Mr. Chair, thank you for the floor.
To the honourable member from Victoria, I will be happy to tell him what has changed. I read today, published September 18, by Bill Curry, deputy Ottawa bureau chief of The Globe and Mail, “BC Ferries deal raised with Transport Canada weeks before Freeland's criticism, emails show”. If this report is accurate, the fact that the CEO of BC Ferries, six weeks ahead of the announcement about their controversial purchase of four ferries from a state-owned shipyard in the People's Republic of China, flagged it with the deputy minister of Transport Canada, the highest on the non-partisan side of that department, was critical. The minister was saying one thing, that she was shocked.
It's a damning indictment because Transport Canada was made aware of this six weeks before that announcement, and they did nothing to protect Canadian jobs. They just sat on their hands and let it proceed. They didn't act to secure those contracts. They didn't push back at it. This raises a number of questions about former minister Chrystia Freeland's abrupt resignation, and it blows a hole in her narrative that she wanted BC Ferries to buy Canadian and was dismayed and upset about it. She said these things on the floor of the House of Commons when I and other members raised concerns about this procurement.
We need to get to the bottom of this. This government has not been level with British Columbians and with Canadians in general. They say, hand on heart, “We want to buy Canadian. Canada strong. Let's work together. Let's build things here faster, better than we've ever done.” However, they were given a heads-up by the CEO of BC Ferries and did nothing, so we need to get to the bottom of this. Chrystia Freeland should come to testify and explain herself, exactly how she could say one thing on the floor of the House of Commons.... As far as I understand, she's still a sitting MP. I'm sure that now, as a former minister, she has the time to work with us, so she can explain herself.
This just reiterates the need to cancel this loan: $1 billion of taxpayer money is going to a PRC shipyard. I am sick to my stomach thinking that this is what the government has done in this matter.