House of Commons Hansard #123 of the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was ceta.
The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan
Order, order. I do not know if you all know, but Santa Claus is on the Hill today. I had a chance to talk to him, and all I asked for was a little peace and tranquillity.
Let us have a little bit of that, while the hon. opposition House leader asks her question.
Candice Bergen Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
Mr. Speaker, she is repeating lines that the Prime Minister has asked her to say, words that she knows are not true. The Liberals are not following the rules, and she has to know it.
Will the House leader show the integrity and the leadership that I know she has, and will she admit that the Liberals need to clean up their act, or will she at least tell the Prime Minister that she is not going to keep doing his dirty work for him?
Bardish Chagger LiberalLeader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister of Small Business and Tourism
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to serve with a government that has lowered taxes on the middle class, that respects the environment and understands we can do more to protect the environment, and that recognizes we need to grow the economy and create the growth Canadians expect us to create.
The member knows very well that when it comes to the rules around political financing, they are amongst the strictest in this country. We will continue to follow the rules. I encourage the member to get to work, and do the hard work Canadians expect us to do.
Candice Bergen Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
Mr. Speaker, repeating Liberal spin and outrageous comments a thousand times do not make them true. Frankly, it is embarrassing to watch the House leader allowing herself to be used by the Prime Minister like this. She can tell him no, after all.
The Prime Minister is breaking fundraising rules. The media knows it. The public knows it. Even Liberal donors and supporters know it.
Is there anyone on that side of the House who has the courage to stand up for what is right, and tell the Prime Minister to stop this corrupt fundraising?
Bardish Chagger LiberalLeader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister of Small Business and Tourism
Mr. Speaker, it is interesting. The member recognizes that I am reminding Canadians, ensuring Canadians, that when it comes to political financing, we have some of the strictest rules in this country.
What is more interesting is that the member chooses to keep repeating the same question, but does not understand why she gets the same answer.
I have confidence in her, as well, that we can work together in this place to serve Canadians, and to respond to the very real challenges they are facing.
Let us get to work. Let us work harder for Canadians.
Alexandre Boulerice NDP Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
Mr. Speaker, the Liberals seem to have forgotten what “appearance of conflict of interest” means.
Their bogus survey on democratic reform is anything but scientific. Children can take it. Adults can take it 50 times if they feel so inclined. It is supposed to be anonymous, but respondents who want their answers tabulated have to disclose their gender, age, level of education, sector of employment, email address, income, language, postal code, and minority status.
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner is concerned. If it is not scientific, if it really is anonymous, why do they collect all that information?
Maryam Monsef LiberalMinister of Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, I would like to correct the member opposite, and assure him that providing demographic information is completely optional.
All information provided by participants will be administered according to the requirements of federal policy laws and federal policies on public opinion research.
Users of MyDemocracy.ca can access the privacy information at the bottom of the page, which explains the information being collected, and how it will be used.
The government will only be receiving aggregated data, without any personal information. We take protecting Canadians'—
Nathan Cullen NDP Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC
Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the minister has even read her own survey, because if we do not give the Liberals all that private information, all of our answers are thrown in the garbage.
We received a call today from Janet, from Alberta. She said when she called the MyDemocracy hotline, she was told these survey questions were approved by the 12-member all-party committee.
That is news to me. I sit on the committee, and we would never have insulted the intelligence of Canadians with such ridiculous questions.
First, the minister threw the committee under the bus, and now the Liberals are trying to blame us for their terrible survey. Thank goodness the Privacy Commissioner is investigating.
Here is a values question for the Prime Minister. Does he have the integrity to keep his own promise?
Maryam Monsef LiberalMinister of Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, we are proud of the tens of thousands of Canadians who have engaged with MyDemocracy.ca. We are proud of the Canadian political scientists who have helped develop this tool. This is a Canadian made application, formed by Canadian academic experts to engage Canadians.
So far, it is working.
Blake Richards Conservative Banff—Airdrie, AB
Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the minister told us that we were visiting the wrong website. She might even be right.
If we took democracy surveys at BuzzFeed, The Beaverton, or even on the back of a cereal box, we would get less skewed results than what they are trying to pass off as consultation now. We would not have to provide our gender, year of birth, household income, postal code, or even the name of our firstborn child for it to count.
The minister keeps telling this House that we do not need personal information to participate in the survey, but she did not say those answers would actually count.
Is she just using weasel words?
The Speaker Liberal Geoff Regan
I encourage members to be judicious in the use of words and language here in the House.
The hon. Minister of Democratic Institutions.
Maryam Monsef LiberalMinister of Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, the Special Committee on Electoral Reform has good advice about asking questions regarding electoral reform. I am sure members have started to read the report which says:
Finally, the Committee was told numerous times that there is no perfect electoral system as different systems emphasize different values.
Recognizing there is no perfect system, the committee used the values and principles set out in the mandate to develop its recommendations on electoral reform.
MyDemocracy.ca is about empowering Canadians to have their say about electoral reform. I encourage all members of this House, and Canadians, to get involved.
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Mr. Speaker, my staff has researched the identity of “Cliff”, cited yesterday by the minister as the defender of MyDemocracy.ca. It turns out he is Cliff Van Der Linden, the CEO of Vox Pop Labs, who was paid a quarter of a dollars to design it. That is a relief, because at first it seemed that the minister was referring to Cliff, the clueless mailman from Cheers. After all, due to the complete lack of security features, Bostonians like Cliff, Woody, and Carla can participate in the survey; Norm can sign in without even leaving his barstool.
Given this lack of security, how can Canadians trust that the results of the survey will mean absolutely anything at all?
Maryam Monsef LiberalMinister of Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, we are all thrilled that tens of thousands of Canadians are participating in MyDemocracy.ca. Providing their personal information is completely optional. Responses will remain anonymous. Any data collected will be administered according to the requirements of the federal Privacy Act. I encourage all members and Canadians to participate in this unique and innovative initiative.
Scott Reid Conservative Lanark—Frontenac—Kingston, ON
Mr. Speaker, just to be clear, Vox Pop Labs are the folks who brought us Vote Compass, the online survey notorious for telling participants they should vote Liberal. A Queen's University professor answered Vote Compass five ways and was always labelled a Liberal. Reports showed that any consistent answer to all 30 questions on that survey caused respondents to be labelled Liberal.
As a result, the CBC ombudsman warned about its data, saying “it is challenging to interpret which uses were authentic and which ones might have been contrived”. Given that MyDemocracy.ca has all the same problems, will the Liberals just take this survey offline?
Maryam Monsef LiberalMinister of Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, we are proud to be hearing from as many Canadians as possible about their values on their electoral system. We are proud to be working with Canada's political scientists in developing this tool. We look forward to hearing from as many Canadians as possible, using this initiative and many others, before introducing legislation in the House.
Alain Rayes Conservative Richmond—Arthabaska, QC
Mr. Speaker, one need only listen to the minister to understand why people are cynical about politics.
Here is what the media had to say this morning about the minister and her new consultation process. Le Devoir said that “respondents are asked to indicate whether they agree or disagree with statements that are, at best, nonsensical and at worst, biased”.
A La Presse article headlined “Hypocrites' Ball” states that “the Liberal government waded into this debate, but is now starting to look pretty foolish”.
Those words were written not by me but by journalists and political analysts.
Can the minister tell us whether she will respect the people and hold a referendum when she decides to change the voting system—
Maryam Monsef LiberalMinister of Democratic Institutions
Mr. Speaker, I continue to appreciate the member opposite's passion for a referendum, and I encourage all members of the House to read the committee's report. We will respond to that report in due course.
Anne Minh-Thu Quach NDP Salaberry—Suroît, QC
Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister promised to be accountable and yet, during this past year, he has not answered any of my questions concerning youth.
Young people's concerns about Kinder Morgan, marijuana, precarious jobs, or electoral reform are not reflected in the measures proposed by the Liberal government. I will not even mention his many broken promises to first nations youth.
If the Prime Minister will not be held to account for his lack of action, why does he not resign and appoint a minister of youth who is truly interested in youth issues?
MaryAnn Mihychuk LiberalMinister of Employment
Mr. Speaker, this gives me an opportunity to indicate how proud we are that we have a Prime Minister who recognized a long time ago the challenge faced by youth, and is taking it so seriously that he is the minister of youth. Not only that, we are proud to have announced the creation of an expert panel on youth employment. It is going to be reporting in December. It is only one of the initiatives that we are doing to help young people in Canada.
Niki Ashton NDP Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB
Mr. Speaker, the question again for the minister of youth is this. When the Prime Minister gave himself the job of minister of youth, many young Canadians expected he would champion their issues. Over a year later, the youth minister has been one of the worst-performing ministers in the Liberal cabinet. He has encouraged police to hand out criminal records for pot possession, backtracked on his promise of a fair new voting system, and is failing to address the very serious issue of rising precarious work among young people.
Will the Prime Minister do the right thing and resign as minister of youth?
MaryAnn Mihychuk LiberalMinister of Employment
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to put on the record that, in fact, we have invested $165 million in the youth employment strategy; $73 million in work-integrated learning, giving young people the chance to get the skills they need; $85 million in union-based training; $175 million in transfers to the provinces for training; and $1.5 billion to increase Canada students grants. And this is only our first year in office.
Darshan Singh Kang Liberal Calgary Skyview, AB
Mr. Speaker, on Saturday, the Minister of Infrastructure announced over $100 million in funding for Calgary public-private projects. This money is aimed specifically to help plan and design the Green Line. However, all over Alberta, there are small communities who have never received any money for public transit.
My question is for the Minister of Infrastructure. How will these small communities benefit from our historic investment in public transit?