Debates of Dec. 3rd, 2008

The Economy

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

I will tell the House why, Mr. Speaker. The new separatist coalition is opposed to helping pensioners, seniors and small businesses. It is on the Liberal website. It quotes the Liberal leader. Here is what he says about one of his new coalition partners:

[The NDP leader's] plan for the economy will raise taxes on businesses, further weakening our stock markets, eroding our savings and killing Canadian jobs...[The NDP] plan is paid for with monopoly money and is a job killer.

That is why the new separatist coalition will not support jobs--

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

Mr. Speaker, while the opposition parties are working to save Canadian jobs, the Conservatives are busy organizing sham protests to save their own hides. In my riding, Wabush Mines has just announced that it will lay off 160 of its workers. IOC Mines has shelved a $500 million expansion, and its temporary and contract workers are being hit hard. All this just weeks after the Prime Minister said we had strong economic fundamentals.

Why do the Conservatives care more about saving their own jobs than the jobs of real Canadians?

[Lisa Raitt, Conservative, Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, as I have said many times in this House, we understand that these are very difficult times, which is why we are putting money into the community development trust. This will help those people who are suffering at this point in time.

However, I find it ironic that the member is only interested in listening to his constituents when it is for the purposes of sustaining the separatist coalition and when it comes to actually listening for the purposes, on a topic as fundamental as giving the separatists a veto on national--

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

The hon. member for Labrador.

[Todd Russell, Liberal, Labrador, NL]

Mr. Speaker, the minister is absolutely right, I stand up for my constituents. We have done more in three days to help the economy than the Conservatives have done in three years. Our plan will boost the economy, save Canadian jobs and provide recovery to industries across the country. What is their plan? It is to make work for Conservative backroom organizers.

The job losses mount. People are not working. The 143 Conservatives on those benches have a job, but the Conservatives are not working for Canadians.

Will the Prime Minister stop the spin?

[Lisa Raitt, Conservative, Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, I will try again. The member for Labrador is not speaking on behalf of his constituents. He is speaking on behalf of a separatist coalition.

This government is working hard for the citizens of Canada. The coalition is bad for democracy, bad for the economy and bad for Canada. Those members should walk away from it or they should take it back to Canadians and let Canadians let them know what they really feel.

The Conservative Government

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the actions and ideology of the Conservative government have triggered the present political crisis. The government has indeed lost the confidence of the House.

Is the Prime Minister going to face the confidence vote in the House next Monday instead of avoiding it by asking for prorogation?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Minister of Foreign Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member mentions confidence. I have a question for the hon. member and his leader. What agreement did he made to trade off his right to veto on three occasions, on two budgets and a throne speech? What does he have to hide? Let's hear the truth. What did they agree to?

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to understand this. The agreement has been released, it is public. But the Minister of Foreign Affairs has just said we have lost our veto power. Yet just a little while ago he said that the separatists have acquired a veto.

Might we know just which it is?

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Minister of Foreign Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, it should be pretty simple for the leader of the Bloc to understand. He has decided not to have a confidence vote in the next two budgets to be introduced. He is the leader, so here is the question. The leaders of the Bloc Québécois and the PQ are going around saying they have won a billion dollars. Is it true that the agreement means a billion dollars for Quebec? Which one is telling the truth? The leader of the Bloc, or Pauline Marois?

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, what is true is that the economic statement reduced the amount going to Quebec from $1 billion to $450 million.

I would like to ask the Minister of International Trade whether he recalls saying on July 29, 2000, that he was not opposed to a coalition with the Quebec separatist party, after the election, in order to ensure that the Conservatives' ideas could be advanced. This was a statement he made to journalists, some—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Order, please. The hon. Minister of Foreign Affairs.

[Lawrence Cannon, Conservative, Minister of Foreign Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, if I have properly understood the response by the leader of the Bloc, he has just denied what the leader of the Parti québécois has said about obtaining $1 billion. Everyone knows about this.

Will theLeader of the Opposition and the leader of the Bloc Québécois tell us today precisely and exactly what the agreement contains, giving us the whole truth, and concealing nothing?

Because we, on the Conservative side, we Quebec Conservatives, want to know whether he has or has not defended the interests of Quebec.

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the question is for me—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

If they could stop yelling.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Order, please. The hon. member for Laurier—Sainte-Marie has the floor, and we need some order in the House so that we can hear him.

Order, please.

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, he has asked me some questions, so I will answer them. He is practising asking questions for when he finds himself on this side.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Everything is out in the open. We conveyed what the three parties in Quebec's National Assembly were asking for. But I want to get back to the July 2000 article in which the Minister of International Trade said that he was holding talks with Parti québécois officials and their supporters about alliances that could be established with the “evil separatists” in the upcoming election.

[Stockwell Day, Conservative, Minister of International Trade and Minister for the Asia-Pacific Gateway]

Mr. Speaker, maybe after question period, outside the House, the member will be able to tell us all whether he and I ever talked about a coalition. The answer is: we never did.

He can give us an answer after question period. Perhaps it a dream for him, but it would have been a nightmare for Canadians and for me.

The Prime Minister

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is the Prime Minister who sets the tone of the House. Respect gets respect and disrespect breeds disrespect.

The Prime Minister now fights to stay on to win a battle that never need have been fought in the first place to preside over a Parliament whose dynamics, whose very relationships he has poisoned and destroyed.

Too late, he has broken it. How could this Parliament work with the Prime Minister?

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and to the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, on this side of the House, we are still playing for the Canadians.

I will list who the opposition members are playing for? They are playing for Jacques Parizeau, the former premier of Quebec. An Ottawa Citizen article states that former Premier Jacques Parizeau applauded, without reservation, the Bloc Québécois leader's recent impressive victory in forming a coalition in Ottawa.

Whose side are they on? Will they stand up for Canada or will they stand for the separatist contract?