Citizenship and Immigration Committee on June 12th, 2024

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

One person at a time, please.

Excuse me; one person has the floor. We have to make sure that we take good care of our interpreters' health. That's very key.

Mr. Dalton, you have the floor.

[Marc Dalton, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC]

It was a good point, and maybe the objective here was to make me lose my train of thought.

The Liberals and the coalition partners have said they want to basically ban vehicles using fuels by, I believe, 2035, if I'm not mistaken. It's just so impractical. It's not just impractical; it's impossible. Dealers—I mean car dealers—are finding it really hard to sell their EV vehicles. Why is that? Price is one thing, even though the price has gone down and even though there have been lots of subsidies. The charging aspect doesn't work for many people, and being able to travel to different places in the province or in the country doesn't work for many people. It doesn't work for everybody.

It's just crazy. Really, a lot of these policies are just crazy. Who is running the country? I mean, we know who's running the country, but do they actually consider the implications of what they're doing to people? Do they want people to have jobs? Do they want people to be able to move, to be able to have vehicles? Honestly, it seems as though the Liberal government is trying to bring us back down and to destroy our nation. That's what they're doing. It's not that they're trying; they are actually doing a fine job of tearing down our nation.

Let's just talk about per capita income. I think in 2017 or 2016, per capita income in Canada was about $55,000, and what is it right now? Nine years later, it is $54,000, approximately $54,000. We've gone down.

When Prime Minister Harper and the Conservatives were in power, in Canada our per capita income was about the same as that of the U.S., of Americans. Our dollar was strong, but that has been whittled away. It has been whittled away by incompetence. That's a shame. I say shame.

People are feeling this and crying out. Look at food banks in Canada: Millions of Canadians are lined up at food banks everywhere. I've visited food banks in Vancouver, and they've told me that use has gone up two or three times. It's doubled or tripled.

In my community also, we have a great food bank. It provides tremendous service. It's the Friends in Need Food Bank, and I will be helping out with the food drive this coming Saturday. People are generous in our community, but they're saying they don't have the goods to give the way they used to because demand is so great.

Let's talk about Toronto. One out of 10—10% of the population—relies on food banks. Toronto has 6.5 or seven million people. People are suffering out there. It's sad.

We had a by-election in Toronto—St. Paul's. It's been a stronghold for the Liberals. I know the by-elections quite often are challenging for a government in power, and we recognize that, but Conservatives won that strong seat.

We had a by-election a couple of days ago in Winnipeg. Liberals gained less than 5% of the popular vote. In Montreal, they lost a seat that was a stronghold of former prime minister Paul Martin. It was held by him. They've lost their way.

Well, this is not a new thing. They're out of touch as the government, unfortunately.

I know the members as individuals. I know different ones right there. I like them as people and enjoy having conversations. I don't care whether it's the Bloc or the NDP. I appreciate that we're people and we're all human, but nevertheless we have political philosophies that I attack. I don't mean it personally, but it is something that is affecting Canadians personally.

The previous Liberal president in my riding told me that the Liberals have just lost their way, and he was going to donate to my campaign. He was a former Liberal president.

If that isn't enough, the Liberal candidate that I ran against in the last election told me that he was going to vote for me in this election. That's not something I'd want to hear if I was a Liberal. I mean, honestly, the alarm bells are ringing. You know that. You see the polls. It's obvious for the Liberals here.

I think that this is a message too for the Bloc Québécois and the NDP. They've hitched their carriage to this horse, or however the illustration goes: They're hitched to this by voting with them. I can see why they're getting pretty squirmy in trying to pull out. It baffles me a bit.

I'll mention this in some comments. The Bloc is now saying they're going to—

[Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe, Bloc, Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

Mr. Chair, I would like to raise a point of order.

We are on a slippery slope. We are currently talking about an amendment on a carbon tax, and we are hearing partisan attacks we would normally hear in the House.

I would ask my colleague to focus on the carbon tax and not launch partisan attacks against people. However, if you want to let him continue, Mr. Chair, I feel that this committee will start looking like a circus. If we want to decently represent the people who put their trust in us, we should behave differently.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you, Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe.

Mr. Dalton, you have the floor.

[Marc Dalton, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC]

I would like to add that Mr. Kmiec’s subamendment clearly refers to the carbon tax, but also to the fact that the government is out of touch with Canadians. My comments are therefore entirely appropriate.

We're talking about being out of touch and we're talking about coalitions. The NDP is tied in with the Liberals on the common working man. I've visited union shops and work sites and other places, primarily in British Columbia, with the Conservative leader, and people there are expressing their frustration. They're talking about the cost of living, about the carbon tax. They're telling me how hard it is. They have trucks, and some of them have firearms for work, and they're feeling the pinch. My riding is traditionally more blue collar, although now it's quite mixed, but the working men and women have had it.

When I was on Vancouver Island, a gentleman came up to me and introduced himself. He was actually a former NDP cabinet minister, and he told me that he had joined a Conservative board, a Conservative riding association. He said it was because the NDP—the NDP-Liberal coalition—had totally lost their way. He said they'd gone woke and were not in contact and not connected and didn't understand the working person.

Look at the map. Look at the 338. Obviously it's just a picture of where things are at right now, and it's not certain that this is what the election is going to be, but just look at where things are at. People are frustrated. Do you get the message?

In British Columbia, if the polling is correct, the Liberals and the NDP are looking at a massive loss of seats. I know each party has their own strategists, but they had better be looking at things.

Mr. Kmiec mentioned that they are looking at the polls. The premiers are looking at how people feel about the carbon tax, and 70% of Canadians don't want it.

Up until about a week ago, NDP Premier David Eby was touting the carbon tax. Last March, I believe, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre asked him to join seven other premiers to join him in opposing the increase in the carbon tax on April 1.

What was his response? This was the CTV News headline:

'Baloney Factory': Eby mocks Poilievre letter asking B.C. to join carbon price fight

A letter from Opposition Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre to British Columbia Premier David Eby, asking him to help halt a federal carbon price increase, was dismissed by Eby as a “baloney factory” campaign tactic.

Poilievre's letter sent Friday [said that] the 23 peer cen rise amounts to an extra 18 cents on a litre of fuel, and people B.C. and Canadians cannot afford it.

Poilievre's letter said the carbon pricing system set up by Trudeau is an imposition on the provinces that requires them to accept an ever-increasing levy.

“I don't live in the Pierre Poilievre campaign office and baloney factory,” said Eby. “I live in B.C., am the premier and decisions have consequences.”

Let's fast-forward to a week ago. What did he say? He said he would remove the government tax if the federal government removes the requirement. He said, “...the context and the challenge for British Columbians has changed. A lot of British Columbians are struggling with affordability”. Well, this didn't happen in just the past four months. This has been going on for quite some time. It's a very interesting choice of words.

He says “the context has changed”. What happens to be the context? The context is that he's in the midst of an election that the NDP thought they were walking away from with a massive majority, but the B.C. Conservatives are now breathing down their necks. The Mainstreet poll showed them ahead at 46% to 44%. There are other polls that show them behind. One party's ahead and one's behind. Basically, they're panicking in the NDP war room. That's why they're throwing out the carbon tax. They said, “Okay. Well, what do we have to do?” This is panic. People can see through it.

I know that Jagmeet Singh with the NDP has said they're going to reconsider the carbon tax. That's good. Let's reconsider it and let's go to an election.

I also want to tell the Bloc Québécois that this is not a tax that only affects the rest of Canada, and not Quebec. Per capita income is also going down. The carbon tax is having an impact. Things are hard for Quebeckers in their province, just as it is for Canadians in the rest of Canada.

Of course, as Conservatives, our strategy will be to blame the Bloc Québécois for keeping this government in power in Canada. This political party—I’m talking about the Liberals—is the costliest and most centralist in Canada’s history. In my opinion, giving money and power to the federal government runs entirely counter to the Bloc Québécois’s ambition, which is independence. They’re the ones holding things up now. It’s expensive to vote for the Bloc.

I thank the committee for listening to me. I wish you all a good day.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you, Mr. Dalton.

The floor will go to Mr. El-Khoury.

I'm going to say the list first, and then I'll give you the floor, Mr. El-Khoury. On the list, I have Mr. El-Khoury, MP Kwan, MP McLean, MP Redekopp and Mr. Kmiec, in that order.

First I have Mr. El-Khoury, and then I will go to Madam Kwan. I will then come to you, Mr. McLean, and then Mr. Redekopp and Mr. Kmiec That is the speaking list.

Mr. El-Khoury, you have the floor.

[Fayçal El-Khoury, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would love to see my colleague Mr. Dalton listen to what I'm going to say—he will contradict himself 200%—but I believe he prefers to run away. Come back.

Mr. Chair, I'm really puzzled.

I am truly disappointed to see that our Conservative Party colleagues are trying to topple the government, rather than prioritize Canadians’ interests. They're going from one province to the next.

When we see that Canadians need to improve their lives after the global economic difficulty, from COVID until now, when we see the interest rates drop two times and continue to drop, that will elevate the lives of Canadians.

They are just looking at their own interest, and they are not taking into consideration whether the people of Canada would like to have an election in these difficult times. I believe if you go from coast to coast, the majority of Canadians don't want to have an election now. They would like all parties in the House to work to make their lives and the lives of Canadians better.

Let me go point by point.

My respected colleague Mr. Kmiec was talking about receiving a letter from school boards asking for the removal of the carbon tax. He said that would help students go to school.

When the government proposed a bill in order to bring free meals to students and to have $10 day care for every child, they voted against it. In the interests of the schools, the parents and the students, they should have voted yes. When it comes to improving the life of Canadians, when we presented dental care, if they cared about Canadians they should have voted yes but they did the opposite.

When we talk about the environment, we have to prepare this country for generations to come, for our children and our grandchildren to have clean air, clean drinking water, a green economy and green infrastructure, yet in every single bill, they voted against this. What they do is to declare something and then do precisely the opposite.

Regarding my good friend Mr. Dalton—and I hope he is here—this is from his portfolio from when he was in the British Columbia legislature. I would like his colleagues to listen and understand what he said in 2017:

Our government made the decision to implement a tax on carbon....

Our carbon tax appears to be working. Independent studies have found that between 2008 and 2012, fuel use in B.C. dropped by 16 percent per capita. In 2015, a review of seven independent studies suggested that B.C.'s carbon tax has reduced emissions in the province by up to 15 percent....

We view this tax as a tool to change behaviour and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

This is what Marc Dalton said in the British Columbia legislature on February 27, 2017.

I hope he has listened to this and will give us an answer.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you, Mr. El-Khoury.

I will go to Madam Kwan.

Madam Kwan, you have the floor.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank very much, Mr. Chair. I'll be very brief about this.

Really, all of this is just a ploy, in my view. It's playing politics at its worst.

What we're seeing here in relation to Bill C-71 is an attempt by the Conservatives once again to kill the bill. I suppose I should not be that surprised because, after all, it was them who brought in Bill C-37, which stripped the rights of Canadians and then deemed them to be second-class citizens. Irrespective of the fact that the Superior Court in Ontario has found this to be unconstitutional, the Conservatives want to persist. I know they'll make arguments and say things like, when Bill C-37 was passed, all the parties in the House supported it.

Let us just be clear on the record. In fact, Don Chapman—who is absolutely an expert about the history of lost Canadians—noted in his book that the Conservative government and Harper at the time, made it clear that, if that bill was not supported unanimously and unchanged by the parties, then he would strip all the other elements that would have impacted veterans and war brides. They would have gone to their graves without having their citizenships recognized.

What did the parties do? They held their noses and did what they had to do in order to honour the veterans and the war brides. Bill C-37 was founded on violations that, in my view, were based on sex discrimination.

Mr. Speaker, I should also add that the NDP's Olivia Chow—who was the critic at that time because I wasn't around the House at the time—attempted to raise concerns around the provisions that stripped second-generation-born Canadians of their right to citizenship. She did, in fact, call for that section to be struck or amended. Of course, that didn't happen because if she had ultimately gone down that track to do anything, it would have meant that the war veterans and the war brides and others.... There were some elements that were good in Bill C-37—

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Hear, hear.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

—that would have been lost altogether. Isn't that right, Greg?

That would have meant that all of that would have been lost and war veterans who fought for this country would have gone to their graves without having been recognized as Canadians. That is shameful. The gender discrimination of the war brides is shameful. That's what happened with Bill C-37.

Fifteen years later, we're trying to fix all of this and again the Conservatives want to play games with people's lives and their suffering. Children that are born stateless are the result of the Conservatives' bill. Separated families are a result of the Conservatives' bill. It got to the point where enough was enough and courageous people took this to court and won.

Even then, the Conservatives say, “Let's put our politics ahead of everybody else and call for an election.” That would mean Bill C-71 would die on the Order Paper. That means constitutional rights will continue to be violated for these lost Canadians.

Mr. Chair, I would add that the Conservatives claim that they support the family members of lost Canadians. Wouldn't you know it? The leader of the official opposition, in correspondence responding to lost Canadian families, said that they would actually see Bill S-245, which is a Senate bill, go to third reading. How did that go?

Not only did they filibuster the bill in this committee for 30 hours but, after we finally got all that passed and it was reported to the House, the sponsor of the bill, Jasraj Singh Hallan, moved in the order of precedence the motion for Bill S-245 as amended to come up to the House for third reading debate and a vote eight times—I think that must be a record—to pre-empt it from actually getting voted on and passed in the House. That is the reality, folks. They can say all they want in all those speeches they just made so that they can put it on social media and say to their leader, “We did our job.”

By the way, to my understanding, they're using that amendment at every committee. It is absolutely a political stunt they're trying to do. I project that they're using it at every committee because I think those are the tactics they want to engage in. That's what we see with those kinds of tactics, a repeat—throw it in, rinse, recycle, start all over again. Those are the kinds of tactics that we have seen over and over again. That's my projection—that it is the kind of thing they will do with the other committees as well, always putting partisan politics ahead of the needs of their community and of Canadians. That's what we're seeing right here, right now, today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you, Ms. Kwan.

We go to MP McLean. Please go ahead. The floor is yours.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

There were some remonstrations I heard there about something that happened 15 years ago. Parties in the House, including not just the NDP, who just spoke, but also the Liberals, have tried this as well: “We voted for that legislation under Stephen Harper, but it's all his fault because he told us we had to.”

I mean, come on. I'm a parliamentarian with a spine. If you were in the House at that point in time and somebody said, “Don't do your job, just do what we say,” I would say that you're not doing your job as a parliamentarian. I can't speak directly to what happened 15 years ago because I wasn't here, but I will say that making excuses for your own behaviour and the decisions that you've had to make.... Every decision that we make in Parliament requires considering both sides, the pros and the cons, of what we're trying to accomplish in that. If you try and undo half of that ex post facto, you are pretending that there was never both a pro and a con to the argument.

Moving things quickly as far as getting more Canadians the citizenship they're due is a job we all have to undertake here. We'd like to undertake that with a bill that would be brought forth here, as well, to make sure we have a robust immigration system, but we're talking about this subamendment right now, which is about including the tactic brought forward by my colleague from the NDP to try and bypass Parliament and bring this bill directly to this committee for expedited delivery as opposed to having people actually address it at second reading in the House of Commons.

I find that to be an affront to Parliament. It has never been done before and, frankly, shouldn't be done. We have a process in Parliament that we use to debate bills, particularly bills that are going to have significant consequences for Canada's immigration system. The stunt being pulled with this motion, to which we have an amendment and a subamendment—two at this point in time—is entirely at the feet of the New Democratic Party. Thank you very much for trying to manipulate this Parliament today, not the Parliament of 15 years ago.

I am also accountable for making sure that I stand up to nonsense, and this motion here is nonsense and goes against the democratic principles we stand for in this country and abide by, which we want to make sure the Liberal-NDP coalition doesn't continue to try and whittle away as we try to uphold democracy across this country.

This subamendment to the amendment to the motion that my colleague brought forward is the number one issue on the minds of Canadians across Canada right now. If you want to talk about listening to constituents and listening to what Canadians are saying, the most important issue right now in Canada is the fact that they have lost faith in this government's words about the carbon tax.

I'm going to say this very clearly here. It's because members of the government, members on the other side here, who are not really responsible because I know they're just reading off their pages, and the government itself—the Prime Minister and each of his ministers—stand up in the House of Commons and address Canadians and say nonsense like, “This bill puts more money in your pocket than it takes out. We just take that money out of your pocket, take it into Ottawa, give it to our bureaucrats to shuffle around and then we add a little bit of salt and pepper to it and put it back in your pocket.”

That's garbage. The Parliamentary Budget Officer has said that's garbage, yet the Prime Minister and his band of merry men and women continue on that completely false narrative. Let's call it what it is. It has been called many things, Mr. Chair, but let's call it what it is. It's dishonest. There is no government money that doesn't come from the taxpayers. Not one cent you are putting in the pockets of Canadians didn't come from the pockets of Canadians. Public finance is public finance, and drifting into a $50-billion deficit for no reason other than the fact that you want to continue to grease your friends is no way to run a democratic government in Canada.

I think we need to continue to hold this government to account. I heard someone say here, in addressing the subamendment, that Conservatives spend too much time at committee examining legislation. What do you think our job is? I'll tell you that I've only been at this committee one year, but I have yet to examine legislation at this committee, because it's been filibustered so much by the Liberals, by not bringing forward legislation, both in camera and in public, trying—

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Mr. McLean, anything in camera we cannot mention here. Please be careful.

Thank you.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Thank you.

Much time has been taken in addressing almost nothing in both public meetings and non-public meetings; I hope that was better said, Mr. Chair.

It is a shame that this committee has accomplished almost nothing in the 12 months I've been on this committee. When I share that with Canadians, and I hope to share that with Canadians, they're going to wonder why we're paying these people to come to Ottawa and sit in meetings where they get nothing done. Let me challenge my colleagues across the table and my colleagues down the table: We need to start getting things accomplished here. Those accomplishments need to include getting the right subamendment, which is what we're talking about here.

Let me give a quick indication of what happens at committee.

This will be illustrative, Mr. Chair. I hope you don't mind.

I was previously on the environment committee. Here's what happened on the environment committee when we were addressing changes to the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. The thing about the Canadian Environmental Protection Act is that it requires melding the science of environmental protection with the legal language of making sure that the scientific reality is put into legislation. It is an art and a science built into one. We took the time to do that. There were protestations from the Liberal side of the bench that we were taking too much time.

In the end, we made some significantly good amendments with the help of a couple of good Liberal backbenchers who actually respected things like science. They respected things like parliamentary jurisdiction and where we were overlapping with the jurisdictions of provinces. We got a better piece of legislation with some significant scientific and legal input from wonderful public officials who provided us advice on that committee.

What was the end result? The amended bill went to Parliament at report stage. All the changes that we'd laboured through in that committee—extensive, positive, constructive, scientific and legalistic changes—were undone in an instant because the Liberals were, I'll call it, blackmailed by the NDP, who said, “Undo all the amendments or else we will not vote for your legislation.”

The Minister of the Environment, one Steven Guilbeault, acquiesced. He acquiesced as he shouldn't have done, because we have a parliamentary process here. Good input from several parliamentarians and the good work of several public officials was completely wasted. Nobody can tell me with a straight face and not sound like a hypocrite that we spend too much time doing the work we're supposed to do at committee. It hasn't been what I've seen done at this committee for the last 12 months.

I also heard one of my colleagues talk about Mr. Dalton's comments when he was a previously elected provincial legislator and the provincial carbon tax in British Columbia. The numbers are off, but I will say that we looked at what the actual reductions at the time were in British Columbia that coincided with the introduction of the carbon tax that was imposed in British Columbia. They almost exactly coincided with the reduction of economic activity.

I'll put that on Mr. El-Khoury's desk, if he can take a look at that, to educate himself. If you're going to have less economic activity, of course you're going to have fewer carbon emissions. If his suggestion is that in Canada we just stop economic activity in order to reduce our carbon footprint, well, we're going to have a lot more people on the street and a lot more people doing nothing. Sooner or later we'll have a lot less public officials and a lot less parliamentarians, because there's nothing to sustain the economy if the economy isn't working.

Mr. El-Khoury, please take a look at that, because it isn't necessarily as direct as what you're saying. In any event, you have now the NDP Premier of British Columbia admitting that it doesn't work and saying that, if the federal backstop legislation weren't there, he would walk away from it.

I don't know what exactly you need to hear from the people it's impacting the most. Canadian citizens have said very clearly, British Columbians have said very clearly and everybody who actually looks at the carbon tax and its ineffectiveness at reducing emissions have said that it is a cost without a benefit.

I'll go into it further later with regard to an education on what a carbon tax is supposed to do and what it doesn't do. The science is clear and the economics are also clear. We can go into that in great detail and I'll debate anybody in the House of Commons on those matters.

What this is really about and why we want to get towards making sure we get a carbon tax election...because we do want a carbon tax election. The reason this has gained some significant tailwinds from all Canadians, Canadians across this country, is that they know now they've been misled by this Parliament. It's a Parliament run by the leadership of the party that's facing me right now, the Liberals, with the acquiescence of the NDP and sometimes of the Bloc Québécois.

We have to make sure that we put it on trial here, and that trial will be when the Canadian people decide that they get to pass judgment on the government that has misled them beyond measure for several years now on what they're trying to accomplish. The question is, of course, if you keep jacking up this tax and keep increasing inflation, why aren't the emissions going down in the world? Why is carbon still going up? Why is carbon increasingly going up from people we should be helping reduce carbon? It's because—I'm going to say this very clearly, Mr. Chair—this government doesn't know what it's doing. It thinks that taking money out of people's pockets is the way to accomplish something, but really what it's accomplishing is taking money out of people's pockets and giving it to their friends. It's a wealth transfer and nothing but.

Like I say, Canadians now are wise to it, and I think they got wise very clearly. If I can think of a crystallizing event on it, it was when Gudie Hutchings, the Liberal Minister of Rural Development, was very clear about why eastern Canadians got a break on their carbon tax for home heating oil, which has a much higher carbon footprint than natural gas. They got a break on that because it was affecting them, and there was the question of how come eastern Canadians get that break but western Canadians and other Canadians don't. She said that maybe western Canadians should elect more Liberals and then they'd do something about it. That is the height of cynicism, and frankly, I think most Canadians thought it was grounds for her to be fired as a cabinet minister.

That partisan approach to how we take taxes from certain people in certain parts of Canada and give carbon breaks to people in other parts of Canada is not the way a country holds itself together. This government has been excessively good at divide and conquer. “Where are our votes, and how do we transfer wealth from people who might not vote for us to people whose pockets we can put money into to vote for us?” is not a strategy that holds together at the end of the day.

As Margaret Thatcher once said, sooner or later when the economy goes downhill you run out of other people's money to take away and give to your friends. That is not the way to run this country. It hasn't been the way it's been run in a proper government, and it shouldn't be run that way now.

Let's talk about a consumer carbon tax, because that's what we're talking about here. There are a few carbon taxes that have been put on our plates by this government. There's not just the carbon tax that's there for people to see. There is, in effect, the clean fuel regulations, which are an additional carbon tax that's on top of the other tax. It's almost double at the end of the day, because in the end, the consumer pays for everything. It's another tax that's built into the energy that goes into producing everything in our economy.

Then there is the regulatory overburden that happens. They're trying to push forward with a clean electricity standard. If you take a look at the $40 billion-plus that has been reported for batteries in Canada, the Government of Quebec put out its number and talked about the cost per tonne of CO2 reduced by batteries. It's over $800 per tonne, which is 10 times higher than the consumer carbon tax. This is subsidization and regulation. Taxpayers' money is being poured out of governments.

Minister of Industry François-Philippe Champagne's moniker in many parts of Canada now is the “minister of writing cheques.” The whole notion, of course, is that if there are going to be cheques written, you may as well have your hand out. It is now just a handout. We have a $50-billion deficit across this country with no end in sight for this government's spendy ways. It's something that has to turn itself around in a hurry. Batteries, of course, are the worst example of how exactly we're feeling this right now in Canada.

Most people don't know this, but I'll tell my colleagues. I know that the only Albertans on this committee are in this party. I look at the Liberals, the NDP and the Bloc, and most of them won't realize that the first jurisdiction in Canada to have a carbon tax was Alberta. Alberta has the industrial carbon tax, and it has been there for 20 years now. It is a very good tax, and it has evolved. I was a critic of the tax in its early stages because it was rewarding activity that was not reducing emissions. Reducing emissions is what we have to do. All these systems evolve.

The 20-year evolution of the industrial carbon tax in Alberta was something during which there was a lot of trial and learning about the robustness of a system that's the envy of the rest of Canada and that this Government of Canada would like to emulate, if it could, although it doesn't like to emulate things from Alberta. It would like to emulate it as far as its own output-based pricing system and industrial carbon tax, if you will, yet it doesn't know how to do that because it doesn't have any expertise, whereas the provincial government in Alberta actually does have expertise in this matter.

When you have siloed expertise in Canada, take the lessons from the people who know what they're doing. That's step one. Find out who knows what they're doing in this process and follow their lead. Follow the Government of Alberta as far as what they're doing on carbon reduction efforts.

I want to bring to my colleagues' attention here that those efforts have led to the reduction in carbon per barrel produced in Alberta by about 34% over 20 years. Think about that. We produce energy, and the energy we produce at the production end has gone down by about a third thanks to the government's efforts in Alberta. Is there any other industry in Alberta that has reduced its carbon footprint the way the oil and gas industry has? Absolutely not.

What about the way the Government of Alberta has? Absolutely not. Where this country has actually seen greenhouse gas emissions reductions is in the province of Alberta and in our additions to the Canadian economy and our efforts to make sure that our production is the cleanest in the world by the measurement standards we have.

Please take a good look at that before you continue to just repeat your government's nonsense lines and understand where we're actually making headway on reducing emissions in Canada's economy.

In a carbon tax, as many people will chirp on social media or other media.... The purity of a carbon tax was introduced by a guy named William Nordhaus, who was both an economist and a climate scientist. I'll bring this to the committee's attention too, and for anybody watching: He brought the whole notion of what the cost of a carbon tax should be and could be. He initially came out with a number of about $26, and he revised that later to about $38 U.S. The issue is that, if you have one tax, one mechanism in society that would address the effects of carbon.... We're not abusing a public good, because the air is a public good, the atmosphere. The climate is a public good and it's not to be changed for free, so it is a way of actually addressing it.

Mr. Nordhaus's approach to it was, “What is the one thing you can do?” If you had a pure carbon tax, it would be the number he came up with, $28 to $38 U.S. per ton. Eighty dollars of course, is much higher than that. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency at the time thought it was around $50, so there's not one thought on this. However, that is in the absence of all of the other ridiculous measures that this government has brought into play on the file, which include another industrial carbon tax, the clean energy regulations, the clean fuel standards, the regulations that cost—as with the batteries—$800 dollars per tonne of emissions reductions. These are ridiculous measures on top of any purity associated with the concept of a carbon tax, which is not represented in the consumer carbon tax that this government put into play here, which is a complete in-and-out scheme for Canadian taxpayers' money.

It was tabled in Parliament this week that, based on an access to information request by one of my colleagues, this consumer carbon tax, which is an instrument of this Liberal-NDP coalition, will cost Canadians $9 billion by 2030. That's $9 billion in extra taxes and they're hiding it behind where you're going to have to make tax increases.

Be honest with Canadians. That's all we're asking for here. They found you misleading them about the carbon tax. They continue to try to hold you to account, and you won't give them an election on the matter. I can guarantee you that every meeting I had this summer was, “Can you please get these people to call an election? It's done. It's over.” Any support this government may have had has been washed away with its dishonesty. People recognize it now very clearly.

You're no longer obfuscating in the cloudy middle or grey area of whether you're telling the truth or not—you're not. You misled Canadians. They recognize it. Now get on with it and face the music, because the music has to be faced here. There is no other outcome. We are going to have an election. People are going to remember exactly what you said on this matter, how you misled them and how much this is going to cost them.

The end outcome here, of course, is that we're here. We're democratically elected. I had a podcast yesterday, and we talked about the whittling away of democracy that's happened here. I'm going to challenge my colleagues, particularly on the government side of the bench, the Liberal-NDP coalition. If you're going to support a carbon tax and say that you're going to continue to not face the public on what it has to say about a carbon tax, then you need to recognize that you have to get better informed about it, because democracy requires people in your positions to actually understand what you are doing.

We're becoming more and more a government of siloed expertise. Anybody who tells me that somebody's an expert in lost Canadians.... Okay, they're an expert in lost Canadians, but connect the dots. Lost Canadians don't exist in silos. For lost Canadians, we have to make sure that we're doing some significant good here at the end of the day.

For anybody who thinks they're experts, bring that expertise to a mix of everything we need to accomplish here in society and ensure we get the right things done for this country, because I can tell you right now, there's a country here that's being wasted, a country whose productivity has gone down significantly. Our country underperforms the world now as far as our economic growth goes.

If it wasn't for the excess immigration that's happened over the last two years, our GDP—gross domestic product—would be negative. What does that tell you? The economy is shrinking except for the new people coming into the economy whom we have to make sure we continue to produce for. That's not a recipe for success. Our productivity has to get better in this country. We have to start producing more per capita.

None of this government's policies have led to any of those outcomes, and it's a shame. It's an absolute shame because I would love to see more people on the government side of the bench who actually understand the economics of what they're trying to do and how it affects everybody in the country, because it is a whittling down of what they can buy with their after-tax dollars.

Let's take a look at those after-tax dollars. With the increases in taxes brought on by this government, people have less take-home pay. Less take-home pay, in addition, buys less because of the inflated dollars that this government has run through as a result of their money-printing operations. Inflation has caused everything to go up in society and created less ability to buy everything Canadians need: food, shelter, clothing, goods. We get less out of the dollars we spend when our take-home paycheques are whittled away by government taxes, and then the take-home pay gets stretched because it doesn't buy as much as it used to buy.

Canada is a democracy still, despite the whittling away that happens, including in the bills that these members across the way bring to the House of Commons. Be accountable on your carbon tax. Show up. Go talk to your.... It's the number one judgment you're going to get. If you're so solid about this being a good thing to move forward with, then let's have a carbon tax election. If you don't think you've misled Canadians, then show up at their doors and tell them you only misled them for their own good. They won't believe you.

I've had many conversations on the sidelines with my Liberal colleagues, with my NDP colleagues, with my Bloc colleagues, and I want to tell them, if you don't think the by-elections in two safe Liberal ridings in June and September were a very clear indication that the Liberals don't have the support of the people anymore, then you're tone-deaf. You're not paying attention. Your eye is off the ball.

Admit to Canadians that you want to continue to dither and whittle away at their savings, whittle away at the country's productivity, whittle away at the democracy that we've fought hard for and won here in Canada, whittle away at everything Canadians stand for in order to continue this facade of what you're actually trying to do. What you're doing is ruining Canadians' lives, ruining the economy, ruining the take-home pay, making everything worse in this country.

Now I'm asking you to think about it and get to the point where we actually get better outcomes, a better Canada, for all our citizens.

I think the last thing I want to say, Mr. Chair, if I may, is...and I'd like my colleagues, particularly my colleagues in the Liberal Party of Canada, because I know most of you are backbenchers and some of you are people I've worked with well in other committees....

Ms. O'Connell, it's the first time I've been on committee with you, so welcome, but please, go to your leadership. Do a quick examination yourselves. You are people who are elected by your constituents. Do you think your constituents are going to be pleased when they look at how much money has been taken out of their pockets, through various means, including this carbon tax, and given to a bunch of your boss's friends, because that is overwhelmingly obnoxious.

The amount of money...and pardon me, I had a finance career before I came here. One thing we do in finance is that we follow the money. The money that's been taken—I'd like to say stolen, but it's not stolen—from the pockets of Canadians, despite the fact that they've been misled about it, has landed in the pockets of several friends of your leadership.

Take a look at all the organizations that are getting greased on the wheels of this dishonesty. Do your constituents a favour and say that you don't stand up for that. That would be a challenge I would put to you. That would be a challenge I would put to my NDP colleague who protested that the NDP only supported that bill 15 years ago because “we were told to”.

Okay. Thanks very much.

Step up. Hold your head up. Go to your constituents and say, “This is what I found out. This is why I'm actually calling for an election as well.”

Mr. Chair, thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you, Mr. McLean.

We have three speakers on the list. We have Mr. Redekopp, Mr. Kmiec and Mr. El-Khoury.

Mr. Redekopp, please go ahead.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

It's great to be here talking about the issue of the carbon tax again, but I want to start with the comments from Ms. Zahid. I agree with her that there are a lot of trolls on social media. There are a lot of nasty comments. There are horrible un-Canadian things that are said by many people online on social media these days. It's sad that it's come to that in our country.

As my colleague Tom Kmiec said, Conservatives are not immune to this either. I don't want to get into an argument of who gets it worse, but I think all of us as politicians have experienced this. It's something that unfortunately we can't control or that we haven't yet figured out how to control. From my perspective, I've always been very fair with what I've said. I will continue to be that way and communicate that way.

Ms. Kwan spoke about the way in which this bill has gone through. I just wanted to remind everybody—sometimes so much time passes that we forget the original orientation of things—that this whole lost Canadians cause started with a Conservative bill from the Senate, Bill S-245. If we recall back, the whole point was to make it very simple. It's been tried to be fixed many times over the years. It has always failed. It has always gotten mired down in complications, which is exactly where we find ourselves today.

I just want to remind everybody that the whole intent was to make a very simple bill to fix a very specific problem of lost Canadians. The Senate actually pushed all the readings through in one day to get it here. The intention was to bring it to the committee. Everybody had previously agreed to this, so get it in and get it into law. It could have been in law for at least a year, at this point, yet because the government chose to hijack that bill and add a whole bunch of other complexity to it, that caused this problem that we find here today.

I just want to remind people that it was always our intention as Conservatives to fix this mistake, this problem, with lost Canadians, and to fix it quickly. That was our intention. However, because of the government's interference in the bill and trying to complicate things and solve 18 problems at one time, here we are. There's a very good chance that this won't get solved in this Parliament, which is a shame.

I want to talk a little bit more about the carbon tax. It has been mentioned a few times today, but I have a bit of a different angle on this. Back in the fall, when the NDP-Liberal government chose to remove the carbon tax on home heating for those voters in Atlantic Canada—it's been pointed out this was a political decision that was made to supposedly protect votes in Atlantic Canada, which of course hasn't happened—there was an outcry.

I have a quote I want to read. It comes from Saskatchewan. Let me read it here. It says:

This exemption is a clear recognition that Canadians are struggling with crushing inflation and higher costs but it has specifically left out relief for the people of Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta....

Instead of picking and choosing who gets relief based on Prime Minister Trudeau’s election map, we’re calling on the federal government to extend relief to all Canadian families.

Who does that sound like? Who do you think said that? I think most people would guess that it sounds like the Premier of Saskatchewan, Scott Moe. In reality, these are the words of the NDP leader in Saskatchewan, if you can believe it. The NDP leader said those words, which are essentially the same as what Premier Scott Moe said. I think most western Canadians have that belief. It's shocking. The NDP have completely reversed their position. The people on the ground have reversed that position.

I have a second quote from the NDP leader, Carla Beck, from a recent Regina Leader-Post article, as follows:

Standing beside one of Regina’s business thoroughfares...Saskatchewan NDP Leader Carla Beck denounced federal policies that have failed this province...especially [the] carbon tax.

The carbon tax has got to go. Saskatchewan people can’t afford it, Beck said.

Of course, most living here would agree.

I just find it kind of humorous that at a provincial level, everybody, all politicians, are running as fast as they can away from the carbon tax. Even at the federal level now, finally, the NDP are starting to. Because of the extreme pressure and the obvious math of the next election, we're seeing them start to change it.

I also want to point out that when our province of Saskatchewan decided to stop collecting carbon tax on home heating, as was done in Atlantic Canada, for me personally, my bill went down by $20 a month instantly. That's not an insignificant amount to Saskatchewan people.

That's about $240 a year for me and I think that's about the typical average that can be expected. That's a significant amount of money. That's just one little piece of it on the carbon tax. That's pretty significant.

I think it's interesting how things have evolved and how important it is for the government to wake up, listen to what people are saying and understand that very large numbers of people in this country—not just in western Canada but right across the country—very much dislike this carbon tax. However, the government continues to be adamant that it not only wants to continue with the carbon tax but continue increasing it every year and quadruple it from where it is.

That's why this amendment to the motion is important. It's to allow Canadians to have their say and have a carbon tax election, so that Canadians can speak up and tell government what they want. Then we can move forward from there.

Mr. Chair, we have spoken about this quite a lot, so I would like to make a motion that we adjourn this meeting.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

There is a motion on the floor to adjourn the meeting. Is there unanimous consent?

There's no unanimous consent, so we'll could go to the vote.

(Motion negatived: nays 6; yeas 5)

I will go to one o'clock and suspend the meeting unless I have a unanimous consent to suspend the meeting now. Do I have a unanimous consent to suspend the meeting now? No.

Okay, we'll go to one o'clock. I will give the floor to Mr. Kmiec.

Please go ahead, and then Mr. El-Khoury is in line.

At one o'clock, I would love to call a suspension because we have not been successful, unless you want to bring this motion again.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Maybe after a few minutes of hearing me again, people will reconsider their choices.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

It's your call.

Mr. Kmiec, I will leave it to the members to make that decision.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I respect the members' choices, so that's entirely up to them.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Mr. Maguire, will I put you on the list?

Thank you.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

May I continue, Chair?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Please, go ahead.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I guess you were given a chance to not let me speak, and I voted to not let myself speak, which is unusual. It's probably the first time in nine years I voted to not let myself speak at committee. It's like I'm at PROC all over again in my first term.

I wanted to address a few of the things I heard from the other side, because I think it's material to everything that we've been talking about on this subamendment, how we got here and the reason for the particular legislation that the main motion is referring to.

Mr. El-Khoury talked about the drops in the interest rate by the Bank of Canada, and then sort of implied—well, not implied, almost said it—that it's going to keep going down. Is the Liberal government going to force the Bank of Canada governor to lower interest rates? That would be most unusual because I thought those interest rate decisions were entirely independent of government. If monetary policy is no longer independent, I think you should put it on the record that it's no longer independent.

On the $10 day care programs, I remember the Conservative side voted for Bill C-35, which these agreements are attached to. It's a disaster in my home province, where there are many day cares, especially private day cares, that are going out of business. Especially in my riding, there are a few of my communities where I have a lot of home care that provide day homes. That's how I grew up in Brossard, on the south shore of Montreal. I grew up in these day homes, basically. They're critical. They're being put out of business by the Liberal government agreement that was forced on my province. You will see a lot of criticism from our Alberta minister at the time, before she was promoted to the environment ministry, on this particular issue.

About the school food program that Mr. El-Khoury loves to promote, it has fed exactly zero children. I'm pretty sure there's letterhead. There's probably some nice writing out there with a beautiful font going around—no children fed, zero. There are a lot of private, not-for-profit organizations that have fed more children than the Liberal government.

I'll give you an example. Brown Bagging for Calgary's Kids has probably fed more children in one week than the entire Government of Canada has in the past nine years. If anything, the government that you keep supporting on the other side has probably taken food out of more children's mouths by making it so expensive than it's actually fed.

This food program is just a total sham. It's a total sham. You should not promote it. There are other things you could talk about that maybe you could convince the public on. Judging from the polls the public doesn't trust you. They don't trust the cabinet and really doesn't trust the Prime Minister. I have not even met Liberals at the doors who would be willing to say “I trust the Prime Minister of Canada.” I've found Liberals at the doors saying, “I want to continue voting Liberal.” It's not, “I'm going to.” They say, “I want to continue. I want to find a reason to vote Liberal.”

I think they're ready for that carbon tax election that my subamendment is calling for. I think they recognize that this has to be done. There are a few more things that were mentioned about C-37, the originating piece of legislation that introduced the first-generation limit, which the superior court judge found was charter non-compliant. Again, if you read the actual judicial decision in the paragraph 60 range, specifically, the charter non-compliance is connected to the incompetence of the former IRCC minister.

The Minister of Immigration's department is incompetent. He's incompetent. He can't seem to get a handle on his file. Some people are just not meant for this. They're on their fifth or sixth immigration minister. Maybe it's time for a seventh. I'm not sure how many it will take to fix this.

Bill C-37 was unanimously voted on not once, where perhaps the argument made by the NDP would make sense, but twice. It wasn't that it was just unanimously agreed to; it was unanimous without dissent.

Because I have been the deputy House leader on the Conservative side, I'm going to reveal maybe some inside baseball things for the public. Typically in this place, House leaders talk to each other. The deputies talk to each other. We all know the positions of our caucuses. I'm not sure how the other caucuses work, but in our caucus, we run our House leadership. We tell them what to do. We have votes, and they are directed on certain matters on what to do. That's the way it works.

On Bill C-37 at the time, my understanding then would have been that if everybody unanimously supported it, you unanimously supported everything within Bill C-37, including the first-generation limit. Bill C-37 also restored citizenship to a lot of Canadians. It was fixing some of the errors in the 1977 Citizenship Act, and I think that is really important to mention.

To make the claim that a third party who wasn't a member of Parliament, who wrote a book and who made a claim that was not backed because that person had not talked to Stephen Harper, as far as I know, or parliamentarians, the House leadership or staffers of the time.... To make that claim...it's just that. It's hearsay: Somebody said something. I would not take that to the bank. It's also, I think, a false interpretation of what was said in Hansard. I don't have that particular page with me. It's upstairs in my desk.

I look forward to debate continuing on Bill C-71 in the chamber, and I'm going to be there every single time it comes up. I'm going to participate. I'm going to keep asking the same question I asked the minister on the first day. How many people would be affected by Bill C-71? I know how many people would be affected by my subamendment right now. It would be 40 million-plus Canadians, who are going to go to the polls and pass judgment on all of us, including the Conservatives. They're going to pass judgment on our performance, and I'm looking forward to it. I have zero fear for my constituents and the residents in my riding. I am more than willing to submit myself to their wisdom, and if they choose to vote me out, they can do so.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to be able to earn their support. I'm pretty sure. I've got a gut feeling. They're pretty satisfied with my work, based on my door knocking in my riding and other parts of the country. I have a good feeling about it this time. Even the vice-chair says he'd vote for me. I want to make sure of that as we continue to talk about this subamendment I've put forward.

I also want to talk about the delays in Bill C-71 and this sudden rush that I see from at least one opposition party and the government side now because there is a court-imposed deadline. There was a court-imposed deadline in June, and the government never bothered to put up Bill C-71 for debate. It did not even bother. It was on notice as of May 23, so at any time afterwards it could have been put up for debate. There was almost 20 days' worth of debate during which they could have put up the bill.

Why didn't they tell their House leadership to do it? This I don't understand. There was a court-imposed deadline then as well, and their side chose not to do it, so it is interesting that, after the summer, they come back and now they claim this must be rushed because there's a court-imposed deadline for December.

I'll also remind us that the court's decision in Bjorkquist from the judge was made in December 2023. Why did it take 156 calendar days for them to table a piece of legislation called Bill C-71? It's not even that long. It's an open question; anyone can answer it. Go back to the minister. That's 156 days for legislation when there were multiple breaks in between, and then not a single day was it debated. However, today we're being told that this committee must approve an aggressive, partisan, anti-Conservative motion with a whole bunch of hearsay in the preamble to rush the bill through the House.

Then their own members complained, along with one opposition party, that we Conservatives, and others too, because they all participated in it, spent 30 hours debating different amendments and hearing from government officials, and that was invaluable. They want us to take it to committee, but then they will complain that we have to rush it through committee because we Conservatives will take too much time.

They should go back to their comms people. That's a bad talking point. Their policy people should be writing their talking points. As a former policy guy, I fervently believe this. Let the policy people write the points, not the comms people—with all the blessings to them, because I know we have them on all sides. They exist everywhere I'm sorry to say. Policy people should be the ones writing these points. It just makes no sense.

I now understand the Citizenship Act better, I think, than any other piece of legislation before the House. I'm comfortable now when I read Bill C-71 after what happened with Bill S-245, and we moved many amendments. We all know this. More than 10 of them were Liberal amendments the Conservative side voted for. We proposed over 40 amendments, some of them very substantial. That was not a filibuster. It wasn't a waste of time. It was productive. We were doing actual work.

I also made promises during that meeting so they were on the public record, and I intend to keep those promises. If they play games, then we will be here debating subamendments, amendments and main motions like this from here until the end of this session, because the public is tired of the government side especially. They're in government. They're supposed to govern. If they want to persuade us, then persuade us. Persuade my House leadership and persuade Conservative members of Parliament that they are right. So far, I haven't seen that. What I've seen instead are attempts to circumvent the process.

When Bill S-245 was before you, I said we could expedite that piece of legislation if we stuck to section 8, lost Canadians, which we all agree with. It's even in this legislation. We could still agree with it. It was a Conservative idea from Yonah Martin. I will also add the fact that during the minister's speech, when he was speaking in French, he referred to this.

He said “sénateur Martin” instead of “sénatrice Martin”. Not even knowing that the sponsor of Bill S‑245 in the Senate is a woman, a Conservative senator from British Columbia, is truly ridiculous. His staff did not even check to see who Yonah Martin is, why she tabled Bill S‑245—which is identical to Bill S‑230—and why it passed so quickly in the Senate the last time.

I'd like to see an attempt, a serious attempt. If you want to work together, we can, I'm more than happy to, but I have members on my side who have serious concerns about Bill C-71. They also have concerns, like in my riding, that we will not have the carbon tax election my subamendment is calling for.

I find it interesting too that I heard particular members saying that Conservatives are doing this at all committees. I literally wrote that subamendment on my notepad in what I affectionately call my chicken scratch. I can sort of read it, and then I wrote out the French version right afterwards. There are no games here. I don't go to my House leadership to ask for permission. They know that. They're as frustrated with me as you are.