Act addresses, among other things, accreditation, national security, data sharing, security safeguards, consent, authentication, liability, complaints, administration and enforcement and screen scraping. The Division also makes related amendments to the Access to Information Act , the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada Act and the Budget Implementation Act, 2024, No. 1 .
Division 10 of Part 5 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 11 of Part 5 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act , the Bank Act and the Insurance Companies Act to, among other things, modernize prudential limits by repealing certain provisions that impose limits on federally regulated financial institutions with respect to debt obligations and borrowing, consumer and commercial loans and investments in real property and equity.
Division 12 of Part 5 amends the Bank Act , the Trust and Loan Companies Act and the Insurance Companies Act to allow for the electronic delivery of certain documents to shareholders, members and policyholders without their consent, while ensuring that they receive paper copies if they request them.
Division 13 of Part 5 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act , the Bank Act and the Insurance Companies Act to increase the equity threshold related to the public holding requirement from $2 billion to $4 billion and to make changes to other provisions that include that threshold.
Division 14 of Part 5 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act , the Bank Act , the Insurance Companies Act and the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Act to, among other things,
(a) clarify the powers of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions in respect of the adherence by federally regulated financial institutions to their policies and procedures to protect themselves against threats to their integrity or security;
(b) provide the Superintendent of Financial Institutions with powers to issue directions of compliance in respect of unsafe or unsound practices in the conduct of the affairs of those financial institutions; and
(c) provide that the Superintendent of Financial Institutions is not prevented from disclosing information to any federal government agency or body for purposes related to the Superintendent’s regulation or supervision of financial institutions.
Division 15 of Part 5 amends the Bank Act to raise the amount of funds that can be withdrawn immediately from a retail deposit account after the deposit of a cheque or other instrument and to remove the delay for the withdrawal of funds deposited by a cheque or other instrument that is not deposited in person.
Division 16 of Part 5 amends the Bank Act to, among other things,
(a) prohibit the activation of certain capabilities for a personal deposit account in Canada without the express consent of the natural person in whose name the account is kept;
(b) permit a natural person in whose name such an account is kept to deactivate certain account capabilities;
(c) permit a natural person in whose name such an account is kept to adjust certain transaction limits on the account;
(d) require institutions to establish policies and procedures for detecting and preventing consumer-targeted fraud and mitigating its impacts; and
(e) require institutions and the Commissioner of the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada to prepare annual reports on consumer-targeted fraud.
Division 17 of Part 5 amends the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation Act , the Bank Act and the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada Act to support the growth of federal credit unions, including by way of amalgamation or asset acquisition and by permitting them to engage in motor vehicle leasing in certain circumstances.
Division 18 of Part 5 amends the Special Economic Measures Act to, among other things,
(a) provide that the Minister of Finance must be consulted before an order or regulation identifying certain persons is made under subsection 4(1) of that Act;
(b) authorize the Governor in Council to make regulations requiring financial institutions to provide to the Minister of Finance information on property that is in their possession or control and that is owned, held or controlled by a person, including a foreign state, identified under that Act and information on profits realized from such property; and
(c) authorize the Minister of Finance to make an order directing a financial institution to pay such profits to the Receiver General.
It also makes related and consequential amendments to the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act .
Division 19 of Part 5 amends the Pension Act to, among other things,
(a) set out in a schedule to that Act the amounts of the basic pension payable during the period beginning on April 1, 1985 and ending on December 31, 2025;
(b) authorize the Governor in Council to amend that schedule;
(c) define the term “province” for the purposes of paragraph 75(1)(b) of that Act; and
(d) update certain regulation-making powers.
It also amends the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Superannuation Act to provide that, beginning on January 1, 2027, certain benefits are to be adjusted only on the basis of the Consumer Price Index.
Finally, it amends the Department of Veterans Affairs Act and the Veterans Health Care Regulations to retroactively clarify the meaning of the term “province” with respect to the calculation of the accommodation and meals charge for the recipients of intermediate and long term care.
Division 20 of Part 5 retroactively amends the Veterans Well-being Regulations to specify that the first annual adjustment to certain amounts used in the calculation of the earnings loss benefit is to be prorated to the number of days remaining in the calendar year. It also authorizes the Governor in Council to make regulations respecting the earnings loss benefit under the Veterans Well-being Act , as it read from time to time before April 1, 2019.
Division 21 of Part 5 amends the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Superannuation Act , among other things, to specify that claims for awards made under Part II of that Act are to be dealt with and determined by the Minister who administers the Pension Act . It also enacts related provisions.
Division 22 of Part 5 enacts the Canada Development Investment Corporation Act , which continues the Canada Development Investment Corporation and sets out its purpose to assist in the creation and development of businesses, resources, property and industries of Canada by providing advice and support to the Government of Canada and by making investments and managing assets that advance Canada’s economic growth and development. The Division also makes a consequential amendment to the Access to Information Act .
Division 23 of Part 5 amends the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act to require that an organization disclose to another organization an individual’s personal information, at the individual’s request, if both organizations are subject to a data mobility framework.
Division 24 of Part 5 amends the Broadcasting Act to provide that it is to be construed and applied in a manner that is consistent with the right to privacy of individuals.
Division 25 of Part 5 amends the Human Pathogens and Toxins Act to, among other things, reaffirm that security of the public is a key purpose of that Act, provide that the Minister of Health must establish and update a registry that will replace Schedules 1 to 4, add requirements for persons who carry out activities in relation to high risk human pathogens and toxins, increase the maximum penalties to which a person who commits an offence under that Act is liable and establish an administrative monetary penalty regime for certain contraventions of that Act or its regulations.
Division 26 of Part 5 amends the Customs Tariff to amend the definition “obsolete or surplus goods” to allow for the refund of duties paid in respect of certain goods that are donated to a registered charity.
Division 27 of Part 5 amends the Export and Import Permits Act to authorize the Governor in Council to add articles to the Export Control List and the Import Control List for reasons related to Canada’s economic security interests.
Division 28 of Part 5 amends the Aeronautics Act to, among other things,
(a) authorize the Minister of Transport to make interim orders that give effect to international standards, agreements, conventions and arrangements;
(b) extend the effective period of interim orders;
(c) modernize regulation-making powers respecting the development of, and compliance with, systems, processes, procedures, programs, plans and documents in relation to aviation safety and security;
(d) provide that air traffic service providers and certain maintenance organizations may be found vicariously liable for offences or violations;
(e) authorize the electronic service of documents;
(f) prohibit interference with the operation of a remotely piloted aircraft system unless authorized by the Minister;
(g) modernize the administrative monetary penalties framework and increase the maximum amounts for penalties and fines; and
(h) establish a regime for the voluntary provision of information related to aviation safety and security and set out limits on the disclosure and use of information provided under that regime.
It also makes a consequential amendment to the Access to Information Act and a related amendment to the Budget Implementation Act, 2019, No. 1 .
Division 29 of Part 5 amends the Canada Transportation Act to provide the Minister of Transport with the authority to make interim orders to give effect to international standards or ensure compliance with Canada’s international obligations.
Division 30 of Part 5 amends the Judges Act to increase the number of salaries authorized for judges of the Court of Appeal for Ontario and judges of unified family courts in the provinces. It also reduces in a corresponding manner the number of salaries authorized for judges of superior courts in the provinces other than appeal courts.
Division 31 of Part 5 amends the Administrative Tribunals Support Service of Canada Act to create a Schedule 2 to that Act, allow the Minister of Justice to add territorial bodies to that Schedule and to allow the Administrative Tribunals Support Service of Canada to provide support services and facilities to those bodies.
Division 32 of Part 5 amends the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 to provide for the establishment of the Environmental Protection Tribunal of Canada and the transfer of the functions of the Chief Review Officer and review officers to that Tribunal. It also amends the Administrative Tribunals Support Service of Canada Act to enable the Administrative Tribunals Support Service of Canada to provide the Tribunal with any necessary support services and facilities and makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Division 33 of Part 5 authorizes the taking of various measures with respect to the divestiture and dissolution of all or any part of the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation. It also makes consequential amendments to other Acts and repeals the Freshwater Fish Marketing Act .
Division 34 of Part 5 repeals section 16 of the Government Annuities Improvement Act .
Division 35 of Part 5 repeals sections 195 and 196 of the Naskapi and the Cree-Naskapi Commission Act .
Division 36 of Part 5 amends the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act to deny the provision of financial assistance to qualifying students in relation to designated educational institutions outside Canada that are private and for-profit and offer courses at a post-secondary school level. It also amends that Act to empower the Minister of Employment and Social Development to suspend or deny the provision of financial assistance in certain circumstances in order to align with a provincial suspension or denial.
Division 37 of Part 5 amends the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act to
(a) clarify that all regulations made under that Act are to be made on the recommendation of the Minister of Finance;
(b) clarify that paragraph 36(3.01)(b) of that Act applies to donations that are not charitable donations; and
(c) prohibit the disclosure of reports, or the information contained in them, related to discrepancies in information discovered in the course of verifying the identity of persons having beneficial ownership or control of an entity.
It also amends the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Regulations to
(a) clarify that paragraph 138(5)(b) of those Regulations applies to donations that are not charitable donations; and
(b) clarify the application of those Regulations to mortgage administrators, mortgage brokers and mortgage lenders.
Finally, it makes a consequential amendment to the Access to Information Act .
Division 38 of Part 5 amends the Borrowing Authority Act to increase the maximum amount of certain borrowings.
Division 39 of Part 5 amends the Canada Business Corporations Act , the Canada Cooperatives Act and the Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act to provide an additional ground on which the Director appointed under the Act in question may dissolve a corporation or a cooperative, as the case may be, namely, when the Director is notified that it is a “listed entity” as defined in subsection 83.01(1) of the Criminal Code .
Division 40 of Part 5 amends the Building Canada Act to add to the information that must be included in the public registry of national interest projects the extent to which each project can contribute to clean growth and to meeting Canada’s objectives with respect to climate change.
Division 41 of Part 5 amends the Canadian Energy Regulator Act to set the maximum duration of licences for the exportation of liquefied natural gas at 50 years.
Division 42 of Part 5 amends the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 to, among other things, remove the mandatory five-year limit for agreements made under subsection 9(5) or 10(3).
Division 43 of Part 5 amends the Competition Act to remove the requirement that the substantiation of representations about the environmental benefits of businesses or business activities must be done in accordance with internationally recognized methodology. It also amends that Act to exclude the application of the provision respecting those representations from proceedings before the Competition Tribunal that are initiated by a person other than the Commissioner of Competition.
Division 44 of Part 5 enacts the National School Food Program Act , which sets out the Government of Canada’s vision for the National School Food Program. That Act also sets out the Government of Canada’s commitment to maintaining long-term funding to be provided to the provinces, the territories and Indigenous peoples for the ongoing implementation and maintenance of the Program.
Division 45 of Part 5 enacts the Stablecoin Act , which imposes duties on persons that create stablecoins and make them available for purchase, directly or indirectly, by persons in Canada. That Act sets out the objects of the Bank of Canada in respect of stablecoin and requires the Bank to maintain a public registry of stablecoin issuers. That Act also addresses, among other things, the redemption of stablecoins by issuers, the reserve of assets that issuers must maintain to fulfill their redemption obligations and the policies that they must establish. The Division also makes consequential and related amendments to the Access to Information Act , the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act and the Retail Payment Activities Act .

Concurrence in Vote 5—Department of National Defence

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the hon. member from Milton East—Halton Hills South.

I think we all know that fraud in Canada is a growing problem. Stories are now appearing in the media virtually every week. Data from the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre shows that Canadians lost $638 million to fraud in 2024. Reported losses to the CAFC since 2021 have now surpassed $2 billion. The rate of frauds being reported remains low, with an estimated only 5% to 10% being reported, so the problem is understated and in the billions of dollars.

We know that fraudsters generally target the most vulnerable people among us, such as seniors, new Canadians and young people. Bank fraud in particular is a significant concern in Canada, yet investigations by financial institutions often end with banks' blaming the very customers who trusted them with protecting their money. This raises the issue of the proper responsibility of banks to their depositors and the role of the federal government in regulating or not regulating them properly.

I would like to share with the House some real examples that have been brought to my attention recently by constituents in Vancouver Kingsway. For case number one, I will read from the letter I received:

“In early September, my dad, a 67 year old retiree called me in a panic. He had just realized he had been scammed out of his entire life savings and more. He was involved in what we believe was a ‘pig butchering’ scam. He was told he was investing in cryptocurrency—he had a wallet which showed incredibly high returns. When he went to withdrawal, he was hit with yet another fee of $90,000 USD to do so. His ‘partner’ who was to be paying the fees to share in the investment suddenly said she didn't have anymore money. This is when he realized.

“...Going through the details of the scam ended up showing that my dad didn't purchase crypto in a typical way. He was directed to the bank to wire money to several different locations. Locally here in Vancouver, then to New York and then finally to Vietnam.

“My dad opened a new account at BMO in April 2025 and thus the transactions begun. Every 10-14 days my dad went to the same branch on Mainland Street in Yaletown and sent anywhere from $100,000-$300,000 USD to accounts based in Vietnam under the guise of ‘purchasing auto parts.’ Every single time he wire transferred the money, the same branch manager signed off on it. No questions asked. By the end of August he had drained most of his RRSPs, remortgaged his home, took out personal loans, and borrowed from family and friends. l'm dumbfounded by the fact that the branch manager at this location never noticed the red flags: a brand new customer, a senior retiree, purchasing nearly $2 million dollars in auto parts from a personal bank account.

“I filed a complaint against BMO.... They refuse to answer if my dad was ever reported to FINTRAC. They replied that he signed off on the wire transfers that stated if he was being coached into cryptocurrency he shouldn't go through with it—none of the wire transfers use that type of language. Further, BMO states that they have a policy in place for prevention of fraud with seniors—obviously this policy wasn't followed in this instance. There has been zero accountability for what happened from BMO. They have said they will not return or refund any of the money and that this was completely my dad's own doing.

“My dad died of a sudden fatal collapse on January 5th, 2026. Months of stress and uncertainty, embarrassment and emotional toll had taken place. He had nothing. Forced to sell his condo to pay off some of his debt but seemingly about to be homeless.

“Fraud is abundant. We read about it all the time. I simply don't understand how the bank could see such large sums of money to be transferred with no regard. And at this point, they simply do not care....

“But I do want something good to come out of his death—more people need to hear stories like this for real change to happen....

“The lack of responsibility by BMO has changed the course of my life. My dad will not get to watch [my or my sisters'] families grow up. He will never financially contribute towards us. We are now left with the bill of his death and bankrupting his estate. lt's a devastating end.”

Example number two is Mrs. L, a 79-year-old senior who was the victim of a devastating financial fraud that resulted in the loss of a significant portion of her retirement life savings. Fraudsters impersonated law enforcement and coerced her into selling her retirement investments in her registered retirement accounts and wiring the money abroad to them from local RBC and TD branches. She lost some $400,000 in her life savings. To add insult to injury, she now faces a significant tax liability from the CRA due to this, despite already having suffered a complete financial loss of much of her retirement savings. Because she withdrew RSP savings, which were then stolen, she now has to pay taxes on these monies, even though they have been lost to her.

The NDP recently moved seven amendments to Bill C-15, the budget 2025 implementation act, no. 1, aimed at strengthening protections for Canadians targeted by bank-related fraud. Unfortunately, Liberals and Conservatives combined to defeat them, and we see nothing addressing this in these estimates. Our amendments would have required banks to reimburse customers who fall victim to consumer-targeted fraud, unless they have been grossly negligent in relation to that fraud. Banks would have also been required to report anonymized consumer-targeted fraud data, so we could get a better understanding of the scope of this problem. The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada would have been required to conduct regular unannounced audits of banks' anti-fraud practices and policies, publish detailed fraud statistics and make its annual fraud report public, so that we could make sure that banks are actually following through on the policies they claim to have. The amendments also sought to make decisions of the Ombudsman for Banking Services and Investments binding.

These measures were recommended by advocacy organizations, including Option consommateurs and Democracy Watch, which argued that without mandatory audits, transparency, and accountability mechanisms, existing anti-fraud rules would remain ineffective.

The United Kingdom recently brought in new rules requiring that a consumer who is a victim of a fraud known as an APP scam, which is a scam wherein the scammer convinces the victim to make a payment, must be reimbursed, unless there is gross negligence on their part. In Quebec, the Consumer Protection Act was recently amended to impose reimbursement obligations on financial institutions in cases of fraud involving a consumer's bank account.

I want to quote Democracy Watch, which noted this:

It is not enough to just require the banks to have policies and procedures in place. The Bank Act was changed in 2018 to add...two provisions requiring banks to have policies, procedures and training to ensure the financial interests of their customers are protected...but the FCAC was not required in those provisions to audit the banks to ensure they comply with those provisions and, as a result, the FCAC has done nothing to ensure they actually comply....

The new anti-bank account fraud measures will also have little effect unless the FCAC is required to conduct regular, unannounced audits and to prosecute and penalize violations...

Option consommateurs noted this:

We believe that an approach that holds banks more accountable will not only allow thousands of Canadians who are victims of fraud to be able to recover their money, but it will also decrease the occurrence of such fraud. By placing greater responsibility on banks, the legislative framework will incentivize these businesses to deploy the appropriate measures to prevent their losses.

The example of the United Kingdom is a clear illustration of this. According to the Payment Systems Regulator, following the entry into force of the new consumer protection framework, the number of claims for...fraud decreased by approximately 15% between October 2024 and June 2025, compared to the same period [the year before].

With the advent of AI and growing technology, the prospects of fraud growing in this country are chilling. Imagine a senior answering the phone and hearing the computer-generated voice of their bank manager or their grandchild, who is asking them to wire money somewhere. This is the kind of technology that exists now, yet we are operating on outdated legislation. Although the government did put a financial crimes agency in the budget, which is a good step forward, it can and should do much more to help protect Canadians from fraud in this country. New Democrats will certainly work together to help make that happen.

Opposition Motion—The Government's Fiscal Policies

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Madam Speaker, this issue has to do with the business of supply, because we just voted supply for the project.

With Bill C‑15, the Minister of Transport callously decided to make people along the Alto corridor second-class citizens. He decided to take away their recourse and their right to question the need for expropriation for a train. Through his actions, the Minister of Transport is destroying what little social licence there was for this project.

People in my riding are being harassed by Alto. There have been unauthorized drone flights. Now they have stopped because they were not allowed in the first place. People from Alto are knocking on doors without identifying themselves and without offering a business card.

There are people in my riding who have been expropriated once already, who are familiar with expropriation and whose family or friends dealt with family tragedies such as suicides, broken families and depression. This is not ancient history. The last five pieces of land expropriated following the airport saga were only given back in 2024. That is what is happening with a train that does not exist and that has no business plan or cost-benefit analysis.

Bill C‑15 is an injustice. The people of Mirabel think that we need to scrap this project and start over from scratch.

Rail Transportation

[Scott Reid, Conservative, Lanark—Frontenac, ON]

Mr. Speaker, first I am presenting 15 petitions, signed by a total of 3,357 Canadians, against the Alto high-speed rail project. I am being flooded with literally thousands of signatures on petitions on this subject. I have already tabled petitions on this topic from an additional 3,300 Canadians.

The petitioners are concerned that their land will be expropriated and their lives destroyed by this project that is going to pass through their communities. They are also painfully aware that once their land has been taken from them by the government, they and their children will then be sent the tax bill for their share of a project so expensive that it will cost $9,000 for every family of four nationwide.

Second, I am presenting the certificate for e-petition 7203, which I sponsored. It calls for the High-Speed Rail Network Act provisions of Bill C-15 to be stopped, the provisions that allow for an expedited expropriation process that will remove the right of appeal and guarantee that landowners get far less for their land than they ought to be getting; for the cessation of further advancement of the high-speed rail project; and for redirection by the federal government of investment toward improving higher-speed passenger rail service within existing rail corridors, which, as they note, can be done within the life of the current Parliament instead of in the year 2038.

E-petition 7203 gathered 17,531 signatures, and, in total, the petitions I am tabling today contain the signatures of over 20,000 Canadians who are opposed to the Alto rail project.

Department of Finance—Main Estimates, 2026-27

[Dan Albas, Conservative, Okanagan Lake West—South Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Chair, I realize the minister has been here for a couple of hours, but he has not answered very many questions, if any. I am hopeful he will answer this one.

Internal documents outline a strategy for massive station area land assembly stretching up to two kilometres around a station, explicitly based on the Hong Kong “rail plus property” real estate model. Since his bill, Bill C-15, fails to include land abandonment or buyback provisions, if the route changes in an Ottawa neighbourhood like Eastway Gardens, who keeps the excess land and development profits? Is it the government, Alto or the private consortium?

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands—Rideau Lakes, ON]

Mr. Chair, on February 25, 2026, the minister voted on Motion No. 44, which would have deleted clause 191 from Bill C-15. Is that correct?

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands—Rideau Lakes, ON]

Mr. Chair, it has been more than an hour that the minister has been here, and he has said an awful lot of things but has not answered our questions, and that trend continues.

Did the screen that the minister said was necessary to avoid a conflict of interest apply to clause 191 of Bill C-15?

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands—Rideau Lakes, ON]

Mr. Chair, did the screen apply to Bill C-15?

Opposition Motion—Protection of Private Property Rights in Canada

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I know a lot of my Conservative friends are wondering about the expropriations built into Bill C-15 for Alto. That is basing it on what kind of title rights we have in this country. Nobody's title rights in fee simple are absolute vis-à-vis our own government, but they are absolute vis-à-vis potential indigenous title, which has not in any way been put forward.

As my hon. colleague from Winnipeg Centre says, there has been no case ever where indigenous title has resulted in fee simple title rights being lost for settler culture Canadians. Fee simple rights are only taken when a government expropriates for something big, like the Mirabel airport or what have you.

Housing

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am rising today to pursue a question I asked in question period on February 27. It was right after the British Columbia government came out with its budget. I have to say that I think every British Columbia member of Parliament was shocked. The B.C. NDP government cancelled a very important program: the community housing fund. The reason I raise this in the context of our federal Parliament is that obviously the Canadian government is making many commitments to build many Canadian homes. Housing starts are up. This is discussed, of course, in the spring economic update.

My concern, though, which was not properly addressed in question period, is that, yes, the federal government is providing funding to the B.C. government, but we have a real opportunity here that I hope the federal Minister of Housing will seize. The last statistic I can find since I asked the question, after the B.C. community housing fund was cancelled, is that the commitment from the federal government, out of the funds approved through Bill C-15, the budget implementation act's commitment of $15 billion to the Build Canada Homes agency, was that $170 million was to go to B.C. This is the latest statistic I can find of what is committed from the federal government to the B.C. government. To be clear, that is the total, which includes all kinds of housing: market housing, social housing, co-op housing and so on.

The opportunity here for the federal government is huge. There are hundreds of thousands of dollars that municipalities, local communities and non-profit associations have already spent in getting ready to build great housing. They have bought the land. They have hired the architects. They have cleared the studies. They have done the zoning. They are ready to roll, and suddenly, the B.C. government's decision to pull out of the funding has left thousands of potential homes for British Columbians in peril. There are big question marks now over many projects.

My plea to the government in pursuing this question tonight in Adjournment Proceedings is this: Set some clear requirements. Parties have the land. They are ready to roll. They have done their zoning. They have their permits. The plans are ready. It is just a question of a top-up from the federal government, specifically designed for non-profit housing in British Columbia. As I mentioned before in my question when I asked it in February, there are projects on Galiano Island and Mayne Island, and also in Saanich. The Prince George council member Cori Ramsay, who is the president of the Union of BC Municipalities, is saying the same thing. So many of these wonderful projects are going to fall through the cracks. We are ready to go.

We are looking for the federal government to commit to creating a special funding program, designed for B.C. in this moment and designed to capture those projects that are ready to roll, shovel-ready, but that may fall through the cracks and never get built unless the Minister of Housing, who is a British Columbian, can step up and design a project that gets the money flowing to build these homes for British Columbians.

Spring Economic Update 2026

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

I thank my colleague, Mr. Speaker.

Basically, the finance minister keeps saying that the world has changed. In his view, the world is always changing, so the situation is serious. Here is what has changed recently.

A little over two weeks ago, the U.S. president signed a new executive order changing the way tariffs are calculated on goods exported by Quebec and Canada. Previously, about 85% of our exports were protected under CUSMA. Today, a large number of goods are subject to 25% tariffs, even though they are covered by that agreement.

As a result, nearly 50% of exports from Quebec and Ontario are now subject to tariffs, according to a recent study by the University of Calgary. Business closures have already begun. We saw a critical situation from day one at BRP. There is the case of Meubles South Shore, and there are others. It is starting to look like a house of cards. We asked the government whether measures would be taken. Our job, as an opposition party, is to ask questions.

Two weeks ago in question period, we asked the Prime Minister what he planned to do about this new way of calculating tariffs, which means that we are no longer protected under CUSMA. Two weeks ago, the Prime Minister had absolutely no idea what we were talking about in question period. He was honest and upfront about it. He told us that he would get back to us with an answer. We gave him a week.

Last week, in question period, we asked the Prime Minister what he was going to do since businesses had started to close. My Liberal, Conservative and Bloc Québécois colleagues whose ridings are home to an industrial base are getting messages from businesses that have been struggling over the past two or three weeks and that are concerned. Many of them are SMEs that have exhausted their line of credit. The Prime Minister's response was to wait for the economic update because it would provide solutions. I have not slept for a week. I have never experienced such suspense in my life. I thought that he was going to sort this problem out.

I read the economic update, and then I read it again. I told myself that the Prime Minister could not have forgotten our businesses, but he has forgotten them. Even though they are covered by CUSMA, they are currently facing 25% tariffs. In light of this, we are calling for a very short-term wage subsidy.

The Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance have announced measures related to workforce training. While it is true that this measure could be beneficial in other provinces, workforce training was fully devolved to the Quebec government several decades ago. The workforce training strategy is managed in Quebec City. Vocational training is managed in Quebec City. Sector-specific internships for the job market are administered there.

To quickly train workers in fields that are in high demand today, we need to send money to Quebec. Ottawa, however, is averse to sending money to Quebec, since it likes to meddle in Quebec's areas of jurisdiction. I see the Minister of Health, who knows I like her. Her department really likes to do that. At the Standing Committee on Finance, we are conducting a study on spending authority, and the other side does not even know what they are talking about. It is disconcerting. So there are no measures for businesses.

The reality is that the United States is going to remain our biggest trading partner for a long time. This is especially true for the SMEs that are affected by these new tariffs. Large companies, particularly those in the aluminum sector, have the industrial capacity to redirect their exports to other markets, sometimes quite quickly, even if that is not ideal. However, SMEs, like the ones back home on Curé‑Labelle Boulevard in Mirabel and elsewhere, do not have the capacity to do that. Their entire bureaucratic and technical infrastructure is designed to export their products to the United States, and they do not have the resources to protect themselves.

These companies are not oil companies. My colleague spoke earlier about subsidies for oil companies. They are not big banks. They cannot afford to hire lobbyists to convince the government to give them tax credits. They have been forgotten.

The government is bragging about a strong economic record in this update. We are being told that exports to the United States have fallen by 10%, which is significant, given that this partner accounts for 80% of our exports. Canada is a small, very open economy. We are being told, quite rightly, that exports to countries other than the United States have increased by nearly 30% or 40%.

That is good news, especially considering that the Prime Minister has not signed a new trade agreement with a single one of those countries. The government is looking for new export opportunities. The Prime Minister has travelled, he has burned fuel, he has played king all over the world. One might therefore think he has signed agreements. However, we have not increased our export opportunities in a single country because the Prime Minister has not signed any trade agreements. What has increased are oil and gas exports to Europe and Asia.

Does anyone know what good came from this strong economic record? Aluminum exports to Europe increased. Our aluminum producers sent their aluminum to Europe because the Prime Minister was unable to solve the problem with the United States. That is what he is covering up.

The government says that the deficit is lower than expected. That is the other good news from the Minister of Finance and National Revenue. It is true. The deficit was $11.5 billion less than anticipated for last year. Let me remind the House that the big banks have lowered their economic growth forecasts for next year and for the year after that. That is last year's deficit. It is true that there was more growth. We acknowledge that. There was also more inflation. Across-the-board price increases generate revenue for the government. However, tax credits for batteries and tax credits for investments in clean energy account for two-thirds of the amount mentioned by the Minister of Finance. These tax credits went unclaimed because of insufficient investments, yet the Minister of Finance portrays himself as Mr. Investment.

The natural disaster fund accounts for the rest. Maybe the Minister of Finance did not do enough rain dancing, but it seems that there were not enough floods and forest fires this year to use up the $7.5 billion that was allocated.

This means we need to focus on the real issues. There is not really anything new in this document. I can show the document, since it has been tabled, so I will take the opportunity to do so. There is not much that is new, just some promising measures that have already been announced. The government deserves some credit when it develops strategies and takes the initiative, so we commend it for doing so.

There is the national defence strategy, the national auto strategy and the national infrastructure strategy. There is the national critical minerals strategy, to which we got phosphate added as part of Bill C-15. The government had overlooked this, but it had the good sense to accept our budget amendment. There is also a national strategy for nature. What is missing? There is still no national aerospace strategy.

The industry as a whole has been calling for such a strategy for two or three decades. People who truly know what is happening, those who manufacture airplanes, helicopters and parts, those who are in my riding within walking distance of my office, on the south shore and in Dorval, are calling for a national strategy. Why? The answer is so that they can develop the products that the Department of Defence and the government need, because it is a long-cycle industry. We need a strategy so that, when the time comes to order products, we can do so.

Giving press conferences like the Prime Minister and other Liberal members are doing is not enough. Right now, they are giving press conferences. Unions come to us after meeting with Liberal members. They bring up the issue with the Liberals, who then tell them that it would be unfair to the aerospace industry in Winnipeg and Manitoba if there were a Quebec-based strategy. That is what Liberal members have told our unions in Quebec. That would be useful.

I listened carefully to the Minister of Finance and National Revenue. It is not always easy, but I listened to him. He said that he wants the Bloc Québécois to side with the government for once, that it would be good if the Bloc Québécois were on the government's side. He said that Bloc MPs are very partisan, that they are very difficult and very narrow-minded. It takes two to play that game. It takes two to come up with proposals that will shape our industry. Why should we be cozying up to the Liberals when they turn a deaf ear to our proposals?

I will explain why there is no aerospace strategy. We know what is happening in Ontario's auto sector. A lot of the manufacturing workforce is experiencing major structural problems. We also know the government would prefer to move a segment of the industry, possibly to Ontario. I do not know if that is true, but I do know that people are worried about it and that there is no strategy.

That is what is lacking in the economic update. Ottawa bureaucracy is out of touch with on-the-ground realities. There are plenty of examples like that. The Minister of Finance says we need to get on board. Every time there is a budget or an economic update, we make demands. Those demands are costed. They are self-funded, five-year proposals. We make those demands even though we know we will never govern. I can assure everyone that I always renew my driver's licence. I know I will never have a car service. I will keep driving my own car. That is fine. I sit down. The entire Bloc Québécois caucus sits down, and sometimes we come up with what everyone acknowledges are the best campaign platform budgets. That is what happened last time.

The first thing we are asking for is that subsidies to oil and gas companies be eliminated. That is step one. That amounts to $10 billion a year. Imagine how many school food programs could be funded with that money instead of propping up oil companies, which have no problem surviving these days. We never received a response to our request, which is entirely reasonable, rational and in the public interest. Another thing we are asking for is that the digital services tax be reinstated. That is worth $7.5 billion over five years. I see some folks over there nodding or frowning. The Liberals said they did it for the good of Canada. I will quote the government, which said recently that it would not pay an entry fee to negotiate with the Trump administration. The Liberals said that. They said they are proud and they are building Canada strong.

We know that they are building Canada strong. We are a little tired of hearing it. In fact, we do not know when this Canada strong is going to get here. They keep telling us that they are not up for paying any entry fees and will not make any concessions ahead of the negotiations. However, the first thing that the Prime Minister did when he came to power was to make concessions and bow down before the Trump administration. The government wants to build Canada strong. It wants to take a stand and show that it does not pay entry fees to negotiate. In that case, it needs to reverse course on its bad decision and reinstate the digital services tax. If Liberal members want to be proud Canadians, they should behave like it. It seems they do not, however. Meanwhile, our media is losing its fight for survival.

Let us talk about the media. There is a crisis in the media sector. It is not me saying this, it is the Minister of Finance, on page 107 of his economic update. It is a good page. I really liked it. The minister says: “Broadcast journalism in particular is a key part of our community fabric.” Let me stress the word “key”. I like the Minister of Finance. He is a revolutionary. He told us about “the government's intention to seek the views of Canadians and stakeholders on extending the Canadian Journalism Labour Tax Credit”. Now that is a revolution. If the Minister of Finance had been around during the French Revolution, he would have set up a booth across from the Bastille and conducted a survey on the price of brioche, and France would now be under King Louis XLIX. That is what it means to do nothing for Quebec. If members want concrete examples, that is exactly what we have.

We are calling for some kind of emergency wage subsidy for businesses. We have been meeting with business leaders who are telling us they need to keep their employees on the payroll. Some companies are productive and can export if there is a free trade deal. The Prime Minister keeps saying that he will sign an agreement eventually. For these people, the solution is not to send them back to school. The solution is to lower production costs for these businesses through wage subsidies and to cushion the productivity hit caused by the tariffs until the situation improves, so that our regions do not shut down. The Liberals are refusing. I wondered why, because it is a good proposal. We are reaching out to the Minister of Finance.

I thought that the government might be waiting for Cúram to be ready, so it could distribute the wage subsidies through Cúram. Apparently, it has money for Cúram, but not for wage subsidies.

Let us talk about employment insurance, which is designed to help people get through a crisis. We are currently in a crisis. The minister tells us that the world has changed and that we are in a crisis. The unemployment rate has held up a little better than expected. We were expecting worse. We need an EI system that covers more than half of all workers. A little over half of Canadian workers are covered by EI. No one here in the House would be able to renew their mortgage if they told their lender that they have fire insurance that has a 50:50 chance of covering them. That does not happen, yet we are willing to subject workers to that.

We asked for temporary measures, and they were put in place. Those temporary measures were so necessary that they were renewed. There are pilot projects in the regions that have been going on for so many years now that they have become almost permanent. If anyone wants proof of why EI reform is needed, there it is.

I want to talk about the $814 million that was stolen from Quebec. I would think this is of interest to the minister. I have read the Prime Minister’s book; it occupies a place of pride on my bookshelf. It is called Values. Before entering politics, the Prime Minister used to travel around, talking about his values. He spoke about the fact that values are more important than the market. He spoke about the fact that having a market economy and capitalism without values leaves us, as a society, without a compass. Then, he entered politics and bought votes. What happened to values?

The Prime Minister decided to refund a carbon tax. We know how it worked. To ensure it was socially acceptable, it was refunded before people had even paid it. He decided to send refunds to seven provinces for money that had never been paid, all in order to buy votes.

Quebeckers paid for that. As the Parliamentary Budget Officer said, and as officials from the Department of Finance told us in committee, Quebec is owed $814 million. Where is that $814 million? It is everywhere except in Quebec at the moment. It seems to me that would be a good step to take.

Let us talk about health transfers. There is no increase in health transfers. The minister is happy because he was prepared to run an $80-billion deficit. However, we are calling for increases in health transfers. We see the need in our hospitals. We know that system costs are rising by 6% or 7% per year as the population ages. We know that no government ever introduced or implemented as many programs based on the federal spending power as the Trudeau government. That was the Trudeau government's choice. Meanwhile, people are languishing in hospital hallways and unable to get surgery. Is federal funding the only problem? It may not be the only problem, but it is definitely a substantial factor, and it is part of the solution. We also know there will be cuts starting in the next fiscal year. There is no mention of that.

There is also the issue of the guaranteed income supplement. The Liberals talk about affordability, but there is nothing in there to address affordability. The Liberals increased the grocery cheque, which is great. We welcomed that. They based it on the GST rebate, which takes into account the family structure, the family benefits that people receive, and so on.

However, as far as the government is concerned, there are still good seniors and bad seniors. The legal retirement age in Canada is 65. If that has changed, no one has told me. As far as the government is concerned, there are good retirees and bad retirees. There are people aged 75 and older whose pension increased by 10%, and there are people aged 65 to 74, who are told to go away and wait another 10 years before becoming eligible for their old age security benefits. This is discrimination between two classes of seniors. The Liberals say they want to help people with the cost of living. Seniors aged 65 to 74 are the missing group, but there is nothing about them. The Minister of Finance and National Revenue tells us that we are just too partisan and that we should support the government, which wants to take care of seniors.

There is also the increase in the Canada public transit fund. There are problems with public transit, and infrastructure investment is needed. This will promote green and sustainable growth. Half the funds went to Ontario. First, the Liberals cut the fund, reducing it from $30 billion to $25 billion over 10 years. Then they gave half the funds to Ontario. Furthermore, since this falls under Quebec's jurisdiction, there is yet another standoff and everything is taking forever. Rather than being paid out for public transit projects, the money that Quebec is owed is being held up here. Perhaps the Liberals will put it into their sovereign wealth fund. I do not know what they are going to do with that money, but it is taking forever.

Let us talk about loan guarantees for the forestry sector. We have a forestry sector that pays countervailing duties in advance. Often, years later, forestry companies will win in court. They will get reimbursed for those countervailing duties, but in the meantime, they are unable to get credit because they cannot use the money they paid the Americans, those same Americans that the Prime Minister calls our friends in his public communications. Forestry companies cannot go and get that money. We need help for the forestry industry. Where is the help for the forestry industry? The minister seems to think that the world has changed, but nothing has changed for the forestry sector. That is what is happening.

Quebec also wants to be reimbursed for the money that it spent on asylum seekers. I am talking about the $733 million that the Quebec National Assembly is unanimously calling for. Is that partisan or do the 125 people who sit in the blue room in Quebec mean nothing? It is the red room these days, but it will be blue again eventually.

The Liberals are telling us that productivity and innovation are important, but they are closing agricultural research centres in Quebec, in the Minister of Government Transformation's own riding. I do not know what he wants to transform in the agricultural industry, but things are not going well. What is more, the salaries of these researchers amount to about $28 million over five years. For an organization the size of the federal government, that is peanuts. There is nothing in this budget to address that.

I do not know who is being partisan about any of that. I do not know what we are supposed to expect from an economic update like the one today. We need to help people, we need to be working on the ground, we need to be listening and we need to propose measures. The government's answer to all that is a sovereign wealth fund. Yesterday, the Liberals announced that they are going to create a sovereign wealth fund. They went to HEC Montréal for the announcement and put on a show. The audience was clapping like penguins. We asked questions. They would not give us any details, because they said we would get the details today when the economic update was tabled. We opened the economic update document and went to the section on the sovereign wealth fund. We could not contain our excitement. However, what we read was that we are going to get more news in a few months' time. There were no details, apart from one new detail about the sovereign wealth fund: The projects that it will fund are the ones that have been approved by the Major Projects Office, which the Prime Minister already basically controls. They are saying that the fund will be independent, but only just independent enough to say yes to the Prime Minister.

Eariler, we asked officials if there would be an independent investment committee. They answered that they did not know, that the board would no doubt be independent, but that the rest remained to be seen. They have no idea how much it will cost to finance this fund. They do not know what type of bond they will fund it with. They do not know what the governance rules will be. They do not even know how much private investment will be mobilized. They are putting in $25 billion, and we want to know how much private investment that will pull in. They do not know, because they only thought of it yesterday. We are supposed to not be partisan and to just clap for this, but these are valid questions. By all accounts, this fund will not be independent from the Prime Minister's Office, because he is the one selecting the major projects. They wind up on his desk, and he is the one who signs off on them. We are being told that the capital of the people who put money into the sovereign wealth fund will be guaranteed and that they will not be taking on any risk, but the projects we are talking about are so risky that nobody is willing to invest in them unless the government gets involved. Who will end up paying for these projects?

Sovereign wealth funds exist all over the world, and there are all kinds of them. Norway has one. It invests in foreign currencies, something Canada should have done long ago to avoid Dutch disease. The Netherlands' oil exports are killing its manufacturing sector. In Canada, we have never really had one, apart from a similar example in Alberta. Some sovereign wealth funds are used to influence geopolitics, like in China, where the Chinese are buying up infrastructure. Some sovereign wealth funds are used to trade on the foreign exchange market. Quebec's generations fund was a type of sovereign wealth fund. In every case, there was always a clear reason for establishing the fund.

The Minister of Finance and National Revenue has set up a fund to make an announcement. At some point, we will need to know why he is establishing this sovereign wealth fund. I am curious, and we have questions. We are an opposition party, and our job is to ask questions. The minister's job is to answer them. Eventually, he will have to answer this.

If anybody is wondering whether we are happy with this economic update, the answer is no, because it does not update anything. We knew it would not be a big document because we had had discussions with the department. We were not expecting a budget, but we were expecting something, at least. If the minister just wanted to upset everyone by announcing the deficit number, we could have waited for the official numbers in October. We will get them in our inbox.

We cannot be faced with such huge changes in tariffs and in the geopolitical landscape of global trade and then be told that the only solution is to encroach on Quebec's jurisdictions. The Liberals have a majority, as everyone knows. We want to contribute, and we always have. We want to make proposals. However, when someone make a suggestion, someone else has to listen. Someone needs to take action. Someone on the other side of the House needs to be sensitive enough to recognize that every member on this side of the House was elected by folks who deserve to be represented and whose views deserve to be heard. I think the government needs to work on its ability to listen, and I think that may well be the most pressing challenge facing this new majority government.

Canadian Space Launch Act

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

Madam Speaker, for the most part, we agree on implementing such a system, as we said earlier. However, my concern is that there seems to be a tendency to waive application of the law every time new measures are introduced. It is tiresome.

As we all know, Bill C‑5 became an act that enables the government to designate projects of national interest. It allows the government to override all existing laws. We also know that Bill C‑15 took away citizens' rights with respect to expropriation. The government also got rid of the environmental assessment for the high-speed rail project. Now it is pushing to exempt certain launch-related decisions from Transportation Appeal Tribunal of Canada review.

I would like my colleague to comment on this. The government seems to view laws as obstacles to progress, but laws are the legislative framework we have established over decades to provide the public with safety and stability.

Consideration of Government Business No.9

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am rising today to add my voice to Government Motion No. 9, which addresses composition of standing committees of the House of Commons and joint committees.

Over the course of this debate, it has been undisputable that committees are microcosms of this place in form and in function, both reflecting party standings in the House and performing the necessary duties to scrutinize legislation, propose solutions and represent the diverse views of Canadians. The granularity of this work being undertaken in committees is what makes us more informed, effective and thoughtful legislators, better equipped to support Canadians. The government has taken a balanced approach to additions to standing committee and joint committee compositions that we are discussing today.

This routine motion in response to the changing landscape here in the House would add to the voices currently at committee. I would point members to House of Commons Procedure and Practice, first edition, which makes it clear on page 819: “Where the governing party has a majority in the House, it will also have a majority on every House committee.” There is an undeniable, long-standing principle in Parliament: A party that has a majority of seats in the House also has a majority in committees. This is at the core of our Westminster system of government.

The motion proposed by the government reflects how things are done in the House of Commons. The numbers on committees ensure that the government has a majority and the chair of the committee does not routinely need to vote to break a tie, because the number in the House means that the Speaker does not routinely need to vote to break a tie. The makeup of the House of Commons has changed since committees were formed almost a year ago. The government has gone from a minority government to a majority. Naturally, this means a change must occur to the makeup of committees to reflect this change.

The motion would not put opposition parties in a position to lose representation. Current committee members of both the government and the opposition would remain unaffected and would be able to continue the important work they have undertaken over the course of the last year. The government recognizes the time these members have invested in familiarizing themselves with their respective committee subject matter and in building trusting relationships with stakeholders and members of all political stripes.

Do my colleagues across the way not agree that having more voices on standing committees would add to the diverse perspectives being shared during a committee's deliberations? Do they not agree that an additional voice from the Prairies or Atlantic Canada, from rural or urban centres, would better inform our studies, reports and amendments?

I have heard my opposition colleagues speak to what they say Canadians voted for in the last election. The message our government was elected on was to build Canada strong. I recall conversations at the door about a year ago being rooted in addressing affordability concerns, managing geopolitical threats and investing in Canada's future. These are the exact issues that committees are expected to undertake. They are a mechanism to further dive into these issues, propose solutions and improve legislation.

I am splitting my time with the hon. member for Halifax. Usually I am the one to drop that note on other members' desks. I apologize. I am sure the opposition would much rather hear from the member for Halifax than the member for St. Catharines.

We have seen collaboration take place since the start of this Parliament, as the government has thoughtfully considered ideas and supported amendments brought forward by opposition parties. Members of the finance committee studied, in depth, Bill C-15, the 2025 budget bill, and proposed amendments. The government brought forward amendments to address stakeholder concerns and, without hesitation, supported opposition party amendments to provide more security to consumers and ensure guardrails on ministerial power.

Even going back to my days in the 42nd Parliament, I did not see a bill go through without amendments by the opposition accepted. This level of collaboration has also been shown on legislation brought forward by private members, as was the case at the public accounts committee when government members proposed reasonable amendments to ensure the scheme and policy objectives of Bill C-230, the creation of a debt forgiveness registry, would work effectively if established.

I have heard claims made against Government Motion No. 9 as changing the checks and balances on government. I find this unreasonable for the simple fact that the mechanisms that hold government to account remain unchanged; ministerial appearances before committees, opposition day motions, the study of estimates and question period are just a few examples. On the valuable studies committees undertake and reports they present, if a member feels that their concerns have not been adequately reflected in a report, they have an opportunity to present the House with a supplemental report to ensure their views are on the parliamentary record.

Last spring, colleagues on both sides of the aisle welcomed many new faces to our caucuses who were eager to represent their constituents, share ideas and work hard to improve the lives of Canadians. Allowing more members on committees gives our colleagues the opportunities to be better legislators. As my colleagues have previously stated, this is a time of unity, to bring Canadians together, to represent the needs of our communities and to listen to one another so we can build Canada strong.

Demonstrating to Canadians that we, as political parties with differing views on matters of policy, can come together, working collaboratively and constructively, is of utmost importance given the challenges we face. We should define ourselves in this time of crisis by the things that unite us, not by those that divide us. This is a critical time in our nation's history, when we will, hopefully, define ourselves not by our partisan interests but rather by how we work together to deliver what the country needs in spite of our partisan interests. We can disagree, but we must rise above pettiness to deliver on our promise to put Canadian interests first.

In my speech, I have noted times that we worked together, whether on government legislation or in private members' business. Let these examples be the rule, not the exception.

I have listened to the debate for a bit, and I am genuinely surprised. Many of these Conservative members were here in the 41st Parliament, and the things they are proposing right now did not exist then, when the Conservatives held the majority. I believe the previous speaker was a member of Prime Minister Harper's office, and I doubt he was proposing the things in the PMO that he is coming to the House today to deliver.

This is how Parliament has worked in this country. The composition of the House has changed, and as such, the committees—

Lawful Access Act, 2026

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Ponoka—Didsbury, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is always great to get up in the House and represent the fine people of Ponoka—Didsbury. I consider myself fairly right-wing, but my colleague from Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee is making me look like a moderate in the House today. I unfortunately do not have time to go back and alter my speech in order to keep pace with my new-found best friend. We are going to be spending a lot more time together, based on my assessment of what he had to say about the government across the way.

It is important to speak to this piece of legislation, Bill C-22, the lawful access act. It is a bit weird to stand here, because it feels like we were just talking about this last fall. This is the second kick at the cat for this piece of legislation for the government. The Liberals tried to have a similar set of laws passed in a sweeping omnibus bill, Bill C-2, but that bill did not pass, and now it seems it is being reintroduced by the government. We know that it is coming on the heels of what was a minority Parliament and is going to turn into a majority Parliament here soon. One always has to keep that in mind. If this bill is crafted the same way that the majority government here was crafted, there is no reason at all to think that this is not a sneaky piece of legislation.

The Liberals laud their talking points and their PMO comms lines that this bill would help keep Canadians safe and get crime under control. The only reason crime is not under control is that we have had 11 years of Liberals across the way. If Bill C-22 were really about law and order, limiting crime or protecting victims, Conservatives would be wholly in support of this piece of legislation, but it is actually not about any of that. It is about power, it is about control, and it has a very deeply Orwellian feel to it.

Conservatives in this country have always believed in law and order. A vital and fundamental pillar of what it means to be a Conservative is to believe in and respect the rule of law in this country. We used to actually have governments that followed the laws as well. It would be nice if we got back to that at some point in time.

The governing Liberals have had many opportunities over the last 11 years to show us that they also want to see a reduction in crime, but every chance that we put in front of this Parliament, they seem to vote against. The Liberals have an ardent history of refusing bail reform and embracing catch-and-release style legislation. Now, after a decade, they expect the opposition members to believe that they are actually serious about cracking down on crime. Well, I am not buying it.

Last week, we debated Bill C-25, which would amend the Canada Elections Act. One of the objectives of that bill is to prevent foreign interference. During debate of that bill, I used the example of the 700 Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps members who are freely living in Canada today. The government will not deport them and will not put them in jail. They are here fundraising, conducting business and harming our country every single day. The Liberals cannot say that they are serious about dealing with foreign interference if they do not deport the terrorists and criminals living in our country. They cannot say they are serious about crime and protecting Canadians without deporting these same terrorists or criminals from the country as well. They cannot have it both ways. That is because the Liberals are not serious about crime.

The Liberals are serious, however, about seizing control and having more power for themselves and their government. We know that much for sure. On Friday, my colleague from Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands—Rideau Lakes referred to Bill C-22 as “Bill C-2 redo”, and he is exactly right.

Last fall, the Liberals put forward Bill C-2, the strong borders act, which fell short of protecting Canadians while overreaching in many areas of jurisdiction where it did not need to, like authorizing law enforcement to open up people's mail and inspect it without any due process at all. There was severe push-back on this, not only from the opposition but from hundreds of advocacy groups, who stood firmly against this legislation because of the risks it would pose to the civil liberties of the Canadian public. The Conservatives successfully blocked Bill C-2, stopping the Liberals from limiting the use of cash in transactions, opening the mail without any oversight whatsoever, and demanding that any service providers, including hospitals, financial institutions and probably even one's local dry cleaning store, disclose user data without any judicial oversight.

Bill C-22 removed some of these proposed provisions that we opposed, but reintroduced some of the proposed parts of Bill C-2 that were rejected when the Liberals held their rightful minority government. They have since reintroduced this bill, now that they know they are going to have the majority of votes in this place. It seems like an awfully convenient opportunity, does it not?

We Conservatives support giving law enforcement officers the tools they need to combat crime and keep communities safe, particularly as threats and dangers evolve in the digital age, but we also believe that there need to be strong safeguards accompanying these powers.

There also need to be clear limits and independent oversight to protect the rights and freedoms of the people here in Canada. Bill C-2 was a failed piece of legislation that the opposition could not and did not support because not only did it fail to adequately address the criminal element in our society, but it infringed on the freedoms and the rights of Canadians in an unjustifiable way.

Now the Liberals seek to reintroduce many of the rejected measures of Bill C-2 in this bill today. They rebranded their failed legislation as Bill C-22 and have brought it back to this very House with their illegitimately obtained, like I said, soon-to-be majority here in the House. This should alarm Canadians, especially the 11-plus million Canadian voters who did not actually vote for a Liberal candidate in the last election.

Our caucus has been very clear in where we stand on the Liberals' obsession with big, bloated and powerful government: It is unnecessary and is a gross misuse of power.

Bill C-22 focuses specifically on telecommunications and Internet service providers while creating oversight for ministerial orders. The Liberals have already banned news from being reported on Meta. Why do they need access to Canadians' information through the Internet and telecommunications providers? Will the personal information of Canadians be shared with the government through this bill, like it would have been under Bill C-2? The government will not tell us. Can any member sitting on the government benches today give me an answer to that? If they could, they probably would not. If they did have an answer, chances are it would be wrong.

Keeping Canadians safe is just a mere disguise for the folks across the way. The Liberals have had over a decade to keep Canadians safe, and they have continuously let crime get worse. The Liberals say that Bill C-22 is needed to keep up with the rapid growth of our world's digital environment and to help keep Canadians safe, but it makes me wonder if this is actually true. I would say that in some cases it is not. Why is this? It is because the Liberals have voted down every piece of crime-reducing legislation the Conservatives have brought to the House since this Parliament commenced last May.

The Liberals have repeatedly ignored the calls of every single premier in Canada who asked for bail reform. They refused to appoint judges, so violent criminals are having their cases dismissed and timed out. This is not about crime reduction for the Liberals across the way. This is all about having an excuse and a reason to seize power and control.

Even CBC pundit Andrew Coyne, known for his staunch Conservative support, and I am kidding of course, said last week that the Prime Minister has an “autocratic streak a mile wide,” and he is showing that now. Coyne said that during a minority Parliament. How bad will it actually get in a majority parliament? It is all about control, about central control by the central banker.

Bill C-2 was about control by letting law enforcement open our mail. Bill C-9 would control what religious people are allowed to say out loud or how texts are supposed to be read. Bill C-22 would control the privacy rights of Canadians through increased government surveillance and access to information.

We know this because the Liberals have a track record of these power grabs, such as changes they proposed to make to the Standing Orders in 2016. I do not know if there are a lot of people here today who remember that, but I remember it. They were going to basically take control of this place. They did not want an opposition; they wanted an audience.

There was the former prime minister's interference in the SNC-Lavalin scandal in 2019 and subsequent firing of the first indigenous female justice minister in Canadian history. As well, we see the consistent cutting, through time allocation, of debates on important pieces of legislation. There were gag orders on government watchdogs, as well as the unnecessary invocation of the Emergencies Act in 2022, which saw the Liberals freeze the bank accounts of hundreds of Canadians.

There was the expansion of cabinet authority provided in Bill C-5. Bill C-15 gives ministers of the Crown permission to exempt individuals and organizations of their choosing from any federal law they want, including the Criminal Code. Now there is online surveillance and access to Canadians' information.

Every time the Liberals are tasked with solving a problem, they always choose to assert total control and dominance over the situation. They grab power for power's sake. They control people's taxes, finances, what they say, the religious texts they read aloud, the firearms they are allowed to hunt with, the things they need to believe to qualify for Canada's summer jobs money and the salmon they allowed to fish for on the west coast.

It is all about control. It is always overkill. It is always too much. It is always over the top. It never solves the problem. Then again, one cannot be the problem and the solution at the same time. Bill C-22 is of course no different.

The Conservatives have put forward so many pieces of legislation to crack down on crime and protect Canadians, but the Liberals continue to vote us down in favour of their soft-on-crime policies that repeatedly let violent offenders out on bail time and time again.

The government does not need to infringe on the rights of Canadians to solve the problem of surging crime. That problem is solved and Canadians are protected by putting violent offenders in jail, strengthening bail laws and deporting non-citizens who are guilty of committing violent crimes here in Canada. I do not see any of that in this legislation. It is because the Liberals are not serious about fixing the problem. They are only serious about garnering more control for themselves and their friends, and taking Canadians' tax dollars and putting it on their—

Opposition Motion—Fuel Taxes

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

I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Mirabel, who is also often my friend.

As we know, gas prices have skyrocketed since the start of Donald Trump's and Israel's war against Iran. The military operation, which began on February 28, led Iran to close the Strait of Hormuz, that handles 20% of global oil. The U.S. forces had anticipated this and warned that it would happen, and it did.

Today, we are dealing with the Conservative motion, and the Prime Minister just announced that he is suspending the excise tax until Labour Day, which will cost about $2.5 billion. This is a blanket measure, but a targeted one might have been a better idea.

In today's motion, the Conservatives are proposing a measure with a total annual cost of $13 billion, which would increase the deficit by 20%. Given the current state of public finances, more targeted measures should have been proposed, ones that cost less and have the most impact on the cost of living.

Furthermore, the calculations in the motion are ridiculous. For example, the motion estimates that eliminating fuel standards would save seven cents per litre. However, that is completely untrue, because with today's high oil prices, biofuels now cost about the same as fossil fuels, so there are no extra savings to be made on that front. This idea that we would save seven cents per litre is far-fetched. I would also like to point out that Quebec has its own standards.

Basically, what they are proposing here is that, since the price of oil and gas is rising, we should consume more of it. What a brilliant idea.

In their motion, the Conservatives also propose eliminating the industrial carbon tax. However, as they themselves indirectly acknowledge in their motion, this measure would not even result in a savings of 1¢ per litre. It is nothing more than a gift to the oil companies. Oil companies have production costs, and the price, which is determined globally, is rising. Consequently, oil companies are making more profit, and if we were to eliminate the industrial carbon tax for oil companies, they would receive yet another windfall that would fill the gap and remove any incentive to pollute less. As I said, the price of crude oil depends on global market prices.

I would caution the government and the Conservatives when it comes to the excise tax. Many experts, including Luc Godbout, believe that this is not the right course of action, even temporarily. A few months ago, Mr. Godbout said that we need to resist the temptation to lower the gas tax for either budget-balancing or environmental reasons. As members know, it will be hard to reinstate this tax later because Canadians will have to absorb the increase. As I said, the government needs to take targeted measures, which are more effective. However, it would seem that both sides of the House would prefer to take broad measures.

Is it wise to allow as much pollution as there is in Donald Trump's America, in other words, unlimited pollution? As members know, President Trump announced the repeal of the vehicle efficiency standard that has steadily increased vehicle range per gallon, as they say south of the border. In Canada, we refer to the number of litres per kilometre. I would remind members that this standard was introduced well before the government's commitment to address climate change. The corporate average fuel economy program, or CAFE, was adopted in 1975 to make the United States less dependent on foreign oil. At the time, vehicles averaged only 13 miles per gallon. That is why it was introduced.

Abolishing such a standard encourages manufacturers to sell larger, more polluting vehicles, since selling those vehicles is more lucrative. It also makes industry and consumers more vulnerable to price shocks and oil shocks. In the long run, consumers are the ones who lose out, because Donald Trump's reasoning, like that of the Conservatives today, neglects the savings that come from energy efficiency, in addition to completely ignoring the costs related to health and the environment.

A few weeks ago, during our last sitting week, the Conservatives proposed removing standards and incentives for the electrification of transportation. The party is against high-speed rail. We are in favour, but with reservations about how the expropriation will be done, considering the safeguards that were removed in Bill C‑15. Through all of this, the Conservatives are trying to keep us completely dependent on oil by opposing any other solution. That is their response to the current skyrocketing prices. It is something to think about.

American economist Paul Krugman wrote a blog post on this issue today. He points out that soaring oil and gas prices, combined with the threat of shortages, highlights the risks of relying on fossil fuels. He demonstrates that economies that are more reliant on oil and gas have been more impacted by the soaring prices than those that use other sources. I would therefore like to repeat my question: Is the solution to remain reliant on fossil fuels?

Paradoxically, Krugman explains that while Trump cancelled the previous administration's plan to develop more renewable energy, his adventurism in Iran has sparked a global rush to invest in solar power, wind power and batteries. Where will the world procure most of the renewable energy equipment it seeks? From China. As we know, China is the workshop of the world. Krugman notes that China's manufacturing sector is larger than those of the United States, Japan, Germany and South Korea combined.

While China is strong in many industries, it is utterly dominant in electrotechnology, the cluster of solar panel, wind turbine, battery and electric vehicle industries at the heart of the renewable energy revolution. Krugman cites the Wall Street Journal, which notes that China's green industrial complex reigns supreme. China accounts for more than 80% of global production in all these sectors, with the exception of wind turbines, where China's share is 60%, with Europe retaining a significant role. China uses most of its production within its own economy. It is designed not only for export, but to reduce its dependence on oil and gas.

Krugman notes that under President Joe Biden, the United States took much needed steps to develop their own electrotech sectors, notably batteries and electric vehicles. It sought to accelerate the growth of renewable energy in general. However, the Trump administration has cancelled all of Biden's renewable energy programs and is also actively trying to block private commercial investments in this sector. Is that what needs to happen in Canada? That is my question.

Krugman says that until America frees itself from Trump's obsession with fossil fuels, if it ever does, China's lead in renewable energy production will likely be insurmountable. He concludes that it is nonetheless unfortunate to see the United States self-destruct and yield the most important industry of the future to China. In doing so, the United States is becoming impoverished, falling behind technologically and losing influence in a world rushing toward the energy revolution. In the end, the United States is not simply burning fossil fuels, but also destroying its future.

That seems to be what is being proposed here and it also seems to correspond to the measures the government is taking in the House. When the government says it wants to be an energy superpower, it is talking about oil and gas. It is forging blindly ahead. Oil is a non‑renewable resource, and climate change is real, whether we like it or not.

The takeaway from the current crisis is that we urgently need to reduce our dependence on oil and aim for more stable and more sustainable economic development. Europe is choosing that path. We can do the same. As Krugman pointed out, however, the problem is that China is manufacturing everything at the moment.

However, we could play a role here. Quebec has everything it takes to do so because our strength lies in the new clean economy. We do not have any oil, but we have renewable energy. We have everything it takes to be one of the key links in the new supply chain for states that are working to reduce their dependence on oil and gas. That is where our future lies. We need to support the development of a whole new sector, that of processing the resources that we have already. We need to embrace this shift toward reducing our dependence on oil and gas so that we can compete with China, which already has a huge advantage. However, that is not the choice that Ottawa has made so far. That is not what today's motion is proposing. These are missed opportunities for Quebec.

The current global context is giving us the opportunity to make the most of Quebec's strengths, to reconnect with our true nature and to act as a bridge between North America and Europe. However, neither the official opposition party nor the current government are promoting that approach.

Rail Transportation

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance and National Revenue introduced Bill C-15, the budget bill, which contains measures to help Alto expropriate land from the people of Terrebonne for the high-speed rail line. People might ask what the connection is between the Minister of Finance, a budget bill and expropriations. It is true that there is no connection, except that the Minister of Finance has close ties to Alto's senior management.

Why did he use his budget bill to help Alto, a company he has close ties to, evict the residents of Terrebonne from their homes?

[Alexis Deschênes, Bloc, Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the minister has not taken the necessary steps to distance himself. He himself introduced Bill C-15 in the House, and that bill includes measures to facilitate the expropriation of land from the people of Terrebonne. He is the one who requested that this bill be drafted in response to his budget, which he himself tabled.

Again, the Liberal minister has close ties to Alto's management. The Liberal minister has introduced legislation to help Alto expropriate land from the citizens of Terrebonne. Is this really the kind of policy the Liberal government is offering Terrebonne voters today?

[Alexis Deschênes, Bloc, Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in his Bill C‑15, the Minister of Finance granted special powers to the Alto corporation to expropriate land from people in Terrebonne to make way for high-speed rail. Bill C‑15, which has become law, bears his imprint.

However, media reports have revealed that the Minister of Finance has personal ties to Alto's senior management. Right in the middle of an election in Terrebonne, a Liberal minister is making it easier to expropriate land from the people of Terrebonne in support of a company with which he has close connections.

Why is the Liberal minister working with Alto at the expense of the rights of the people of Terrebonne?

Lawful Access Act, 2026

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I was rather pleased when I reviewed Bill C-22, because I think it is better than what was proposed in Bill C-2 last year. However, I am not sure that it meets all of the necessary conditions for it to come into force.

It will come as no surprise that the Bloc Québécois is also not sure whether this bill should come into force. Honestly, I cannot tell my colleagues this morning what position the Bloc will take when it comes time to vote. We are still thinking about it and taking into consideration the comments, suggestions and criticisms we are hearing from civil society and others. While many people recognize the merits of many of the provisions of Bill C-22, others are concerned about other aspects of the bill.

This weekend, I read a New York Times article that a colleague sent to me about a recently developed software program that can hack into the databases of banks, governments and businesses. This software or AI could be put up for sale and sold to the highest bidder. We learned about this a few weeks ago, and the situation is constantly evolving, day by day.

Access to personal information is a major issue. It may well be the most important issue that this honourable House will have to address during the 45th Parliament. However, at this point, there is not a lot of data available to us. As I said, the situation is evolving day by day. What seemed impossible six months ago has now been a reality for months, and we are now grappling with what has existed for just a few weeks. Needless to say, we have no idea what will exist in six months or a year.

Despite all that, we are about to pass a bill that purports to regulate what will happen in six months, a year or 10 years. It is going to be quite difficult to draft a bill that includes sufficient measures to protect the entire population against various problems. It will also need to include sufficient regulations to protect individuals' right to privacy and all the rights recognized by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In saying all of that, I still have not really said anything; I know that and I am fully aware of it. However, I want everyone to recognize the gravity of the situation, the importance of this bill and our lack of tools in the face of all the objections that are being raised.

In this context, we must keep a watchful eye on the process we are about to implement. I am thinking in particular of the National Security and Intelligence Review Agency. That agency is a good thing. However, when I read the bill, I noted that the agency will only receive unredacted reports after the redacted reports are tabled. That means decisions will be made and regulations will be adopted by the government without the House having a say and without the agency, the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner and all the other organizations that exist to protect people's rights and freedoms being able to look at them.

Will we not end up making matters worse? I am not saying that is the case, but I would say it is one of our main concerns regarding Bill C-22. Part 3 stipulates that Bill C-22 must be studied in committee and reviewed after three years. That is good news. The question is whether a review after three years is sufficient, given how quickly these situations evolve. I am not convinced that it is. If Bill C-22 is referred to committee, this is something that will need to be examined. Will the government be open enough to discussing the matter with the opposition parties and agree on a safeguard mechanism that is sufficiently well defined? That is the question.

I just want to digress for a moment. Today, by-elections are being held in three ridings, two in Toronto and the other in the riding of Terrebonne, Quebec. What will the results of those by-elections be? I do not want to make any assumptions and no one has a crystal ball, but one thing is certain: The situation of the current government, which until now has been a minority government, could be very different as of tomorrow. What impact will that have on the safeguards that we are working on? Will the government still be as open to their political opponents when they are in a minority situation as it was when they had the upper hand over the government? I do not know.

Until now, one committee member, regardless of their party affiliation, could tip the balance one way or the other, since the committees are often, although not always, made up of a Liberal chair, with four Liberals on one side, four Conservatives on the other and a Bloc member. That means that the Bloc member could hold the balance of power in committee and could decide between the Liberals' position and the Conservatives' position. Will this situation continue after tomorrow, once the by-elections are over and we know the results? I do not know.

I do not recall whether it was in the news today or yesterday, but I have to say that I was pleased to read that, according to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, the government would continue to work closely with the opposition, or at least respect the positions taken by the opposition, and that this would continue. I appreciated that openness. I just hope that that is what will actually happen, because if we end up with a majority government that plans to ignore the positions advocated by the opposition parties, then the situation could become very troubling, especially since we have already passed bills such as Bill C-15, which, in my humble opinion, granted the government excessive powers, and we have before us today Bill C-22, which could be similar in nature.

Is it wise to pass Bill C-22? Perhaps, perhaps not. As I was saying, there are some positive aspects. We need to address the issue of access to information. I understand that we need to get up to speed with what is being done elsewhere in the world. That is an argument that has come up a few times. However, when we take a closer look, it is not necessarily clear that Canada is in such a bad position compared to what is being done in the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom or elsewhere in the world. We therefore need to examine this closely. Would Bill C-22 not put us in a position that is abusive—or at the very least excessive—compared to what is being done elsewhere? That may or may not be the case.

One thing is certain: No matter what side of the fine line we stand on, mechanisms for protecting every person's rights and freedoms are vital. In my opinion, Bill C‑22 does not place a high priority on that.

The powers conferred on the agency, which I believe are largely cosmetic at this point, require careful examination. It might be nice to see words like “protection agency” in the bill, but in reality, if this agency is informed of what was done—right or wrong—only after the fact, what can it really do besides say that it would have disagreed had it been consulted? A fat lot of good that will do.

It might be a good idea to do the review before things happen, not after. The regulations that will be made should be examined, if not by the House as a whole, then at least by independent agencies responsible for protecting the rights of all citizens. I think these issues deserve to be studied.

The bill also sets a threshold of “reasonable grounds to suspect,” rather than “reasonable grounds to believe”, which would need to be met before certain investigations can be authorized. This distinction may seem semantic, but it is actually quite significant, since “reasonable grounds to suspect” represents a significantly lower threshold than “reasonable grounds to believe.” Granting investigative powers based on mere suspicion could amount to a blank check. The threshold for “reasonable grounds to believe” was already relatively low. Lowering it further is cause for concern. If the bill is considered in committee, I look forward to hearing what organizations responsible for protecting rights and freedoms have to say about this. For my part, I find this issue troubling.

The Intelligence Commissioner's approval of regulations is also an important factor. However, will the commissioner be allowed to intervene at an early stage? A veto power might be excessive, but at the very least, the authority to observe, critique and make recommendations would be essential. However, I do not believe that the current version of Bill C-22 offers much hope in this regard.

In my view, both the agency and the Intelligence Commissioner, which are essentially the only two independent bodies with the power to reassure the public and protect each individual's rights and freedoms, should be consulted before decisions are made to avoid jeopardizing everyone's rights and freedoms.

Personally, I have nothing to hide. However, the idea that the authorities might be able to access my emails or financial information strikes me as intrusive and makes me feel uncomfortable and unsafe. No one is completely comfortable with that level of surveillance. Everyone is concerned about an Orwellian dictator, even though some say that we reached that point some time ago and that we have to stop being afraid of that. That may be true, but Bill C-22 proposes giving such a dictator even more power, which may alarm many.

We need to focus on how we are going to protect individual rights and freedoms. We all know that our lives are already quite public. Almost everyone is on social media in one way or another. These platforms contain a lot of information that would otherwise be personal and confidential. Every individual chooses to post pictures, text or documents on those social networks. They choose that kind of exposure, and that is perfectly fine. I understand that.

Bill C-22 goes even further, however. When we start talking about banking information, emails, and all that, it becomes a cause for concern. Although I believe that law enforcement and government agencies must be given the means to protect us from malicious intrusions by foreign agents or organized crime, or from all kinds of attacks that may be launched against our bank accounts or other assets, and although I believe that the government must take measures to protect us from this, I also believe that the government must take steps to ensure that, in doing so, it does not infringe on our right to privacy. This is the fine and delicate balance we are currently trying to strike: the balance between protecting ourselves from organized crime and foreign interference and protecting ourselves from potentially abusive intrusions into our privacy without any safeguards in place.

I would also like to hear from the Ethics Commissioner. We will see what he has to say if the bill is referred to committee. The Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner, the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service are all institutions that must take a close look at Bill C‑22. While it may be an improvement over, or more acceptable than, Bill C‑2, Bill C‑22 is nonetheless questionable and troubling. It must be examined thoroughly. I will leave it at that and say that we in the Bloc Québécois are continuing our reflection in the hope that we will be able to find a sound position to take on these serious issues.

Putting of Questions

[The Speaker, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I am trying to read a statement, so the Chair requests respect. I do not want to have to ask a member to leave.

I will start again from the top.

To preserve its impartiality, the Chair must intercede as little as possible and, whenever it can, be guided by the will of the House.

Two recent events have put these limits to the test. On Friday, February 13, 2026, when the question was put on one of the report stage motions for Bill C‑14, by the Assistant Deputy Speaker, members did not indicate if the question should be carried or negatived, nor did anyone ask for a recorded vote. In this unusual situation, the Assistant Deputy Speaker relied on a relevant precedent from the United Kingdom and declared the motion negatived. Then, on Thursday, February 26, during the putting of the question on the motion to read Bill C‑15 a third time, the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands, who is not a member of a recognized party, asked the Chair for a recorded division. The Chair reminded the member that she could not make such a request, as this ability is reserved for members of recognized parties, under Standing Order 45(1).

That provision of the Standing Orders has been in effect since June 2023 and stems from changes the House has made to its procedures since September 2020, including an end to the practice of calling for “yeas” and “nays”. Prior to that change, any five members could rise to ask for a recorded vote further to the Chair's assessment of the result of the voice vote. Members could also indicate that a question be carried “on division” to denote that the matter was not decided unanimously, without resorting to a recorded vote.

That provision also states fairly clearly the options available to the House, as follows:

When a question is put on a motion, any member participating in person may ask that the motion be carried or carried on division. Any member of a recognized party participating in person may ask that the “yeas” and “nays” be entered in the Journals.

In other words, any single member of a recognized party can trigger a recorded vote. The provision continues:

A request for a recorded division shall take precedence over a request for adoption.

However, as we discovered on February 13, the Standing Orders in current practice are silent on what can happen if the House chooses none of the options on offer. Moreover, the Standing Orders do not seem to offer a way to negative a motion other than by recorded division. Some clarifications are in order.

If the House remains silent or if only one request to negative a motion is made, on or without division—that is, if no member clearly asks that the motion be carried—the Chair will declare the motion negatived.

Conversely, and to be clear, if the Chair hears requests to both negative and carry a matter, in the absence of a request for a recorded division, the Chair would have no alternative but to declare the motion carried, consistent with the options set out in Standing Order 45(1).

A member of a recognized party may still request a recorded division, which would take precedence over any other request. In all these circumstances, the requests must, of course, come from members participating in person.

Note also that members of unrecognized parties and independent members cannot request a recorded division. This is a rule that the House has given itself. It is, of course, the prerogative of the House to change this rule if it sees fit.

The Chair hopes that these clarifying remarks will guide members when questions are put in the future. I thank all members for their attention.

Rail Transportation

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the people of Terrebonne are worried about expropriation for the high-speed rail project, and they are right to worry, because in Bill C-15, the Liberals weakened the Expropriation Act specifically to limit the rights of property owners along the rail alignment. The mayor of Terrebonne is calling for real consultations. The Lanaudière chapter of the Union des producteurs agricoles is afraid that our best farmland will be cut in half and then abandoned. Everyone is worried.

Why are the Liberals making expropriation easier and treating the people of Terrebonne like second-class citizens instead of working to earn social licence?

Financial Institutions

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, in her short time as a member of Parliament, the member is making outstanding contributions on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. She is doing great work in the constituency, she brings great experience as a former town councillor, and importantly, as a lawyer, she stood up for women who had been abused in domestic relationships.

The member points to Bill C-15. Of course, its main focus is the economy, but within that bill is a focus also on open banking. The autonomy provided by open banking can help women experiencing violence in relationships. It is another way that we are showing support for people across communities and especially vulnerable populations. We will continue to do that.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, earlier this week, I was proud to stand alongside my colleagues on this side of the House to vote in favour of Bill C-15. In addition to unlocking generational investments to help build a strong, modern, resilient Canadian economy, Bill C-15 contains important measures to make life more affordable for Canadians, including measures to advance open banking.

Can the parliamentary secretary let us know how open banking reforms would allow Canadians to securely share financial data and give consumers clearer choices and better tools to manage their finances?

Business of the House

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, on this side of the House, I cannot think of anyone better or anyone who listens more attentively and regularly to farmers than the current Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food. The minister, I know, will be continuing his extremely hard work in representing their interests and reassuring them about the coming planting and growing season on the Prairies. We are going to absolutely look after our farmers from coast to coast to coast, including those very hard-working farmers on the Prairies. We will, of course, be addressing this issue as we return to Parliament after the break week next week, when members will be in their constituencies serving their constituents.

This afternoon, however, we will resume debate at third reading of Bill C‑15, budget 2025 implementation act.

Tomorrow, we will begin debate at second reading of Bill S‑2, with respect to new registration entitlements.

When we return from our constituency week on Monday, March 9, we will consider Bill C-20, the Build Canada Homes act, at second reading, and on Tuesday and Wednesday, we will consider Bill C-13, an act to implement the protocol on the accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, and Bill C-18, which would implement the comprehensive economic partnership agreement between Canada and Indonesia.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I wish you and your constituents a very good constituency week.

Finance

[Stéphane Lauzon, Liberal, Argenteuil—La Petite-Nation, QC]

Mr. Speaker, budget 2025 and its accompanying budget implementation act are a bold plan to respond to unprecedented economic uncertainty with a speed, scope and scale not seen in generations. I am pleased to see that the House is also responding at this crucial time with the same sense of urgency. Earlier this week, the Standing Committee on Finance completed its clause-by-clause review of Bill C‑15, which we voted on last night.

Can the Minister of Finance remind us exactly what we voted on?

Rail Transportation

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Ottawa promised to apologize to the expropriated residents of Mirabel, but it also promised to never again carry out abusive expropriations.

In Bill C-15, the Liberals, with help from the Conservatives, are giving Alto exceptional expropriation powers for the high-speed train. They are doing away with the right to be heard by a hearing officer. They are doing away with community impact studies. They are preventing a farmer who has suffered a disaster from rebuilding. There is not a single other citizen in Canada who is subject to this.

Why are the people from the north shore being treated like second-class citizens by the federal government?

Ministerial Powers

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

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House to table two petitions.

The first is from citizens who are concerned about potential abuses of power by cabinet. Proposed section 12 in part 2, division 5 of Bill C-15 permits ministers to exempt entities, meaning companies, from the application of any act of Parliament apart from the Criminal Code.

These citizens are of the opinion that such unlimited, unrestricted and undefined power could undermine core protections established by laws related to the environment, public procurement and competition. They are therefore calling on the government to reconsider proposed section 12 in Bill C-15 to prevent such abuse of power by ministers.

Finance

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the report of the legislative committee on Bill C-15, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on November 4, 2025.

The committee has studied the bill and has decided to report the bill back to the House with amendments.

Build Canada Homes Act

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

Madam Speaker, today, we are discussing Bill C-20, which seeks to establish Build Canada Homes as a Crown corporation to build affordable housing. Obviously, the Bloc Québécois is in favour of that.

The budget, which is currently being debated as part of Bill C-15, provides for $13 billion over the next four years, until 2030, and gives the government and the Crown corporation the power to build so-called affordable homes.

For several years now, we have been experiencing a major housing crisis. The Bloc Québécois is pleased that the government and the minister, whom I commend, are taking steps to expedite efforts to build affordable housing, but why are we in the midst of a housing crisis to begin with? Why are young people no longer able to buy a home, since prices have skyrocketed in recent years? Why are people who are struggling to make ends meet no longer able to find a place to rent? Why are they no longer able to move, to find a new place to live at a price that does not force them to make sacrifices when it comes to putting food on the table or buying other basic necessities?

That is the housing crisis we are facing today. I must remind the House that the housing crisis was caused, in part, by Justin Trudeau's government, in other words, by the Liberals sitting here today, through the Century Initiative, which planned to increase Canada's population to 100 million people by the end of the century. The immigration floodgates were opened. The Bloc Québécois supports immigration, but the government must ensure it can meet its ambitious goals. Increasing immigration to such a level, which no other OECD country has done in terms of immigration, was very risky. Neither McKinsey nor the government even thought about implementing measures to support this sudden spike in immigration. Such support would include schools and hospitals and, of course, housing. That played a major part in the situation we are now in.

Of course, one of the problems related to the housing crisis concerns the financialization of housing. Rather than investing in shares in companies that produce goods and services and then receiving a portion of the profits, some people are relying on the housing market's tendency to rise in value and buying a condo or house without necessarily intending to reside there, but rather to put it back on the market in a few years and make a profit. This is another major problem. Justin Trudeau's government and his finance minister Chrystia Freeland put a few measures in place to mitigate that. For example, there was the anti-flipping measure, which required a certain amount of time to pass before someone who bought a house could resell it. There was that too. There is also the fact that a lot of people are living in increasingly larger spaces, which leaves less space available, in terms of housing stock, for people who need it.

Now the government is putting its shoulder to the wheel and finally making a major effort, which we applaud. It is going to invest $13 billion over the next four years, with the possibility of more to come later on.

Housing essentially falls under the jurisdiction of the provinces and Quebec. We in the Bloc Québécois are concerned when we see that Ottawa wants to bypass the provinces and Quebec to tackle the housing issue. Yes, we are happy that the government is putting money on the table. Why is the government putting money on the table? It is because it can afford to do so. Why can it afford to do so? It is because of the fiscal imbalance, which is thoroughly documented in the Parliamentary Budget Officer's annual reports. These reports point out that, when taxpayers pay their taxes, about half of the revenue goes to the federal government while the other half stays in the provinces. However, the expenses that the provinces have to cover in order to deliver services in areas under their jurisdiction, such as education, health care, roads and so on, are much higher than those incurred by the federal government in meeting its responsibilities, which essentially consist of transferring funds to either the provinces or to individuals. Examples include EI and OAS. The federal government has fewer exclusive jurisdictions. National defence is one, although the government made a significant shift in this area in its most recent budget. The fiscal imbalance means that Ottawa does have some flexibility, as documented every year by the Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer.

The government sees the crisis that it helped to create, and it is saying that it will do its part and take decisive action. We welcome this gesture, but we are concerned about jurisdiction. Why? Up until the late 1980s, there used to be many partnerships between Quebec and Ottawa in the area of social housing, such as low-income housing, for example. Then, all of a sudden, the federal government decided that it was no longer interested and was abandoning the whole thing. All of a sudden, Ottawa, which had been involved in an area of provincial jurisdiction, changed its policy and left people in poverty. In other parts of Canada, this was a real disaster, a real dismantling of social and affordable housing. In Quebec, because we care, we decided that we could not let that happen. The Government of Quebec came to the rescue and saved the day by taking over the federal government's share. Then a few decades went by without Ottawa putting any money back into social housing, and that was a serious problem.

Over the past 10 years, under Justin Trudeau, there has been a renewed focus on affordable housing, and even some social housing programs, which we welcomed. However, it has been a pittance given the housing shortage and skyrocketing housing costs. That is our concern.

Now, all of a sudden, Ottawa is getting on board and creating a Crown corporation. It is putting money in the budget that will be transferred to the new Crown corporation. Yes, but what will happen in four years, six years, eight years, ten years? Will organizations and people who want to submit projects then have to go to the federal government, continue to work with the SHQ or turn to the Quebec government? We shall see, and I will come back to that since it is not specified in Bill C‑20, which establishes the Crown corporation.

However, an agreement, a memorandum of understanding, was signed between Quebec and Ottawa in that regard. We need access to that document, but we do not have it. Why? This is not unusual. Ottawa waits until it has signed agreements with all of the provinces before disclosing the content of those agreements. Why? The reason is that, often, Quebec manages to negotiate a little more autonomy than the other provinces, and Ottawa does not want the other provinces to follow Quebec's lead. That is why Ottawa generally tends to sign agreements with Quebec last. However, in this case, it seems that the federal government was in a rush to reach an agreement. The agreement was signed and my riding neighbour, Caroline Proulx, the Quebec housing minister, praised this agreement and said that the MOU respected Quebec's areas of jurisdiction. We find that reassuring and it encourages us to support the principle of this bill, but, obviously, we will have to look at the specifics of the MOU.

Bill C-20, however, leaves much to be desired. The bill establishes the Crown corporation and gives it a plethora of possible tools. The corporation can do great things, but the House has no control over it. The Crown corporation and the government have a great deal of power to develop affordable housing, but, after that, there is no accountability.

For example, the government's definition of affordable housing can be found on the website for Build Canada Homes, which was initially mistranslated in French as “Bâtir Maisons Canada”. That definition states that affordable housing should cost 30% of the median income of the neighbourhood or region, so we are not talking about an individual's ability to pay. A person living in poverty has an income below the median income of their neighbourhood. This is completely different from social housing, which is based on ability to pay and is set at 30% of the income of the person or household living in the dwelling, rather than on the median income of the neighbourhood. Meanwhile, this definition is nowhere to be found in Bill C-20. It is only found on the Build Canada Homes website, not in the legislation.

If we can trust the government when it says that it will build affordable housing, then that is great. However, the bill provides no guarantee that the housing will actually be affordable. We have no guarantee that any of the funding will go to social housing. That is really worrying.

Social housing, whether it is co-operatives, low-income housing or housing from other organizations, is based on the ability of households, as I was saying, of individuals, to pay based on their income. That is what we need to focus on. Bill C‑20, the Build Canada Homes act, allows for that. However, if Build Canada Homes did not build any social housing at all, it would still be within its framework or mission. That is a serious concern.

The same is true for energy efficiency standards, for example. The government says it needs to make an effort to fight climate change and set higher standards. That is set out in a document online stating that, yes, efforts must be made in that direction, but it is not in the bill and it is not in the mission. Build Canada Homes is not required to ensure that environmental standards are in place for the projects it will support.

Once again, we are supposed to just trust the government. Once Bill C‑15, the budget implementation bill, is passed, the government and the Crown corporation will no longer be accountable to the House. We are being asked to trust the government, and this raises concerns.

It is the same thing with local materials. Obviously, when people buy two-by-fours or two-by-sixes, they do not import them from the U.S. or Europe. We make enough of those products here in Canada. However, the government has said that people need to maximize local benefits, make efforts to ensure that the materials purchased are produced locally and drive Canada's economy. That is all well and good, and we welcome that. However, that is also in a schedule that is neither on the website, nor in the bill. The government has made a commitment, but what kind of accountability mechanisms will there be? Once again, it is not within the Crown corporation's mission, and it is not in the bill. We have to trust the government, which will not be required to keep its commitments afterwards.

I was a member of the Standing Committee on Finance prior to the last election. The committee heard from the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation, or CMHC. In fact, the committee heard from a great CMHC economist who had done the study the committee was discussing. He told the committee that at the rate things were going with the Century Initiative, which was a major factor, rents and home prices were going to double between 2019, the base year he was using, and 2030. That is deeply concerning.

When CMHC officials appeared before the committee, they presented some tables that the committee had requested showing the various CMHC affordable housing programs. The committee found that standardizing programs, such as the rapid housing initiative, ensured each province and each territory received its fair share on a per capita basis. Quebec would receive its share. As for the rest of the programs that were not standardized, Quebec did not receive its fair share.

Again, the Build Canada Homes website states that the government would aim for regional fairness, but this is not in the bill. What does regional fairness mean? There are no standards or obligations. Build Canada Homes will not be required to say that each province will have its share. What we have learned over the past years is that when this standard is not included, Quebec does not get its share. This is a matter of great concern for us. It is a question of fairness. When there is no standard, Quebec does not get its share. There is no standard here. I will say it again: We have some real concerns.

As I said a few moments ago, Build Canada Homes is structurally very flexible. It allows for partnerships, it allows for funding to be transferred directly to the provinces, and so on. Build Canada Homes has considerable latitude to do great things. However, depending on the government's goodwill, it also makes it possible for housing projects intended for social housing or transitional housing to be converted into housing projects that would not really be affordable. There are no restrictions in this regard. That is obviously a serious concern.

Yes, the government said so. Yes, it was in the presentations last fall. Yes, the Build Canada Homes website says there will be money for transitional housing for people trying to get out of homelessness. The government says that funds will be allocated and that there will be partnerships with the provinces. That is what we want, so we welcome that. There will be opportunities to fund co-ops, social housing and low-income housing. We welcome that, too. However, there are no guarantees in this bill, so that is a concern.

I would like to mention a tenant advocacy organization in Quebec, the Front d'action populaire en réaménagement urbain, or FRAPRU, which is located in Montreal. After reading an interview published by The Canadian Press on February 7, members of FRAPRU publicly expressed their concern that Build Canada Homes could be used to financialize housing. They said, and I quote, “The cat is out of the bag. After promising to build affordable housing through Build Canada Homes, the...government's new strategy is becoming clear. Build Canada Homes will be nothing more than an investment bank”.

These people, who are on the ground fighting for tenants' rights so that we have social housing and so that people can live with dignity, had a lot more to say. Given what the minister has said in media interviews, FRAPRU is now concerned because the Build Canada Homes tool box comes with financial levers that the government can use to have the private sector develop housing. Some of that housing could be considered affordable, but there are no guarantees. Organizations like FRAPRU believe that this will undermine the mission of Build Canada Homes.

Are we talking about projects where support or subsidies will be granted to construction companies or real estate developers to build more housing, or will the spirit of the bill truly prevail, meaning that more affordable housing will be built? Supply and demand dictates that if there is more housing overall, prices will tend to fall. However, the members of the Bloc Québécois are asking for more than that, as is FRAPRU.

We do not just want more housing. We want more truly affordable housing, which ideally means more social housing. We would have liked to see a guarantees regarding social housing in this bill. We would have liked to see guarantees for local purchasing in construction and for environmental standards. We would have liked to see guarantees for transitional housing to lift people out of homelessness. We would have liked to see a standard that ensures fairness between the provinces to make sure that Quebec gets its fair share.

As I said at the beginning of my speech, Ottawa has a record of doing some great things on social housing, but overnight, the government changed priorities and left things in a state of ruin. Quebec had to step in to clean things up, and I am genuinely concerned that with the latest intrusion into an area that falls under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces, the same thing will happen in a few years' time. When this issue is no longer fashionable, when it is no longer in vogue, the government will slash the whole program, and Quebec will once again have to pick up the pieces and go back to the drawing board.

If my party has to vote on the bill as it stands, we would have some reservations. We support the principle of social housing, but the bill falls far short of the government's commitments. There are far fewer guarantees. We are not prepared to sign a blank cheque for the government and say we trust it and we know it will do a great job. We will not do that because we want the government to be held accountable. We want guarantees to ensure that taxpayer dollars, money from the people we represent, is invested properly and is not diverted. In the meantime, we remain extremely concerned.

However, Ottawa has signed a memorandum of understanding with Quebec. As I said, Quebec was the first province to sign on, which is quite rare and exceptional. Caroline Proulx, the minister in Quebec City, and my friend, whom I wish to acknowledge, noted in a press release that “the agreement announced today is a major step forward in housing. It is significant and fully respects Quebec's jurisdiction, priorities, and legislative framework.” This gives us enough assurance, even though we have not yet seen the document, to say that we will support the bill at this stage. I have no doubt the committee will find ways to improve it. We will work on that. We also really need to have access to the text of the agreement to make sure Ottawa fully complies with all of the Quebec government's priorities.

In closing, I would just like to remind the House that the bill gives the Crown corporation Build Canada Homes the status of agent of the Crown, which gives it the powers of the government, including the power to expropriate land, the power to avoid paying municipal taxes and the power to get around Quebec's laws and municipal bylaws. We were told that this was not the government's intention and that the issue will be corrected in the agreement, but we are keeping an eye on that.

Government Accountability

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition that I would like to table on behalf of Canadians who are concerned about Bill C-15 and the powers contained in that bill that would give the government the power to override any of its laws, other than the Criminal Code, at the discretion of a minister. The petitioners think that this is an unreasonable overreach of government power that could exempt an individual or a company from any law, including the Conflict of Interest Act. The petitioners are concerned about this, and I am happy to table their petition.

[Sandra Cobena, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to table petitions from Canadians who are deeply concerned by the sweeping powers contained within Bill C-15.

The petitioners warn that this provision would allow ministers to exempt any individual or corporation from any federal law, except for the Criminal Code, without full public or parliamentary scrutiny. They believe it undermines the foundational principle of our democracy, which is that laws are made, amended and set aside by Parliament, not by unilateral executive decision. These Canadians support innovation and economic growth, but they are clear that flexibility must never come at the expense of transparency, accountability and the rule of law.

The petitioners, therefore, call on the Government of Canada to remove or significantly limit these sweeping powers to ensure proper parliamentary oversight to guarantee that no authority is placed above the law. I am honoured to present these petitions on their behalf.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to present a petition from constituents from Edmonton West and across the country regarding the government's provisions in Bill C-15 that would grant individual cabinet ministers sweeping powers to secretly exempt companies or individuals from federal laws. If anyone saw the operations committee the other day with the performance of the President of the Treasury Board, they would see why we cannot give such sweeping powers to ministers.

The signatories ask that the government immediately remove any provisions that allow cabinet ministers to exempt companies or individuals from federal laws.

Proceedings on Bill C-15

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, there have been discussions among the parties, and if you seek it, I believe you will find unanimous consent for the following motion:

That, notwithstanding any standing order or usual practice of the House, Bill C-15, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on November 4, 2025, be disposed of as follows:

(a) it be an instruction to the Standing Committee on Finance that, during its consideration of the bill:

(i) the committee shall have the first priority for the use of House resources for committee meetings,

(ii) all amendments for clause-by-clause consideration of the bill be submitted to the clerk of the committee in both official languages no later than noon on Thursday, February 19, 2026,

(iii) the clerk of the committee write immediately to each member who is not a member of a caucus represented on the committee and any independent members to inform them of the study of the bill by the committee and to invite them to prepare and submit any proposed amendments to the bill, and that these amendments shall be deemed proposed during clause-by-clause consideration of the bill,

(iv) the Chair of the committee write as promptly as possible to the chairs of the standing committees who have chosen to consider the subject matter of the provisions in the bill to inform them that any recommendations or suggested amendments be sent to the Chair of the Standing Committee on Finance no later than noon Thursday, February 19, 2026,

(v) the committee proceed to clause-by-clause consideration of the bill no later than Monday, February 23, 2026 at 11:00 a.m.,

(vi) if the committee has not completed the clause-by-clause consideration of the bill by 5:00 p.m. on Monday, February 23, 2026, all remaining amendments submitted to the committee shall be deemed moved, the Chair shall put the question, forthwith and successively, without further debate on all remaining clauses and proposed amendments as well as each and every question necessary to dispose of clause-by-clause consideration of the bill,

(vii) the Chair shall report the bill to the House no later than Wednesday February 25, 2026;

(b) the bill may be taken up at report stage at the next sitting following the completion of the provisions of subparagraph (a)(vii) of this order; and

(c) the motion for third reading of the bill may be made in the same sitting during which the said bill has been concurred in at report stage.

Employment

[Karim Bardeesy, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to be associated with a government whose record on jobs is very strong. Jobs are growing faster here than even in the United States, and incomes are growing faster than inflation.

The next part of our plan, the budget implementation act via Bill C-15, is before Parliament right now. The hon. member opposite can work with his colleagues and work with us to ensure speedy passage of the bill in order to forward the major projects the member is talking about and the economic growth that is behind the bill.

Motions in Amendment

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

Mr. Speaker, unfortunately, it is true that both the government side and the official opposition side sometimes tend to equate the time spent studying a bill with wasted time. In some cases, they seem to see them as one and the same. If we spend a lot of time studying a bill, that is seen as filibustering. However, the reason we spend a lot of time studying matters like Bill C-15, which is about 630 pages long, is clearly that it involves a lot of work—all the more reason to refer it to several committees. Should that be considered filibustering? I do not think so.

Similarly, when the Conservatives debate a Bloc Québécois amendment on hate speech over several sittings, maybe we could call them out for filibustering, although it is not something I think we should do systematically. To say that the time we spend debating something in the House is filibustering is a bit of an insult to the work of parliamentarians.

Housing

[Caroline Desrochers, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Housing and Infrastructure]

Mr. Speaker, we know that young Canadians are struggling right now because of the cost of living and the cost of rent.

The good news is that Build Canada Homes is already delivering results. We took action in the first 100 days. We have reached major agreements with provinces and municipalities, and there are projects that are currently under review. However, these projects will not move forward unless the opposition supports Bill C-15 on the budget and on Build Canada Homes.

We need their co-operation. If they truly want to be there for their constituents, they will stand up and vote with us.

[Leslie Church, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Secretaries of State for Labour]

Mr. Speaker, I wish the Conservatives knew more about construction, but it seems what they know about is obstruction.

If these Conservatives cared about building homes for young Canadians, they would pass the two bills we have before the House right now. They would pass the budget implementation act and they would pass the Build Canada Homes act, because those are the tools that are getting shovels in the ground right across Canada for the next generation of young Canadians who need affordable homes.

The Budget

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will try to watch the clock carefully, because I cannot possibly take apart even the so-called conditions that are found in proposed paragraphs 12(3)(a) through 12(3)(e) at page 301 of the bill. They are highly discretionary.

The bill would do no such thing as create guardrails; it may create small children waving by the side of the road. It is not a piece of legislation that is well drafted, nor are any of these terms defined, including “public interest” and “regulatory sandbox”. The minister would be allowed to work within their own discretion. Furthermore, the transparency could be as much as a year after the exemption has been granted saying that a federal law does not have to be obeyed.

I would prefer better drafting. I urge the government to amend Bill C-15. If it means what the government has its Treasury Board Secretariat say in committee, it ought to have drafted it to say so.

[Claude Guay, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, as our economy pivots and modernizes, it is important to appreciate the fact that existing regulations may not fit the needs of new and emerging technologies. This can cause significant delays or even stop new products or services from entering the Canadian marketplace. Doing so can hamper Canadian entrepreneurship and innovation, reduce competition and make life less affordable for Canadians.

That is why, in order to help regulation keep pace with innovation, our government committed in budget 2025 to expanding the use of regulatory sandboxes through amendments to the Red Tape Reduction Act. As members know, regulatory sandboxes are commonly used devices that permit a new product or service to be tested in the marketplace under a temporary set of rules and controlled by regulatory supervision. This can help regulators safely decide whether to make any permanent regulatory changes to how that product or service should be regulated.

Our government is of the view that regulatory sandboxes would help support economic growth, reduce red tape, and improve Canada's investment environment by permitting new products and new technologies to get to market in a safe and efficient manner.

However, the concerns raised by the member opposite are valid. I would like to reassure my hon. colleague that it would not be the wild west; there would be guardrails in place. Indeed, the government has included safeguards in both the legislation and supporting policy to ensure that regulatory sandboxes would be used responsibly and consistently across the government. Our goal is to protect the economy, the environment and the welfare of Canadians in the use of regulatory sandboxes.

Bill C-15 would not allow ministers to exempt any person or business from any federal law for broad policy purposes. For example, the legislation includes several safeguards, including providing clear time limits for exemption; requiring exemptions be in the public interest; requiring that public health, public safety and the environment be protected; and limiting exemption to individual entities. Exempting entire sectors of an industry or fast-tracking an entire major project is not within the scope.

The legislation also includes explicit transparency and accountability requirements that would allow for continued oversight and prevent executive overreach. The minister would have to publish exception orders and an explanation of the decision-making process, while protecting confidential business information as required by law.

Furthermore, the President of the Treasury Board would have to table an annual report in Parliament listing all exemption orders issued in the previous fiscal year, the rationale for each, and the ministers responsible. This oversight mechanism would ensure that Parliament is informed and able to scrutinize the use of these authorities.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the late show has never come so early.

I am rising tonight to raise an issue that I initially put before the House on December 9, 2025. I am rather proud of the fact that I seem to have been the first member of Parliament to have put this on the public record. Hopefully people noticed, and yes, there is a growing coalition who wants to raise awareness of the issue I first raised here on December 9. It is division 5 within the omnibus budget bill, Bill C-15, which, at over 600 pages, takes a while to read, get through and study.

I want to categorically put it on the record right now that I see no sign that the Conservatives are filibustering Bill C-15, the omnibus budget bill. It takes a while to study a budget implementation act of over 600 pages. I also believe that since the bill was put up for first reading on November 18, there is no sign of delay since the House, by unanimous consent with my objection, adjourned a day early on December 11. We have only been back a little while, and 600 pages plus changing 20 different laws takes some time.

I maintain, as I did on December 9, that the most egregious section of the bill is the one that says that a minister can, on personal discretion, deciding it is in the public interest, exempt the application of any Canadian law, except the Criminal Code, from application within their area of jurisdiction and that they will make this public not immediately, not soon, but according to the act, as soon as it is feasible, with no time limit on that.

Since the time that people have become alarmed about this, there has been testimony before committee. Because, as we just did, we passed Bill C-15 on division at second reading, we did not have a recorded vote, which is why I have not been able to state on the record that I cannot possibly vote for the budget implementation act as currently drafted with the sections found in division 5.

Since then, because it did pass on division at second reading, it has gone to the finance committee and other committees for study. I found it interesting, in going over the witnesses put forward, the ways in which the Liberals are trying to justify this extraordinary power grab by individual ministers to exempt any entity from the operation of any Canadian law except for the Criminal Code.

The defence of this provision first started with the response by the hon. Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Finance, who answered and said that because “Canada has world-class innovators and entrepreneurs,” we need to build the strongest economy and “we are reducing red tape”, because division 5 of Bill C-15 is to amend the Red Tape Reduction Act. The hon. parliamentary secretary continued, “As part of this process, we are reducing red tape to broaden the use of something called regulatory sandboxes to help foster and spur research...and innovation.”

Since that time, the concept of regulatory sandboxes has been expanded upon by the witnesses from the Treasury Board before the committee. The witnesses put forward that there were “misconceptions in the public domain”, and they wanted to explain all that because what they said to the committee was that regulatory sandboxes are a “well-established governmental tool” to allow the testing of innovative products.

Where does this well-established governmental tool come from and where is it defined? Even after going back to amend the Red Tape Reduction Act, Bill C-15 does not include any definition of “regulatory sandbox”—

Employment

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L’Érable—Lotbinière, QC]

Madam Speaker, we see their plan. We know how they plan to get Bill C-15 adopted. They are the ones who proposed the deadline. They are the ones who proposed the schedule and they are accusing us of obstruction. That is ridiculous.

What has really happened since they got here? Some $58 billion in investments have left Canada for the United States, including the Brookfield headquarters. What a coincidence. Some 51,000 manufacturing jobs were lost last year.

Will the Prime Minister support our bill on Canadian sovereignty to reward those who build our economy, instead of remaining passive and making things up while our jobs are moving to the United States?

[Leslie Church, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Secretaries of State for Labour]

Madam Speaker, as my colleague noted earlier, overall employment has been up over the past 12 months and wages continue to rise. These are proof points of an economic plan that is in action, but this is not over.

The government brought forward this fall our economic plan in our budget, Bill C-15, which is before the House. It would create tens of thousands of jobs, jobs in the skilled trades. It would bring forward tax cuts that would grow our economy and increase investment. It would create major new investments in housing, in infrastructure, and in some of the largest projects this country has seen.

When will the Conservatives put those small differences aside, start cheering for Canada—

[Carlos Leitão, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry]

Madam Speaker, the strategy for addressing these issues is set out in Bill C-15. It is set out in the budget. That is our plan. It is a very broad and comprehensive plan, with many measures.

Will our Conservative colleagues do what needs to be done and support us so that we can pass the budget as quickly as possible?

Opposition Motion—Apology to Those Whose Land Was Expropriated in Mirabel

[Alexis Deschênes, Bloc, Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj, QC]

Mr. Speaker, if anything, I wish that my colleague were right and that this were all made up, because I would be less concerned for the people over there. Some mayors are now saying that they are not being consulted. That is a fact.

What does Bill C-15 do? It exempts the project from a number of protections that were enshrined in law. These are legitimate concerns, and it worries me when my colleague dismisses them out of hand because her party is in power. This tells me that they lack sensitivity, perhaps even intellectual curiosity.

[Alexis Deschênes, Bloc, Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj, QC]

Mr. Speaker, what is progress? In my opinion, that means moving forward as a society toward the common good.

Was Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau's Mirabel Airport project a step in the right direction at the end of the 1960s? No, because the plan for an airport of the future fell through, but also and especially because it was rushed. With the massive expropriations carried out by the federal government in Mirabel, leaving 10,000 people displaced, 3,000 families uprooted, and 97,000 acres of land expropriated when less than 15,000 acres were needed, the project did not lead to progress. It created human tragedies. Hastiness is not conducive to progress.

I have another example, which goes back even further. It is for my western colleagues. The Canadian Pacific Railway was also built quite quickly. Thousands of immigrants came from all over the world, and they did the work in abusive conditions, in mediocre living conditions. Fifteen thousand Chinese workers laboured on a project that ultimately injured and killed them. Six hundred people died during the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Hastiness is not conducive to progress.

When I was a journalist, I did a few news stories on the people in Mirabel whose land was expropriated to mark the 60th anniversary. I remember the testimonies I gathered, and I saw first-hand that the scars were still there. I saw that these human tragedies—when someone is uprooted from their home, when their land is taken from them, even if they are compensated afterward—leave lasting marks. It was the 1960s, a time when, in the name of progress, everything had to move so fast that no one bothered with the human beings who were in the way.

Then along comes Bill C‑5, adopted under a closure motion in June, and now Bill C‑15, which is still being debated in the House, and once again we find ourselves in a climate of haste. The high‑speed rail project has been on the table since the 1980s. This government has been in power since 2015 without making much progress on it. Now, suddenly, it has to be done, and done quickly and forcefully. Rushing as a strategy is dangerous and counterproductive.

Let us look at how this Liberal government intends to proceed with Bill C‑15. Among other things, this bill “enacts the high-speed rail network act”. To help people watching understand, it would have been possible to build high-speed rail network earlier, in the old world, before Mr. Trump and the current rush. However, certain rules had to be followed, rules that surely exist for good reason, such as ensuring that people's individual rights are protected.

What is the purpose of the high-speed rail network act? Its purpose is to speed up projects. That is the government's direction. However, when people move faster, they take more risks, and when they take more risks, the risk of injustices increases. In our constituency offices, we all receive calls from citizens who are victims of injustices, who call us because their employment insurance cheque has not arrived, because their old age pension cheque did not come in, because their passport was lost. These things happen. The public service makes mistakes; the government makes mistakes. If we decide to move even faster, we increase the chances of error. I spent 10 years in legal aid trying to correct injustices committed against citizens.

Bill C-15 allows things to move even faster, thereby increasing the risk of error. What we are essentially saying is let us take the time to do things right. Let us make sure that real progress is made, because we are in favour of the high-speed rail project. However, let us make sure that real progress is being made and that we do not create a host of human tragedies.

So what does this legislation say? It says, among other things, that Alto will not be required to get approval from the Canadian Transportation Agency. The Canadian Transportation Agency was probably useless anyway. That is probably why it was created. It was meant to be useless and slow down business. That is why, today, we no longer need the approval of the Canadian Transportation Agency. I am sure that all the people who have worked at the Canadian Transportation Agency and who were appointed to it by this government feel that they have served no purpose all these years.

When Alto submits proposals for the high-speed train route, they will be deemed approved by the agency, which raises the risk of errors and injustice.

Furthermore, Bill C-15 grants Alto significant powers in terms of expropriation and the right of first refusal to speed up construction of the high-speed rail line. How it will basically work is that land is going to be expropriated now and assessed later. Alto will be able to expropriate land within a corridor 10 kilometres wide. That seems like a lot to us. It is not playing political games to say that the people of Mirabel are concerned. It brings back memories of Mirabel in the 1960s, when 97,000 acres were expropriated when only 15 were needed.

Alto will be allowed to expropriate land now and do the environmental assessment later. Will that speed things up? Of course it will. However, what will end up happening is that after expropriation and assessment, the conclusion may be that the route should not pass through there because the impacts are too great. People will have already been expropriated, and Alto will end up with land that it does not need. This brings back memories, and that is what members on the other side do not seem to understand.

Another Liberal innovation is public hearings. Sections 9 and 10 of the Expropriation Act require the responsible minister to hold public hearings on a proposed expropriation in the event of opposition. However, Bill C‑15 will exempt Alto from holding this public hearing and will also exempt it from having to obtain the consent of cabinet in order to decide to expropriate. Will this speed things up? Of course it will. Does it increase the risk of error and injustice? Yes.

Next, there are work prohibitions. That is worth noting. Once Alto has expropriated land, it will be able to request a prohibition on work. We are concerned about this, and some citizens are concerned as well. Suppose I live in the 10‑kilometre‑wide corridor—10 kilometres is wide—and I have work to do on my property, or I need to invest in my farm business or something else. With a work prohibition, I cannot. It prevents a lot of activities from being undertaken. That is the problem with this initiative. We are told that things will be imposed and sped up, but there are people who will suffer injustices and who will be unable to take steps to develop their property.

Furthermore, apparently, all that can obviously be done by email, which it is also faster. We could use a bailiff, because when we need a serious thing done, we send in a bailiff. Once again, however, it is more complicated and more expensive, but it provides assurance that people were served their documents by hand. Here, however, people are going to receive notice of their eviction by email. That just shows how seriously we take the process.

We are very sorry to dampen the Liberals' enthusiasm for high-speed rail. We like the idea of high-speed rail too, but we cannot bring ourselves to applaud along with them and dismiss the very legitimate concerns of people on the ground, who were told the news.

We are told that consultations are in progress. What we are seeing are happy hours and immersive experiences. They tell us that they want to make it festive. It may appear that way, but the lack of sensitivity is glaring. Finally, our motion today is simply to say that things need to be done the right way to prevent human tragedies. That is how progress is achieved, and that is how we move forward as a society toward the common good.

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

Thank you Mr. Speaker. Quite often, the questions we get later on come from the people who did not listen. Then they ask us about things that we repeated about 15 times during our speech.

Before I continue, I should mention that I will be sharing my time with my esteemed colleague from Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj.

Now let us briefly discuss a few points. We know that the proposed route, even though it is not final, will result in the expropriation of land belonging to Mirabel families who, in many cases, are still affected by the brutal expropriations that took place during the construction of Mirabel Airport in 1969. We are talking about more than 3,000 families whose land was expropriated, and the government did not even use all of the expropriated land. Some are seeing their former properties taken away a second time. Most of these people had to leave the region and uproot themselves to rebuild their lives elsewhere.

Despite its direct responsibility, Ottawa has never been willing to apologize to the people of Mirabel. There have been apologies outside of Parliament, it is true. The late Marc Garneau, may he rest in peace, offered one in 2019, outside the House. However, there has never been an institutional apology from the House to those whose lives were completely turned upside down.

The government is presenting the consultation process as a gesture of courtesy. It is in no way related to citizens' grievances. The government is saying that a public consultation is under way. However, new dates are supposed to be scheduled in Mirabel. Do we have those dates yet? I do not know. If someone across the aisle has the answer, I would be very open to hearing it during questions and comments.

One of the things we have heard repeatedly in the speeches so far is that things have to move quickly. Things always have to move quickly. They have to move very quickly. That is exactly what happened in 1969. Things moved too quickly for something that was not worth it, for a project that was a blatant failure and for which we are still paying the price today. There are still families who have been affected by this.

Sometimes people tell us that all that is in the past, that it is history. We heard that when we proposed our motion on the events of October 1970 back in 2020. We heard it last week when we asked questions about the Prime Minister's speech on the Plains of Abraham. We were told that we were living in the past. What interests them are jobs, the economy, social services, Canadians' rights and so on. However, they are the ones who chose to give a speech on history. They talk about history, pick it up and dust it off when it suits them, but the last thing they want is for us to talk about it.

I asked my colleague from Saint-Jean a trick question earlier. I asked her what would happen if, in her former life as a lawyer, someone had come into her office and said he or she had been the victim of some situation or other some years back, only to have my colleague tell that person to stop living in the past and move on. She answered that she would have been disbarred. The same is true here, in this case.

There is something else we often hear as well. We are told that over the past 60 years, an entire consultation system has been built. In Quebec, there is the well-known Bureau d'audiences publiques sur l'environnement, or BAPE, which does exceptional work. A whole consultation framework has been established, which means projects can no longer simply be imposed or pushed through while ignoring people's wishes.

Let us not forget that during the last week of the parliamentary session in June—when people were suffering through a heat wave, when the bravest among them were still firing up the barbecue or heading to the pool, and when almost no one was interested in politics while we here were suffocating in our jackets and ties—we were hit by a super closure motion to ram through a bill allowing numerous laws to be suspended, including, in some cases, provisions of the Criminal Code, and giving developers the ability to sit down in a minister's office and push through a project without having to obtain the public's approval. That was Bill C‑5, which was passed with the support of the official opposition, who supported not only the bill itself, but also the super closure motion. Now we are being told that we life needs to move fast, and we are going to fast-track the need to fast-track. That is exactly what happened at that time, when political attention was at its lowest.

That is not acceptable to us. No, that does nothing to reassure us. We will certainly not take comfort in the fact that Bill C‑15, the 2025 budget implementation bill, will allow the government, and Alto by extension, to circumvent the provisions of the Expropriation Act.

It is incorrect to say that the federal law is the same as the Quebec law, because several provisions of the Quebec law, including the right to challenge and the compensation mechanism, are not the same. It is obvious that the hasty expropriations and the interprovincial nature of the project will allow Ottawa to circumvent Quebec's laws and regulations by bringing the issues under federal jurisdiction. Quebec does not have exclusive jurisdiction when the project is not entirely within its borders.

Earlier, we were told about disinformation coming from the Bloc Québécois. I heard a lot more disinformation from the other side when they claimed that the Bloc Québécois is against the high-speed train, which is a lie. Nothing could be further from the truth. Social licence for projects also means taking into account the experiences of local populations and their socio-historical relationship to the land, whether they are Quebeckers or indigenous people.

I am from Saint‑Hyacinthe, but I am rising this evening to talk about Mirabel because it concerns Quebec, and what happens in one corner of Quebec affects Quebec as a whole. Since Ottawa has given itself disproportionate powers under Bill C-5 and Bill C-15, we do not want the feds to repeat the Mirabel fiasco in other projects.

What we are doing today with our opposition day motion is not just correcting a mistake from the past, because it can never be corrected. It is not just to protect the people of Mirabel, but to protect all Quebeckers. If Ottawa was able to traumatize an entire region in 1969 without the carte blanche it now has because of Bill C-5 and will soon have because of Bill C-15, imagine what it will be able to do when this comes into effect.

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

Mr. Speaker, that simply supports the theory that the government wants to move much too quickly, likely for the sake of interests that are completely at odds with those of the people, but that is not all.

Aside from dealing with environmental studies, the Impact Assessment Act seeks to better understand the health, social and economic impacts of a project. However, the government is prepared to scrap all that with this bill. That is already set out in Bill C‑15. It completely sets that aside when convenient.

If the government wants to move quickly, it is to serve other interests than those of the people. That is what keeps us up at night. It is not the project itself that is the issue, but the way in which it is likely to be carried out.

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

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that it is a pleasure to rise today to speak during our opposition day debate, except that I am doing so because the people of Mirabel, and potentially other places in Canada, are experiencing a situation that is distressing, to say the least.

Our motion today stems from the idea expressed in a simple quote: those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. That is exactly what we want to do with our opposition day. We want to ensure that, at a minimum, history is properly understood, and by offering an apology, we can provide assurances that it has been understood so that we can avoid repeating the same acts that were catastrophic in Mirabel, among other places, some 50 years ago.

All of this is taking place in a rather interesting historical context, because, not so long ago, the Prime Minister gave a rather intriguing speech at the Quebec Citadel in which his rewriting of the facts showed, at best, a lack of knowledge about Quebec's history and, at worst, contempt for it.

We therefore have to wonder whether the government cares at all about Quebec's reality or whether it is just focused on moving forward as quickly as possible with the high-speed rail project. At the risk of repeating what my colleagues have already said, we support that project. What we have a problem with is the approach that is being taken.

From what we have seen, there is cause for concern when the government gets involved in a project. We are seeing that right now with the Cúram software. The government is telling us that it is going to hold consultations. However, in a project already riddled with cost overruns, the government is not even listening to its own officials when they say that there are flaws, that the software they have implemented is poorly designed. We therefore have to wonder whether the government will really listen to the public.

The government keeps telling us that it will follow best practices, that it will ensure that the studies, consultations and discussions with the public are conducted properly. However, at the same time, the government has given itself the right to completely rewrite these best practices. It is on the ice and rewriting the rules of the game in the middle of play.

I listened to most of the speeches by the Liberals today. I find it interesting that when asked about the content of our motion, no one seems willing to commit. However, our motion is quite simple, and I would be curious to know which part of the motion makes them hesitate to say right away that they are willing to vote in favour of what we are proposing today.

Our motion reads as follows:

That the House call on the government to apologize to those whose land was expropriated in Mirabel.

It is also a unanimous request from the Quebec National Assembly. We are constantly being told that it was a disaster and that it must never happen again. In that case, what would it mean to offer an apology?

The second point of our motion reads as follows:

[That the House call on the government] to acknowledge the collective trauma these expropriations caused for thousands of Quebeckers who were forced to abandon their homes, their communities and their livelihoods...

My colleague from Mirabel, among others, gave some striking examples of this this morning. Even on the government benches, they were talking about this trauma. It seems easy enough to acknowledge.

Finally, the motion says:

[That the House] urge the government not to undertake such expropriations again without public consultation, social licence and appropriate compensation.

The Liberals are telling us that this is what they want to do. Why is it a problem, then, for them to support the motion? I wonder about their real intentions and I wonder how they will vote on our opposition day motion.

The Minister of Transportation, who is also the Leader of the Government government in the House of Commons, somewhat set the stage this week regarding the government's approach to this issue. I would like to quote some of the answers he gave to my colleague from Mirabel during oral question period. He said this:

Mr. Speaker, why did the member not stand up to oppose Quebec's Act Respecting Expropriation, which made it possible to build and complete the Réseau express métropolitain? The bill is based on the exact wording of that Quebec act and Ontario's legislation, which also allows for the development of public transit projects. This is not new, and we are obviously going to negotiate directly with the property owners.

His answer tells us a lot. I will not say that he is trying to mislead the House because that would be giving his comments more weight than they deserve. The law he is referring to allows people in Quebec who receive an expropriation notice to challenge that decision, either the right to expropriate or the amount that will be allocated, before Quebec's administrative tribunal or the Quebec Superior Court.

Meanwhile, the government used Bill C-15 to amend the Expropriation Act so that the transport minister can set a price without a hearing, so there is no comparison between the two acts.

Alto, the company responsible for the project, is giving itself a right of first refusal, which will limit what owners are able to do with their property. This will limit the choice of buyers. The financial offer made to them will be non-negotiable. For example, a farmer who has a right of first refusal imposed on his land would not even be able to farm it. Who would want to buy such land? That alone will have a huge impact on the price.

There is also the fact that sections 9 and 10 of the Expropriation Act require the appropriate minister to hold public hearings on a planned expropriation, but Bill C-15 explicitly repeals that obligation. That means what the government is saying is that there will be no public hearings like there are under Quebec law.

The Minister of Transport said earlier that if we agreed with what happened in Quebec City, we should agree with what is happening here. I am tempted to say that he was misleading the House, and not just the House. In another response to my colleague, the Minister of Transport said this:

Mr. Speaker, in fact, consultations were held and there will be more. We are consulting all the mayors and community stakeholders in the Lower Laurentians, across the entire region, as well as in Quebec and Ontario. Guess what? Canadians are excited about this new technology, this progress.

Come on. My colleague is comparing an international airport to a small corridor that is 60 metres wide. Give me a break.

What he forgot to mention is that those 60 metres will be located in a 10-kilometre-wide corridor where a right of first refusal may apply. Alto is reserving this corridor for the high-speed train, and it informed people of this through email. People are panicking, particularly in Mirabel, a place whose wounds from the expropriation that people experienced 50 years ago have yet to heal.

Knowing that they may not be able to resell their homes, even if the rail line does not end up passing through their property, and that they will not be able to renovate, repair or do any work until they find out whether there will actually be an expropriation, creates anxiety and panic that serve absolutely no purpose. That is what happens when the government moves too quickly, ignoring the scars of the past I talked about and showing a kind of disdain, or perhaps a lack of knowledge of history.

The minister insists that there will be consultations. The initial round of consultation is to take place between January 15 and March 29. We have just learned that there will be consultations. When farmers are on their land, working or preparing their fields, they do not have time to submit briefs on such short notice. The same goes for municipalities, most of which have newly elected councils. They are just beginning their debates and the implementation of their budget. The consultation period is very, very short. The format of consultation is also problematic. They want to host happy hours and to present the major components of the project online. Is that really consultation?

After that, the next step would be in the fall. There will be about nine months between the first part and the second part of the consultations, for a project that has been discussed for more than 10 years. We are in a situation where the saying “let us slow down to speed up” really applies.

I will not have time to go into the next point in detail, but I know my colleagues have already done so. A whole lot of provisions governing major projects and expropriations are completely set aside in Bill C‑15. That will allow this project to move forward much too quickly. The project itself is not fundamentally bad, but it is not always possible to do something quickly and do it well. This is a striking example of that.

The government is giving itself a lot of leeway, and that is why we have concerns about the upcoming bill. We fear it will be rushed through without any real consultation and that, in the end, the government will do exactly the opposite of what is in our motion, which is quite simple. It is about recognizing the trauma experienced by the people of Mirabel 50 years ago, apologizing to them, and ensuring that it never happens again.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, yes, it is always ironic to see members of the official opposition supporting closure motions. It is as though the Conservative Party had cast itself as a government-in-waiting and decided that it was great because, when they are in power, they will be able to take advantage of these botched processes.

I would still like to mention something about Bill C‑5 and the Conservatives. When I presented them with an amendment to exclude the Indian Act from the process, because it would have excluded indigenous people from consultations, the Conservatives voted in favour of our amendment. That meant we could not steamroll indigenous peoples, and I am grateful to them for that. That is why the federal government is coming back with the Bill C‑15. To me, this is a historical aberration.

[Caroline Desrochers, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Housing and Infrastructure]

Mr. Speaker, as everyone knows, I am a new member, and I am extremely proud to represent the riding of Trois-Rivières, which, for the first time in decades, is fortunate to have a woman member representing it. Together, we are going to do some great things.

When I told my friends and family that I was considering going into politics, they told me that I would get eaten alive, that I was too conciliatory, too naive, that I only saw the good in people. Guess what? It is true that I approach things with a glass-half-full attitude, and it is true that I sometimes view things through rose-coloured glasses and think that there is always a solution, because at the end of the day, there is one fundamental thing that underpins all the work we do here in the House and that we should all be able to agree on, namely, civic duty. All 343 members of the House have the privilege of coming here every day to move things forward for all Canadians and to find solutions to the problems they face, regardless of the political stripe of the member who represents them.

As a 25-year veteran of the federal public service, I am non-partisan by nature and I get behind good ideas and good solutions, no matter who brings them forward. However, I have to say that my opposition party colleagues' political games and obstruction are starting to try my patience and good will. Here in the House and in committee, we bring concerns to the table. People agree that these concerns are important and that we need to talk about them. Then they say that what we are proposing is no good after all. When we point out that our proposal is what they asked us for, they say that it is no good and that they are concerned about something else entirely anyway.

We see that every day on everything from affordability to Criminal Code reforms to strengthen the justice system, as we saw yesterday. Today's motion by my colleague, the member for Mirabel, is yet another example of that. I find it irresponsible and deplorable for parliamentarians to completely ignore the facts and move a motion suggesting that the current framework is the same as what we had in 1969. Let me be clear: We recognize that what was done 57 years ago should never have happened. We recognize that the people of Mirabel were hit hard and still bear the scars. When the last of the expropriated acres were returned in 2019, the late minister of transport acknowledged that a big mistake had been made and that it should never have happened. My colleague, the hon. Minister of Transport, reiterated these comments this morning.

What I find unacceptable is trying to scare the citizens of Mirabel with statements that my colleague knows full well are not true. I know that my colleague is a diligent and well-informed person, that he has certainly read the budget implementation act, that he has certainly read the high-speed rail network legislation, and that he must be well aware that the Expropriation Act of 1985 has been radically amended to include consultation in the process. He surely knows that the high-speed rail legislation modernizes it and introduces additional measures. For his information and, above all, for the benefit of the people of Mirabel and all those around the corridor of this major project between Peterborough and Quebec City, I would like to reiterate some of the principles. Once adopted, if the obstruction stops, the legislation will guarantee consultation through impact assessment, support consultations with indigenous peoples and provide greater clarity on regulatory processes. In short, the project will not go ahead by overriding communities and landowners.

I will now speak for a few moments about the high-speed rail project. I know that my Bloc Québécois colleagues have been trying very hard since this morning to say that this is not the subject of the motion, but that is a bit like taking people for fools. We know that the Bloc Québécois and Conservative members have already voted together against the funding needed to launch this project.

Canada's first high-speed rail network is a transformative, generational project that will give Canadians the transportation system they deserve, one worthy of a G7 country. High-speed rail will generate approximately $35 billion a year in economic benefits and create more than 51,000 jobs by increasing productivity and improving mobility between regions. High-speed rail will quickly connect economic hubs, boost tourism, cut travel times in half, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, stimulate the development of affordable housing along the Toronto-Quebec City corridor, and provide jobs for those along the route, including in rural communities. These communities need those jobs and need this economic boost.

It is important for the regions, it is important for the people of Trois‑Rivières, and I know it is also important for the people of the neighbouring riding of Berthier—Maskinongé.

Under our new government's new buy Canadian policy, Alto will use hundreds of thousands of tonnes of Canadian steel, wood and concrete to build the high-speed rail line, along with structures, facilities and electrical infrastructure. In fact, Alto and its partner, Cadence, have begun talks with the Canadian steel industry to better understand what it can provide and how we can help it provide what is needed.

Few infrastructure projects in Canadian history have generated this much industrial demand. Attempting to block this is kind of irresponsible. I am speaking to both opposition parties through the Chair. This is one of a series of major projects that our new government has promised to build, projects like the port of Contrecoeur and housing and other investments we will be making in the north.

Canada is facing ongoing U.S. threats against the steel, wood and aluminum sectors, so it is time to stop playing political games and put the interests of Canadians and Quebeckers first. As a matter of fact, 76% of Quebeckers are in favour of the project.

The first stages of the consultation process for Alto are now just starting, and Mirabel is included. Consultations will also be held in the riding of Trois-Rivières and in the riding of my colleague from Berthier—Maskinongé in the coming weeks. These consultations will take place in more than 100 communities along the corridor. There will be discussions with municipalities and undertakings with potentially affected landowners. There have been many discussions with the Union des producteurs agricoles, round tables on various topics with stakeholders, open houses and an online portal, which has already received more than 26,000 submissions.

Let me be clear: The experiences of the residents of Mirabel in 1969 constitute a historic injustice. We acknowledge that it should not have happened. However, the process has changed radically over the past 57 years. It changed radically when the Expropriation Act was amended in 1985. It will change radically once we pass the bill that is currently before Parliament, Bill C‑15, which includes the railway right of way legislation.

We have worked very closely with Ontario and Quebec to draw inspiration from the expropriation laws in those provinces so that we can be as aligned as possible with the provinces and move forward as quickly as possible with a very productive program.

High-speed rail can be built without repeating the mistakes of the past. This is an important project for Quebeckers and for the people of Ontario as well. It is an important project for Canadians. It promises nothing but benefits. All project stakeholders have agreed to consult each other and ensure that the project delivers as many positive benefits as possible.

If my colleague is interested in helping his constituents, I strongly encourage him to focus his energy in constructive ways by supporting the measures we propose to make life more affordable, to build more housing, to preserve our social safety net and to build Canada strong, rather than persist in filibustering during parliamentary committees and here in the House of Commons.

When I got into politics, my goal was to help people. I really felt that we would be able to work together, hand in hand with the parties, at such a crucial time in Canada's history, a pivotal moment in our lives and in the lives of our businesses and workers, as well as the lives of Quebec families and Canadian families, who live in uncertainty.

Let us stop playing political games, work together and move forward.

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

Mr. Speaker, first of all, my colleague from Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton is asking me to wish my colleague from Les Pays-d'en-Haut a happy birthday, so I, too, am wishing him a happy birthday.

Now my colleague is asking us to get on board by passing Bill C-15 so that we can move faster. That is precisely why we are raising the red flag. We are saying that we must not rush this. In 1969, the government went way too fast, and ended up having to give back 85% of the land. Today, we are in a situation where the government wants to reserve a 100-kilometre-wide strip for a project that requires only 60 metres. We are afraid that history will repeat itself. That is what we are trying to explain to our colleagues.

I think that, with his sensitivity for Quebec, my colleague should convince his caucus to agree to apologize.

[Tim Watchorn, Liberal, Les Pays-d'en-Haut, QC]

Mr. Speaker, today I am going to talk about high-speed rail. I will leave pipelines to the experts in that domain.

I would just say that everything that has evolved in the last 60 years has brought us to where we are today. Too many people have talked about making a high-speed rail line. We are going ahead with a high-speed rail line, and we are going to do it in record speed. I hope our colleagues from across the way will pass Bill C-15 and get on the train with us.

[Tim Watchorn, Liberal, Les Pays-d'en-Haut, QC]

Mr. Speaker, our Bloc Québécois colleagues want Canadians to believe that building a high-speed rail line will harm their communities, that it will be done without consultation and without the measures we have put in place over the past 60 years. They are trying to justify their opposition to high-speed rail and their goal is to kill the project before the legislation is even passed.

They have joined Conservatives in the past to try to cut the initial funding required, and they are trying to do it again today by blocking Bill C‑15. Indeed, their actions are quite fitting, given their name

I want to be clear. Expropriation remains a measure of last resort. Negotiating with landowners will always be the preferred approach. That principle will not change.

Before turning to Bill C-15, I want to acknowledge what we have heard in recent weeks. Since public consultations began, residents of the Mirabel region have raised concerns about land acquisition, expropriation and the need for direct, respectful engagement. We have heard those concerns clearly, and I can confirm today that Alto will be holding an in-person public session in the Mirabel area later this month, to ensure transparency, dialogue and accountability.

I want to explain why Bill C-15 is necessary for this linear project and how it is maintaining appropriate protections for landowners. Bill C-15 is necessary because the high-speed rail initiative is unprecedented in Canada. It involves a corridor of nearly 1,000 kilometres, crossing hundreds of communities and requiring the acquisition of hundreds of pieces of land. Because of the time, cost and complexity involved, land acquisition represents one of the most significant risks to the project, particularly if we are to begin construction in 2029, as announced.

The current federal Expropriation Act is a statute of general application. It was not designed for a project of this scale or this complexity. Without a framework adapted to this reality, delays multiply and costs escalate, precisely what communities and taxpayers want to avoid.

The land acquisition measures in Bill C-15 are not intended to increase uncertainty. They provide tools to help the government coordinate more effectively and get shovels in the ground faster while maintaining fundamental protections for property owners. Some of these measures have raised concerns, and I want to address them directly.

First, contrary to what has been said, expropriation does not take place over email. The intention is to allow communication by email only when the owner has indicated that this is their preferred method of communication and has provided their email address. This is an additional method of communication that supplements, rather than replaces, those provided for in the law.

Second, a prohibition on work does not mean that owners lose the use of their land. They will be able to continue their existing agricultural or commercial activities. Owners will also be able to carry out normal maintenance, repairs or work needed to keep their land from deteriorating.

Third, Bill C-15 does not prevent landlords from putting their buildings up for sale or allow the federal government to set land values.

The right of first refusal is a management tool that informs Alto when an owner is ready to sell. Owners remain completely free to put their property on the market. This tool simply allows Alto to acquire the property on a priority basis at a price previously agreed to by the owner.

The Government of Quebec has even given this power to the municipalities in recent years. It is called the right of first refusal. It allows cities to protect strategic or sensitive land without affecting the owner's property value. In my riding of Morin‑Heights, municipal council used this tool to acquire and protect one of the most beautiful pieces of land in the municipality. It is called Castel-Marie, and it is one of the municipality's most stunning parks. The tool works well for buyers and transferors. I can vouch for that.

We must also be honest with Canadians about what it takes to deliver projects of this magnitude.

High-speed rail is one of the most ambitious infrastructure projects in our history, a true nation-building initiative. Projects of this scale cannot be delivered without using adaptive tools. This project cannot advance responsibly without these land acquisition measures. Inaction would not preserve the status quo. It would mean delays and higher costs. Importantly, these measures are not unheard of. They are aligned with similar provincial regimes, including Quebec's act respecting expropriation and Ontario's Building Transit Faster Act.

The economic stakes are significant. High-speed rail will create tens of thousands of jobs, strengthen productivity, improve regional connectivity and deliver lasting economic benefits for Quebec, Ontario and Canada as a whole. Every year of delay carries real costs for workers, businesses, taxpayers and communities.

I support the construction of high-speed rail and Bill C-15. I am asking my Bloc Québécois colleagues to stop blocking the project and get on board.

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

What a shameful lack of consideration for the public. Mr. Speaker, this is very concerning.

The Liberals' condescending approach is to push projects through without any real discussion. That breeds mistrust, even with respect to potentially positive initiatives to support things like the fight against climate change and transportation for Canadians, and especially for Quebeckers.

What we are seeing is that the government is sabotaging its own momentum. Instead of moving forward, it is backtracking. Obviously, we are calling on the government to hold serious consultations with mayors, citizens, farmers and businesses. We are talking about their lives and the place where they live, but so far, no public consultations have been held in Mirabel, or at least no meaningful consultation, and so we are waiting for some new dates and locations.

There is a new new process that will increase accountability when it comes to consultations. Every consultation process must have a record of proceedings. People have the right to know what is being said and it needs to be archived somewhere. People's concerns need to be documented.

It is very worrisome to see a project worth tens of billions of dollars start out like this. Obviously, I would add to that Bill C-5 and Bill C-15, among others, which will allow the government, and therefore Alto, to circumvent the provisions of the Expropriation Act.

Let us come back to the 1969 experience. It has shown how deeply the federal government already traumatized an entire population, even without the excessive powers granted by these bills. Imagine what they will be able to do now with these bills. Imagine how far they will go, especially considering that Bill C-15 gives significant powers of expropriation and the right of first refusal to Alto, among other things, in order to speed up the construction of high-speed rail.

By trying to move too quickly, there is a risk that things will once again go off the rails. Rushing things and doing them poorly seems to be the government's modus operandi when it comes to major projects. We will certainly also refuse to allow selective use of the Impact Assessment Act, because we need impact assessments that are worthy of their name, that are comprehensive and that allow for genuine consultation. We are currently seeing exactly the opposite from the government.

[Rhéal Fortin, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to start by stating that I will be sharing my time with my colleague, the member for Abitibi-Témiscamingue.

To begin, I would like to reassure everyone. I know that some Bloc members have already said this, but I will say it too: We are happy about the high-speed rail line. Is that clear now? We have been asking for it for several years, we have hoped for it, we have defended it. Now that it is here, we are happy to have it.

That said, I want to quickly review some history. In 1969, Pierre Elliott Trudeau's federal government decided to expropriate a total of 97,000 acres to build Mirabel airport. I should say that I had no idea how big 97,000 acres was, but I checked, and it is 4,268,000 square feet. I had a little trouble visualizing that too, so I did the math. That area is equivalent to 74 football fields, each measuring 57,600 square feet. That is pretty big.

In 1969, Pierre Elliott Trudeau told the people of Mirabel that he was sorry, but that he needed their land because it was in the public interest. Some people cried, as our colleague from Rivière-des-Mille-Îles said earlier, and some children cried when they saw their parents crying. It was tragic. These people were farming and received a notice in the mail saying that the land was no longer theirs. The government said it was sorry, but explained that Mr. Trudeau had decided to take their land.

I will spare my colleagues the details of the legal saga that ensued. Obviously, most of the people contested the expropriation notices. The federal government said no and insisted that it was in the right, that the land was not worth anything more. There were debates, it ended up in court, and then people were finally compensated with amounts that, as members might expect, were not enough to buy a comparable property or house. It was nowhere near enough. That was in 1969.

In 1985, the federal government said that it believed it had made a mistake and taken too much land. It then decided to give the land back. That is what was announced, but the land was not actually returned. It was resold. People were told that their land was being given back to them, but that they would have to pay for it. Obviously, people did not have the money for that. The compensation they had received 15 years earlier was not enough. Some of them took out mortgages and bought back their land, while other properties were bought back by different people.

We are not talking about small parcels of land here. It was not a matter of expropriating a few extra acres and saying that they were going to put them back on the market. No, it turns out that 85% of these football-field-sized properties were not needed. The federal government admitted as much in 1985, 15 years after kicking everyone out. Fifteen years later, the government said that it had made a mistake, but did not even apologize. The government said that it made a mistake and was going to put the land up for sale.

That, too, is obviously a tragedy. It is tragic to see that we did not even need that airport, after the people of Mirabel were told that the expropriation was for the public good, that they were participating in the history of Quebec and Canada, that their land was being taken, but that they were pioneers and heroes and that, thanks to their land, the nicest and most efficient and effective airport in the world would be built. In 2004, the government said that it was wrong about that too and that it was closing the airport, and the airport was indeed shut down.

When asked what would happen with the flights, the government said that they would go back to Dorval. To add insult to injury, the Dorval airport was renamed the Pierre Elliott Trudeau airport. It was the ultimate show of disrespect. I do not know who the genius was who came up with that idea, but that was a nasty blow the federal government dealt to the people of Mirabel.

Over the course of 35 years, billions of dollars of our own money were spent to build an airport, compensate people whose lands were ruthlessly and needlessly expropriated, and then demolish the airport by paying even more billions of dollars. This whole adventure cost us a pretty penny, not just in terms of money, but also in terms of tragedies involving people, families and companies.

It is no wonder that the people of Mirabel have been left traumatized. Some may say that they are overly sensitive. I encourage my colleagues to go back and listen to the stories we heard, because, even after all this time, it is mind-boggling.

I listened to our Liberal colleagues. In the moment, as they were speaking, I was happy. I was saying to myself that they understand that this was a terrible thing that must not be repeated. I was happy about that. The member for Rivière-des-Mille-Îles was telling us about trauma, although I do not recall her exact words. Her father took her to visit a plot of land. Hearing that, I thought that they are on the same page as the rest of us, that they realize that what was done was not right, that it was cruel. That is reassuring.

The Bloc Québécois motion is simple. We are not talking about high-speed rail. First, we want Parliament to ask the government to apologize. When someone messes up that badly, the least they can do is apologize. Second, we want the government to recognize the trauma that its extraordinarily awful mistakes caused to these people. It seems to me that, when someone does something like this, it is fairly easy to admit that a mistake was made, especially considering 85% of the land has been given back and the airport has been shut down. The mistake is obvious, in any case. Third, we are asking the government to commit to not doing it again, to not undertaking such expropriations again without public consultation, social licence and appropriate compensation. What is so terrible about this motion?

If I were a Liberal member, I would hurry to say that my government, the government I inherited, that is, the Liberal government at the time, made a ridiculous mistake and it apologizes. If I were a Liberal member, I would say that I apologize on behalf of my government and on behalf of the Canadian government of 1969. I would think that would be the first thing to do. Second, I would acknowledge the trauma that it caused, as several members have already, including the member for Mirabel a few moments ago. I would say that I recognize that trauma. Third, I would say that I think such a thing must never be allowed to happen again. I would therefore urge the government to be careful never to make the same mistake. I almost heard that, but the words “I apologize” were missing. It is not complicated. We teach our children to say it in preschool: When someone misbehaves at school or with their friends, they apologize.

The people of Mirabel, the people of Quebec and I would go so far as to say the people of Canada expect a greater show of responsibility from their federal government. I fail to understand why we cannot do that. I urge my colleagues to apologize, to acknowledge the trauma, to promise never to do it again and to compensate people. I do not have much time left, but I will talk about compensation.

As it stands now, the high-speed rail project, which, as I said, we are very enthusiastic about, is unfortunately exempt from every landowner protection mechanism that exists in Quebec and Canada. Bills C-5 and C-15 throw them right out the window so that the promoters can do whatever they want, whenever they want, however they want.

Representatives from Alto said that they did not want to ask for too much, but that they wanted a 10-kilometre wide by 1,000-kilometre long right-of-way between Quebec City and Toronto to make sure that the rail line is in the right place. That is a 10-by-1,000-kilometre area where properties have not yet been expropriated. People have houses or farms there, but they can neither renovate nor mortgage nor sell their properties. Their hands are tied now that Alto has published their map on the website.

We were talking about fearmongering earlier. There is no need for that; people can simply go on Alto's website and they will see the map. They will know that they are in the corridor. Cities like Boisbriand, Rosemère, Sainte-Thérèse, Mirabel—I will not name them all since I only have a few seconds left—are all impacted by that right-of-way. People cannot sell their homes. It is impossible to sell a house in a situation like this. Not a single bank will give a mortgage loan. Renovations make no sense. Why throw money down a bottomless pit?

They need to be compensated and consulted, and we need to make sure not to repeat what happened in 1969.

[Steeve Lavoie, Liberal, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have read Bill C-15 and I am familiar with it.

The idea is not to eliminate laws or regulations, but to speed up projects. Think about the major maritime corridors and how long it took to build them. Today, we are talking about a project that the government wants to build in four years instead of eight. Just look at the Quebec City tramway. In 2007, it was valued at $750 million. Now it is $13 billion. That is 18 times the original cost, and taxpayers are footing the bill. Between 2018 and 2026 alone, the cost quadrupled.

What we want is to reduce costs. We are talking about an eight-year timeline that we would like to shorten to four years, while respecting the provinces and their regulations.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague was singing the praises of a 21st-century vision. Mirabel airport was a 20th-century vision.

After the Mirabel fiasco, the expropriation laws were indeed amended. I would invite my colleague to review the provisions of Bill C-15, which suspends exactly what he is referring to, in order to ensure that the process respects the people who will have to make decisions and live with this project. I invite him to reread Bill C-15, first of all.

Secondly, we are all in favour of a vision for the future, but will he vote for or against the motion to ensure that the people of Mirabel can—

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the member explained to us how passionate and inspired she was by the much-touted Alto high-speed rail project.

I did not quite understand her position on the motion being debated today. It makes me wonder. What we are criticizing is that the people of Mirabel were not part of the consultations, first of all. We are criticizing the unceremonious strategies used in Bill C‑15 to fast-track processes outside the usual laws.

That said, at the end of the day, the motion we are debating today calls for an apology to the people of Mirabel. The member agreed that what was done to the people of Mirabel in the past was wrong.

How would apologizing to the people of Mirabel compromise the project that she cares so much about?

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the government could start by apologizing, and if it does not want to make the same mistakes again, maybe it should not give itself the means to make them. I would invite my colleague to listen to my speech again. Bill C‑5 and Bill C‑15 give the government the tools to make those mistakes again.

The hon. member can talk to her colleagues if she wants to prevent that from happening.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to the debates since this morning and I see what the government is trying to do by suggesting that we are fearmongering and that we are living in the past.

I want to clarify something. I want to clearly state what our intentions are and also explain something that is very troubling to every parliamentarian here. I want to come back to the motion.

The motion very clearly calls on the government to apologize to the people whose land was expropriated in Mirabel and to acknowledge the collective trauma experienced by those who were forced to abandon their homes and significantly change their life plans. We are also calling on the government to learn from its mistakes and commit to not undertaking such expropriations again without public consultation, social licence and appropriate compensation.

When I looked at our motion, I was inspired by what the Prime Minister did in his speech in Davos.

The Prime Minister is a well-read man. In his speech in Davos, he drew attention to an author I really admire, Václav Havel. He talked about the power of the powerless and especially the celebrated idea of living in truth.

I would like to invite the Liberals to live in truth, so I want to explore the concept not of apology, but of forgiveness. These are two different things. The philosopher who discussed the concept of forgiveness the most vigorously was Vladimir Jankélévitch. The Prime Minister might be familiar with his work. Jankélévitch said that there is a difference between forgiveness and apology. As Vladimir Jankélévitch sees it, forgiveness is recognition of the seriousness of the offence. With this motion, what we are asking the government to do this morning is to recognize the seriousness of the offence against the residents of Mirabel. In keeping with Vladimir Jankélévitch's perspective, forgiveness is not the same as an apology, where the intent is to reduce liability or erase blame because it was involuntary.

My friend from Lac-Saint-Jean often uses the rhetoric of apologies, saying that it is not his fault and that it is unintentional. We forgive him. However, that is not what we are looking for from the government today. Instead, we are looking for true awareness. Apologies are an attempt to downplay responsibility, often by contextualizing, as my colleague from Lac-Saint-Jean does and as the government also does. What we are asking for, namely forgiveness, means taking responsibility, and that is what we are doing today. We are saying to the government that it acted dishonourably in the past and that it needs to take responsibility for it. That is how a wrongdoer expresses responsibility. What we are trying to do today, what we are asking the government to do, is to take steps to acknowledge the wrong that it did to the people of Mirabel so that it never happens again. I want to emphasize that: never again. In fact, all things considered, today the Bloc Québécois is asking the government to reflect on its responsibility, something the government does not often do. We want to make the government aware that it cannot repeat the tragedy of the Mirabel expropriations by contextualizing and blaming challenging conditions that may be adverse to our economy. I say this because the danger of a tragedy like the one in Mirabel happening again is very real.

In both Bill C-5 and Bill C-15, the government is giving itself a way to shirk its responsibilities under the pretext of responding to the tariff crisis. As in the case of Mirabel, both Bill C-5 and Bill C-15 use the rhetoric of major projects that will build a new Canada to justify deviations from democracy without any guarantee of results.

I would remind the House that, last June, the Bloc Québécois vehemently opposed Bill C-5, which allowed the government to exempt proponents of major projects from the obligation to comply with certain laws. The government goes even further with Bill C-15. Consider, for example, something hidden on page 300 of the bill. There is a seemingly benign amendment to the Red Tape Reduction Act, which was passed by the Harper government.

The government is giving the minister the power, for three years, to exempt any company from any law, except, of course, the Criminal Code. Imagine that.

Here is what the bill says:

...a minister may, by order, for a specified validity period of not more than three years and on any terms that the minister considers appropriate, exempt an entity from the application of (a) a provision of an Act of Parliament, except the Criminal Code, if the minister is responsible for the Act; (b) a provision of an instrument made under an Act of Parliament, except an instrument made under the Criminal Code....

The government is telling us that these exemptions are meant to facilitate innovative projects, but we have our doubts. In reality, what the government's amendment does is place any company above any law.

It is at this point that we need to look back on the infamous case of Mirabel and what it teaches us. Rushing ahead the way we are with Bill C-5 and Bill C-15, while setting aside the principles of the law and abandoning government responsibility, is a disaster waiting to happen.

As the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. I would like to give an example of this inconsistent behaviour we are seeing. The government introduced a plan to build oil and gas infrastructure. This infrastructure is supposed to help us get through the tariff crisis. I will skip over the whole issue of co-operation in the case of the agreement between the federal government and Alberta, which was announced without British Columbia even being informed that negotiations were happening about infrastructure that would pass through its territory. I will leave that aside. Rather, the real inconsistency in the government's behaviour is that it is trying to persuade the public that its measures will address the tariff crisis.

When we take a closer look at what the government is actually doing, we quickly realize who would benefit from the creation of oil and gas infrastructure. The biggest players in the oil and gas sector are 80% American-owned. The government is in a hurry to give itself additional powers to build infrastructure without having to comply with laws so that, at the end of the day, it can give more opportunities to American companies. We could not make this stuff up.

In recent years, which large companies have made the most profit in Canada? Companies in the oil and gas sector have. For every dollar of profit, 60% goes into the pockets of American owners. Today, with Bills C-5 and C-15, the government is trying to force infrastructure projects down our throats that will have the same kind of impact we saw for the citizens of Mirabel. These infrastructure projects will benefit Americans under the pretext of fighting the tariff crisis, without respecting environmental principles.

I am saying all this because, ultimately, we realize that when the government acts in a hurry, disaster often looms. One prime example of this is what was done in the past in Mirabel.

Today we want the government to be aware of its actions, to apologize to the citizens of Mirabel and to commit to not repeating this type of mistake.

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

Mr. Speaker, she is forgiven; I, too, sometimes address members directly.

We can see how easy it is to acknowledge mistakes and forgive one another. It would be nice if the government apologized so the people of Mirabel can finally turn the page on this hurt and look to the future.

For my colleague's sake, I will repeat the purpose of today's motion. Earlier, she listed all the processes that protect our constituents and give them a real right to appeal. The purpose of today's motion is to convince ourselves that we can tell our constituents to move forward with confidence because the government will have made a formal commitment to ensure that the laws are respected during consideration of Bill C‑15. We want the government to work with us to ensure that those rights are not taken away.

We are not telling our constituents that they are right to be afraid. We are telling them that our analysis of the bills currently under consideration is scaring us. There seems to be a desire to skip steps. That scares me. If this drags on, there may be a decision to move forward at some point. That is what we want to avoid, and we are trying to achieve that in a very constructive way.

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

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

I will begin by reassuring my colleague opposite that, yes, I have participated in consultations in the past. I have a message for the people watching at home: They can take part in consultations and have a meaningful impact on projects as ordinary citizens. That is exactly what I did in the municipality of Saint‑Félix‑de‑Valois when I attended Quebec's environmental public hearings board, or BAPE, because one of our drinking water sources was at risk.

When people throw accusations around and say that other people do not know or have never seen certain things, they should be careful about the high horse they are riding on when talking to colleagues. We are all equals, we are all elected officials. That is what I want my colleagues to remember.

Now, what we are asking for today is an apology, because that has never been done. I am hearing all sorts of things that make no sense. We are being told that we want to live in the past and that we are fearmongering. That is not what we are doing.

We looked at the beginning of the project, particularly with regard to the Mirabel area, where the route was recently modified. From what I have heard about the consultations that were held, they were more like information sessions. People were told that they could look at the wonderful project to give their opinion if they wanted to. The Bloc Québécois wants to ensure that those opinions are taken into account and that the law is respected.

I liked the speech by the member for Thérèse‑De Blainville, because she talked about those details. That is exactly what we want. We want the law to be respected, but we are concerned. Why are we talking about Mirabel? It is because no apology has ever been offered and we are heading back into the same territory.

The train will also pass through Berthier—Maskinongé, and I am concerned for my constituents. Some members are saying they do not understand our concern, given how good the project will be for everyone. A riding like Berthier—Maskinongé is basically a rural area between cities. We do not have any cities. The train will simply pass through our riding. I cannot say that there is a huge gain for us. The Bloc Québécois has always said that high-speed rail is a positive project, a major one, but is it too much to ask that the work be done properly? Basically, that is what we are saying this morning. Can the work be done properly, with respect for the people?

My colleague told me that I do not understand the environmental assessment process, but I hope he has seen the maps. There corridors are 100 kilometres wide. That seems excessive. Only 60 metres is required to accommodate high-speed rail.

People say that the Bloc Québécois is using this to make political hay, but the fact is people contacted us directly. I will once again make my colleague across the floor happy by telling him that I will be in Trois-Rivières on February 18, and I will be in Berthierville on February 19. I know that citizens, particularly agricultural producers, will be there to protest and may oppose the project. They are afraid because the project is being presented quickly, and they are being told that the government wants to move faster and is going to carry out incredible infrastructure projects. Last spring, the House passed Bill C‑5, which gives the government the power to override all legislation on the pretext that this is a major, forward-looking project. That is where our fear comes from.

We are currently studying Bill C‑15 at the Standing Committee on Finance. It is a bill that will give the government excessive powers. We have spoken out against it. The government hid this on page 300 of a 660-page document, and then they come and tell us that we have to be honest and work in good faith. I feel like saying, “let's go, come on”. Can we really work in good faith?

We are looking at this, and we see that powers are going to be changed. This bill will grant powers, including with respect to section 98 on the Canadian Transportation Agency. Under our current interpretation, the government will be able to override the agency. We want assurance on that front. A government member even admitted that this would spare cabinet the embarrassment of being contradicted by the agency. After that, we are told that we are scaremongering. We read the bills. We hear things, and, of course, we feel like reacting. Things get emotional.

We can imagine how emotional it was for the communities. We spoke at length about the people in Mirabel, the children who watched their fathers cry on the kitchen table.

In Forillon Park or St-Scholastique
Gotta make way for tourists and airplanes
Early mornin', gotta hit the bricks
We're in the way, they explained
Got played a damn dirty trick
Chased off our homes, our lands, our country.

In case my colleagues did not recognize it, that was from a song by Paul Piché. It is a simple reminder that this is also about human beings. We are not using that quote for political hay or anything of the sort. We know that big projects are on the horizon. We see this business-first government, clearly under corporate influence, that wants to act quickly and seems to have contempt for parliamentary work. The Prime Minister—if I may be judgmental for a second—does not look like he enjoys being here. That is what it seems like.

Our job is to make sure that our legislation is complied with. I was honest earlier when I said that I enjoyed the member for Thérèse-De Blainville's interventions. She mentioned specific acts and said that it was done under proper legislation. That is exactly what we want to ensure: that the legislation is complied with.

We have identified a number of threats in Bill C‑15. It is still being studied. We are concerned that the official opposition might approve it all. We want to take precautions before changing laws. Changes to impact studies and selective modifications suggest an intent to limit the right to object. That is what we want to avoid.

Why plan for 100 kilometres when they need only 60 metres? In Mirabel, the government had to give 85% of the land back. We do not want that to happen again. I have been listening to my Liberal colleagues in good faith, as I always try to do. I am not perfect, but I always try to act in good faith.

I am looking at our motion. We are asking the government to apologize for the expropriations. It had to give 85% of the land back to people. People were tenants in their homes for years. I do not want my constituents in Berthier—Maskinongé to go through that.

A dairy farmer talked to me two days ago. He told me that he had looked at the proposed route, that he and his family were really panicking and that they would be going to the consultation in Trois‑Rivières on February 18 because the route goes across a corner of his porch. He asked me if I was going to go. I am not making this up. I am not exaggerating for effect. I am telling you what a constituent told me.

I often joke with my colleagues and staff that I am too sensitive for this work. That is my situation. Maybe I am too sensitive for this work, but I cannot understand why a government does not have the courtesy to admit that what happened in 1969 was a mistake, to apologize, to acknowledge that this was a collective trauma and to promise that this will never happen again.

Since this morning, government members have said all of these things and acknowledged everything that is in the motion. I can find a quote for every word and put a member's name to it. I thank them for that. It means that they are aware of it. What I do not understand is why, for next week's vote, they are unable to persuade their caucus colleagues that the Bloc Québécois's motion is not dangerous, that the Bloc is not trying to corner the government and that it simply wants the government to agree to do things right.

They have been saying this all day long, so what is the problem? The problem is that the Liberals tend to say not to worry, only to turn around and do the opposite. The government has apologized to many groups, and that is a good thing. We agree on that. It is important to acknowledge the mistakes of the past in order to move forward in a positive way. I think the people of Mirabel deserve that. I think the people of Berthier—Maskinongé who will be affected by the Alto project deserve to have it done right. They deserve assurances that their rights will be respected and that there will be a genuine right to appeal.

That is why I encourage the member to speak with her colleagues and convince them.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, our motion is as follows:

That the House call on the government to apologize to those whose land was expropriated in Mirabel, to acknowledge the collective trauma these expropriations caused for thousands of Quebeckers who were forced to abandon their homes, their communities and their livelihoods, and to urge the government not to undertake such expropriations again without public consultation, social licence and appropriate compensation.

Those are the terms of today's debate. I think it is important to repeat them so that we know what we are debating, and also because, so far, a number of individuals who have spoken have not addressed the subject or have decided to talk about another subject. I can see a link between the subject at hand and the government's much-touted high-speed rail project. There are plans for it to pass through Mirabel, and there are plans for expropriations. That is precisely why it is so relevant to address this issue.

I think it is a shame that the Liberal members who have spoken so far seem to be in some kind of denial. There is a matter before us. They are being asked to apologize to the people of Mirabel for the nightmare they went through in the 1960s, and they are not addressing the issue. That is the matter currently before us. That is what we are discussing. I find it sad.

As we have said several times so far, we feel that this is a way to wipe the slate clean and end the debate. The government wants to be able to tell the people of Mirabel that it wants to run another project through Mirabel while they still bear the scars of the past. Before going any further and doing it again, the government should restore a bond of trust by apologizing for what happened.

That is the least it could do. That is the issue we ran with today. We want to discuss it. So far, Liberal members have barely managed to mention the expropriations that took place in Mirabel in the 1960s. They are skimming over the subject for now. I find that sad, and I hope that, by the end of this debate, there will be some progress based on what we have heard today. I hope that they will be able to vote on the issue and even support the motion. I do not think there is a single Quebecker—apart from perhaps the prime minister who caused this nightmare or his son—who could say that what happened was a good thing.

In this context, I do not understand how a government could decide, despite everything, to vote against the motion. In my opinion, the only thing that could explain that is some kind of arrogance or pride. The Liberals may think to themselves that it was a Liberal government that did this, and Liberals cannot do anything wrong or crooked, as if Liberals did only good things. The government could then stay in denial. That would be sad, because this is a historic opportunity to heal some of the wounds that still exist. I think it would be an honourable and worthwhile thing to do. In our hearts and minds, each of us should be asking ourselves these questions as we hold this debate.

I want to say a little more about what the people of Quebec went through. I think everyone in Quebec stands in solidarity with what the people of Mirabel went through back then. I think it is worth taking a look at what happened and providing some context.

On March 27, 1969, there was a shocking announcement: Pierre Elliott Trudeau's government intended to seize 97,000 acres of farmland upon which houses were built. People lived there; families lived there. Fourteen Quebec municipalities were affected. The 97,000 acres of farmland covered more square kilometres than the city of Montreal. People had big ambitions for the future airport. The vision was monumental. Eventually, it became clear that it made no sense, which is what everyone said at the time: It was so huge that it made no sense. Nevertheless, out of sheer obstinacy and perhaps, once again, hubris, the government refused to acknowledge that the vision was far too ambitious for what was needed. Those 97,000 acres were home to 3,000 families. Those 3,000 families lost their homes and were deported. They were exiled from their homes.

According to estimates, these 3,000 families were made up of more than 10,000 people. I find that horrific, and I think that everyone in Quebec finds what happened back then horrific, too. Today, the government has a great opportunity to take up this issue and lay it to rest. It has the opportunity to apologize and admit that it made a mistake which resulted in major problems. These expropriations caused tragedy, left land scorched and homes burned down, and led to people being thrown out of their homes by police.

The airport opened in 1975. The supreme irony is that 10 years later, in about 1985, the government started returning the land to the owners after realizing that it had expropriated too much. The thing is, it did not give back just one or two properties; it gave back 85% of the expropriated properties. That is outrageous. It later turned out that 85% of the expropriations had been unnecessary.

Today, I understand why the people of Mirabel are shocked when they hear the word “expropriation”. Trust cannot be built by telling people to get out of the way, in the name of modernity and progress, and telling them that you know what you are doing, when, in the end, 85% of the expropriated land was surplus to requirements. That does not build trust.

On top of that, this Liberal government is saying that it has no reason to apologize, but that we can trust it because everything will be done differently this time. I am really having a hard time understanding this. As someone who does not even live in Mirabel, I am not sure I would be able to trust the government. I do not trust anyone who has such a paternalistic attitude toward the public, when they are incapable of acknowledging their mistakes and apologizing for them.

I will continue my story. To date, 85% of the expropriated lots have quietly been returned. On September 15, 1997, all international flights ceased. Around 20 years after it opened, Mirabel airport stopped accommodating international flights. The government's colossal project had amounted to pretty much nothing. Everyone started talking about a white elephant. This is a permanent stain on the history of Canada, the history of Quebec, because Quebeckers are the ones who experienced it, and primarily the history of Mirabel, but also the history of the Liberal Party, it must be said.

That is not all. On October 31, 2004, commercial flights were ended. There were no more commercial flights to Vancouver or anywhere else. It was over. The airport was shut down. Worse still, in the same year, on January 1, 2004, the government went so far as to rename Dorval Airport after Trudeau, even though he was the one who expropriated the people of Mirabel. The other airport was renamed in his honour. It makes no sense, but that is Liberal arrogance.

I am truly sad because, at the time of the 50th anniversary, the Quebec National Assembly formally called on the federal government to apologize. The Quebec National Assembly called for this, it is not just the Bloc Québécois that did so. However, the Bloc Québécois also called for this because it represents the voice of Quebec, and as such it tabled a motion before the government in 2019. What was the government's response? It said no. It is unbelievable, and yet this shows how this federation, particularly the Liberal Party, generally treats Quebec: in a patronizing and paternalistic way. Then they wonder why some people want to separate. The Liberals cannot even comprehend this, because they are so right that they cannot be wrong.

Once again, they have an opportunity today to redeem themselves. They have an opportunity to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past. I am reaching out to them. I invite the government to reflect on Bill C‑15, in which it gives itself extraordinary powers to circumvent the normal expropriation process. I invite the government to consider Bill C‑5, which has been passed and which allows the government to circumvent all the environmental legislation to implement major projects. What is the point of these laws if the government ultimately decides to amend them or not enforce or abide by them? It makes no sense. I think the Liberal Party needs to start thinking about this. I think now is the right time to do that.

I look forward to answering my colleagues' questions.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with some emotion that I address the House. Despite the fact that I have only just come back and that I am slowly recovering from pneumonia, I felt it was crucial that I speak. Since I am short of breath and the government's comments are enough to knock the wind out of a person, I hope I will make it to the end of my speech and, more importantly, that I will live up to the name of my riding by staying calm.

First, I want to say that I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères.

Right now, in the public arena, those who are speaking out in local newspapers are mayors, stakeholders and members of the Union des producteurs agricoles, or UPA, who are wondering what this is all about. What is the deal with the so-called consultations that took place yesterday when people did not even know any consultations were happening? In the end, a few people attended, but the whole thing was just a public relations exercise. They were not real consultations at all.

I will come back to this, but the government is simply pretending to recognize the mistakes of the past in this situation. Meanwhile, it has just given Alto the power to do whatever it wants and to do it quickly through Bill C-15. It is all in the approach.

I want to begin my speech today by quoting a song by Paul Piché that accompanied me throughout my teenage years. It really encapsulates today's debate. The people in Mirabel will surely remember it, maybe with a tinge of sadness:

In Forillon Park or St-Scholastique
Gotta make way for tourists and airplanes
Early mornin', gotta hit the bricks
We're in the way, they explained
Got played a damn dirty trick
Chased off our homes, our lands, our country.

I would add that they lost their health too. Some lost their families, and some never recovered from this betrayal. We are told here today, with all the sensitivity that technocrats like the member for Thérèse-De Blainville can muster, that a program could be implemented and that mistakes were made, but that people should get over it. That is not what is needed.

The people in charge of major projects have to show respect for human beings first and foremost and not take them for fools, and they should not pass themselves off as promoters or peddlers, as the Minister of Transport is doing.

Trust has to be earned. Crucial to earning people's trust for the high-speed train that will go through Mirabel, where a monumental, horrible mistake of historic proportions was made, is the recognition by this people's assembly of the pain, the suffering and the way people's lives were negatively affected. There must be an apology.

The government has certainly had the opportunity to apologize. On the 50th anniversary of the expropriation of Mirabel residents, the Quebec National Assembly asked Ottawa to apologize. Some Quebec MPs tell us every day that there is no need for the Bloc Québécois to stand up and ensure the voice of Quebeckers is heard in the House of Commons. I have yet to hear them talk about the folks in Mirabel whose land was expropriated. I hear them talking about the big high-speed rail project, but not about the people whose land was expropriated to build Mirabel. I am not hearing them now.

Our debate started an hour ago, but I have not heard them voice any intention of apologizing.

Yes, Marc Garneau apologized, as an individual, and it was a gesture worthy of the man I respect, but this motion concerns a democratic institution, the people's assembly, which includes representatives of certain parties, one of them being the party in power. As they peddle their projects, the last thing they want to do is apologize. They are certain that they know what the people of Mirabel need better than we do.

On April 3, 2019, the National Assembly of Quebec unanimously passed a motion that had the unanimous support of MPs from Quebec. It seems to me that something unanimously passed by the National Assembly is something that a Quebec member of the House of Commons should be able to bring forward, table and put to a vote here, but no. Here is the motion:

THAT the National Assembly mark the 50th anniversary of Mirabel residents' expropriation;

THAT it demand that the Government of Canada formally and officially apologize to the Québec citizens who were expropriated by the Federal Government in 1969 for the construction of the Mirabel airport.

In April 2019, the Bloc Québécois, which is the only party that passes on the unanimous decisions and unanimous votes of the Quebec National Assembly, moved the following motion in the House:

That this House acknowledge the 50th anniversary of the expropriation of land from Mirabel residents and that this House call on the government to formally and officially apologize to the people of Quebec from whom the federal government expropriated land in 1969 to build the Mirabel airport.

At the time, some members who are in the House today voted against the motion. Today, they are introducing an omnibus bill that waives important provisions of the Expropriation Act, such as the ability to appeal compensation powers.

Furthermore, the Minister of Transport is saying that people are not being accurate in their remarks. In response to a question from the member for Mirabel in the House, he wondered why the member for Mirabel did not rise to criticize the Quebec law on the grounds that its wording is the same as that of the federal law. That is false, completely false, particularly on the issue of appeals and compensation. Still, the Liberals continue to ask us to trust them. They want the people of Mirabel to say okay, they will allow the government to do what it has to do because the Liberals recognized that the airport was a mistake.

Mirabel Airport was touted as the seventh wonder of the world in the 20th century, the project of the century that needed to be built fast so we had to act quickly. What happened? It was a huge disaster. Today, the government does not even have the decency to apologize to the people who suffered and are still suffering decades later.

I would like to warn you that Alto is doing things all wrong. To quote Daniel Bélanger, another singer-songwriter I like, “it is all in the way you do it”, and Alto has clearly just failed its first test. I do not know how they are going to recover from this, but clearly in our neck of the woods—it is also going to run through Lanaudière, Mascouche, Terrebonne and so on—farmers and young families are saying the project should be stalled until they are consulted, because they want to be treated equally and have their say.

As for the rail line, as hard as it is to believe, they are saying a rail line will be built somewhere in a strip not 60 metres wide, but 10 kilometres wide. They are making it up as they go along.

I hope my colleague from the Quebec City area will stand and support our motion because he is a man of honour.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the member moved me. He gave a moving speech, with an accurate assessment of the reality facing our farmers. Members will recall that, during the pandemic and toward the end of it, there was talk of food security and how important it is to be self-sufficient. We are faced with a bill, Bill C-15, that gives absolute powers.

In his speech, the member said that people lost their land and their homes. I would add that their physical and psychological integrity were harmed. There is no willingness to apologize on the other side of the House. Why does my colleague think that is?

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot, nor can anyone in this House, fix the mistakes that were made in the past, in any project.

We have to do the best we can, and the best we can do today is the process outlined in Bill C-15, the process that Canadians voted for, a process that gets big projects built quickly but respects our history, respects the lessons we have learned and respects the processes we have put in place, including assessing these projects for their impact on communities and on our environment.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, at one point, I was afraid that the minister was not even going mention today's motion. He eventually did address it.

What I saw, however, was that the minister used pretty much the same arguments here in the House as those presented to the people of Mirabel in 1969, namely progress and modernization. Worse still, with Bill C‑15, the government is looking to bypass the normal expropriation process that exists and that is established in legislation. How can we blame the people of Mirabel for not trusting the federal government after the trauma they experienced?

The motion before us today gives the federal government an opportunity to apologize to Mirabel's expropriated residents for the horrors that were committed in 1969 and into the 1970s. However, the minister's perspective is that voting in favour of this motion is not the first step that should be taken. It is not the first thing his government should do to build trust.

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I want to wish all my colleagues in the House a good morning. This is a wonderful opportunity for the government, for myself, for the government team and even for the opposition team to come together and support a promising project, a major project, a project that will benefit all Canadians, particularly those living along the corridor, as well as their children and grandchildren.

The Alto high-speed rail project is a perfect example of what we need to accomplish together as a country. It is a perfect symbol of how united two of our largest provinces are when it comes to tackling climate change, improving congestion and efficiency in our transportation systems, and enhancing Canadians' quality of life in their day-to-day lives, whether they will be taking this train once, occasionally or every day.

Today, I want to talk about this major project, the enthusiasm it is generating across Canada and the profound changes it will make to our economy and to people's lives. I will then talk about Bill C‑15, how vitally important it is to the project's success and the consultations we are carrying out to make sure it is done right. Lastly, I want to speak directly to the people of Mirabel.

The high-speed rail project is inspiring people in Quebec, in Ontario and across Canada. There is huge public interest. We need only look at the people who are flocking to the open houses, the public consultations, to get a preview of this major project, which would be the first of its kind in North America. They are so proud. As Laval's mayor, Stéphane Boyer, said when the announcement was made in December, this is a project that will transform our country and bring Canada fully into the 21st century. The enthusiasm goes far beyond partisan lines. The former Bloc member for Trois‑Rivières, René Villemure, who was the Bloc Québécois transport critic, no less, said he was relieved and delighted when the high-speed rail project was announced.

We all agree that this is a transformative, major project. The corridor that will be served by high-speed rail is home to more than half of Canada's population. It includes our major financial centres, important manufacturing hubs, world-class universities, and innovation clusters. In Mirabel, for example, the aerospace and aeronautics sector is a strong, strategic and valuable pillar of the economy. It is clearly renowned. Mirabel's aerospace cluster is known all over Canada. I have been to the region myself on several occasions. The member for Mirabel is right to say that his constituents are welcoming, but above all, they are forward-looking. Like all Canadians, they are concerned about their children's future. They want to see development in their region and investment in the institutions and capabilities that will enable continued growth.

Together with the member for Thérèse-De Blainville, the member for Rivière-des-Mille-Îles and the member for Les Pays-d'en-Haut, we form a core team strong enough to continuously ensure a bright economic future and offer ideas and opportunities to the people of Mirabel. We are proud of that.

However, when we look at the entire transportation corridor between Quebec City and Toronto, we must face a harsh reality. Our transportation system is on its last legs. One only has to take a drive down Highway 20 or the 401, or try to get around Quebec City, Ottawa or Gatineau during rush hour. We simply have to make major investments in our highways and in our rail system. We are dealing with clogged highways, overcrowded airports and a rail system where freight trains take precedence over passenger trains.

It is high time we took action. It is time to reduce the pressure on this corridor, which is critical to our economy and to Canadians' quality of life. High-speed rail will change that reality. It will significantly reduce travel times. It will provide a reliable, modern, low-emission transportation option on dedicated tracks. It will enhance workforce mobility and unlock billions of dollars in economic productivity. The project will also help increase the housing supply. It will create more than 50,000 jobs over 10 years and lower Canada's greenhouse gas emissions by millions of tonnes. This is not just a transportation project. It is an economic transformation. It is an investment in Canada's future.

This is all the more important in the current economic climate, especially with what we are experiencing with our neighbours to the south. High-speed rail will boost long-term productivity by expanding labour markets, attracting private investment, and supporting housing growth in the country's most densely populated communities. This is an essential upgrade to a congested transportation network at the heart of Canada's most populous corridor. If Canada wants to remain competitive in an ever-changing global economy, this is exactly the kind of infrastructure we need.

However, it is also clear to us that this project cannot succeed without the support of Canadians. That is why we are doing a lot of consulting and a lot of listening. Since January, Alto and the Government of Canada have been carrying out extensive public consultations, which we announced in December, to help Canadians prepare, ask questions and fully understand the extensive rail line being proposed. In addition to the many studies already completed, Alto has launched an in-depth public consultation process. These consultations will discuss, in particular, route options, station locations, environmental mitigation measures, noise, vibrations, as well as land use and protection. These consultations include virtual sessions, an online information platform and open houses in several communities between Toronto and Quebec City. There will be more. I encourage Canadians who have not yet participated to make their voices heard.

I want to be very clear. These are not meetings where decisions have already been made. On the contrary. If someone asks, “Where will the station be?”, the answer will not be, “Here is where it will be.” The answer will be, “Where do you think it should be, in your opinion?” That is what real and meaningful consultation looks like.

Furthermore, Alto and the Government of Canada are committed to building and maintaining respectful relationships with indigenous communities along the corridor. Engagement with indigenous communities began several years ago and continues today through a targeted consultation process. Bill C‑15 clearly recognizes the importance of indigenous knowledge and provides for its protection. This is how we build modern, linear infrastructure with and for communities.

I would also like to set the record straight in the House: Informing people that land may be required for a project does not automatically mean the land will be expropriated. If expropriation is necessary, it would be carried out in accordance with the expropriation regime in force, with the adjustments provided for in Bill C‑15. The basic rules regarding notice, objection, compensation, assessment, reimbursement of reasonable costs and access to the courts remain unchanged and continue to be governed by the Expropriation Act. Anyone who says otherwise is not being upfront.

I would also like to address a concern raised recently, namely the idea that land can be appropriated by email. Let us be very clear: This is not how expropriation works in Canada, and it will certainly not be the case for Alto, the high-speed rail project. Email cannot be used for expropriation. It is only an optional communication tool used after discussions have begun, and only—I repeat, only—if the owner voluntarily chooses that means of communication. Registered mail remains the norm and it is still fully available, even in the law. Anyone who says otherwise is not being upfront.

The high-speed rail project remains fully subject to the Impact Assessment Act. Yes, certain measures are designed to avoid duplication between federal processes, but this is a matter of making the process more efficient, not weakening it. The project will be thoroughly assessed in terms of environmental impacts, climate impacts, effects on communities, indigenous rights and, of course, long-term sustainability. Nothing in this robust assessment will weaken the project. On the contrary, it will strengthen it. Anyone who says or claims that there is no environmental impact is not being upfront.

Now, I want to address the people of Mirabel directly. This is important.

The Mirabel airport project is one of the most frequently cited examples in Canadian history of what happens when large infrastructure projects are built without taking into account local populations and the reality of communities. It is important to note that this reality has been recognized not only by critics, but also by governments themselves, as the member for Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill just mentioned.

In April 2019, Transport Canada announced that it was restarting the process to sell or return 748 acres of land expropriated in 1969 to the previous owners. As my colleague noted, by that time, the Government of Canada had already returned nearly 90,000 acres of land to Mirabel-area residents through two separate programs in 1985 and 2008. In April 2019, the then minister of transport, the late Marc Garneau, who is in our thoughts every day, announced that Ottawa had made a big mistake 50 years earlier. It is quite clear, obvious even, that he was right. He apologized to the people of Mirabel and to the families who had fallen victim to these expropriations.

This kind of recognition is important. It conveys a fundamental truth: Governments must be able to acknowledge and learn from past mistakes instead of pretending they never happened. I can assure the people of Mirabel, Quebeckers, Ontarians and all Canadians that the Government of Canada is fully aware of these lessons. I would even go so far as to say that both levels of government are fully aware of them.

When a project of such major economic and national significance is being considered, it should be subjected to rigorous review. It should be subjected to thorough analysis. Everything should be done properly in the planning stages and on the ground. The expropriation of the Mirabel airport lands showed us what happens when we take the wrong approach to building. That is absolutely not what will happen with the Alto high-speed train. Anyone who says otherwise is not being upfront.

It will be located where millions of Canadians live and work, in Canada's most densely populated corridor. As the mayor of Quebec City, Bruno Marchand, said, this project will have a major impact on getting people, including workers, from point A to point B more efficiently. This is a major project for Trois‑Rivières, Montreal, Laval and Quebec City.

This project meets a real need. We need to reduce congestion on our roads and get people moving faster and more efficiently.

There is this phenomenon in Canada that does not work in our favour. If all we are doing is adding another process, new wording in a law, another step or something else that does not really improve what we already have, what are we adding?

We are adding delays. Canadians are being deprived of the opportunity to use one type of infrastructure or another. We are adding costs. In this case, it will cost about $5 billion more per year. Therefore, reducing the high-speed rail planning stage from eight to four years, which is what we are proposing, will save Canadians $20 billion. That is a rough estimate, but an estimate nonetheless. Delays cost money.

Canadians spoke loud and clear in last April's election: It is time to build Canada strong. It is high time we get nation-building projects off the ground. It is time to stop beating around the bush and make major investments that will improve the lives of our young people and grow our economic capacity. The part of our economic capacity that hinges on trade with the United States will decrease.

Imagine a student living in Ottawa who wants to enrol in a program at the Université du Québec à Trois‑Rivières. That student could go to class and come back the same day or go there three days a week. Imagine a worker in Peterborough, a small town, who could go to work in downtown Toronto and thus contribute to the Canadian economy while enjoying life in a small town. It is the same thing in Trois‑Rivières. A business person from Laval could realistically get to Toronto to do business in record time and come home the same day.

This is a linear project. Not a single metre can be missing. It is a project that does not like curves. The high-speed train is a promising project that will be built in a 60-metre-wide corridor. I want to reassure the people of Mirabel and everyone who lives along the line. First, we will use public rights-of-way. Second, if we do need to acquire land, we will do so with as little disruption as possible.

Third, people will be fully compensated, down to the last penny, for the market value of their land.

Three cheers for Alto, Canada and major projects. Let us make this happen.

Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit Act

[Claude DeBellefeuille, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon, QC]

Madam Speaker, as always, I greatly appreciated the speech by my colleague across the floor. It is a pleasure to hear him speak. He is a new MP, and I honestly think that he has learned a lot, very quickly.

I know that my colleague is a thorough and hard-working member of Parliament who knows his files. In his speech, he said that budget measures had been announced to help people. I wonder why, three months after the budget was tabled, a budget measure is being introduced in a separate bill. My colleague is well aware that the Standing Committee on Finance is currently studying Bill C-15, which implements the budget that was presented.

Why did his government not include this measure in its budget three months ago?

The Economy

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, what the people in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean, elsewhere in Quebec and across Canada really want is a plan: an economic plan, the Prime Minister's plan, the plan they voted for, the plan that is before the House.

The Conservatives are filibustering the Prime Minister's economic plan. We managed to get Bill C‑19 passed so we can help Canadians. Now I urge the Conservatives to pass the budget implementation act, Bill C‑15, without amendment. That is the Prime Minister's plan to build Canada.

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Minister of Industry and Minister responsible for Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague knows full well that we have a plan and it is called the budget 2025 implementation act, no. 1. We have been seeing obstruction from the opposition, the Conservatives, for far too long. Unfortunately, in these tough times, where the geopolitical situation is very intense and families across the country are struggling to make ends meet, Canadians expect us to be able to work together.

Will the Conservatives vote in favour of the budget, yes or no? Will they stop filibustering the budget implementation bill?

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, there is a plan in front of the House to create $1 trillion of investment in Canada. There is a plan before the House to continue to build the kind of infrastructure that my colleague just referred to. There is a plan before the House that would deregulate, that would free up, that would invest and that would make Canada the most attractive tax investment destination in the world. It is called the budget implementation act. If we bring that bill forward today, will that party support it, yes or no?

Rail Transportation

[Yves-François Blanchet, Bloc, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of any agricultural producer who considers their farm to be too small to be worthy of respect.

Are the powers to suspend rules, laws, parliamentary privilege, environmental consultations, and expropriation rules not proof that Bill C-5 and its offshoot, Bill C-15, are heartless bills?

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals say they will discuss matters directly with citizens, but in their Bill C-15, they put a gun to their heads.

People back home are not excited to know that they may be sent an expropriation notice via email. They are not excited to know that they will not be able to dispute these notices for 30 days.

The Liberals want to get rid of the requirement to hold public hearings and conduct impact studies. They want to maintain control over the land in question for two years. Worse yet, they want to unilaterally set the purchase price of the land.

It is all in Bill C-15. This is a throwback to the 1960s for Mirabel.

Will the government back down on these measures?

Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit Act

[François-Philippe Champagne, Liberal, Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC]

Mr. Speaker, let me start again. I see the Conservatives are full of enthusiasm this afternoon, but I want to make sure that they clearly understand what we are doing in the House.

The second bill, as I was saying, was Bill C-15, the budget implementation act, which would help lay the groundwork for the generational investments that have been included in budget 2025. In other words, we have a long-term vision. It is one that is focused on building a strong and resilient Canadian economy while, at the same time, remaining focused on the more immediate needs of Canadian families and Canadian workers.

All of this is part of our response to a rapidly changing and increasingly uncertain world. We know, for example, that while inflation has cooled off since its postpandemic peak, food inflation remains stubbornly high for Canadian families. Global supply chain shocks caused by tariffs, geopolitical disruptions and climate change have all caused food prices to rise around the world.

That is why I am pleased to inform the House that the Canada groceries and essentials benefit will put hundreds of dollars into the bank accounts of more than 12 million Canadians. That is very significant. Everyone in the House should rejoice that we are going to meet the moment for Canadian families.

We know that affordability is a priority for Canadians, and it is a priority for our government. I would like to believe that it is a priority for everyone here, and I urge all members of the House to work in collaboration with us and help pass the bill in the swiftest manner one can imagine. The Canada groceries and essentials benefit will deliver real help to Canadians who are struggling with the cost of groceries and everyday essentials.

This new benefit will replace the GST credit, but more importantly, it will be more generous. As a refresher, the GST credit is a non-taxable payment made four times a year to help low- and modest-income individuals and families. It is a way of making our tax system more equitable. However, for many Canadians, this assistance is no longer sufficient as a result of rising food costs. We are therefore proposing to increase this benefit by 25%.

In addition, this year we will add a one-time payment equal to 50% of the current benefit, because what people need is immediate support. Since 2020, food inflation has added an average of $782 to household budgets. That is precisely what we are seeking to offset. People understand our long-term vision for growing the Canadian economy, but they also need immediate relief. That is why we are stepping up.

Right now, a person living alone who is eligible for the GST credit can receive a maximum of $443 per year. That same person would get approximately $950 in total from the one-time payment during the 2026-27 benefits year, thanks to the changes we are proposing. This is material, this is timely and this is important for Canadian families. For a couple with two children, the amount would increase from approximately $1,086 to $1,890. That is $800 more in the pockets of Canadian families.

It is right that members of the House are rejoicing, and I know my Conservative colleagues are rejoicing in their hearts at being able to support Canadian families.

Making life more affordable for Canadians is the right thing to do. This is part of Canadian values. When times are tough, Canadians rise up and help each other. That is why the first thing we did with Bill C-4 was cut the income tax for 22 million Canadians. Some 22 million Canadians have received a tax cut. This is significant and, in fact, it was the first act of our government. This represents savings of up to $840 for a two-income family.

With that same legislation, we will formally cancel the federal consumer carbon pricing, bringing down gasoline prices by approximately 18¢ a litre in most provinces and territories. We are also lowering the upfront costs of buying a new home by eliminating the GST for first-time homebuyers, saving them up to $50,000.

This is a government that understands Canadians and responds to Canadians' needs.

We are also continuing to lower the cost of child care, ensuring that 900,000 children and their families can save thousands of dollars every year. We have also made Canada's national school food program permanent so that we can feed up to 400,000 children a year and save participating families with two children an average of $800 a year. Canadian families across the country welcome this kind of help. We are implementing automatic federal benefits for 5.5 million individuals by 2028 so that Canadians can easily and reliably receive the assistance they are entitled to.

We are leaving no stone unturned when it comes to making life more affordable for Canadians. Affordability must be a central measure of our country's economic success. Affordable housing helps workers live near their job. Accessible child care enables more parents to fully participate in the workforce. National school food programs help families and children get ahead, and less expensive groceries and food security mean that Canadians can afford a healthy meal. They mean not having to choose between eating well and other basic needs.

The new Canada groceries and essentials benefit is going to really improve the lives of those who need it most. That is what is in this bill, so I urge all members of the House to support it. I know my colleagues care about this legislation because it helps Canadian families at a time when they need it most. This is one step we are taking to make Canadians' grocery bills more affordable. However, as I said, it is not the only one.

As the Prime Minister announced last week, we will also be implementing long-term solutions that will help us tackle food security and build more resilient supply chains.

For example, we will capitalize on the strategic response fund, the purpose of which, I would remind the House, is to help the sectors affected by tariffs adapt, diversify and grow. We are committing $500 million from this fund to help food businesses expand capacity and increase productivity.

We will be spending $150 million specifically to help small and medium-sized enterprises through the regional tariff response initiative. This funding will prioritize investments that expand capacity and increase productivity in order to increase the food supply and ease price pressures. I want to take this opportunity to thank the president of the Union des producteurs agricoles du Québec for the insight he gave us into measures that the government could be taking to help farmers.

In order to take the pressure off food banks, we will also be investing $20 million in the local food infrastructure fund.

All of these investments will help us improve food security in Canada. I know that this is an issue many Canadians across the country are worried about.

To lower the cost of food production in Canada, the Prime Minister also announced that we are introducing immediate expensing for greenhouse buildings. This measure would support increased domestic supply and investment in food production over the medium and long term. We will develop a national food security strategy to make food more affordable, and we will work with the provinces and territories to standardize unit price labelling so that Canadians can shop and compare prices easily in this era of shrinkflation. I think this is something we should all be rejoicing about.

We are taking action on several fronts to address a complex issue that is very real for Canadians and Canadian families. There are several causes of the food price inflation we are currently seeing, many of which are outside Canada. We cannot control what other countries do, but we can control how we respond here in Canada. This bill is our response: support for food production here in Canada, stronger supply chains and help for people who need it most. This bill is part of our commitment to build a stronger, more resilient Canadian economy and make life more affordable for Canadians.

In fact, we are already seeing progress. Some everyday expenses such as gas prices at the pump, child care fees and cellphone bills have come down. Wages are growing faster than inflation and have been growing so for 33 consecutive months. Those are the facts. This is the Canadian economy, which any commentator has said is resilient.

Currently, the price of groceries and other necessities continues to be high. That is why we are taking action in a targeted and responsible manner. We are protecting the most vulnerable Canadians while remaining fiscally responsible. That is what Canadians expect. Our goal is clear. We want an economy that works for everyone. We want real economic growth that is shared by all. We want an economy where costs are reasonable and where help is available when Canadians need it.

We want to make sure that Canadians feel the benefits of our country's economic growth in their wallets and at the kitchen table, not just hear about them in economic reports. That starts with everyone being able to put good food on the table. That is how we build Canada strong, and that is what we are doing.

Canada is strongest when all Canadians are strong. That is why we are acting: because we believe in every Canadian. We believe in every Canadian family, and we believe in Canada.

[François-Philippe Champagne, Liberal, Minister of Finance and National Revenue]

moved that Bill C‑19, Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, I can see the enthusiasm on both sides of the House. My Conservative colleagues too are brimming with enthusiasm this Monday morning.

I am pleased to rise today to start the debate on Bill C‑19, Canada groceries and essentials benefit act. A lot of important things are getting done in the House, but I would say that this bill is equally important—crucial, even—to Canadian families.

This is the third piece of legislation I have had the honour to introduce as the Minister of Finance and National Revenue. The first, members will recall, was Bill C-4, which put more money in the pockets of Canadians with the middle-class tax cuts. The second, Bill C-15, was the budget implementation act—

Housing

[Kody Blois, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I have a great idea for the member opposite. This government has put a series of measures in place to help support young Canadians getting into their first home and to be able to build more housing supply in this country, whether it is Build Canada Homes or removing the GST up to $50,000 for new homebuyers buying their first home. The Conservatives obstruct at every single pass.

The member has to go back and answer to his constituents for why Conservatives are standing in the way of the progress this government is seeking to advance. There are important measures in Bill C-15. They should get on board and actually be a part of the solution.

Opposition Motion—Canadian Economic Sovereignty

[Kody Blois, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the member talked a lot about initiatives that the government has put forward in the budget through the budget implementation act, Bill C-15, which is before members at the moment. One thing the member knows the importance of is international trade, so I was surprised that when I looked through the opposition day motion today there was not a single mention of diversifying trade markets and Canada's place in doing exactly what he talked about, fuelling and feeding the world.

The member represents Portage—Lisgar, and I had the opportunity to have a quick look. Over 5,000 of his constituents, according to the 2021 census, are involved in the agricultural industry. Peas, oil seeds and beef are major elements of the regional economy that he represents.

We were just in China. We established a trade arrangement. Does the member support the work the government has done to open up markets for farmers in his part of western Canada?

[Kody Blois, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I know a lot of members are sticking around because they are excited for the speeches after question period. I look forward to engaging in today's opposition day motion, presented by the hon. member for Battle River—Crowfoot.

I would like to recognize that I will splitting my time this afternoon with my hon. colleague from LaSalle—Émard—Verdun. He is an exceptional member, and I look forward to his remarks after mine.

This is an opposition day motion that the Conservatives have put forward calling for legislation to be called the Canada sovereignty act, and then laying out a series of considerations they would like to see in that said act. It is important for Canadians to understand at home, though, that the Conservatives have not done their homework. They have not come to Parliament prepared. They have not shown up in the House of Commons to actually introduce a piece of legislation. They have, on a piece of paper, put together a few thoughts, and I would argue a number of those thoughts are actually not comprehensive to the work that is expected not only of parliamentarians but of major political parties here in Canada.

I want to start by recognizing that this is not legislation. We heard questions in the House today from opposition members who were talking about legislation they had put before the House. There is nothing of the like, so it is important that we start with that premise. The Conservatives do have a little bit of work to do to sharpen their pencils and show up in this place with actual legislation in place and not just half-baked ideas.

Second, let us take a look at what they have put on paper. There are areas where I will give them some credit and some areas where they are just blatantly missing very important elements. First of all, I think many Canadians would agree that in this environment, economic sovereignty is absolutely connected to defence and defence sovereignty.

I have behind me the former minister of defence, the current Minister of Global Affairs. She would tell the House, having been experienced in that role, that we absolutely have to invest in the Canadian Armed Forces. She was a great champion in her time on that portfolio. She continues to support the Minister of National Defence and is continuing to do that work globally today.

This is exactly why we are spending $81 billion over the next five years to rebuild our Canadian Armed Forces. My hon. colleague from Oakville East grew up in Kentville, but she also spent time at 14 Wing Greenwood. I know she would agree with me that when we think about the men and women who serve in our Canadian Armed Forces, in the Royal Canadian Air Force, those investments that matter for our men and women in uniform are absolutely crucial. There is not one mention in the Conservative opposition day motion about the importance of defence as part of our economic sovereignty.

That is a blatant error that the Conservatives have not really thought through. It is something that we have moved on. We are increasing long-overdue pay increases for the Canadian Armed Forces. This matters at Aldershot; it matters at 14 Wing Greenwood. The hon. member for Acadie—Annapolis and I are working with the Minister of National Defence on identifying additional housing in the Annapolis Valley. We think this is important not only for our Canadian Armed Forces members but also the broader community in the Annapolis Valley. It is something we will have more to say on.

How about trade diversification? Again, the Minister of International Trade, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the entire government have had a deep focus on building international trade. There is not one single mention of this in the Conservative opposition day motion.

We recognize fully that the partnership we have established with the United States, with the economic co-operation we have had for many decades, has been beneficial to both countries. We will continue in earnest to make that case to the U.S. administration, in order to make sure we can secure a continental economic free trade agreement.

Make no mistake that Canadians elected this government to build trade relationships around the world, and that is what the Prime Minister and his ministry have been doing. Our Liberal team has been building trade relationships around the world. I can point to the United Arab Emirates and 70 billion dollars' worth of a sovereign wealth fund that is going to be focused on investing here in Canada.

I keep referencing my hon. colleague behind me, but she has ties to Nova Scotia. She is heading to India in a few weeks, which is one of the largest consumer markets in the world. It is a democracy. Notwithstanding it is a country that we have not always had agreement with fully, the government believes we have to focus on the pragmatic and co-operative elements of enhancing our trade relationships.

We were also in China in the new year to establish a trade arrangement. This is not a free trade agreement, of course not, but it is to resolve existing tariffs to make sure Canadian farmers and seafood harvesters in Atlantic Canada have access to that market. There has not been a single word from the Conservatives about that this week. They do not really want to talk about how important that is to the five billion dollars' worth of export markets for Canadian farmers, particularly for canola in the prairie provinces, for the re-establishment of beef market access and for Canadian farmers to export their peas, which is almost $600 million a year to the Chinese market.

In fact, I asked Conservative members earlier today whether they even support the government's work to remove those tariffs. There was no response. They are not making clear what their position is. Our position is very clear. Part of our economic sovereignty in this country has to be to diversify our trading relationships. That is what we are doing. There is not a single word about this in the Conservative opposition day motion. Again, it is not a bill before the House but a few lines on a piece of paper. The member for Battle River—Crowfoot has not done his work.

However, let us talk about farmers. We heard a lot of questions in the House about farmers, but I am going to remind my hon. colleagues from the opposition that they had their moment in April to talk about farmers. In fact, the hon. member from Kelowna mentioned farmers three times in a question. That is three times more than what the Conservatives had in their own platform in April. They had an opportunity to concretely put forward what their vision was for farmers in this country, and there has not been a single word.

I will remind farmers in Kings—Hants and farmers across this country that the Liberal platform was comprehensive. We included measures around increasing business risk management tools such as AgriMarketing, for example. I would like to highlight the $224,000 that the government is supporting the Nova Scotia fruit growers with to help establish markets around the world. This is but some examples of what we are doing to work concretely.

In addition to what I just talked about around the trade arrangement with China, it is absolutely fundamental to Canadian farmers. Conservatives love to beat their chests on this, but there is not a whole lot of actual pen to paper about what their policies would be. Rather, they continue to talk about any type of environmental policy as just being problematic in the country instead of highlighting, for example, what the Minister of the Environment did in question period around the biofuel policy in this country actually being good for Canadian canola farmers.

The members of Parliament who represent these areas in western provinces and who are actively arguing against policies that support their own communities have to ask themselves why they are doing this. Why are they acting against the interests of their farmers and their own communities when this is an environmental policy that actually benefits rural Canada? This is what I find perplexing.

However, I do have some good news for my Conservative colleagues. On the elements they are talking about around reducing red tape, fast-tracking national projects and focusing on building a resilient Canadian economy focused on tools to drive additional investment in this country, we have a plan for that. In fact, it is before the House. It is called the budget, Bill C-15, which is the budget implementation act.

There are a lot of very important measures there, including what is called the superdeduction. This is around businesses being able to expense capital expenditures in a year as opposed to multiple years, which is an important tax measure to drive productivity. We are focused on putting the lowest marginal effective tax rate in the G7 into place. This is all residing in legislation that is before the House.

The Conservatives and, frankly, all members on the opposition side have to ask themselves why they are slowing down this progress when the government has measures to drive the economy forward and do some of the things the Conservatives, among the few elements they have, would agree with the government on. Let us get to it. Let us move forward and focus on that.

I will finish with this. We have an MOU with Alberta to focus on driving natural resource development and working on reducing red tape. This would also make sure that these are done in conjunction with indigenous people, that we have commitments around industrial carbon pricing to reduce emissions and that we have a competitive lens in terms of what we are doing.

There is no mention of artificial intelligence. Again, we want to talk about what is going to be revolutionary in the global economy. The expectation is that, by 2035, artificial intelligence will contribute $15.7 trillion to the global economy. There is not a single mention in the Conservatives' economic plan about how the government harnesses that opportunity.

[Kody Blois, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I want to give my hon. colleague some good news. Some of the things she talked about, in terms of driving the economy forward, actually reside in Bill C-15, which is still before Parliament. I would encourage the member and her Conservative colleagues to work collectively with the government to advance those measures.

The question I have for the hon. member is this: She represents a rural riding. She has a lot of farmers in her riding. She talked quite negatively about the engagement of the trade arrangement that the government has established with China, which is removing tariffs from five billion dollars' worth of exports that are being tariffed right now. That matters for the prairie provinces; that matters in Atlantic Canada on seafood. We do not disagree that, of course, the United States will remain an important trading partner, but this government is looking to diversify.

Does she really believe from her position in the Conservative Party that we should not have done this for Canadian farmers, that we should not have opened up markets with the second-largest economy in the world? Is that her position?

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to be back in the House. Unfortunately, as my colleague said, today has a real Groundhog Day feel. Clearly, the true intention of this opposition day is to pad the already overflowing coffers of Canadian oil and gas companies. Are they actually Canadian? I will get to that.

The subject of the motion is something we have been talking about for ages. Essentially, it would grant oil and gas companies' every wish by completely doing away with what little remains of the previous government's already inadequate measures to fight climate change. The truth is that the Liberal Prime Minister spent a year sabotaging his own political party's feeble environmental legacy, and now there are hardly any climate policies left. Basically, what we have here is an intention to fulfill oil and gas companies' every last wish.

We all remember that things got off to a Trump-style start. When the Prime Minister took office, his first order was to abolish carbon pricing for individuals, which is completely contrary to the Paris Agreement. Like Mr. Trump, the government is turning its back on the Paris Agreement. After that, everything fell apart as the federal government scrapped one after another of the country's climate policies.

The Conservatives were actually dismayed when the Liberal Prime Minister's platform in the last election mirrored their own playbook: slashing carbon pricing on polluters, including major polluters such as big Canadian oil and gas companies.

The irony is that over 60% of Canadian oil and gas companies' assets are held by U.S. investors. What the Conservatives are proposing, and what the Liberals are doing, is to claim to be fighting against U.S. economic imperialism while actually rolling out the carpet for Mr. Trump's billionaire friends and goosing the profits of these largely foreign-owned companies. For them, Canadian sovereignty means making it easier to transfer money from Canada and Quebec to the U.S. to boost companies' already excessive profits. Now the Conservatives are calling for the repeal of federal measures that they say are blocking or penalizing development in Canada. Members should know that development has been picking up speed since the Liberals came to power.

Let us take a closer look at what our Conservative friends are proposing. They are calling for the Impact Assessment Act to be repealed. I do not think our colleagues have been paying close attention to what has happened since the current government came to power. The government has passed Bill C-5, which allows it to suspend at least 10 acts and seven regulations, including some environmental ones, which means it can circumvent environmental assessments. There is no need to even repeal the Impact Assessment Act, since it has already been partially done. The government gave itself the power to do that.

Let us take a look at Bill C-15, the budget implementation act. It allows any minister to suspend any legislation under the guise of innovation. This has already been done. What the Conservatives are asking for has already been done by the governing Liberal Party, for the benefit of oil and gas companies, as I said, to expedite approvals for this industry's projects.

The other demand in the Conservative motion is to repeal the west coast Oil Tanker Moratorium Act. I could talk about how appalling it is to call for a moratorium to be repealed in order to allow oil tankers to pass through a marine conservation area. Obviously, that would be environmentally risky, but it is also a complete violation of the rights of the first nations that have called for the moratorium to be upheld, because they do not want oil tankers on their territory. However, the federal government has already committed to building an oil sands pipeline that could carry a million barrels a day to the west coast for export, and the pipeline would pass through this area. Evidently, the government is already willing to do what the Conservatives are demanding. Bill C-5 is there to make it easier.

The Conservatives are also calling on the government to do away with the federal industrial carbon tax. I am pleased to tell them that the federal government is already working on that. Alberta backed down and has not raised the carbon price for its companies. The offset price is currently $25 per tonne in Alberta, whereas the carbon price in Canada is supposed to be $95. The federal government is letting Alberta do whatever it wants and is not forcing the province to raise its price on carbon. What is more, we know full well that the MOU between Alberta and Canada will weaken industrial carbon pricing policies, so once again, that wish has already come true.

Our Conservative friends are calling on the government to do away with the cap on oil and gas companies' polluting greenhouse gas emissions, but the government has already promised to do so under the Canada-Alberta MOU. That wish has already been granted. Is it a responsible thing to do? Does it make sense? From a climate perspective, it does not make any sense to impose zero constraints on the biggest polluters in the country, on the sector that is the largest polluter in the country, such as the oil sands, which emit as much greenhouse gas emissions as all of Quebec. The government repealed those regulations, but the Conservatives have obviously not realized it yet, because they are asking again for it to be repealed.

They are also calling on the government to remove the federal EV sales quota. The federal government suspended that EV sales quota just last fall. It is no longer forcing Canadian manufacturers to offer the public EVs or to offer a bigger supply of more affordable vehicles that would free them from the need to use gas. It has already suspended this quota, with no indication as to when it will be reinstated. We do not know for sure, but we strongly suspect that it could be significantly watered down, because Ontario is unequivocally demanding an end to measures like this. Western Canada's oil companies are calling on the government to drop such measures. As we have seen, the federal government has even abandoned the EV buyer incentives.

The government is already on track to fulfill the oil and gas companies' entire wish list, but my Conservative colleagues have failed to realize that almost all the climate architecture and measures put in place by the government have been dismantled since the Prime Minister took office. Of course, I will not even mention the fact that Canada is still not allowed to import European electric vehicles under the pretext of safety. This puts these far less expensive and more technologically advanced vehicles out of reach, and it enables the government to shield Canadian manufacturers, which rank among the worst in the world when it comes to electrification and which are slowing the adoption of electric vehicles across this country.

My Conservative colleagues are also calling for the federal plastics ban to be lifted. Of course, 99% of plastic is produced from oil and gas. This is a potential market for oil and gas companies. It is easy to see why our Conservative colleagues are pushing for plastic production bans to be lifted, even though the world is heading in that direction and even though the international community is working toward a global agreement to get rid of plastic. Plastic poses serious risks to human health and the environment, and it is one of the world's fastest-growing sources of greenhouse gas pollution. Plastics are what oil and gas companies are counting on to keep making profits.

Well, I am pleased to inform my Conservative colleagues that the government is already backtracking on this. Canada was supposed to implement an international export ban on single-use plastics in December, but the government backtracked in the fall. Once again, the government is granting oil and gas companies' wishes before my Conservative colleagues even realize that it is doing exactly what those companies want.

The other thing my Conservative colleagues want is the removal of federal regulatory restrictions that impede communication and advocacy by Canadian companies. Basically, they want to eliminate rules that prohibit greenwashing by oil and gas companies. Once again, I am pleased to inform my Conservative colleagues that, in the latest budget, the government made it clear that it intends to soften anti-greenwashing laws, even though those laws protect consumers and ensure that they get the truth about how oil and gas companies are performing. Everyone knows they are among the world's worst offenders when it comes to telling the truth.

Unfortunately, this day is completely pointless. This is, yet again, what oil and gas companies want. They have gotten almost everything they want. When are we going to talk about real solutions to get off fossil fuels, which cause climate change, underwrite war, destabilize Quebec's economy, drain our wallets and escalate extreme weather events that are extremely costly to Quebeckers, their health and their economy?

The Economy

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, we certainly want to wish the Leader of the Opposition well in this very decisive and important week for him. We know that he will have success at his party's convention.

The Prime Minister's plan to grow our economy, to create a trillion dollars in investment and to protect our workers and our industries from trade threats is before the House in Bill C-15. We take very well the leader's openness to work with us on legislation. Can he give us a date, just a date, in the next words out of his mouth, as to when we can have third reading on the BIA?

Government Priorities

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

Mr. Speaker, this year we will be presenting a shareholders' report instead of our usual session review, because Canada has essentially become a business.

Under this Prime Minister, the Liberals are not even pretending anymore. The fight against climate change is over. The environment is a roadblock to trade. Bill C-5, Bill C-15 and Bill S-4 throw compliance with the law out the window because it slows down business. Quebec's distinctiveness does not matter anymore. The Prime Minister joined the challenge to Bill 21 as fast as he dropped his French lessons.

Are the Liberals aware that Quebeckers did not vote for their Canada Inc.?

Speaker's Ruling

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Madam Speaker, I wish I could say I was pleased to rise today. December 10 is coincidentally Human Rights Day, and I stand here at the point of report stage on Bill C-12, which threatens to actually violate international human rights law. I will go into why I believe that to be the case and why I am offering amendments at this late stage.

I want to extend my deep appreciation to the hon. member for Vancouver East for seconding my amendments. She also worked hard to put amendments forward during clause by clause at the national security committee, where we met. A number of other members of this place continued to try to make amendments, some of which I agreed with, others of which I did not, until midnight, when we were cut off from trying to make amendments, but we tried.

I want to give the people who are watching these speeches right now some more context.

I want to thank my hon. colleague from Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola. We may disagree on some of the points, particularly those on refugee protections, but I agree and want to associate myself with his very elegant preamble on what is wrong with omnibus bills, how many things are stuffed into the bill we have before us and whether it is appropriate to do that. I agree with him that it is not.

It is true that the Liberals used to make comments about the horrible Conservative omnibus budget bills. We have an omnibus budget bill before us today that passed on division, which, by the way, coincidentally means that members of Parliament were not able to register personal votes. I was not able to vote against it, as I would have wished to have done, but it was agreed that it would be passed on division by the recognized parties, which means that the Greens and the NDP MPs in this place could not register opposition to Bill C-15, the mother of all budgetary omnibus bills, at over 600 pages long.

Never mind that. Right now we are talking about my amendments, and those of others, to Bill C-12.

Let me start briefly by sharing the path this bill took, as the hon. member for Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola has done in brief.

Back in June of 2025, as the numbers indicate, Bill C-2 was one of the very first bills put forward by the new administration under the Liberal Party in a minority Parliament. It did not take long for Bill C-2 to attract attention. I have never seen such quick work by as broad a range of civil society organizations, and I have seen lots of opposition.

There is a huge coalition of more than 300 NGOs that are completely opposed to Bill C‑2 because of the human rights violations, because of the interference with and violation of privacy rights, which the member for Kamloops talked about. One example is allowing Canada Post employees to open personal mail.

I will just briefly list some of the organizations to give a sense of the breadth and depth of concern. There was OpenMedia, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the United Church of Canada, the Muslim legal rights association, Women's Shelters Canada, the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association, and Amnesty International. A broad range of organizations said that Bill C-2 should not pass, that it was appalling.

I will quote the executive director of OpenMedia, Matt Hatfield, who happens to be one of my constituents. He said that Bill C-2 was all about one thing, which was “pleasing President Trump”.

Bill C-2 was a target. I know many of us as MPs received so many letters from constituents saying we have to stop Bill C-2. I thought we had won a victory when it was reported in the media that the Liberal government was going to withdraw Bill C-2 and replace it with something that was not odious.

I have had the great honour of serving in this place since 2011, but I have never seen a shell game as gross as this. In October 2025, the government brought forward the bill that is before us today, Bill C-12, which contains as many offensive elements toward the rights of refugees and violations of human rights law internationally as the original bill, Bill C-2. The Liberals sort of did a bait and switch. The Liberals withdrew the parts about being able to open our mail and have access to our data from Internet service providers. Those are not in Bill C-12, but the surprise is that they remain in Bill C-2.

Bill C-2 remains on the Order Paper. We have been informed more recently that, once Bill C-12 passes, the government will bring back Bill C-2, having removed the sections that they expect us to pass it quickly, and it will probably pass quickly because that is how things go around here. Bill C-12 will go through, and then we will get Bill C-2 back, but without the sections we have passed in Bill C-12. I hope members are following me in this attempt to explain what the government is doing.

Bill C-2 attracted widespread public opposition, so it was a bait and switch. We are replacing Bill C-2. We have Bill C-12. The provisions of Bill C-12 remain offensive to the same groups that say nothing has changed since the original Bill C-2. This process is still about pleasing Donald Trump. Bill C-2 had a catchy title: the strong borders act. Bill C-12 has a less catchy title: strengthening Canada's immigration system and borders act. They are pretty much the same animal. We will get Bill C-2 back, but with the sections that have been passed in Bill C-12 removed.

What is offensive about all this? I had hoped to have a chance to speak on December 10, on Human Rights Day, to talk about international human rights. Ironically, I am because I am presenting amendments to Bill C-12. Otherwise, Human Rights Day would go by unobserved in this place. We observe it by pushing through a piece of legislation that violates international human rights.

What about this bill makes it offensive? As I mentioned before, the so-called lawful access pieces, going into Canadians' mail and accessing Internet service provider information, have yet to come forward in a stripped-down version of what was put forward in June in Bill C-2. We will get that back again. Meanwhile, Bill C-12 takes away the rights of people who would ordinarily have the rights of refugees to come to Canada and say they need to claim refugee protection.

Here is the the catch: Bill C-2, and now Bill C-12, say that, if someone has been in Canada for a year, they no longer have the right to ask for refugee protection. They no longer have the right to ask for a hearing for a fair assessment of their case. I will just explain why it could be that someone who has been in Canada for a year has not yet asked for refugee status.

Let us say someone came to Canada on a valid work permit or a valid student visa. They had no reason to imagine they were not going to be able to continue their studies or continue their work. The situation in their home country could have changed, the government shifted and they suddenly knew that, if they returned, they would be jailed. Their previous activities or their exercising of free speech would put them in jeopardy. This does not automatically give anybody a claim to stay in Canada to be able to avail themselves of the rights that Canada signed on to in international treaties to protect refugee rights. It just says they are allowed to ask for protection and the system will decide if they are a valid refugee or not. Those opportunities have ended. The rules changed for people who have already been in Canada for a year and would have no reason to think they need to ask for refugee protection.

I have put forward numerous amendments here today, as we heard the Speaker read out, and I am grateful to the hon. member for Vancouver East for seconding them. These amendments, even if carried, could not remedy what is wrong with this bill. The appropriate thing to do would be to withdraw it completely and to not try to interfere with human rights in the guise of making Donald Trump happy. We do not have ICE in Canada raiding institutions, schools and workplaces to grab people and say they are getting shipped out of the country before they can get due process. That is not us.

That is not Canada, but we move closer to that actually being who we are if Bill C-12 is passed without amendment and without accepting the amendments put forward today by the hon. member for Vancouver East and me. We need to protect human rights.

Justice

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

Mr. Speaker, the Liberal abuse of power continues.

After Bill C-5, which gives the federal government the power to circumvent all laws for its major projects like pipelines, now we have Bill C-15. The Liberals are enshrining the right for all their ministers to break any law under the guise of innovation. That is not all. Liberal senators' Bill S-4 also allows them to circumvent the law.

If the Liberals can decide everything without obeying the law and without consulting anyone, can we still call this a democracy?

The Budget

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, one section of the enormous Bill C-15, in the over 600 pages of an omnibus budget bill, has not yet been even mentioned in this place and was not mentioned in the budget either.

The idea that the budget implementation act just implements things in the budget is belied by pages 301 to 304, which would exempt the application of Canadian law to any entity, which could be people or corporations, at the discretion of the minister, with no public oversight.

Can anyone here, particularly the Minister of Finance, explain this?

Opposition Motion—Pipeline Construction

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Madam Speaker, let us be clear. What we are talking about today is an Alberta-Canada oil and gas agreement that amounts to literal climate betrayal. Canada is abandoning its greenhouse gas reduction targets. It is abandoning all of the environmental policies it has put in place over the past 10 years. It is abandoning biodiversity by revoking measures like the west coast oil tanker ban. It is abandoning protection for indigenous lands. Simply put, the Prime Minister is rolling out a political oil and gas agenda that is moving ahead at top speed, no matter the price and whatever the cost. This is climate betrayal by the Liberals.

Not only did this cause the member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie to resign as a minister, it also resulted in two expert advisors to the Prime Minister walking out. We have a Prime Minister who is circumventing legislation and pushing out everyone around him who cares about the environment and climate change. Whether they are ministers or experts, it is, “Thank you and good night, the Prime Minister no longer needs you.”

Then he goes and signs an agreement with Alberta to produce and export 1.3 million barrels of dirty oil per day, without the consent of British Columbia and first nations. There was no discussion with first nations before the agreement was signed. There is no obligation in the agreement to respect the rights of first nations. First nations have stated unanimously that the tanker ban had to remain in place. They also very clearly stated their position that this agreement had to be revoked. What is the Prime Minister doing? He is doing absolutely nothing. He is not listening to first nations.

It is the same for British Columbia. There was no consultation with British Columbia prior to this agreement. The Premier of British Columbia found out in the papers that the Prime Minister of Canada was negotiating an agreement with Alberta in secret. He was never consulted, and there is nothing in the agreement that allows British Columbia to refuse to have a pipeline forced down its throat. The agreement says only that British Columbia must be consulted.

This is a clear threat to the other provinces and to Quebec, who could basically have an oil and gas fantasy forced upon them. It is one of the worst cases of predatory federalism ever documented. It is an exceptionally violent attack on the environment and on respect for the provinces, which is nowhere to be seen. This agreement essentially shows a blatant disregard, a denial of our institutions and a denial of due process for the presumed goal of rolling out an oil and gas business plan. Once again, the government is exploiting the trade and tariff crisis to go full steam ahead on oil and gas.

That it made plans with the Premier of Alberta is understandable, obviously, but members should remember that this oil is one of the most polluting oils on earth. It is the biggest environmental issue in Canada. The Prime Minister is no longer concerned about climate change. Obviously, a private proponent has yet to come forward, so the Prime Minister is most likely willing to give the oil industry more billions. We know that he believes this pipeline must happen at any cost, but the cost for Quebeckers will once again be in the billions even though they have nothing to gain from it. This is a pipeline for western Canada and the oil and gas industry, even though we know that we should be investing in solutions to build the economy of the future. We should be thinking about clean electricity, green buildings, and the electrification of transportation, companies, and small and medium-sized businesses. We need to build this expertise. The jobs of the future are in these sectors. They are not in oil and gas.

Let us turn back to the member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie, who published a letter this morning. The member was very clear. He said that it would be disingenuous to say that Canada is going to meet its greenhouse gas reduction targets. He was highly critical of this agreement between his boss, the Prime Minister, and Alberta's Ms. Smith. He said this was a fire sale rather than a compromise because essentially, Canadians will get nothing in exchange for the sacrifices made for Alberta. That is also true for Quebec. Not only does Quebec have nothing to gain from this deal, it has everything to lose. The agreement has also abandoned 10 years of environmental measures that have already been implemented. While they may not have been adequate, they have now been abandoned, plain and simple.

Members will recall that these are the highlights of this agreement.

It is essentially about the government giving the oil and gas industry everything on its wish list, as the government has been doing since it came to power. It is about increasing the production of oil and gas, including dirty oil, including gas extracted by fracking. It is about one or more oil pipelines to transport at least 1 million barrels of oil produced from Alberta bitumen, the dirtiest, or almost the dirtiest, oil in the world. It is about expanding the Trans Mountain pipeline system to add 300,000 to 400,000 barrels of dirty oil per day. It is about ending the moratorium on oil tankers on the west coast, which would allow tankers carrying crude oil to travel through a marine protected area, with all the potential risks to this very fragile ecosystem, and to all the jobs in the environmental protection sector in that part of the country. It is about increasing electricity production using gas, a fossil fuel. It is also about suspending the clean electricity regulations for Alberta. This obviously creates uncertainty, quite apart from the fact that it means we are really not moving in the direction of renewable energy. What are the other provinces likely to do? They are going to ask for the same lax standards.

The agreement increases the industrial carbon price to $130 per tonne. The government had planned for a price of $170 per tonne in 2030. However, it is being scaled back for Alberta. The price is now $130 per tonne, but it is not even known when this price will go into effect. Is it in 2050, for example? What is the trajectory? There is no clarity on this. Then, of course, there is talk of constructing a carbon capture and storage megaproject at a cost of billions of dollars, for the oil and gas industry once again, for Alberta's dirty oil. In addition, the government is going to allow carbon capture and storage to be used to increase oil production through enhanced recovery, something the government said in its budget that it would not do. It is flip-flopping. Not only is it flip-flopping, it is basically walking away once again from its commitment to stop subsidizing fossil fuels.

On top of that there are the methane regulations. Canada is now going to have to reach an agreement with Alberta on the methane regulations. We already know that Alberta has just been given an additional five years, meaning that this province will implement the regulations five years later than planned. What are the other provinces likely to do? British Columbia will probably demand the same thing. What kind of regulation will we end up with when all is said and done? It will very likely be watered down, with less ambitious targets and with additional loopholes built in. In addition to all this, there is one final wish from the oil and gas companies: amend the Competition Act to eliminate the measures for combatting greenwashing.

All of the oil and gas sector's wishes are being granted. Let us now return to the much-discussed emissions cap. In the oil and gas sector, the oil sands currently emit more greenhouse gases than all of Quebec. These emissions have risen nearly 500% since 1990. A new pipeline is obviously going to increase production and increase emissions. This is very clear. There is no such thing as a barrel of decarbonized oil or a barrel of green oil; it simply does not work that way. It is a sham. One need not be the sharpest pencil in the box to understand this. Everyone understands that if production increases, emissions will increase.

The agreement also talks about carbon capture and storage, but 80% of emissions from oil come from combustion. This does nothing to address the problem of emissions. The science is very clear on this. The agreement talks about implementing carbon capture and storage technology, but at this time, the technology is still unproven. It has not been deployed at scale. It is still experimental, and it is extremely expensive. It will require billions of dollars of public funds. Canada is, of course, ready and willing to chip in 50% of those costs for the oil and gas companies.

This is climate betrayal. Many people voted for the Liberals thinking they would be better than the Conservatives. However, their record is currently worse than the Conservatives'. The Conservatives did not even manage to authorize a pipeline under Stephen Harper, who presided over some dark years in terms of the environment. This Liberal government, on the other hand, will have two to its name. It used Bill C‑5 to suspend certain laws and Bill C‑15 to trample every environmental law in order to push this oil project through. People did not vote for that. The climate crisis is still raging. Using the tariff and trade crisis to advance a Conservative agenda is completely irresponsible.

The Bloc Québécois is obviously going to oppose this plan and refuse—

Liaison

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

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this. I was very happy to learn that the Conservatives had moved the motion, because we are working on that right now. I have in hand reports on committee meetings held since the parliamentary session started. I have to say, the numbers are not great. We hear speeches about collaboration, yet 412 out of 468 meetings have been held as of today. If we include today and tomorrow, I know that at least one meeting is going to be cancelled. Apparently, there was some good news about the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, but we know that there will be others. In the past week, it has been happening more often, but that is not a good thing, because we are here to work. So that is going to increase again.

Taken all together, then, we are talking about 56 meetings that were not convened and 112 hours of work that was not done, which amounts to 12% of committee hours. That is before today. If I add today, that is another 12 hours of meetings that will not be held. I predict that it will go up to 20 hours, because there are several discussions and we are being told that, since we are just wrapping up studies, we are not going to start the next one and that everyone wants to go home. Those are the discussions that are taking place, but we are here to work. The sad reality is that for the six years I have been sitting on these benches, the House of Commons has unfortunately not been known for its efficiency. It is really sad.

We need only look at the debates we have here, where we spend several days on one bill. In theory, as the hon. member for Joliette—Manawan pointed out earlier, it is the members, representing the people in their ridings, who will come and speak. It is up to the government to win the support of a majority in a minority situation. Unfortunately, we often get here with our main points and our positions, and then we go on and on about our positions for three or four days. Ultimately, we end up voting the same way as if we had voted on the first day. That is often the case. Sometimes opinions change, but it is rare. In terms of efficiency, sometimes we wonder whether what we are doing is productive, whether we are moving things forward. Sadly, the hourly cost of our operations is quite high. That is the truth.

Committees are usually the best part of parliamentary life. A committee is supposed to be made up of people of good faith who want to advance a cause. They may have differences of opinion, of course, but they want to debate them in a healthy way, then sit down, get to work and study.

We are talking about filibustering. It is appalling how much time we are wasting. Earlier, I repeated one of my questions from last fall. In response, the member told me that it was not his fault, that the government that did not want to release the documents. In fact, both sides are right, and we find ourselves caught between the two major political parties, trying to move things forward. Unfortunately, far too often, if not almost always, we seem to be the only adult in the room. That is very sad.

We are here to work. If someone chooses to not work or not call a committee meeting the next morning or the next evening, they are not paid less; they receive the same salary. The work needs to be done, but it is not getting done. There are various reasons for that, but it is not right. The statistics I gave cover the 25 standing committees, but they do not include the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations, the Standing Joint Committee on the Library of Parliament or the Subcommittee on International Human Rights. In total, there are 29 committees, so the statistics may actually be even bleaker than the numbers I provided.

How does this happen? What possible reason could there be for a committee not to sit? The chair is supposed to consult with the vice-chairs. It may happen once in a while, once in a session or once every two or three sessions, that a meeting is cancelled because something is not working or because there is a problem with witnesses or something like that, but that is rare, and that is not what we are seeing in this session.

How is that possible? I have asked my colleagues in the House about this. How is it that we find ourselves talking about this today? It is not right for us to be compiling statistics to show how little the committee meets and why we need to sit down and look at how often this is happening. I would like to announce that I have planned some meetings with colleagues, including a colleague on the government side, with whom I want to discuss this issue.

Beyond that, I want to discuss the issue of filibustering. This is actually quite surreal. It is understandable for the opposition to sometimes use this approach to block debate, but why are government members blocking their own bill? They are filibustering their own bill. This is unbelievable. They introduce a bill and then, once in committee, they refuse to discuss it. Take, for example, Bill C-9, which we were debating earlier. When they realize that an amendment does not suit everyone, they no longer want to move forward. They do not know how to back down, so they choose to talk for hours and hours on end. I have identified three examples from committees.

First, at the Standing Committee on Finance on October 22, we witnessed the Liberals using appalling filibustering tactics to avoid debating the motion tabled by the Bloc Québécois, which was next on the agenda. That is one of the games they play. People watching us at home should take note: This is what their elected representatives are doing. When they do not like the next item on the agenda, they prefer not to talk about it because they do not have any intelligent arguments to defeat it when it comes to a vote. They prefer to prevent discussion, so they take the floor and talk for hours. On November 19, the same thing happened. On December 8, they did it again during the study of their own bill, Bill C‑15. In total, there were 5.5 hours of filibustering at the Standing Committee on Finance alone.

Let us talk about the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, which was mentioned earlier. There was supposed to be five meetings on Bill C-9, the law on hate speech, but two of them were not held. Both the Liberals and the Conservatives contributed to the filibuster. The Conservatives are good at pointing fingers, but they are even better at filibustering. I have noticed since I entered this place that they have a lot of experience with that. The Liberals cancelled the December 4 meeting. We still had meetings scheduled this week, but we were unsure whether they would go ahead. We thought they would be cancelled until a Conservative colleague gave us the scoop: He told us that the committee had been convened. We are very pleased about it, but in all, seven hours of work were lost. Those seven lost hours are no small matter. Sitting around the table are 10 members, two analysts, the clerk, the technical team and the interpreters. Every hour is expensive. That is the message I want to get across today: It costs a lot of money. Then they talk to us about budget efficiency. They want to cut transfers to the provinces. Something does not add up there. We need to be efficient for the common good.

Now let us talk about the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. Bloc members raised the Driver Inc. issue in the House. My colleague asked some excellent questions about that today. Six meetings have taken place, and five more are scheduled, almost as many as the number of meetings that have already taken place. Sometimes, our members only find out the day before when a meeting is cancelled by a unilateral decision of the chair. I know that the Liberals like unilateral decisions. We talked about the Constitution recently, about “operation citizenship” and other things that have been done unilaterally. Bloc Québécois members are offering to collaborate, but under certain conditions: There needs to be an openness and a desire to work, instead of trying to corner us in uncomfortable positions. That requires an open attitude on the part of chairs. I mentioned it earlier to my colleague from Winnipeg North, who is paying close attention right now. I hope he will ask me a question about that, because things need to move along. Since November 6, there have been nearly 12 hours of Liberal filibustering at the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.

Last week, the Bloc Québécois succeeded in passing a motion to summon a former prime minister to explain what this “operation citizenship” was all about. We were able to get it passed because, good news, the Liberals do not have a majority. Every once in a while, they are not the ones calling the shots. Since they were not happy about what happened, they cancelled all committee meetings this week, citing bogus reasons. We were told that there could be votes, so it would be impossible to hold a committee meeting. Give me a break. It is not as if votes never take place. We could simply start later. Then we were told that there were no witnesses, or that we have worked hard since the start of the parliamentary session so everything is fine; it is time to take a break. I was told that by email. It is appalling. People are asked to be thorough and do the work, but while the parties are blaming each other, nothing is moving forward. We were elected to study bills in committee and pass them in order to improve things for the common good.

I am a new whip. I must confess that I have been in shock since I began observing the 29 committees of the House of Commons, including the 25 standing committees. I am shocked because I realize that there is no co-operation in many of the committees. There is only obstruction, and many meetings do not take place.

I want to acknowledge the people who sit with me on the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food. Although imperfect, they are much better than others because we work for the common good. That should be the case for all committees. That is what matters.

I have a tip for people who sit on other committees. Sometimes, even when we are working on resolutions or recommendations for reports, we talk to each other before the meeting. To save time, we talk to each other before the meeting. Rather than arriving at the committee meeting, filibustering proceedings and wasting everyone's time and money, we come to an agreement beforehand. We call each other to find out what the others are thinking. That way, when we arrive at the committee meeting, we are ready to go. It is very efficient. Instead of arguing for two hours, we pass resolutions and get things done.

We do not always agree, but most of the time we manage to find common ground. I dream of the day when this will happen at all House of Commons committees. Obviously, if we do that, there will be fewer clips to post on social media. I understand that some people think that is a shame. People want to have clips to show how they put someone in their place, but things should not be that way. That is how naive I am. That is what I would like to see.

I talked about witnesses earlier. As an elected official, there is something that I find completely unfathomable. When we get to committee, three or four witnesses are already seated at the end of the table. These people travel a long way. Their travel costs are paid for, and often their accommodation expenses are, too. They also come thoroughly prepared. After all, they are here to testify before the Government of Canada. These people are not stupid, they prepare, they show up with documents and they know they only have one shot at stating their position.

Then they sit down and people start filibustering. One member starts talking and never stops. Meanwhile, the witness at the end of the table is not really sure what is going on. He listens and looks at his watch. Finally, after an hour or two, two or three members quarrel and move motions. Sometimes, members move motions with witnesses present. After two hours, we apologize and tell them that there was not enough time to hear from them. We thank them for coming and ask them to send us their brief by email. Had they known, they would not have come.

The following week, the clerks tell committee members that they will have to cancel the meeting because no witnesses have agreed to appear. That is not surprising; it was to be expected. We need to be serious. We are bothering people, everyone from professionals and scientists to academic researchers and farmers, people who do not have time to appear. They have to be on their land, working. When they come here, it has to serve a purpose. Let us be serious.

It is important to respect witnesses. When they are sitting in a committee room, they should always be given priority. I know sometimes we have no choice, because of procedure, but that should be a rare exception. That is not what we are seeing in this Parliament, and it is incredibly sad to hear the comments. For example, at the beginning of a committee meeting, the chair decided to change the agenda and raised another subject. This allowed the Liberals to move a motion that undermined the one that another member managed to get adopted at the previous committee meeting. These are unfair tactics. The Liberals should talk to us if they want to change something, and they should talk to each other. Can we work seriously?

Earlier, I heard the parliamentary secretary criticize the Conservatives for moving this motion, because we should be talking about Bill C-15, a 650-page omnibus bill. On page 300 of the bill, the fine print says that any minister can repeal any legislation whenever he or she wants as long as they can claim that it is in the name of innovation. Is that what they call co-operation? It is up to us to seek it out, find it, flush it out, and expose it in the media. The Liberals tried to sneak this through. Afterwards, they will come here acting all offended and say that we are preventing them from doing their job. If everyone acted in good faith, I think we could make progress much faster.

As for me, I worry a lot about resources and issues. The government tends to hide the issues.

I would like to take this opportunity to give another example that really worries me, and that is the situation of interpreters. I raised this issue at the Board of Internal Economy. We are talking about filibustering and keeping committees going until midnight, cancelling one meeting and then holding another, and so on. Who is being negatively affected when that happens? It is not just the MPs, their teams of advisors, the clerks and all those people. It also affects the interpreters.

Imagine how difficult their work is. Interpreters listen and speak at the same time in the other language. Imagine how complex that task is. I do not know what percentage of elected officials in the House are bilingual, but it is certainly not half. I know it is not 60%. I would guess that it is closer to 20% to 30%, and even that is generous. They cannot learn another language because that requires effort.

The interpreters are good enough to be able to listen in one language and summarize in the other at the same time. They do not translate word for word. They interpret, and to be able to do that, they need to see the speaker's face and hear how they express themselves. They have to be aware of the context, and they need a basic knowledge of the topic under discussion. It is a big job.

This year, however, the House of Commons let them know that it would be accepting the lowest bidder and that it made no difference if the guy interpreting a legal discussion was not well versed in the law. They could not care less. An interpreter only needs to give a rough idea of what is being said. People are even starting to talk about bringing in AI, but we need human beings to pick up on human emotions and listen to real people.

I have another chart that I am not supposed to show the House, but I can refer to it during my speech. It lists technical incidents involving interpretation. I have not yet pulled out the statistics, but what we notice on a daily basis with the whips' team is that, very often, when there are technical problems, it is because the interpreters were online remotely. There are delays, they cannot see people, they cannot see each other to take over, which means that when one of them stops talking, sometimes there will be a bigger gap in the interpretation.

Who pays the price for this? Apart from, of course, the interpreters who have to protect their hearing health, it is always francophones who pay. Mr. Speaker, you are one of the few who are truly bilingual, but you know as well as I do that it is always francophones who pay, because 80% to 90% of the discussions take place in English. So, the little piece of missing information is the one that francophones are lacking for their analysis, to make their representations, or to properly evaluate legislation.

However, the constituents of a francophone member are just as deserving as the citizens in an anglophone province. They have the right to be properly represented. I see some members who seem to want to object, so if they have something to say, they should stand up and raise a point of order. I think what I just said was very parliamentary. Every voter has the right to be represented with dignity.

Do my colleagues know why I am taking this opportunity to talk about it? It is because when I spoke to officials from interpretation services at the Board of Internal Economy, they gave me a bit of an empty statement that really said nothing. Then they barely addressed my questions and concerns about how the process for awarding future contracts is changing. They told me not to worry, that the certification exam is extremely rigorous and ensures top quality. They kept telling me that, but what did I learn last week? They changed the exam. They have said there will be no problem and no more shortages. They have added an external auditor to come and evaluate, and that individual's votes would count as much as those of the four House of Commons experts who used to do the evaluation. When there is a tie, the administration will decide. There will be no more shortages.

That is one example among many where I think the government is being somewhat insouciant and saying that it is going to fix things and that everything is going to be fine. However, we have to be serious and thorough, and the same goes for committees.

I have a message for the government. Being the chair of a committee is a privilege. The role of chair—and you are doing a magnificent job sitting in the chair of the House—is to be neutral and to be fair to everyone. However, I have some examples where that is not the case. Then people wonder why some members are not acting in good faith like others. If everyone acts in good faith, it can be a virtuous circle, but if there is bad faith, it can be a vicious circle. Bad faith on one side leads to bad faith on the other. Let us stop wasting time and get serious about working for the people.

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

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the gentleman who seems upset. The Liberals chose to fly solo. The people elected a minority government. The government tabled a budget without seeking the support of another party to get a majority of votes in the House. The same thing goes for Bill C-15. The other opposition parties chose to let the budget move on to the next step so as not to trigger an election, even though it was not to their liking.

Now, the member wants to change the rules of the House. Why? It is so that a minority government can govern like a majority would. I do not think that will happen. I would like to humbly remind him of the way things work. People vote to elect members of Parliament. The government needs to listen to members and get a majority of votes in the House. That is where the problem lies.

If the Liberal members chose to fly solo, to work alone, then they should not be surprised when they have a hard time getting things done. What does the parliamentary secretary think about that?

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

Mr. Speaker, I am wondering if the member would concede the irony we are witnessing today in the House of Commons. Right now, we were supposed to be debating the budget implementation bill, but the Conservatives have made the decision once again to prevent MPs from being able to carry forward on Bill C-15 by bringing forward this concurrence motion. That in itself is another filibuster preventing the Canadian legislation that we are proposing.

Seniors

[François-Philippe Champagne, Liberal, Minister of Finance and National Revenue]

Mr. Speaker, financial fraud is a serious problem that disproportionately affects seniors, newcomers and other vulnerable populations. That is why we are taking decisive action through budget 2025 and Bill C-15 to strengthen law enforcement and to protect seniors from the scourge of financial fraud.

Surprise, surprise, the Bloc Québécois does not support that. While it may hard to understand why the Bloc Québécois would oppose measures to protect seniors, what is abundantly clear is that the 44 members from Quebec on this side of the House will always be there to defend seniors.

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

Mr. Speaker, strengthening economic security also means protecting seniors' dignity and financial peace of mind. That includes protecting them from fraud, which is a major political issue. Who said that? It was the member for Shefford.

We agree. That is why it is disappointing to see the Bloc Québécois delaying the passage of Bill C-15. Could the Minister of Finance remind those who are intentionally delaying this bill's passage about the very real impact that their partisan games are having on seniors?

Disability Tax Credit

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Conservatives love to ask the same questions over and over again about supporting Canadians with disabilities. They hold press conferences, repeat the same slogans and pretend to care, but when it is time to actually remove barriers and deliver the supports Canadians need, what do they do? They delay.

Budget 2025 delivers actions. We are breaking down the red tape that blocks access to the Canada disability benefit. We are investing $115 million to lower barriers and provide a one-time supplemental payment for every disability tax credit certification or recertification that opens the door to the benefit. That is for the more than six million Canadians with disabilities who should not need a lawyer to access support. That is why we are simplifying the disability tax credit process. As promised in the fall economic statement, the benefit will be exempt from taxable income, because support should actually mean support.

Conservatives cannot claim to stand with Canadians with disabilities while they are voting to keep these barriers exactly where they are. The question is simple: Will they pass Bill C-15 or keep hiding behind slogans?

High-Speed Rail

[Karim Bardeesy, Liberal, Taiaiako'n—Parkdale—High Park, ON]

Mr. Speaker, our history is filled with examples of projects that connect our two largest provinces. Today, we have another opportunity to continue this proud tradition. One of our major national projects is the Toronto-Quebec City high-speed rail project.

The next step to get there is to pass Bill C‑15, which enacts the high-speed rail network act. What is the holdup? It is the opposition, which is playing games to delay the passage of this bill.

This is why we cannot have nice things.

Quebeckers and Ontarians have waited long enough. Every major country in the world except Canada has high-speed rail connecting their two biggest cities. It is time to stop playing games. It is time to move Canada forward.

Conservative Party of Canada

[Jake Sawatzky, Liberal, New Westminster—Burnaby—Maillardville, BC]

Mr. Speaker, budget 2025 proposes a measure that businesses across the country have been asking for: the productivity superdeduction. It gives companies the ability to grow, drive investment and stay competitive in a rapidly changing global market. Manufacturers want it. Clean-tech firms want it. Small and medium-sized businesses want it. They are ready to invest, but they need Conservatives to get to work instead of blocking these investments from flowing to Canadian businesses.

Conservatives have been refusing to study Bill C-15 in committee for weeks, delaying the very tools that businesses need and the economic growth that communities across Canada are counting on. If the opposition were half as serious as its question period theatrics, it would send Bill C-15 to committee.

Are the Conservatives prepared to do the job their constituents sent them here to do, or is their annual holiday party more important than standing up for Canadian businesses?

Employment

[Anna Gainey, Liberal, Secretary of State (Children and Youth)]

Mr. Speaker, the reality is that opposition members are currently shutting down committee work.

In committee, we are trying to move forward with Bill C-15, which will provide the support and investment that Canadians need right now. What is happening in committee is shameful. I encourage opposition members to change course and support the measures in place in committee.

Business of the House

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, it will come as no surprise to anyone that I totally disagree with my esteemed colleague's version of the facts. It is precisely the outbursts of Conservative members, true to their leader's example, with their three-word slogans and determination to upend the work of the House and committees, that prompted the decision by the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore to cancel this morning's committee work.

I encourage all members to focus on the issues. We introduce bills of great importance to all Canadians. We ensure that these bills move forward and are debated in parliamentary committees and in the House. The least we should be able to expect is to be treated with decorum, not in a heated, even frenzied way by the official opposition. I invite the Leader of the Opposition to tell his members that their behaviour, shouting and agitation are a disservice to our democracy.

This afternoon, we will continue with second reading debate of Bill C-15, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget. We hope the debate will end this afternoon.

Tomorrow, we will resume second reading debate on Bill C-10, an act respecting the commissioner for modern treaty implementation.

Next week, priority will be given to the third reading of Bill C-4, an act respecting certain affordability measures for Canadians and another measure. Canadians know well that we have cut income taxes for every taxpayer. We made sure we got rid of the consumer carbon tax and the GST for first-time homebuyers. This is something the Conservatives said they wanted to do, but apparently not.

Also, there will be the second reading debate of Bill C-13, an act to implement the protocol on the accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, a very solid piece of economic policy. We would think the Conservatives would be interested in that, but apparently not.

We have the report stage and third reading of Bill C-12, which would strengthen Canada's immigration system and border, something the Conservatives talk about a lot. However, apparently they have nothing to say about this substantial and very important piece of legislation.

There is the second reading of Bill C-2, the strong borders act. It contains a concept known as lawful access, which police forces across this country have been asking for. They have been calling the offices of Conservative members to say that they know the Conservatives are divided on that. They know they have had some very difficult conversations in their caucus. The police want the ability to deal with extortion and child pornography. The Conservatives said they wanted action on this. This is action, but the Conservatives want to hold it up.

Finally, should Bill C-15, the very good budget bill before the House, not collapse today, it will also be considered next week.

Instruction to Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Yes, but now they have AI. They have ChatGPT. Those will help them with their speeches if they are running out of speeches to give.

Madam Speaker, when it comes to the interests of Canadians, what we hear from the Conservative Party is something purely focused on one thing: what is in the best interest of the Conservative Party, not what is in the interest of Canadians. This is what we find unfortunate. We see it during question period. During question period, it is all about personal attacks. It is about character assassination. It is not about substantive questions. They attack the Prime Minister with personal attacks whenever they get the opportunity and prevent anything from passing in the House of Commons. Then they will say that the government is unable to pass anything. Well, duh. If they gave me 12 students from Sisler, Maples or any high school in Canada, I would be able to filibuster a bill indefinitely.

This is the type of mischief we see day in and day out coming from the Conservatives. We tried to get a commitment. Weeks ago, I was standing here and saying to members opposite, “Bail reform legislation is before us today.” I was debating it that day and all I asked for were commitments to allow the legislation to pass before the end of the year. It is not an unreasonable thing to ask for.

One of the Conservatives brought forward a private member's bill. It has a substantive change. He is standing up saying that he wants unanimous consent to pass it all today. “It is out of second reading, so there is no need for a committee meeting. It is out of report stage and third reading, so let us send it over to the Senate. We do not need to debate the legislation.” This is what Conservative members talk about for their private member's bills.

When it comes to government legislation, they say, “Oh, just hold on a second.” They want to give the false impression that the government does not know how to handle legislation, so they filibuster here on the floor of the House of Commons. They filibuster in the committee. They work on trying to come up with creative amendments in certain situations to prevent legislation from ultimately advancing. This is the behaviour we see from the Conservative Party. How productive is that?

Let us remember that, in the last federal election, Canadians told all of us, not just the government, that this was going to be a minority government. The expectation was that all parties would work together. That does not mean they have to support everything the government does, nor does the government have to support everything the opposition wants. However, there was an expectation that, when things are good for Canadians and in their best interest, there would be a sense of co-operation.

Do we see that today? We do not see an official opposition that is prepared to co-operate. How many times have we brought forward the budget implementation bill because Conservative after Conservative wanted to speak to it? They will not sit late so that more of them can speak to it, but they want to be able to speak to it. Why not allow the bill to pass to committee? If it goes to committee, it can be broken down, and several committees can go into it in great detail. They will not, though, because it is not in the Conservative Party's best interest. It might be in the interest of Canadians or Parliament as a whole, but it is not in the best interest of the Conservative Party. As a direct result, they are not going to deal with it. They have made the determination that they want to prevent the legislation from passing.

I can already imagine it today. We see the wind-up as the fall session comes to an end. My recommendation is that we come back for Christmas. I am okay with doing that. My colleagues might feel a little uneasy about it, but I will put the interests of Canadians ahead of my personal interests and the interests of Parliament. If it means we need to put in extra days, we should do that. If the Conservatives really and truly want more debate and are concerned about debate time, I am prepared to advocate that we sit longer hours and more days. They will not get any opposition from me on that. I can tell members that, at the end of the day, chances are that I will probably be around more than most others in order to listen to and participate in that debate.

Therefore, I look to my Conservative friends on the opposite side and appeal to them to look at the substantive legislation we have today, which has been filibustered. I ask them to work with the government, as the government will work with the opposition, so that we can in fact have substantive legislative changes, such as the bail reform legislation. That would be one for me personally, and it would also be an awesome thing to happen for Canadians. We could actually do it before Christmas, but everyone here knows it can only happen if the Conservative Party participates in it fully.

In the spirit of being a parliamentarian who has a deep amount of respect for the process, I apologize to the member opposite for saying that his speech was garbage. I respect all speeches delivered inside the House.

Business of the House

[Steven MacKinnon, Liberal, Minister of Transport and Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I will not trouble members once more today with the exciting details of our memorandum of understanding with the Province of Alberta, but I will provide some transparency and clarity, as always, on the way forward for Parliament in the spirit of co-operation and transparency as we work with my honourable friend and, indeed, all members of the House.

This afternoon, we will continue the debate at second reading of Bill C-15, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget.

Tomorrow, we will call Bill C-10, an act respecting the commissioner for modern treaty implementation, at second reading.

On Monday, we will see the House return to the third-reading debate of Bill C-4, an act respecting certain affordability measures for Canadians, which contains tax cuts. Indeed, I am sure the Conservatives will want to hurry that bill off to the Senate.

On Tuesday, we will resume the second-reading debate of Bill C-13, an act to implement the protocol on the accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.

On Wednesday and Thursday, we will begin debate at report stage and third reading of Bill C‑12, an act respecting certain measures relating to the security of Canada's borders and the integrity of the Canadian immigration system and respecting other related security measures.

For the benefit of those committees studying the supplementary estimates, I believe Tuesday, December 9 will be the final allotted day of the supply cycle, but I will confirm this at this time next week.

I also want to mention that there will be a ministerial statement on Thursday, December 4 to commemorate the Polytechnique massacre.

Climate Change

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is official: Canada is giving up the fight against climate change. The Prime Minister will announce it on Thursday by launching a brand new pipeline for dirty oil from western Canada, on top of Trans Mountain, which has cost taxpayers $34 billion and which will cost us even more in climate disruptions. Thanks to Bill C-5 and Bill C-15, this new pipeline will be exempt from environmental assessments and laws—

Presence in Gallery

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order regarding Bill C-15, the budget 2025 implementation act, no. 1.

I would like to notify the House of a technical issue in clause 71. That clause of Bill C-15 proposes amendments to the trust reporting rules in the Income Tax Act. Some of these amendments were intended to first apply to the 2024 taxation year. Due to a technical issue in subclause 71(14) of Bill C-15, these amendments are inadvertently limited so that they apply only to the 2024 taxation year and not later years.

It is the government's intention that the proposed amendments referenced in that subclause apply to the 2024 taxation year as well as to subsequent taxation years. This is consistent with what was reflected in the draft legislative proposals for this measure, which were publicly released by the Department of Finance in August 2025.

To provide clarity to impacted taxpayers, the government intends to propose an amendment to Bill C-15 to rectify this technical issue at the first opportunity.

Business of the House

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise and answer the Thursday question on behalf of the government House leader, as the deputy House leader.

Of course, there has been a lot of discussion this week, but, most importantly, what I have heard from Canadians is that they really want to talk about the budget that we put forward, which many members of this House voted on. Lots of Canadians want to talk about the jobs that will be created through the budget and the affordability measures that are in the budget to help Canadians move forward.

This afternoon, we will continue the debate on second reading of Bill C-15, an act to implement certain provisions of the budget. We will resume debate on the bill tomorrow, as well as next Monday and Tuesday. On Wednesday and Thursday of next week, we will call second reading of debate of Bill C-13, an act to implement the protocol on the accession of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.

I would also like to inform the House that there will be a ministerial statement on Tuesday, November 25, which is the first day of the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence.

Finally, I would like to seek unanimous consent for the following motion: That, pursuant to subsection 24(1) of the Building Canada Act and section 62 of the Emergencies Act, a special joint committee of the Senate and the House of Commons be appointed to review the Governor in Council’s and the minister’s exercise of their powers and performance of their duties and functions under the—