Industry and Technology Committee on Feb. 9th, 2026

[Karim Bardeesy, Liberal, Taiaiako'n—Parkdale—High Park, ON]

I know that certain parts of the budget implementation act have been sent to this committee. I don't know if that part has been sent to this committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

I think we've been relatively flexible in some of the topics of discussion here today—

[An hon. member]

[Technical difficulty—Editor] good job.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

—so I'll afford the minister an opportunity to respond.

Colleagues, there's a lot of crosstalk here. We're almost there.

Minister, I'll go to you and provide you an opportunity to speak to this.

I think it's fair game for now, Mr. Bardeesy, but I appreciate your bringing the matter to my attention.

Madam Joly.

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC]

Yes, of course this government believes in innovation. We believe in cutting red tape. We also believe in the importance of parliamentary oversight.

[Michael Guglielmin, Conservative, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

I guess my concern with this provision specifically, and I think the concern that Canadians would have, is that clause 208 allows ministers veto power over laws passed by Parliament, basically going all the way back to Confederation, as long as they don't fall within the Criminal Code. It makes elected representatives less relevant and concentrates more power in the cabinet and with the Prime Minister.

It's not like Canadians don't have reason to be concerned. I mean, we have seen major scandals from your government, from the Liberal government, where political discretion in the past has intersected with powerful corporations. SNC-Lavalin and WE Charity are two obvious examples. Respectfully, Minister, you were in cabinet at the time. Had these laws been on the book, we would never even have known about any of these conflicts of interest.

Can you explain why Canadians should trust that this new exemption power wouldn't just be more exemptions for well-connected Liberal insiders?

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC]

First and foremost, we always respect ethics laws. I personally always do, and I will always do so, as well.

Your point is well taken. I think that is why this committee is studying the BIA. You should make a recommendation and we'll take that into account. We believe, as I mentioned, in parliamentary oversight.

[Michael Guglielmin, Conservative, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

To make the point, so Canadians watching and people at this committee can understand how serious this could be, we have examples here now on the disclosures for the Prime Minister's lobbying, where they're more than double, where he's met with business more than double the amount of times as the previous prime minister. According to the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 59 people with whom the PM is connected have become the heads of Canada's largest corporations.

Our concern, and I think the concern that Canadians would share more broadly, is we need to be confident that exemptions under clause 208 don't simply reflect exemptions for the prime minister's friends.

Can you commit today that every exemption granted under 208 will be publicly disclosed, with full legal justification before doing so?

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC]

The Prime Minister came into politics having a breadth of experience in the private sector and also having worked at the Bank of England and the Bank of Canada, which is actually very useful to the country at this time, when we're dealing with a trade war.

I'm convinced that the ethics screens are in place and that all laws are being followed and that there's no tolerance for any form of breach of the screen.

Why? Fundamentally, what we value as a government and an institution is the trust of people. I really think that you should make the recommendation, which is important, and we'll take that into account. I really believe in the work of MPs, such as you, and I really think that we need to make sure there are strong guardrails to keep the public's trust.

[Michael Guglielmin, Conservative, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

Thank you, Minister.

I can appreciate the business experience. I spent my career in business before getting into Parliament to apply business acumen to the parliamentary process. That doesn't mean that we, as parliamentarians, and you as a minister of the Crown, shouldn't be enacting laws that are as narrow as possible to ensure that there's no room for exploitation, conflict of interest or corruption.

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC]

That's exactly why you should come up with recommendations. We'll make sure that we act in good faith and see what can be done to create some important guardrails.

I agree that we need to go fast and make decisions quickly. We need to reduce the red tape. We need to get rid of bureaucratic reflexes that have been in the public service—sorry, colleagues—for too long. At the same time, we need to make sure that there's parliamentary oversight. I think we can square that circle.

[Michael Guglielmin, Conservative, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

Thank you, Minister.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Mr. Ma, you'll conclude the line of questioning with five minutes allocated.

[Michael Ma, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Minister, your recently announced auto strategy received great reviews from labour unions, from provincial government and environmental associations. Everyone appears to be pleased with the direction our government is now going.

How will the newly announced auto strategy help define the Canadian auto industry strategically in the coming years?

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC]

A lot of decisions were taken by the auto sector, and a lot of it was linked to the Inflation Reduction Act under President Biden. A lot of decisions were taken in the U.S. linked to that. President Trump decided to make his own decision. That's fine, but we need to think ahead.

Thinking ahead means asking how we can continue to build cars that people will want to buy at an affordable price and stay competitive and how we can keep our footprint here at a time when there's a strong push for U.S. automakers to leave and go south of the border, while being able to attract new investments. We know that we will be revising CUSMA. That's something we'll be working on.

We came up with different ways. I've talked about enticing auto production in Canada. We do that through the $3-billion strategic response fund for auto. We're doing that through a remission system that basically is to support automakers in Canada. When they reduce their footprint, we penalize them and we reduce their market access for cars coming from the U.S. We're doing that also because we believe that companies that will increase their production in Canada should be able to benefit from it.

We're looking at creating a credit system for companies that will be able to produce more to sell to those that are decreasing their footprint. That is why we will be able to anchor the companies that are here and potentially attract more car companies. We want to use defence procurement also to attract investors, either from Korea or Germany.

[Michael Ma, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Minister, colleagues here today have expressed concerns about EV subsidies going to the pocket of Donald Trump and so forth. Can you walk us through how the government is supporting domestic production?

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC]

I just mentioned the strategic response fund and the remission framework, obviously because we're imposing tariffs on U.S.-made cars. I also just mentioned the EV tariffs, of course.

The EV incentives include the cars that are made in Canada. They can be even more than $50,000, if they're made in Canada. We will be there to support them.

It is for the Dodge Charger right now, but it's also for plug-in hybrids. We think that the plug-in hybrids, including the new RAV4, the next Civic—we hope—and the Lexus will be able to be covered, but we think we can have more.

We have the Volkswagen battery plant right now that has started construction. LG also has a battery plant. We have two really important battery plants and we think they are really important anchors for new investors.

[Michael Ma, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

That's great.

Minister, to follow up on that, how has the government helped to expand consumer choices with the recent trade missions?

[Mélanie Joly, Liberal, Ahuntsic-Cartierville, QC]

We have a free trade agreement with Europe. We have a free trade agreement with Asia. We believe that by having a bloc of middle-power countries together working on having a free trade zone without tariffs, we can increase choices.

We also want to make sure that automakers that are exporting a lot to Canada are able to also produce in Canada. That's definitely our goal and we'll work with them to attract more investment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Colleagues, that brings us to the end of the first hour.

Madam Minister, thank you for joining us.

Mr. Vincent and Mr. Chhabra, we very much appreciate you being here as well. We understand how difficult it is to take time away from the office, so we appreciate it.

Colleagues, I am going to very briefly suspend, in order to allow the parties a moment to talk about the motion. We will come back publicly to deal with it and then I'll suspend again for us to go in camera to get to the report.

The meeting is suspended.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Colleagues, this is reminder that we are still public.

We are going to deal with the motion that Madam Dancho brought forward. Once we've dealt with it, I will suspend so that we can go in camera and continue with the report.

Mr. Guglielmin, your hand is up. The floor is yours.

[Michael Guglielmin, Conservative, Vaughan—Woodbridge, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

We had some discussions among the parties. I'd like to move an amendment, which I believe will satisfy everyone here, to remove the words “that this study take precedence over all other business”. Also, we want to make some additions. The first one is “new auto strategy;” and the second one is:

that this study proceed immediately following the conclusion of the reports for the studies on Canada's Underlying Productivity Gaps and Capital Outflow and the Defence Industrial Strategy; that the study be undertaken concurrently with the study on the adoption of artificial intelligence in strategic industrial sectors in Canada;

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Okay.

Mr. Ste‑Marie, is the interpretation correct?

[Gabriel Ste-Marie, Bloc, Joliette—Manawan, QC]

Ideally, it would be good to send the translation to the interpreters, but it was presented to me.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ben Carr]

Okay. It's to conduct your study on artificial intelligence at the same time, that is, after the reports have been completed.

Just before, Mr. Guglielmin, do you want to...?