Finance Committee on July 30th, 2020

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

—put in place a grant program to recognize the volunteerism that young people are doing right across the country. That is a piece of it that is disappointing and that I regret and I apologize for, but the ensemble of things that we've done to help students across this country in this historic pandemic has made a real difference in the lives of students and in communities across this country that are seeing young people step up and contribute—

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

We've had equal time, Prime Minister.

We'll have to move on to Mr. Poilievre, and the concluding questions will go to Mr. Fraser.

You have five minutes, Mr. Poilievre, and please don't shut my lights out this time, will you?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Don't shut your own out either.

You claim that the program's purposes were threefold: help you through the pandemic, help charities get through the pandemic and help students pay for their post-secondary in the fall. Which of these could the Canada summer jobs program not have done?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

The three aims that I listed for the CSSG were to encourage young people to step up, to help out community organizations and to recognize volunteerism and reward volunteerism by students as a way of making a difference in this pandemic.

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

We go back to Mr. Poilievre.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

You can't name a single one of these objectives that could not have been fulfilled—

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Yes, the third one, that third one is not—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

—by the Canada summer jobs program.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

That's not true, Pierre. The third one, recognizing volunteerism, is not done by the Canada summer jobs program.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Right, recognizing paid volunteerism. You called it volunteerism so that you could take it outside of the Canada summer jobs program and give it to your friends at WE.

My next question, when you directed—

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Mr. Chair, can I just respond to that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

Mr. Poilievre, the Prime Minister has got about eight seconds to answer that one, and then we'll go to your question.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

The CSSG was about recognizing and rewarding volunteerism. It's not about jobs. It was about volunteerism, and that, unfortunately, is something that we can't do because the program—

[The Chair, Liberal, Wayne Easter]

We go back to Mr. Poilievre.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

You just misused the word so that you could justify outsourcing a program that already effectively exists within the government.

Now when you did that, you directed a half-billion dollars, and.... Yes, you did. You're the head of the cabinet.

Did you know that the group to which you were directing that half-billion dollars was in violation of its bank covenant, yes or no?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

That is not something that we had as information at that point.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Did you know that the government money would go into a real estate shell foundation instead of into the WE Charity, yes or no?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

The details on the payment were worked out by our professional public service in terms of how the contribution agreement flowed.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Did you know that the chair of the board had resigned, yes or no?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

No.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

You clearly did not do any due diligence of your own. As the chair of the cabinet responsible for approving a decision, you should have had some basic facts. Sir, you were using half a billion dollars of taxpayers' money here. You had a fiduciary responsibility. Why didn't you ask these questions?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

We have flowed tens of billions of dollars through the CERB—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Right. The question isn't about the CERB.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

—through the workers benefit, through various ways to help Canadians, and we were very active in making sure that flow was right.

There are many different programs, and in cabinet, in government, we trust the ministers and the public service to do their jobs and make sure that things are delivered in the right way, and in this case, they did.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Chair, the time has come for the Prime Minister to stop blaming public servants. This was his decision.