Debates of Jan. 26th, 2016

Health

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday I rose in the House to talk about local food issues in my riding of Toronto—Danforth. Canadians are concerned about the negative effects of consuming high levels of sodium and trans fats in their prepared foods.

Can the hon. Minister of Health please share with the House the government's plan to eliminate trans fats and reduce sodium in processed foods?

[Jane Philpott, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, as my colleague the hon. member knows, I have been a family doctor and have had many patients who have suffered the devastating consequences of heart disease and stroke. Therefore, it is now my duty as Minister of Health to work with all Canadians to reduce the prevalence of these conditions. We will do so in part by reducing trans fats and reducing sodium intake. My department, Health Canada, has already introduced mandatory nutritional labelling guidelines in order to reduce trans fats and will continue to work with the food industry and all Canadians to improve the health conditions of all Canadians.

Automotive Industry

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Oshawa, ON]

The Liberal government is hurting the manufacturing sector with its job-killing carbon tax, increased payroll taxes, and support for increased energy costs. It ignored the sector in its Speech from the Throne, and the Prime Minister has even been quoted as saying that Ontario needs to transition away from manufacturing.

That is unacceptable. When will the government do the right thing, quit interfering, and support the auto manufacturing industry so that it can create well-paying middle class jobs in communities like Oshawa?

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Innovation]

Mr. Speaker, as we know, the government recognizes that the automotive sector is a very important sector in Canada, employing almost half a million people. As we develop the government's innovation agenda, we will continue to work with our partners to build a stronger automotive and manufacturing sector in the country.

The Environment

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in her report, the commissioner of the environment categorically stated the following: “the...Board did not adequately track companies' implementation of pipeline approval conditions, and...was not consistently following up on company deficiencies”.

Follow-up is inconsistent. What is more, over half of all Quebeckers oppose the energy east project. Under the circumstances, the Prime Minister has no choice but to step up and make a decision. Will he scrap the project or will he ignore the wishes of Quebeckers?

[Catherine McKenna, Liberal, Minister of Environment and Climate Change]

Mr. Speaker, I met with the commissioner, as did my colleague, Minister Carr.

The National Energy Board told us that it accepts the report's conclusions and is working on implementing solutions.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Geoff Regan]

I would remind my colleagues that members must not name ministers, but rather refer only to their departments.

The hon. member for Montcalm.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, when British Columbia said no to northern gateway, everyone listened. When the Americans said no to Keystone XL, everyone listened.

However, when 82 municipalities representing four million Quebeckers do their homework and say no to energy east, we are insulted, scorned and even threatened.

When will the Prime Minister take off his referee jersey and stop stalling for time? When will this government finally understand that TransCanada's pipeline is not welcome in Quebec?

[Jim Carr, Liberal, Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, it would be interesting to compare the positions of the three parties opposite to what we are advocating, which is to consult Canadians about a process that will lead to these major projects that are important for the future of the Canadian economy, to carry the confidence of Canadians without trying to divide Canadians by sector, by region, or by politics.

Oral Questions

[Andrew Scheer, Conservative, House Leader of the Official Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if I could get unanimous consent of the House to table some documents that were printed and released during the election. Perhaps the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance has not had a chance to read them. They are the Department of Finance fiscal updates in both official languages showing that the Conservative government left the Liberals with a surplus.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Geoff Regan]

There is no unanimous consent.

There is a point of order. The member for Saanich—Gulf Islands.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I think you will find this a real point of order. It comes from our Standing Orders. It is not just a small reminder, but picks up from your efforts earlier in question period to remind members. While I was at COP21, I heard great news from Parliament that there was a new spirit in this place, that there was a real consensus around no heckling, and that we could expect greater decorum.

Mr. Speaker, you said from your chair that you could hear the noise. From here, I want to remind members that Standing Order 16 and Standing Order 18 make it an offence to interrupt members when they are speaking and to be disrespectful to members. I would like to see some respect for our rules and decorum in this place, and I would do anything in my far corner to assist you, Mr. Speaker, because in the noise I could not hear members' questions and ministers' answers.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Geoff Regan]

I thank the hon. member for her intervention. Whether it was a point of order is another question, but I appreciated it very much. I appreciated her support for these efforts because I know very well that Canadians feel very strongly about this. They know that students come here regularly and see what happens in Parliament, and they want this to be a place of vigorous debate where we also show respect for one another. We all have the capacity, which most members here have shown, to restrain ourselves when there are things we do not hear.

We could also have a bit less in terms of standing ovations. That would also help.

The House resumed consideration of the motion for an address to His Excellency the Governor General in reply to his speech at the opening of the session.

Resumption of Debate on Address in Reply

[The Speaker, Liberal, Geoff Regan]

Resuming debate. The member for Richmond Centre has four minutes.

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I will continue.

Before the interruption for statements and question period, I had talked about the impact of increasing Liberal deficits and government debts. This upsets a lot of people in Richmond Centre who, for the most part, are fiscally conservative and live within their means. For all the preaching the Liberals give to environmental sustainability, one would also hope that their financial measures would also be accountable and sustainable. However, it is evident they will not be, despite the fact that the Auditor General clearly showed that we, the former Conservative government, left our last full year in government with a surplus.

There was one other significant issue that came up during the recent election campaign, about which a huge number of my constituents talked to me, and that was the Liberal plan to legalize marijuana. Unlike any references to businesses, marijuana was mentioned in the throne speech. I will quote directly from the throne speech:

...the Government will introduce legislation...that will legalize, regulate and restrict access to marijuana.

I will plainly state for the record that many constituents in Richmond Centre, including me, are against the legalization of marijuana, and I made our policy on this matter very clear during the election. As the representative for Richmond Centre, I will be watching the government's proposed response to this very carefully.

This concludes my comments. I will close by saying that it is indeed good to be back in the House of Commons, representing my constituents and serving our great country, Canada.

[John McKay, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's concern with deficits. I do not know how strong that concern was when her government ran so many deficits, but her newfound enthusiasm for running balanced books is welcome. Certainly, as we get the economy back on its feet, we will ensure that is exactly what we will do.

My question pertains to the issue the member raised around legalization of marijuana. I want to know if the member is aware how the current policies, as they pertain to marijuana, have absolutely failed. The fact is that youth prevalence rates of marijuana today exceed 20% and, in fact, are almost double tobacco.

Would the member comment on the success we had—and I can speak to that success as a former executive director of one of the largest health organizations in the country—in going after tobacco, by regulating it, by public education, by ensuring that minors did not get it, by taking it out of the hands of young people through successful campaigns that were engaged? Has she looked at that and will she work with us in turning back all of the failure we have had and toward the success we must have in protecting young people?

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to state that it is healthier not to smoke marijuana than to smoke it. It is not healthier to make a product that has been proven to impair the intelligence of the people smoking it. Let me ask the member opposite if Liberals want to be driving on the street with somebody behind the wheel smoking tobacco or marijuana.

I also want to tell the member opposite about the many concerns that parents in my riding have told me about. Looking at the city of Vancouver alone, there are 100 illegal, very bad dispensaries for young people.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, my question is related to the member's comments. The Conservative deficit came up today in question period, and there should be no trickery on this particular issue. When Jean Chrétien became prime minister, he inherited a multi-billion dollar deficit. When the former prime minister took over governing the country, he inherited a multi-billion dollar surplus. He turned that multi-billion dollar surplus into a multi-billion dollar deficit in two years. That took place even prior to the recession. He had a deficit in every budget since then, including the current budget. Why should the Liberal government listen to the Conservative Party when it has never really had a balanced budget or a surplus in the last 20 years?

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond Centre, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to set the record straight. It was the Martin government that cut health care and education expenses to balance the books. That is why, when the Conservatives became government, we had to increase the health and education transfer. That is the kind of record the Liberal government has had. That is the kind of so-called balanced budget it had, at the expense of school children, education, and health care. That is what the Liberals did.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Democratic Institutions]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek.

What a pleasure it is to return to Parliament on this, my fourth time, and rise again in the House.

Let me start, Mr. Speaker, by congratulating you. It has been a tremendous honour and privilege to work with you, and to see you as the Chair is very satisfying indeed. I look forward to your tenure, and I hope it is long.

I remember my first time visiting this place when I was a student from Westney Heights Public School in Ajax. I came here in Grade 8 with a student tour. I was infused by the possibility that this place represented, that people of any background or walk of life could come here and represent their home community and get the opportunity to make a difference. I am maintained by that same optimism and sense of wonder as I stand here today.

I want to say to the residents and voters of Ajax how profoundly lucky I feel and how appreciative I am of the opportunity to serve.

I also want to thank my family and, in particular, my children. Many members know already and some are just finding out that this can be a challenging life for a family. My son Braeson who is 20, my daughter Maia, and my youngest boy Riley have been phenomenal supports in my life. I am so lucky to have them. I am blessed and deeply appreciative to have a wonderful family.

I want to thank my incredible campaign team, specifically my campaign manager Evan Wiseman, Sterling Lee, my friends from Heart & Stroke who were incredible on the campaign, Krista Orendorff, Alex Maheux, Nadia Formigoni. I also want to thank Jules Monteyne, Norma Telfer, Rhonda Evans, Sumi Shan, Surinder Kumar, Humera Khan, Jim and Liz Wiseman, Milan Kubik, Tom Thiru, Dinesh Kumar, Randy Low, Stephanie Ince, and so many others. Much work goes into the opportunity of serving.

When I look at the problems that are facing the folks who live in Ajax, and when I was presented with the opportunity over a period of 100 days, like so many members, to knock on doors and share in conversations about what was worrying them and keeping them up at night, it became evident that basically making ends meet was a major challenge for so many of them, getting the opportunity to send their kids away to school, or pay for the obligations of a mortgage. They faced these challenges but were not earning more money. They had been stuck over the last decade in the same financial circumstances. One of the reasons we have the honour of being able to serve in this place is that we spoke directly to the need of those in the middle class, and those struggling to join it, to be able to get ahead, to be able to get a bit more. That is why the throne speech talks directly about the middle class tax cuts we intend to bring forward to help alleviate that challenge.

One of the things that was deeply concerning for residents of Ajax was their ability just to get to work. I talked to people who had commuting times of over one hour and who were frustrated with an antiquated transit system that was poorly invested in. These people just want the opportunity to get home quickly to see their families. They want to get to work and then go home to the life they want without spending so much of their time in gridlock. They understand that our plan to invest in infrastructure would mean a better life for them. It would mean more time with their families. They also understand that, with a struggling economy, the investment in infrastructure would give us an opportunity to improve our economic circumstance and get the economy rolling again. They understand that infrastructure is the best way we could invest. They saw the chronic under-investment that had been taking place in Durham specifically and the GTA more generally. They saw it as needing a change. Our plan as articulated in the throne speech speaks directly to that ambition.

I also heard a lot—and this relates directly to my opportunity to serve as parliamentary secretary—about the need to conduct the business of government differently. This was materially different in the last election and the four elections that I had run in previously, where people spoke about the tone and tenor of the debate in Ottawa, the high degree of partisanship and the visceral nature of it, the personal attacks rather than focus on matters of substance, and the need for each and every one of us to do better and to do more. For the first time I heard real concerns about the strength of our democracy, watching our parliamentary institutions—parliamentary officers whose responsibility it is to hold vigil over the institutions that keep our democracy strong—grow weak.

I was reminded in this place of my work with the Parliamentary Budget Officer when I was the critic for public safety and national security. I was trying to get cost estimates for bills before we voted on them, asking for something as simple as information on how much something was going to cost before we voted on it, and colleagues, we could not get that. We could not get straight answers, whether it was on corrections, jets, or any other matter. We saw that problem disintegrate, get worse and get deeper.

Our democracy is held strong, not because we are a better country, not because we know more than others, or because we are just better people. It is held strong because of the institutions that guard it. It is made strong because of the parliamentary officers who vigorously provide oversight, who ask uncomfortable questions, and shine lights in dark corners. Our democracy is held strong because of those institutions. It may seem that it serves us in the short-term to allow those institutions to weaken, so that we can hold power or gain advantage, but the erosion that causes is fundamental.

As the former executive director of the Heart and Stroke Foundation, I am also deeply encouraged by the words in the throne speech to take action on preventative health. The reality is that we have for the first time a generation of young people who are really facing enormous poor health. We have had a tripling of childhood obesity in just a generation. We have a tsunami of chronic disease and illness that is going to hit this country unless we take it very seriously.

I can speak for the diseases that I represented, heart disease and stroke, and say that around 70% are preventable. Believe it or not, it is around the same for cancer. We know what we have to do. Therefore, we have initiatives like stop marketing to kids. There is over $2 billion a year spent trying to convince our kids to eat poorly. We have the opportunity to change that and level the playing field, so that healthy food options are given fair hearing for children.

Advertisers have something called the “nag factor”. Any of us who are parents remember this when our children are so crazy for a food product, such as Sponge Bob candies or something, that they nag and nag until we finally give in. We need to change that and level that playing field.

I am also excited for the action that we are going to take in the area of smoking. Canada led the world and was one of the jurisdictions that could be counted on when it came to preventative health. For the last decade in tobacco control, we have been off the field. Our action to take on plain packaging, to ensure that marketers are not able to take advantage of that, is hugely important.

The example that we set in tobacco, and I was referencing this in my comments earlier, are instructive in the debate that we will have on marijuana. Some people want to oppose this debate as if there is not a problem today and to provide marijuana because we people want to have it, which is an absurdity. The reality is that we have a massive failure in policy as it revolves around marijuana.

Our young people are smoking marijuana at a rate of about two times that of cigarettes. Think about that. If we just set as an objective the reduction of the prevalence of marijuana to the level of cigarettes, it would be a massive achievement. It is taking something that is illegal and bringing it down to something that is legal. From a health perspective, we have a phenomenal opportunity to take the lessons of tobacco and apply them to marijuana in order to reduce prevalence, protect children, and at the same time decrease illegality.

It is an honour to return to this place. I look forward to the debates to come. As parliamentary secretary, I look forward to working with my colleagues on all sides of the House in making the institutions that make our democracy strong stronger, and the debate that will come in the days ahead.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Durham, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the member on returning to the House. We are both passionate about the Durham region and I appreciated his first speech.

I was rather startled that the member would use the approach that we learn from the lessons of tobacco as we make marijuana more accessible to more Canadians. Our lessons from tobacco have been dealing with the serious health impacts that we have come to know as a society over the last 50 years. Therefore, we have made it harder, we have restricted access, and enforced more programs to stop young people from smoking. The government is about to embark on the opposite course.

If we were about to learn from the lessons of tobacco, we would not be legalizing a substance that clinical studies have shown can actually hamper brain development in young people. Why would we be making it more accessible to young people?

How can we actually not truly learn from tobacco by keeping this an illegal substance?

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I look forward to working with the hon. member to strengthen Durham. We have a lot of good work ahead.

On the specific question he asked, the problem is that marijuana is already accessible to young people. As I said in my comments, for over 20% of young people there is a current prevalence rate of marijuana.

We can live in a pretend reality where we imagine that young people do not have access to it, where we imagine that is not the case, but the reality of the efforts for the last 10 years is a consistent increase in the prevalence rate for which this substance is smoked and utilized.

If there is an honest interest, and let us be clear about that, in actually reducing the prevalence of marijuana among young people, then the science is clear. The science is that, as it currently stands, it is far too easy for a young person to obtain the substance, that criminals do not care who they sell their product to, that the controls are utterly inadequate, and that the policies of the past have been an abject failure.

The reality is, when we look at where tobacco was, there was a prevalence rate of almost 50%. The policies around restriction, around ensuring young people did not have access, around going after public health campaigns to ensure that people understood the dangers of the substance they were dealing with, allowed that prevalence rate to be pulled from over 50% down to 9% for youth. That is pretty instructive.

If we set as an objective the reduction of the prevalence rate of marijuana to the prevalence rate of smoking, as a near-term target, and I do not suggest that is an end, then we would have accomplished much, but what has been accomplished to date is nothing but failure. If we want to make real change, let us do it.

[Arnold Chan, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise and congratulate my friend from Ajax on his return to the House. In my particular case, when I refer to him as my friend, indeed he really is a friend of mine that I have known for two decades. I would never have imagined at the time that I would have the opportunity to serve with my friend in this particular place. I really do look forward to working with him to further the issues that he described specifically in his speech.

There are a number of topics that the member for Ajax raised on which I could ask questions, but I have a very specific one, and of course it actually affects the region that we ultimately represent. Although I am not from Durham, I represent an area just a little bit to the west of him in Scarborough.

I would like to know whether he thinks that particular projects or aspects within our platform that talk about infrastructure would make a material difference to his particular residence in Ajax? Would he describe to this House what those things might actually be that we could work on collaboratively with other members of this House?

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax, ON]

Mr. Speaker, let me quickly continue the lovefest here and say to my hon. colleague that I could not have imagined a day when I would have the opportunity to rise in response to a question of his. It is a profound honour to serve with somebody who is such a good friend over such a long period of time. I look forward to serving with him for many years if we are blessed with that opportunity.

As it relates to transit, this must be our biggest priority. The transit system in Durham is woefully inadequate. Our green infrastructure needs investment. There is an enormous amount of work to be done. We are talking with our mayors. We are working with the province. We will be working with members opposite to ensure that Durham gets its fair share and we get it moving.