Finance Committee on June 8th, 2026

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

There is no unanimous consent. Therefore, we will briefly suspend while we receive that and get it translated.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Colleagues, you have now received the documents in your inbox, so we are going to resume.

Shall the subamendment for CPC-6 carry?

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

Are you taking speakers to debate it first?

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

I've already asked if this one will carry so.... I got everybody back.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

That was pretty quick.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Kelly.

Shall the subamendment for CPC-6 carry?

(Subamendment negatived: nays 7; yeas 4)

Thank you.

Mr. Garon.

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

I know we have a lot of work to do, Madam Chair, so I don't want to slow the committee down further. Nor do I want to point any fingers or anything like that. I know everyone here is working hard.

However, twice now, we've suspended the meeting so we can get fairly short subamendments translated. Each time, the meeting was suspended for 45 to 50 minutes.

Why did it take so long? What is the holdup?

Do we not have enough resources? If that's the case, perhaps we should ask for more. I realize that sometimes members may not agree with the subamendment. Obstruction may be at play, or it may be perceived that way, but it's not normal to have to wait almost an hour every time. We'll never finish at this rate.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Garon.

I agree. Waiting that long for translation isn't acceptable. I asked the legislative clerk to look into it. He said there were technical issues, but I'm going to ask the legislative clerk or committee clerk to file a complaint with the House. It's really not normal, but we are going to carry on.

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

If I may say, Madam Chair, I think this relates to parliamentary privilege. It could potentially stop people from putting forward amendments and subamendments because they don't want to hold things up for an hour or hour and a half. It could also have the opposite effect, where people put forward amendments precisely to slow things down and make the committee wait an hour each time.

I seriously question whether we can keep working under the circumstances, given how long we have to wait. I know everyone is working hard. That's not the issue. I know resources were cut back, but how can we keep working? Are we going to get through three clauses between now and midnight?

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

That's a good question. I will ask the translation bureau. We will obviously file a complaint. Thank you for raising the issue.

We'll continue now.

We will return to the main amendment, on CPC-6.

Mr. Kelly.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

Before we proceed to that, I think Mr. Lawrence will speak to it.

You were awfully quick to ask the question. For the practice of committee and the rules and practice that we normally follow, when you announced—

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Is this a point of order, Mr. Kelly?

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

Yes, it is.

I wished to debate and to make the argument for that subamendment and you didn't afford me the opportunity to do so. It wasn't because I had delayed in trying to get your attention or because I had not been on top of it. You immediately posed the question without even inviting or asking if members wished to speak to it.

I'm not going to challenge your ruling, but I am going to ask you if that was an error on your part or if that will be in the normal process. How will we ensure that we can get your attention if you immediately put the question without allowing members—

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Kelly.

I did look around the room. I didn't see anyone raise their hand. I take it under advisement. Thank you, Mr. Kelly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

We will return to the main amendment on CPC-6.

(Amendment negatived: nays 7; yeas 4)

(Clause 11 as amended agreed to on division)

(Clause 12 agreed to on division)

(Clause 13 agreed to)

(Clauses 14 and 15 agreed to on division)

We are on new clause 15.1 and CPC-7.

Mr. Lawrence will speak to that.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

You're welcome.

[Philip Lawrence, Conservative, Northumberland—Clarke, ON]

Thank you.

I would move the following amendment to add:

15.1 (1) Within six months after the day on which this Act receives royal assent, and once a year for the two following years, the Minister of National Revenue in collaboration with the Minister of Finance must undertake a comprehensive review of the operation of sections 12 to 15 of this Act and table a report on the review in each House of Parliament on any of the first fifteen days on which that House is sitting after the report is completed.

(2) The report must include

(a) an estimate of the fiscal impact of the application of the sections referred to in subsection (1) and;

(b) an assessment of the impact of those sections on domestic alcohol producers, including on small and medium-sized brewers.

(3) The Minister of National Revenue and the Minister of Finance must publish the report on the website of the Department of National Revenue and of the Department of Finance, respectively, within 10 days after the day on which the report has been tabled in both Houses of Parliament.

This is another of several amendments we have brought. Our motivation here is to increase the amount of reporting. We understand that some of this information may be available in bits and pieces, but we would like to see a clear way for Canadians, commentators and analysts to review this information, not only for a projection but so that it can be reviewed and audited so that people can gauge whether this reform and these other reforms have been successful. We understand that the PBO is there to evaluate the government, but it's not the PBO's job, nor should it be, to provide disclosure.

There was a previous government that said that it would be open by default, and that government certainly did not live up to that. However, perhaps the Carney government would live up to this by providing greater disclosure.

I believe that none of these requests, this one included, is particularly onerous, and we believe that it is the government's obligation to provide good value for money. This would enable not just us but commentators, the PBO and, most importantly, all of Canada and Canadians the ability to benchmark the progress and the success or non-success of the government.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Lawrence.

Go ahead, Mr. Turnbull.

[Ryan Turnbull, Liberal, Whitby, ON]

Similar to other amendments that have been proposed by the Conservatives, it'll come as no surprise that we oppose this one as well. The reason is that they're asking for the fiscal impact of these measures, which has already been included, for the alcohol excise duty relief measures, in the spring economic update. It's $66 million over five years, starting in 2026-27.

There's also some concern about being able to isolate some of the other impacts that this relief may interact with. Members might be interested in how these relief measures would affect consumer preferences, provincial pricing policies, input costs, international trade conditions and broader economic conditions, but we feel it would be challenging to isolate those impacts, especially in the short term, as proposed in the amendment.

To respond to Mr. Lawrence, the Parliamentary Budget Officer does really important work independently to aid in our democracy and our parliamentary debates by doing fiscal and economic analysis. The Department of Finance regularly provides datasets to the PBO. I've never actually heard of the office not providing information to the PBO. Where there have been challenges in the past, it's been when the Conservatives want to get access to that data that can't be released for confidentiality reasons more broadly. The information is often shared from the Department of Finance to the PBO to do their analysis. They publish their reports publicly, which are aggregated results. That information flow has been fairly regular. I don't know of any instances where data has been held back from the PBO.

If members of Parliament want additional information or analysis, I'm sure they can request that from the PBO. We don't feel that what is being asked for here merits all the additional operational costs. In fact, we're actually trying to reduce the operating costs and increase the efficiency of the government. Members opposite used to believe in that, and now it seems like they want the opposite. It seems very inconsistent, but I'll leave it to the Conservatives to justify to their constituents why they want to increase government operating expenses.

I'll leave it there.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Turnbull.

Mr. Kelly, go ahead.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

Thank you.

To respond to the question that Mr. Turnbull put to me, the Conservatives expect accountability and transparency from the government. It's been lacking in so many ways over the last 11 years, and these amendments are meant to encourage the government to embrace reporting and data.

I mentioned earlier the Auditor General reports that frequently cite the poor tracking of data and the lack of information that the government has to measure its own success and failure. This comes up time and time again, where the Auditor General looks at a department and says that they don't have the data to measure the efficacy of whatever they're undertaking. They get their spending authorization from Parliament, and they get told what their objectives are. Without data, the public service may think they're doing a fine job, but when the Auditor General comes in they find that they are not doing as well as they think they are, and they don't have the data to benchmark their results.

That's why we are big on transparency and accountability. Accountability comes with being able to measure the progress of items.

With this one in particular.... I had a private member's bill in the last Parliament about the excise escalator. It's funny that the government brought in the escalator. There was no escalator before. It used to be that the government had to vote increases on excise in the House of Commons, just like the Crown has had to do since the Magna Carta. They've had to turn to Parliament to be able to tax citizens.

They gave themselves the escalator. Then, in subsequent years when the escalator became increasingly unpopular, especially among brewers as well as among consumers, they went ahead and reduced the rate at which they were automatically increasing the excise on alcohol. We don't agree with the policy of an automatic escalator on excise. When the government then, from year to year, tinkers with it by not increasing per the automatic increase that they gave themselves, we want to see accountability and we want to see the reporting as described in the motion.

Since it appears that the government will not support this amendment, I might try to see if we can massage it a little bit with a subamendment. I'm going to propose that the amendment be amended by replacing paragraph (b) of the proposed subsection 15.1(2) with the following:

(b) an assessment of the impact of those sections on domestic alcohol producers, including on small and medium-sized brewers; and

(c) a summary of any publicly available data used to prepare the assessment referred to in paragraph (b).

Just for the record, once this is translated, I wish to speak to the subamendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Kelly.

Please send that in writing.

I'm going to take a chance here and ask if there is unanimous consent to let this one stand. We can come back to it at the end of the meeting.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Crowfoot, AB]

I don't think so. I think, as Mr. Turnbull established earlier, it's best to take these one at a time. Let's get this one dealt with.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

The will of the committee is so wonderful.

Excellent. We will take a brief suspension. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Colleagues, the committee meeting is resumed.

You will have received the translated subamendment and the original text in your inbox.

Mr. Kelly, the floor is yours.