Finance Committee on Feb. 23rd, 2026

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Go ahead, Mr. Garon.

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

I'm trying to understand this. As far as I could tell, there was a willingness to correct a significant flaw in the bill. I repeat, we're talking about a violation of farmers' rights. This is about allowing people whose barn or silo was partially or completely destroyed in a disaster to earn a livelihood. How does that make the law and the rail project more complicated? I'd like the member to explain that. I think I'm a pretty smart guy, but this I don't understand.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Would you like to respond, Mr. Leitão?

[Carlos Leitão, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

I just want to say that this is our subamendment, and in our view, it unfortunately makes things more complicated. It wasn't well drafted, so we are simply asking that it be withdrawn.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Is there unanimous consent for Mr. Leitão to withdraw his subamendment?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

That brings us back to the amendment.

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

No, actually. I would like us to vote on the subamendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Can we vote on the subamendment?

Just a moment, please.

I will have to suspend for a couple of minutes. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you very much, colleagues.

Having spoken with the legislative clerks, I rule Mr. Leitão's subamendment inadmissible due to paragraph 16.78 with regard to form. Unfortunately, “an amendment is out of order if it refers to, or is not intelligible without, subsequent amendments or schedules of which notice has not been given, or if it is otherwise incomplete.” Given the fact that it didn't really fit with the initial amendment the Bloc put forward, it is inadmissible.

We will now return to BQ-2.

Monsieur Garon.

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

I want to make sure I understand. The amendment was deemed out of order because it wasn't intelligible. Is that right?

[Carlos Leitão, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

It's the subamendment.

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

All right. I just wanted to make sure I understood correctly, because there was a glitch with the interpretation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

That is right.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Yes, it was the subamendment Mr. Leitão had proposed further to your amendment.

Are we ready to put the question on BQ-2?

(Amendment negatived: nays 8; yeas 1 [See Minutes of Proceedings])

We will now move to BQ-3.

Monsieur Garon.

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

Madam Chair, I'm under no illusions, having just seen what members of the committee think of protecting the rights of people whose land is being expropriated. First, I'm disappointed that we no longer have an official opposition. That's concerning. The people in Mirabel and elsewhere are going to take note.

BQ‑3 is even more important. As an ordinary Canadian who is not the victim of the proposed high-speed rail network act, you are not treated like a second-class citizen when you receive notice that your land is subject to expropriation. You have the right to voice your objection should you disagree with the price you are being offered.

I will paraphrase what my Conservative colleague Jacques Gourde said in his speech in the House two weeks ago. Farmland is not like a car: if the land is divided, it can't be replaced by the insurance company like a lost or stolen car can. Jacques Gourde, the Conservative member for Lévis—Lotbinière, said that.

Accordingly, if your land is being expropriated, it makes sense that you are allowed to challenge the price you're being offered. It makes sense that a dispute resolution mechanism is available to you. Resolving a dispute may take some time, but it doesn't stop a project from being carried out when the political will is there. This is about political will.

This is what you can do, then. You can request a public hearing, and a government-appointed commissioner will hear you out. The commissioner will make their recommendation to the minister, who, with the help of public servants, will decide on the final price. If you still don't agree with the price, you can appeal the decision to the Federal Court, which is neither a simple nor clear process. It tends to be extremely costly for someone whose land is being expropriated, in terms of legal fees and court costs. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. It is precisely so that doesn't happen that people are allowed to be heard in the first place.

I have a suggestion if the government wants the project to move forward quickly. By the way, the project doesn't exist. The government doesn't even know where within a 10‑kilometre range the train is going to run. If the government wants the project to move forward quickly, it should appoint commissioners.

If the high-speed rail network act becomes law, as currently proposed, here's what will happen: the Federal Court will be inundated with cases for years—similar to what happened in Quebec with the act respecting the REM—and after a few years, it will turn into a scandal because people will not have had the opportunity to be heard.

In proposing this amendment, the Bloc Québécois is simply trying to ensure that people whose land is being expropriated are entitled to have their objections heard by a commissioner within 30 days, before the minister makes their decision. This way, an agreement can be reached without people going broke in an effort to be heard by the Federal Court, people who are already dealing with their land being divided. This is land that was supposed to go to their children, land that, in many cases, they've been farming for generations.

I will say it again: This does not slow down the Alto project. Actually, it's not the Alto project. It's the Liberals' train. If Alto could, it would do things at a normal pace. This is the Prime Minister's project. This amendment does not slow down the project, because the project does not exist as of now. All this does is protect the rights of people whose land is going to be expropriated before the project even exists. What's more, it will save taxpayer money by preventing a flood of applications to the Federal Court.

Keep in mind that the segment connecting Montreal to Ottawa, including a stop in Laval, is just the first segment in a network that spans 1,000 kilometres. Imagine how many people in that 1,000‑kilometre long corridor will be applying to the Federal Court. The government can't even pay people their old age pensions. It's already put $6 billion into the Cúram software. Now we're told that the Federal Court will have to deal with cases from people who live along the 1,000‑kilometre route—unless, as Alto says, the proposed act in its current form favours negotiated agreements. The reality is that the agreements are in such violation of the rights of the people subject to expropriation and are so detrimental to their negotiating power that they will be brought to their knees and have to submit to the government, because Alto is the government. Ultimately, they are going to have to accept less than the price they would get on the market.

The way the act is written, the government is getting away with violating people's rights, with no regard for public funds or attempt at procedural fairness.

No matter what the Minister of Transport says, the act as written does not ensure that the project will move forward in a reasonable time frame or have social licence.

I urge the two parties in government, whose members are sitting next to me, to support an amendment that goes to the heart of our role as MPs, which is to keep the government in check, to prevent the government from always doing anything it wants and to represent our constituents, our farmers. Next to me is a member from Quebec whose riding is home to farm communities, so I know he is sensitive to the issue. I know there are members here who voted on the motion regarding the Mirabel expropriations, a motion that passed with unanimous support two weeks ago, and I know they are sensitive to the issue.

I urge the members here to do what the people in their ridings elected them to do. I urge them to do their job and vote in favour of this amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Garon.

Mr. Leitão, go ahead.

[Carlos Leitão, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Madam Chair, I don't have a subamendment. I'll say that first.

However, it won't come as a surprise to hear me say that we oppose these two amendments, BQ‑3 and BQ‑4.

Of course, what happened in Mirabel in the 1960s and 1970 is inexcusable and unacceptable, but that is not at all what's happening here.

My colleague, however, gave a more recent example, the REM case in Montreal. No, it did not clog up the courts. The system worked fairly well.

In our view, slowing down the process for a project of this magnitude, which seems to enjoy significant social licence, would be extremely costly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Leitão.

Mr. Garon, you have the floor.

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

Madam Chair, we're talking about the high-speed rail network act. The Minister of Transportation—who is also the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons—and the government keep telling us that this bill is similar to the one passed by Quebec's National Assembly for the REM, or the Réseau électrique métropolitain. I just want people to understand one simple thing. When you have two different problems, it is not always wise to apply the same solution. That's what we taught our students at university, and I think that's still the case. That hasn't changed much since I left five years ago.

The REM is a project that spans a few dozen kilometres. Its route is not linear; it can curve and easily use existing rights-of-way. What's more, it stops everywhere and has economic benefits everywhere. That's the context in which the project was developed. I know that Mr. Leitão was a minister at the time, if I'm not mistaken. The notion was that there wouldn't be many tracks, that the route would curve and make stops everywhere, so they decided to adopt a law.

Today, Mr. Leitão is telling us that for a 1,000-kilometre project, which cannot have a route that curves nor use existing rights-of-way, and whose train does not stop anywhere, the same law will be drafted. This argument makes absolutely no sense.

What happened is that the Department of Transportation botched the job. It made a law. It took existing models and analyzed the situation poorly. Then it realized that its train route didn't curve, and that the people who were being expropriated would probably want to exercise their bargaining power. So it thought it would take that right away from them.

They say they don't want to delay the project, but I'll tell you what happened with this law. For nearly a year, Alto, a quasi branch of the Liberal Party of Canada, shared a map of the route. It was like a GIF image, and was so blurry that you couldn't really tell where it went. On January 14, Alto published a 10-kilometre corridor that runs through places no one expected. It included Mirabel, but also other locations. This was not announced to mayors, city councillors, or MPPs. However, we received reports that Liberal MPs in my region were aware of it. It seems we are not all equal in this House, as far as Alto is concerned. On January 14, municipalities were informed—some found out on January 22, 23, or 24—that Alto would be coming to consult with them in 10 days, that it would be visiting them for business receptions and consultations. That's what they were told.

However, the engineering offices of cities such as Sainte-Thérèse, Mirabel, and Brownsburg-Chatham are not like those of SNC-Lavalin. Often, they are small teams juggling many different projects. The way their government operates, if two civil servants who are engineers extended their holiday vacations, the cities would be left completely stranded. Guess what? That's exactly what happened.

My colleague, whose riding is in Laval, says this isn't 1969. He's happy because he has a train station in his region. I'll tell you one thing. We know that my riding, Mirabel, is scarred by a series of expropriations. Highway 13, Highway 50, the Enbridge pipeline, power lines and GazMétro facilities were built there, but what is happening now has never happened before, because no one has ever been reckless enough to behave the way the federal government is behaving in 2026. People learned history's lessons.

It's fine for Quebec's former finance minister, Mr. Leitão, whom I greatly respect and who is very nice, to defend his government's position tooth and nail, but the government's current position on the high-speed rail network act is deceitful and untenable.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Garon.

Shall amendment BQ‑3 carry?

(Amendment negatived: nays 4; yeas 1 [See Minutes of Proceedings])

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

We'll now move on to amendment BQ‑4.

Mr. Garon, you have the floor.

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

Obviously, Madam Chair, it is consistent. What Bill C‑15 is saying is that government no longer wants to listen to people and doesn't want to give them any rights. It is telling people to go to Federal Court—and to empty their RRSPs, their pockets, their children's education funds and their farm renovation funds to do so. That's what this bill does. By rejecting the amendment, we are allowing the government to do just that. People will remember it.

What amendment BQ‑4 does is restore the 30-day period for filing an objection.

I will tell you one thing, and it is very important. When Alto comes to hold its bogus consultations—which are essentially business receptions with plasma screens, not consultations—it tells people that the Bloc Québécois members are liars because the 30-day period for opposing expropriations still exists. That is what Alto is telling my fellow citizens. That's what it's telling people in Laval, Saint-Eustache, and everywhere it goes.

According to the clause I wish to amend, if amendment BQ‑4 is rejected, there will no longer be a 30-day period. I am saying this to farmers who are listening to us, and we will make sure the word gets out: You should know that if this proposed amendment is not adopted, the 30-day period for filing an objection will be abolished.

I will say one thing about this bill: It tells you what Alto's word is worth, from its CEO down to the people further down the ladder, the peddlers who come to our ridings to sell us false information and who come to say that elected officials' messages to inform the public are wrong.

If this amendment is rejected, the 30-day deadline will be abolished, just as the Liberal government wants for its Liberal train.

I invite all my colleagues to do what they were elected to do, which is to defend their fellow citizens, to ensure that all citizens in this country are equal, and to adopt amendment BQ‑4.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Garon.

Mr. Leitão, you have the floor.