Evidence of meeting #7 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 43rd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was projects.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
Does this mean that you don't respect the jurisdiction of provincial and municipal governments and their ability to make the best possible decisions for their areas?
Liberal
Catherine McKenna Liberal Ottawa Centre, ON
Of course we respect this. As I said with regard to the gas tax fund, Quebec doesn't provide information on projects, in keeping with the agreement negotiated by the Conservative Party. At the time, your party didn't ask for any detailed accountability. However, today, you're asking me why I don't have the information required for each project in Quebec. You can't have it both ways.
Conservative
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
Minister McKenna, you keep boasting that over 50,000 infrastructure projects have been completed. Yet you're telling us that you don't have the detailed information. How can you come up with 50,000 infrastructure projects if you don't know the number of projects in Quebec? It doesn't make sense.
We're asking the Auditor General to conduct an investigation to set the record straight on the infrastructure program. Why did you vote against our motion to ask the Auditor General to conduct an investigation into the investing in Canada plan?
Liberal
Catherine McKenna Liberal Ottawa Centre, ON
I'm always pleased to provide information, unlike the former Conservative government.
Conservative
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
Minister McKenna, we're talking about you and your government. You're currently investing billions of dollars. We're asking you for answers. It's all well and good to keep looking back. However, we're asking you about the billions of dollars needed for economic recovery. We're asking you about future spending and how we'll be accountable.
Unfortunately, we can't say right now that the first years were very good. In an interview, you acknowledged that you needed to be smarter and more effective. Why then did you vote against our request for more funding for the Auditor General? Why did you vote against our request for an investigation?
Liberal
Liberal
Catherine McKenna Liberal Ottawa Centre, ON
I want to remind everyone that the Conservative government cut the budget for the Office of the Auditor General.
I think that we can always do better. The 10-year agreement signed by the Conservatives doesn't require all the provinces to provide detailed reports.
Conservative
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
How are you doing the math if you don't have the figures?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Vance Badawey
Thank you, Mr. Berthold. Thank you, Minister.
We'll move on to Mr. Bittle for five minutes.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Minister, I was wondering if you could take a little time to talk about your department's duty to consult with indigenous peoples. I know we haven't discussed it yet during this opportunity, but I believe we should.
Liberal
Catherine McKenna Liberal Ottawa Centre, ON
I will say, I was a bit surprised by the previous view that seemed to be espoused that we shouldn't have a duty to consult. It's actually a constitutional obligation, the duty to consult with indigenous peoples. But it's not just a constitutional duty; it's how we get better outcomes. Right now, we're having a discussion across the country, across the world, about systemic discrimination and racism. We need to get better outcomes, and duty to consult is not red tape. It's how you make sure you're advancing reconciliation, getting outcomes for indigenous peoples. I think we should all agree that every indigenous child should have the same opportunities as our children, the same opportunities to succeed, the same investments in infrastructure. That is what we want as a country, and I think that's incredibly important.
That's a reflection that I have had recently as there's been a discussion about systemic racism. What are the social determinants of infrastructure? How do we make sure that it's not just how much money we invest, but it's where we invest and who we're investing in and who we're supporting? Think about the community centres in communities that have a lower socioeconomic status. We need to be making sure that those investments are being made, that we're working together with indigenous peoples. We know there's been an underinvestment in infrastructure. This is incredibly important.
The duty to consult is part of that. It is not just a constitutional obligation. As a lawyer...it is a constitutional obligation, so we need to take it very seriously, but it's also about outcomes. I think at the end of the day, I know all of us got into politics because we believe in building a better Canada. That is exactly what the duty to consult is about. It's about building a better Canada for all Canadians, not just some Canadians, but all Canadians, including indigenous peoples.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
Thank you very much, Minister.
I am wondering if you could also expand on the climate lens because we see that, even during this pandemic crisis, the crisis of climate change continues. We don't have to look very far. We saw what happened in Alberta with the recent storms; there's story after story. It seems that we hear from the Conservatives that this is red tape, not something worthy of discussion, but the costs of inaction are so great. It's unfortunate—I know you can't see them—but they're laughing at that notion.
This is fundamentally serious. I'm being shouted down on one of the most fundamental questions of our lifetime, and they continue to think that it's funny to talk about climate change. However, Minister, I hope that you have the opportunity to expand on the climate plan, the importance for the government—
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.
In no way in any of the testimony of mine or my Conservatives have we said anything to the fact that Mr. Bittle has said—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Vance Badawey
Mr. Doherty, that's not a point of order. That's more debate, so I'm going to go back to Mr. Bittle.
Liberal
Chris Bittle Liberal St. Catharines, ON
You have a few other colleagues and a few other members of the Conservative Party and Conservative premiers across the country who scoff at climate action, and you were scoffing at climate action when I was talking about it a second ago. You continue to shout me down and try to take away from this opportunity for the minister to discuss the importance of a climate lens.
It's interesting that I have the floor and that Mr. Doherty continues to talk and continues to shout me down. We've heard Mr. Doherty, I believe, specifically denying the existence of climate change and stories in the press about that, and so have others of his colleagues.
Minister, can you please go ahead and discuss the importance for your department—
Conservative
Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC
I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.
I just want to make it clear that the other colleagues he was mentioning are not me.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.
I just want to be on record, as I have been very clear that I do believe in climate change.
Thank you.
Liberal
Catherine McKenna Liberal Ottawa Centre, ON
That's good. You all believe in climate change and that it's man-made and that we can do something about it, which is great because that is exactly what we're doing with our infrastructure plan.
We believe the climate lens is incredibly important, and I want to give a shout-out to my parliamentary secretary, Andy Fillmore, who you all know, because it was through his private member's bill that we brought in a climate lens.
As I said, we had already said that we needed to get a 10-megatonne reduction in emissions through our infrastructure plan. I could talk about climate change in many ways, but let's just talk about how it saves us money in the long term. Think about where we need to get. As a country, we've committed to net-zero by 2050. Why we are doing that? We are doing that because we know that if we don't do that, the impacts of climate change are going to be so severe that they're going to have a huge impact on every aspect of our lives. You've heard Mark Carney, former governor of the Bank of Canada and former governor of the Bank of England, talk about this.
That's why we look at the investments that we are making that are going to help reduce emissions. Those can be investments in renewable energy; those can be investments in public transportation. Also, what are the investments that are going to help us adapt to the impacts of climate change? That's why we have the disaster mitigation and adaptation fund that has been a huge success and oversubscribed.
We need to be making sure that we think about how we're building. I like to say that when you build, you can either increase emissions, or you can reduce emissions. You can either become more resilient or less resilient. That is the work that we're doing with municipalities that are on the front lines of climate change. You don't hear many municipalities doubting whether climate change is real because they have to deal with the floods, as Ms. McCrimmon said of her own riding where they were sandbagging once every few years.
We're making those investments, and we will continue to do that.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Vance Badawey
Thank you.
Ministers Garneau and McKenna, thank you for your time today and for coming out and answering questions from the members of this committee.
Members, thank you for making the time to travel down to Ottawa to be a part of this session.
Most importantly, thank you to the people beside me and behind me, the team who made this happen. Thank you very much. I know we're under challenging times right now, and for you folks to pull this off and allow us to have this meeting is really appreciated.
With that, I will adjourn.