Science and Research Committee on June 18th, 2025

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

We'll go to Mr. Mahal.

[Jagsharan Singh Mahal, Conservative, Edmonton Southeast, AB]

I agree with Mr. Noormohamed as well. At the same time, given the complexity and the vastness of the issues that are in there, if we are efficient enough to cover them before the four meetings, then why not? However, if we need four meetings, I don't think that's a bad idea at all. As long as there is that flexibility to switch it either way, we should be okay with that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I really don't know what testimonies have already been heard. I will look into it. However, I think we should make a decision if we want to start with this study when we come back in the fall. We need to make a decision about the number of meetings so that, accordingly, the number of witnesses and their names can be given to the clerk, so that they can plan and invite the witnesses for the study. That is just my suggestion. It is up to the will of the committee members. Whatever you decide, I will do that.

There are no further hands. Seeing no agreement, maybe we can take a vote on the amendment proposed by Mr. Noormohamed.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

I'm just going to withdraw the amendment. It's fine.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Do we have unanimous consent for Mr. Noormohamed to withdraw that?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

(Amendment withdrawn)

We have dealt with the amendment, so we are back on the motion as presented by Mr. Blanchette-Joncas.

Is there any discussion? I see none.

(Motion agreed to)

Go ahead, Mr. Ho.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to move a motion that is very topical to the events of the House of Commons in the last week—yesterday, actually.

I move that, pursuant to Standing Order 108(3), this committee undertake a study on the existing research, and the research that is currently ongoing, on the capacity of Canada's power grid, or lack thereof, with respect to meeting the planned expansion of the government's new electric vehicle, or EV, mandate, which the Liberals voted in favour of on June 17, 2025—that was yesterday—and that the committee study this matter for no less than five meetings; and that the committee report its findings to the House of Commons; and that, pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee request that the government table a comprehensive response to the report.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Have you sent this motion? Have you given the...?

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

We can circulate it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

We will have to get the motion distributed to all of the members so that they can have a look. I'll give you a few minutes so that the motion is distributed in both official languages to all of the members. I'll suspend the meeting for a few minutes so that the members can have a look.

The meeting is suspended.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I call the meeting to order.

We have a motion that has been distributed to all the members. The motion has been moved by Mr. Ho. Is there any discussion?

Mr. Noormohamed.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I find this motion quite interesting because it starts to raise a series of constitutional questions in respect of jurisdiction. I'm very curious about this, as a British Columbian, where the provincial government has set a mandate of 100% EV adoption by 2035, and more importantly, for the purposes of this conversation, about the fact that the Government of Quebec has also indicated it intends to get to 100% EVs by 2035 in a tiered program.

I'm very curious about this conversation, philosophical in nature, particularly when there are provincial issues and jurisdictional issues at play in respect of what provincial grids look like and what provincial hydro corporations are actually doing to support this. I am curious why this isn't something that the Conservatives would want provincial governments to take up as part of their own conversations in Quebec and in British Columbia, and to challenge, for example, the Government of Quebec as to why it thinks it's a good idea to do this. This is not necessarily a federal issue in the way it's currently being characterized in this particular motion.

Provincial governments have a profound responsibility and profound trust that requires them to think these things through. I would be particularly interested to hear from my Bloc colleague about how he would rationalize this conversation and challenge the sovereignty of the Government of Quebec on this particular issue, when it has made it abundantly clear that it is part of its commitment to the environment and its commitment to ensuring that we are fighting climate change, something that we certainly believe on this side of the table.

How does playing gotcha politics on something like this help assert the important moves that the Government of Quebec—in my case, the Government of British Columbia—and others have made in trying to fight climate change in terms of increasing EV adoption and incentivizing people to do this? Quebec, I think, has put in place a policy where it intends to have one EV charger per 16 EVs. Now, I can't imagine that Hydro-Québec, which has done incredibly smart work in this area, would be making those decisions without having thought this through.

If we want this to be a discussion where we bring in provincial hydros and grill them—and we can start with Hydro-Québec—I don't know that it serves anybody's purpose in trying to do what I think many of us want, especially if we look at the vote in the House yesterday, with the defeat of the Conservative motion. Why would we want to go down this road? We intend not to support the motion, if that wasn't obvious.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Mr. Noormohamed.

We have Mr. Baldinelli next.

[Tony Baldinelli, Conservative, Niagara Falls—Niagara-on-the-Lake, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I thank my colleague for his comment.

I believe we can propose a friendly amendment that could answer some of the questions from my Bloc colleague and assure him of some of the concerns he's raised to me. I'll propose that after some of my comments.

What we're doing is responding to an issue the government has mandated and to the questions and concerns that have been expressed to us, as parliamentarians, across this country. Not only are individual constituents responding to us, but I'm also hearing from the major auto producers—Ford, General Motors—that have great concerns with this government's EV mandate, and that have asked the government to backtrack from its position. In fact, the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers' Association has come forward, stating that the government is wrong in its EV mandate position. It's essentially saying that, with the U.S. tariffs now in place—it's quoted from X—pursuing that policy would be like “putting the puck in our own net”, and I agree with them.

I have a GM V8 engine facility just next door to my riding in St. Catharines, and I also have one that is local, in Tonawanda, New York, which is not even a 30-minute drive away. GM just made the largest engine investment it's ever made, $888 million, into the facility in Tonawanda, New York. Do you know what, Madam Chair? We make the exact same engine as they do in Tonawanda. It's the V8 that goes into the Silverado, and we make a Silverado in Oshawa. What has GM done? They shut down a third shift in Oshawa.

My GM facility in St. Catharines is two million square feet in size. I had the pleasure of working there for four summers as a student, as a university student. They put me through university, and I'm brand loyal because of it. The vehicle I drive today is a 2022 Buick Enclave. Its engine was made in St. Catharines. The vehicle was manufactured in Michigan. What happened recently? General Motors removed that V6 engine line from St. Catharines, with the hope that one day they would pursue EV engines. Guess what. They put that on hold.

Ford Motor Company has put on hold EV production at Oakville. In fact, it is going back to ICE engine production and vehicle production in Oakville because the demand from consumers is not there. What is challenging for the auto sector in Canada is that the jobs that are going to be impacted.

The United States, through its tariffs, and this president.... He's made it abundantly clear that his job is to ensure that auto workers are employed in the United States and not in Canada, so why is it that this government is helping him do that? What we're doing is driving investment, auto investment, out of Canada. General Motors just made another $4-billion announcement, taking jobs out of Mexico and returning them to Michigan. Why is it that this government, through its policies and pursuing this EV mandate, is almost complicit in helping Donald Trump achieve what he's looking to do, which is to return jobs to Michigan?

Do you know what, Madam Chair? I want to ensure that there are still good-paying auto sector jobs in southern Ontario. There was a report in The Globe and Mail just the other day that said we are at risk of losing 50,000 auto worker jobs. That would be devastating for the Canadian economy. Since the 1960s, the success of the auto sector, in both Canada and the United States, was based on the regulatory harmony that existed between both countries, from the Auto Pact on. That regulatory harmony was looking at both countries. What they did, in a sense, was that they controlled what came out of the tailpipe. They didn't regulate what the consumer purchased in terms of a vehicle.

They regulated the environmental standards that needed to be pursued. Both countries agreed to that. They then left it not only to the consumer to decide but to the manufacturer to get in line to do that. We are nowhere near that with this EV mandate. Ford, GM and even Honda are telling us not to pursue this. It's astounding to see a government continue to pursue something that's going to fail so miserably.

What we're seeking to do is ask, “Do we even have the capacity here, for example, in Ontario, to be ready for that?” I know that the Independent Electricity System Operator in Ontario did a report in December of 2023. That report dealt with what it is going to take for Ontario to get to net zero as a province in terms of electrical production. The federal government tried to say to the provinces, “Let's do it by 2035.” Guess what. That was simply impossible, and the provinces let the federal government know that. In that report, it said that, in Ontario, it's going to take us to 2050 to get there, and that it was going to cost $400 billion to do so. That would take us from 42,000 megawatts to 88,000 megawatts. The Ontario government is doing it. It's pursuing small modular reactors, for example. That's a key policy plank, and do you know what? I'm pleased that they're doing that. I have companies in my riding such as E.S. Fox that are going to be important companies in helping to build that out.

As of today, we are in no position to be ready for a 100% vehicle mandate. That's why we put forward this motion. I think we can propose a friendly amendment to answer some of the concerns that my Bloc colleague had as well as my Liberal friend's earlier concerns, so that we look at the issue without touching upon the jurisdictional issues that he mentioned earlier on. I think we can get there with your support, and I want to propose that friendly amendment now, if I could.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Please go ahead.

[Tony Baldinelli, Conservative, Niagara Falls—Niagara-on-the-Lake, ON]

I want to go forward with this, and I think we can make the motion read like this:

That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(3), the committee undertake a study on the existing research, and the research that is currently ongoing, with respect to the planned expansion of the Liberal government’s new EV mandate which they voted in favour of on June 17, 2025; and, that the committee study this matter for no less than five meetings; and, that the committee report its findings to the House of Commons; and that, pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee request that the government table a comprehensive response to the report.

That would be my amendment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you.

We have an amendment. I'll read it.

The amendment is to, in the second line after “currently ongoing”, delete “on the capacity of Canada's power grid, or lack thereof”. The motion would read as follows:

That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(3), the committee undertake a study on the existing research, and the research that is currently ongoing, with respect to the planned expansion of the Liberal government’s new EV mandate which they voted in favour of on June 17, 2025; and, that the committee study this matter for no less than five meetings; and, that the committee report its findings to the House of Commons; and that, pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee request that the government table a comprehensive response to the report.

We have an amendment on the floor.

Go ahead, Mr. Noormohamed.

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

Madam Chair, an amendment is not supposed to materially alter the nature of the motion.

The motion initially sought to discuss the power grid. It has now gone from discussing the power grid to a philosophical debate about the EV mandate. If the research component of this and the motion initially talked about the capacity of the power grid, and we've now removed the entire reference to the thing that the study was about, that's a new motion, Madam Chair. That's no longer an amendment to an existing motion, because the materiality of the motion has changed completely.

I think the amendment is inadmissible.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Give me just a second and let me consult with the clerk.

Looking at the amendment that has been proposed, my ruling is that it changes the purpose of the original motion, so I rule the amendment out of order.

We are back on the motion as presented by Mr. Ho.

Seeing no debate, is it the will of the committee to adopt the motion?

(Motion negatived: nays 5; yeas 4)

Go ahead, Mr. Ho.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to move another motion in connection with this. I find it kind of ironic that Mr. Taleeb Noormohamed talked about jurisdictional issues and about B.C. and Quebec having purportedly their own mandates. However, yesterday, the government went out and asserted federal jurisdiction on.... I just find it kind of ironic, the—

[Taleeb Noormohamed, Liberal, Vancouver Granville, BC]

I have a point or order, Madam Chair.

I know the member is new, but I think it's important that we follow the rules of the committee. Of course, decorum is important. There's a misrepresentation of what was said, and the facts as laid out do not.... I mean, I think this is important. I don't know what the rationality is. If there's a motion to be presented, present the motion. However, the preamble to the motion can't be “Mr. Noormohamed did X or Y, and the vote was X or Y.”

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

That is debate.

Mr. Ho.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

I'll continue with just the motion.

I move:

That, pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(i), the committee undertake a study on the existing research, and the research that is currently ongoing, with respect to the planned expansion of the Liberal government's new [electric vehicle] mandate, which they voted in favour of on June 17, 2025; and, that the committee study this matter for no less than five meetings; and, that the committee report its findings to the House of Commons; and that, pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee request that the government table a comprehensive response to the report.

That's all.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Okay, I'll suspend the meeting. I just need to consult the clerk on this. I'll suspend the meeting for two minutes.