Debates of March 12th, 2015

Bill S-7—Time Allocation Motion

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a sad day again for Canadian Parliament. This is the 91st time the government has used closure, or time allocation, in this Parliament. It goes beyond any previous government in Canadian history. It is twice as bad as what was the previous worst government in terms of open intolerance of democratic debate in this House. The only solace for the Canadian population is that Canadians know that in 200 days, they will be able to vote the current government out of office and bring in a government that actually respects parliamentary traditions.

With the last three closure motions and time allocation, we have seen a real intolerance of debate. We have seen with Bill C-51 that the government is systematically refusing witnesses who could bring a lot to bear on the bill, which is a controversial piece of legislation. Yesterday in the House, the minister might as well have told Yukoners that the government will not accept any amendments to Bill S-6. The Conservatives want to make a show of going up to Whitehorse but have absolutely no intention of actually listening to witnesses and bringing amendments to Bill S-6.

My questions to the minister with respect to Bill S-7 are simple. Will the government hear from witnesses who want to come forward on this bill? Will it actually entertain amendments, or will it show the same disdain it has shown with so many other pieces of legislation by refusing amendments put forth by parliamentarians?

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. opposition House leader is forgetting one vital fact about Canadian democracy, and all effective functioning democracies in the world, which is that populations have the right to judge governments and decide whether they are getting good government not by the length of debate, not by the prolixity of debate or the level of obfuscation by the opposition, which in this House and Parliament has been enormous, but by the results achieved.

This bill would bring real results for Canadian women, those who are born here or who come here as newcomers and immigrants, and it has been debated. In fact, it was by listening to the report by one of the House standing committees on strengthening the protection of women in the immigration system, to which the NDP and all the opposition had ample opportunity to contribute, that we have come to the drafting of this bill.

The bill has been debated in the House and for three days in the Senate at second reading and three days at third reading. There were three full days at the Senate committee. Seventeen speakers have already spoken to it in the House. We look forward to hearing from many more and from many good witnesses at committee. This bill, which is urgently needed, is getting the democratic consideration it needs.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, there has been a change in the way this House has operated since the Conservative/Reform Party acquired its majority. Since then, we have seen the government implement time allocation, which is closure. When the member said that there were three days of debate, that might work out to a few hours of actual debate. It is not 72 hours of debate, which is what the member might be trying to imply when he makes that simple statement.

The reality is that members of Parliament traditionally are afforded the opportunity to voice the concerns expressed, in good part, by the constituents they represent here on the floor of the House of Commons. Never in the history of the parliamentary system in Canada have we witnessed such a disrespect for allowing debate to occur on government bills, budget bills, and so forth.

My question is for the government House leader, and it is very simple. Why do the government and the Prime Minister not allow for genuine debate and dialogue on all forms of legislation brought to the House? Why are there limits? It is highly undemocratic.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right. We are at a historical watershed in this place. We are seeing things we have never seen before, and we are seeing them from the Liberal Party of Canada. It claims to have the best economic interests of Canadians at heart. However, when we get a glimpse of what the Liberals' policies might be, they only want to raise taxes. The Liberal Party of Canada, which claims to be pro-immigration, has supported absolutely none of our reforms to the immigration system to clean up the mess it left us in 2006. The Liberals have complained about every single step forward we have made.

The Liberals have already said in this House that they support the bill. The member just stood to say that he wants an endless debate. He wants everyone to be able to express the same view over and over again. He wants that inefficiency. He wants the time of this House to be wasted, even though that party has made up its mind. We have never seen such hypocrisy in this place before.

[Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe, NDP, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, just a few minutes ago, the minister said he was looking forward to hearing from witnesses at committee on Bill S-7. Well, I have some doubts about his comments that I would like to share, if I may.

First of all, just this week, some newspapers referred to a Conservative Party internal document that revealed that the Conservatives had already decided on the content of the report before the latest committee review even began. This proves how little the Conservatives care about the evidence given by witnesses.

Furthermore, during debate on Bill S-7, we had not even finished the second hour of debate when the minister said that the title was just fine as it is and it would not be changed.

When the minister says he is looking forward to hearing from witnesses, frankly, I do not a believe a word of it, because we know very well that the Conservatives' minds are already made up and they have no respect for the parliamentary process or for the opinions of the experts who appear in committee.

This time allocation motion is just further proof of that.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, on the contrary, not only are we prepared to hear from witnesses in committee and continue to debate here in the House, but we also based this bill on a committee report written in 2013 and 2014. That report was on protecting women in our immigration programs and on the issue of forced marriage. We had already heard from the opposition and various witnesses when we drafted this bill.

It is hard to understand why the NDP cannot come together and support a bill that is so positive for women and so warmly welcomed by women across the country.

We are confident in our position on our side of the House because we want to move forward with the necessary reforms to ensure that forced marriage, barbaric practices, underage marriages, and honour killings have no place in our country.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to pick up the theme the hon. member for Winnipeg North was developing, and that is the issue of process and democracy in this place. I believe that the government has invoked closure on debate through time allocation more than 90 times in this Parliament. Over four years, that works out to 22 times per year. That, for Canadians who may be watching this, says that the government, 22 times a year, approximately, tells this House that we, as parliamentarians, cannot stand up in this place and represent our constituents and contribute to the debate and discussion in this place.

The consequence of that is that amendments, necessary improvements to legislation, which are contributions from all parties in this House, particularly the opposition, are not made. That is why there have been a record number of government bills that have been ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in this country, including Bill C-31, which I, in committee, warned the government would be unconstitutional. Sure enough, that was found to be the case.

In terms of making good legislation, I understand that the government has a majority, and ultimately it needs to get business done, and we, as a responsible opposition, co-operate with that. However, does the member not agree that good suggestions on this side of the House that can improve the legislation are things a responsible democratic government would want to welcome in this place, not for the good of the opposition but for the good of Canada and the good of Canadians?

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think Canadians understand that being elected to this place, having the right to stand in one's place and speak in this place, should not give any of us, any party, an unlimited right to obstruct and slow the business of this House.

The fact that closure has been invoked a number of times in this place has brought Canadians enormous benefits through changes to the tax system. There are lower taxes. It has brought protections, over 40 of them, through the justice system, with improvements to the Criminal Code that are bringing the crime rate in this country down. It has brought us free trade agreements, a record number, dozens of them, which is way beyond the record of any previous government.

On this particular issue, let us listen to the words of Aruna Papp. “Canada was designated the best country to be a woman”.

We are morally bound to take a stand on behalf of all women who are victims of abuse, especially on behalf of young girls, the most vulnerable in our immigrant communities. That is why we are moving forward with this legislation. That is why we want it to become law sooner rather than later. That is why we agree that the Criminal Code needs to be changed to protect women.

We have a fundamental difference of opinion with New Democrats on this issue. They do not want to change the justice system. They do not want to strengthen it. That is their policy. Month after month, year after year, Canadians have rejected it. We will continue to listen to Canadians.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Speaker, this may not be the last time that I say this, but I have sat in this chamber for 18 years and I have never seen a government that has shown such disrespect for democracy and the institution of Parliament. The government has imposed time allocation 91 times.

I would like to remind the Minister of Immigration that he was formerly the ambassador to Afghanistan. We sent our young soldiers there to fight for democracy, a parliament and freedom of speech for Afghans. This same freedom of speech is not being afforded to us as parliamentarians. It is as though the Conservatives believe that they have all the answers and that they will settle this with an election. Basically they are saying that they do not believe in the democracy of Parliament or in debate and they do not want Canadians to hear arguments against their bill.

However, it is a fundamental right in a democracy and the very purpose of Parliament. I am sure that when the Minister of Immigration was the ambassador to Afghanistan, he fought to give Afghans a parliament and freedom of speech. The Conservatives are stripping us of this constitutional right. What the government is doing is so very wrong. It is regrettable and Canadians are watching. It goes against our country's democratic tradition.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in no country has democracy ever given an elected official the right to do nothing about anything. If we were to do what the NDP proposes, this Parliament would have been much less productive. Canada's crime rate and tax burden would be much higher, we would have lost growth and we would not be in a position to create 1.2 million new jobs across the country.

If were to open the door to inaction or paralysis, we would look much more like the Afghan government. Canada's standards are much higher than that.

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to talk about the minister's time allocation motion, which would limit the time for debate on this bill. Since I am not running in the upcoming election, I would like to put something on the permanent record here in the House.

I believe that the quality of debate in the chamber could be improved. The government says that speeches are repetitive. That is its argument for limiting debate. I think what is going on is that the opposition is doing its job in criticizing the government's legislation. However, the speeches we hear, and I would say we hear this a lot from the government side, and to be fair, sometimes from the opposition side, are not real debate in terms of a clash of ideas, in terms of responding to each other in a give and take, back and forth exchange of ideas and a testing of ideas.

The reason the debate needs to continue is to have better-quality debate. If we had good-quality debate, we could finish it in a couple of days and would not need to limit the number of speeches.

We in the opposition are challenging the government. We are pointing out problems. We are bringing up facts and evidence, and we need a response from the government. If we got a proper response and had a back and forth debate, a real debate, instead of just reading speeches where we pass by each other, from an intellectual point of view, we would not need to limit debate.

Therefore, I call on the government—

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

The hon. Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, here I am and here we are, in debate with the opposition members, responding to their individual questions. I am not passing the hon. member in the night. I am not sticking to some prepared line. I am listening to him, and I am prepared to collide with his view.

The fact of the matter is that the Liberal Party of Canada has agreed to support this bill. The Liberals have not made any suggestions for improving it. They made some outrageous comparisons and engaged in some outrageous rhetoric in the Senate committee, which lowers their party's credibility. Now, they have turned around to support the bill, with one exception: they want to drop the word “cultural” from the title. We are not going to do that, and we have made our view clear.

There is nothing more to say from our side to the Liberal Party, because the Liberals have made no proposals on this bill. Why would they not be prepared to move forward? Why would they not be prepared to move on to another question where they do have views? Could it be that they simply do not have views on most questions, and therefore would rather tie themselves into procedural knots to disguise the fact from Canadians that on these issues, as on others—on protecting women, on enhancing the economy, on lowering taxes, on opening new markets—the Liberal Party of Canada—

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Order, please. We have 13 minutes left and I see that a number of hon. members wish to participate, so I am going to enforce the one-minute rule more strictly as we go through these next 13 minutes.

The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, Bill S-7 is the product of a report that came out after extensive study done by the citizenship and immigration committee in the House. We have heard extensive debate in this House, as has been heard in the Senate. To continue to hear regurgitated speeches that are not only repetitive but ad nauseam repeating of the same points over and over, does not add to the quality of the debate as the Liberal member was so eloquently trying to explain.

However, I want to ask the minister this question.

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Do not disagree with your minister, please.

[Ève Péclet, NDP, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Be careful. You are talking too long. The minister is going to tell you to stop talking. On Afghanistan, do not forget.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I did not heckle anybody when they were speaking. They like to heckle. This is the Liberal and the NDP way. When we bring up a valid point to which they do not have a response, they heckle. That is their style.

I have a very simple question for the minister. I understand the minister did country-wide consultations on this subject. I wonder if he could share with us some of the things he heard that have brought urgency to the fact that we need to pass this legislation in an expeditious way so we can respond to those folks who are victims of these—

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Order, please.

The hon. Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the parliamentary secretary, who has done extraordinary work on this bill and across the board on immigration, citizenship, and passport issues, for that question and for engaging in this debate.

Let us listen again to Aruna Papp, who said that it is about time and she commends the government for its leadership, for taking a stand on a very difficult issue, and for defending the human rights of vulnerable women unable to speak for themselves.

In addition, according to Julie Miville-Dechêne, the president of Quebec's Conseil du statut de la femme, “This will allow us to address the phenomenon of young girls forced to marry when they are sent abroad during their vacation.”

Just on the question of civil marriage, we are making important changes here that we all agree on in this place: that there be a requirement for free and enlightened consent before two people marry; that there be a requirement for an existing marriage to end prior to someone entering into another marriage; and that there be a national minimum age of 16. That minimum age does not exist in this country outside of Quebec. We need to move on this.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is actually with a great deal of sadness that I rise in this House today to once again have to speak against another time allocation where the government is using its majority to shut down debate. It gets rather tiring when we hear, “Let us get it through this House; we will get it to committee because that is when we will have the in-depth study”.

I saw how that worked for Bill C-51. Once we got to committee, the government's proposal was no more than three meetings. On top of that, the Conservatives kept the Privacy Commissioner from testifying there.

What I am finding confusing is that the minister said it is absolutely imperative that they take action on this right now. We already have legislation prohibiting marriage before the age of 16. We already have laws saying that one can only be married to one person at a time. All of this rhetoric is so divisive and meant to create a milieu that the Conservative government is doing something, when all it is doing is feeding fear and suspicion and trying to pretend it is fixing something that is not broken in Canada.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there we have it again. The NDP position on this bill is to do nothing; it is not important; life is perfect in Canada for women and girls, and so nothing needs to be done.

That is what the member just said. The member said that there is no need to do anything because it is not broken.

One settlement agency in Toronto, in its workload, identified more than 200 cases of forced marriage. Dozens of settlement agencies across this country have identified dozens, and potentially hundreds, of cases of polygamy so far without even really looking into this in detail.

Marriages are not being dissolved before other marriages take place. Free and enlightened consent is not being given. Marriages of people under the age of 16 are not prohibited from occurring in this country. Girls are still being removed from this country to be forcibly married elsewhere against their will and then brought back to Canada.

We need action on this if Canada is to live up to its standards.

[Françoise Boivin, NDP, Gatineau, QC]

My goodness, the minister is not actively listening this morning, Mr. Speaker. It is rather discouraging.

I rise to speak to this time allocation motion because I take exception to the idea that we in the NDP are not concerned about matters of justice. On the contrary, as the justice critic, I can tell you that every bill introduced in the House by the government is studied carefully. The only difference between the Conservatives and us is that we try to be consistent with the Criminal Code.

What my colleague from Newton—North Delta said quite eloquently is that these provisions already exist. It is not that the NDP does not want to stand up against forced marriage, polygamy and honour crimes, it is that all these provisions already exist. The Conservatives are playing with people's heads, and it is insulting. We have carefully reviewed all the justice bills and we even supported a number of these bills, including the one introduced by the Conservative member for Yukon on fetal alcohol syndrome. Perhaps because we supported it, the Conservatives decided to withdraw it.

[Chris Alexander, Conservative, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we are talking here about Bill S-7. We are talking about women and girls facing forced or underage marriages. The members opposite from Gatineau and Newton—North Delta keep saying that the justice system already offers enough protections.

What should we tell the hundreds of women and girls who are victims of this type of crime and had no protection? They were literally taken from their homes, forced to leave Canada, forced to marry abroad without their consent and return here, against their will, to spend their life with that person. The existing protections are not enough. That is what people and stakeholders across the country told us quite clearly.

Why is the NDP not listening to those people?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in terms of Bill S-7, the Liberals will be proposing an amendment that, instead of the bill's short title referring to “barbaric cultural practices”, the word “cultural” be eliminated and it simply be “barbaric practices”.

The reason for this is that such practices are not limited to any one community. There is Bountiful in British Columbia, which is Christian. There was a Jewish group in Quebec.

The word “cultural” is taken to be demeaning to the Muslim community, among others perhaps. I know the minister is highly aware of insults to the Muslim community in which he has indulged, not appearing to know the difference between a hijab and a niqab.

However, the general point is that I do not think the word “cultural” is necessary. It can be taken away. I wonder if the minister would agree to that amendment.