Thank you, Mr. Chair.
This is red tape reduction week, and our government has been committed to working with all parties across all jurisdictions to ensure that we support small businesses. All of the players and stakeholders in this want to make sure that we reduce the red tape to be able to move forward.
We worked with all levels of government effectively during COVID. That's the best testimony. We managed to work effectively and protect the lives of many Canadians. We had the backs of businesses and relaxed a lot of constraints to ensure that small businesses, which seem to be the focus of this motion, were given the support they needed. Also, there was the extension of the CEBA loan and how effectively we worked with other institutions to support them, and even the reduction of the small business tax at the outset when this government came in.
Very much in the true spirit of this motion, or what should have been the spirit of it, we support the reduction of red tape. However, in general, I'll make two or three points that I want highlighted.
One, I think the intent of this is a mix of politics and a bit of promotion on social media. I think the intent of getting a motion like this to the committee and reporting to the House is to bring in a concurrence motion and hold the government back from doing what we are all here to do.
Naturally, as to the preamble about the 2024 red tape report and 92% of small businesses, a lot of this is old data from way back in 2021 and 2022, or it is not in our jurisdiction. I'm not going to get much into the preamble and the relevance of the preamble, because that, to me, is just a social media clip.
The real motion is:
In order to lower costs, and improve services for Canadians, the committee call on the government to immediately reduce the regulatory burden and red tape across all sectors in the economy...within 30 days of this motion...
The scope of this motion is going to warrant a lot of conversation. My colleagues are going to address some of the points that have been made here. As part of the preamble, I believe there's a lot of room to set the story straight.
On that note, I think the scope of this motion and the intent of this motion are misaligned. I look forward to hearing the true scope and the real intent of this motion as we continue our conversation.
Thank you.