House of Commons Hansard #72 of the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was office.

Topics

Opposition Motion—Internal tradeBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

6:30 p.m.

Some hon. members

Yea.

Opposition Motion—Internal tradeBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

6:30 p.m.

Conservative

The Deputy Speaker Conservative Bruce Stanton

All those opposed will please say nay.

Opposition Motion—Internal tradeBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

6:30 p.m.

Some hon. members

Nay.

Opposition Motion—Internal tradeBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

6:30 p.m.

Conservative

The Deputy Speaker Conservative Bruce Stanton

In my opinion the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Pursuant to Standing Order 81(18), the recorded division stands deferred until later this day.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:30 p.m.

Liberal

Lawrence MacAulay Liberal Cardigan, PE

moved:

Motion No. 1

That Vote 1, in the amount of $110 040 788, under Office of Infrastructure of Canada — Operating Expenditures — in the Main Estimates for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2017, be concurred in.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:30 p.m.

Edmonton Mill Woods Alberta

Liberal

Amarjeet Sohi LiberalMinister of Infrastructure and Communities

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to be here this evening to talk about infrastructure.

Infrastructure Canada has an unusual history. It originally operated as a program, known as the infrastructure national office, which was administered by the Treasury Board Secretariat, until it was established as a department.

Between 2006 and 2016, the department has operated under various portfolios, often sharing ministers and deputy ministers. My predecessor, the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Jean was also responsible for other departments when he was minister of infrastructure and communities. He held the Transport Canada portfolio for a period of time. He was the minister of intergovernmental affairs and president of the Queen's Privy Council, and he was the minister of the economic development agency of Canada for the regions of Quebec.

Infrastructure Canada, until November 2015, was never a stand-alone department with a dedicated minister and a dedicated deputy minister and their support staff. As minister for intergovernmental affairs and president of the Queen's Privy Council, the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Jean was able to make use of the office space associated with these positions.

In November 2015, a dedicated Minister for Infrastructure Canada was appointed, and Transport Canada and Infrastructure Canada were separated into two different departments. However, one deputy minister remained in place with the responsibility for both departments, and he sat with Transport Canada employees in their dedicated office space and building a few blocks away from Infrastructure Canada.

On March 2, 2016, just over three months ago, a dedicated deputy minister for infrastructure was appointed. The same month, our government announced the first phase of our $120 billion 10-year plan to invest in Canadian communities. We committed to invest more than $10 billion in the next two years to our government's priorities: public transit, green infrastructure, and social infrastructure.

However, being able to deliver tangible results for Canadians requires space where we can work collaboratively and efficiently. We required offices for our support staff. When I was first appointed, my colleague the Minister of Transport was kind enough to loan us some office space in the short term. We looked at various options, including continued operations out of the Transport Canada offices, but ultimately the best option was to build a separate office space to consolidate all of our staff to one floor.

The department worked with Public Services and Procurement Canada to find space and create the new accommodations. Our working space, for up to 32 staff members, was created in accordance with Treasury Board and Public Services and Procurement Canada guidelines. As per the Treasury Board guidelines, Public Services and Procurement Canada reviewed the contracts and made sure there were no concerns from the Government of Canada's perspective.

In full support of the Government of Canada's commitment to openness and transparency, we proactively disclosed these expenses publicly last April. We bought furniture for 32 office spaces. We bought furniture for collaborative spaces and boardrooms, where we can hold our meetings. We also purchased furniture for the reception area, so that visitors can sit while they wait to meet with our team.

To be clear, the cost to build and furnish the space for 32 people, including an office for me, the deputy minister and our support staff, and the reception area was $835,000.

When I took office in November, I committed to working in collaboration with my provincial, territorial, and municipal partners. I committed to working in collaboration with other stakeholders, indigenous peoples, and our key partners, and I have done so. I have met with mayors, wardens, premiers, chiefs, parliamentarians, and ministers. I have met with stakeholder organizations, like the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association, the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association, the Association of Municipalities of Ontario, the Canadian Urban Transit Association, and the Canadian Council for Public-Private Partnerships.

In fact, after my visit to the city of Red Deer last March, Mayor Tara Veer said this:

The fact that a sitting federal infrastructure minister came to Red Deer to me bodes well for recognition of mid-sized cities and regional hubs...But it also built a relationship with the minister and our region so that in the future there is an open door for the municipalities of our region.

I have also met with city organizations like the Board of Trade of Metropolitan Montreal and the Vancouver and Toronto boards of trade. I have met with chiefs and elders from Treaty 6 First Nations, and chiefs from Treaty 8 First Nations. I met with Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde, and with the Fort McMurray Métis and with Saskatchewan chiefs just last month. It is through working closely with these partners and stakeholders and listening to their priorities for their communities that we have made it to where we are today.

Where we are is delivering on our commitment to invest more than $120 billion over the next 10 years. We announced in March that we would be providing more than $10 billion of new money over the next two years for public transit, green infrastructure, and social infrastructure, starting right away. We established the clean water and waste water fund, worth $2 billion, and the public transit fund, worth $3.4 billion. We shared the allocation details with the provinces and territories.

Our discussions around bilateral agreements with the provinces and territories are going very well. In fact, we will have good news to share very soon. These agreements will allow us to start investing infrastructure funds and start funding new projects, retroactive to April 1.

Since Canadians elected our government, we have announced 164 projects for nearly $300 million in federal funding across the country, leveraging almost $800 million of investments in Canadian communities, investments that will create jobs, grow the economy, and bring opportunities for the middle class.

However, we are not coasting on our successes; we are building on them. When we announced $10 billion in budget 2016 for our infrastructure investments, we said it was for infrastructure work that could begin right away. We encouraged our partners to think of rehabilitation work that had to be put off for too long. We said that we wanted to renew the existing infrastructure, while we worked toward a plan that would support the long-term infrastructure investments that we knew were also needed.

We are referring to that as phase 2 of our plan. This is the phase that will focus on large-scale projects that take years to plan, design, and build, projects that we know our partners want to do and that will have a transformative effect on communities.

We have committed to announcing phase 2 of the long-term plan in the next year. It will be built through collaborative discussions and consultations so it can meet the needs of the communities across the country.

Through the upcoming summer months, I will continue to engage with my provincial, territorial, and municipal partners. I will be engaging with indigenous peoples and other key stakeholders to craft a plan that meets their needs. This includes attending conferences and events where we can host ministerial round tables.

My staff and I have reached out to all of our colleagues from both sides of the House to ensure we hear from Canadians across the country. My parliamentary secretary is leading these consultations and he will speak more about them later.

In my time as a bus driver, as an Edmonton city councillor, and now as a federal minister, I have conducted myself in an open and transparent manner. I have spoken at length about my belief in the principles of collaborative working relationships, of partnerships, and of honest, direct communication. I have held myself to a high standard and have expected my office to act in the same manner.

In that spirit, my department has posted on our website an unprecedented level of information, including the funding remaining in existing programs for each province and territory. We have posted project level information and funding amounts for all of our programs on the government's open data portal. We have shared the letters that were sent to the provinces and territories, which specifically detail their allocations under the new infrastructure programs and the changes we have made to old programs.

As I mentioned earlier, the costs that we incurred as part of the set-up of the new office for up to 32 people were posted in that same spirit of openness and transparency.

People often ask why we include social infrastructure as part of our broad-based infrastructure plan. People think that investing in roads, bridges, transit, water, waste water is the only infrastructure investment we can make. Those are very important and critical investments.

We committed to invest in social infrastructure because we felt that investment in affordable housing, investments in ending violence against women, investments in early learning, investments in cultural and recreational facilities would unlock people's potential.

I have experienced the power of infrastructure. I am the Minister of Infrastructure, but I am also the minister because of infrastructure. The transit buses that I took to work, the libraries where I went to learn English changed my life. The people on my bus who I took to work, the people who came home from work using public transit, those are the people on whose behalf we build the infrastructure.

Let me close by telling a story of a young mother of three children who was on the verge of being homeless. She called my municipal office looking for support and help. We were able to provide her with a secure, stable, affordable place to live through the agencies that served Edmonton. Within one year, that mother was able to turn her life around. Her children were back in school and succeeding at school. She had a job that she could hold because of that access to housing, that access to support services that she needed to put her life together. That is the power of infrastructure.

That is why we are investing in communities and why we need to do it now. That is why we are investing $120 billion in public infrastructure, public transit, clean infrastructure, and social infrastructure, to make our communities more inclusive and welcoming for people to live, to make our communities more resilient to climate change, to ensure we invest in projects that matter to Canadians from coast to coast to coast. That is our vision for infrastructure.

We have created a dedicated ministry with a dedicated minister, a dedicated deputy minister, dedicated staff, and a dedicated space to deliver on those commitments.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:45 p.m.

Conservative

Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB

Mr. Speaker, after listening to the member' s speech, clearly infrastructure is very important to him. Could he provide us with what, in his view, is the definition of “infrastructure”?

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:45 p.m.

Liberal

Amarjeet Sohi Liberal Edmonton Mill Woods, AB

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, infrastructure is about unlocking people's potential. Infrastructure is about public transit, about having safe places for people to go home to. Infrastructure is about providing homes for people who do not have them because they have ended up living on the street due to circumstances beyond their control.

Infrastructure is about women fleeing domestic violence and finding safe havens to escape that violence. Infrastructure is about early learning facilities for our little ones, so we can invest in the future by unlocking their potential. Infrastructure is about everything each and every day that Canadians use, whether they are buses that take us to work, or the waste water facilities that we do not notice because the municipalities have done a good job running them, or clean water, or the investments we are making in social infrastructure. It is about people.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:50 p.m.

NDP

Alistair MacGregor NDP Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the minister making himself available to the House for questions and for providing some context for the $835,000 figure, which is for 32 employees.

I first want to know if the minister could tell the House how many employees in the previous government were dedicated just to infrastructure when infrastructure and Transport Canada were together. Maybe he could compare and contrast that number with the 32 he has now and provide Canadians with more of an explanation on some of the different roles those 32 employees carry out. What Canadians really want, in the spirit of transparency and openness, is to ensure that government resources are being used as efficiently and cost effectively as possible.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:50 p.m.

Liberal

Amarjeet Sohi Liberal Edmonton Mill Woods, AB

Mr. Speaker, when I was appointed Minister of Infrastructure and Communities, I did not have any staff, so I had to start from scratch. I had to build my ministry from scratch. The only person who gave me support was the deputy minister, who I share with Transport Canada.

I had to hire a new chief of staff, parliamentary secretaries, my departmental political non-exempt staff. There are close to 24 people working in my office now, with the potential to grow up to 32 people. We are doubling our investments in infrastructure, from $60 billion to $120 billion over the next 10 years. I currently have those staff members, with the potential to grow that number.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:50 p.m.

Honoré-Mercier Québec

Liberal

Pablo Rodriguez LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities

Mr. Speaker, it is refreshing to hear a definition like the one the Minister of Infrastructure provided. It is refreshing, modern, and open to the world.

I want to congratulate the minister on his excellent speech, but especially on the excellent work that he does. I have the privilege of working with him on a daily basis, and I have seen him in action. The minister toured the country. He went to every province and every region. He met with mayors, councillors, and Canadians across the country.

I would like to know what priorities people talked about when the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities had these meetings across the country.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

June 14th, 2016 / 6:50 p.m.

Liberal

Amarjeet Sohi Liberal Edmonton Mill Woods, AB

Mr. Speaker, the first thing I did when I was appointed to this position was engage with Canadians to learn what the needs were, what was working for them, and what was not.

I engaged with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and with big-city mayors. I made phone calls to all of my provincial counterparts to let them know about our government's willingness to work in collaboration and partnership.

I learned during those conversations that the top-heavy approach of the previous government was not working for them. They wanted local decision-making. They wanted their municipalities to decide what the needs were. I heard about the relaxing and reforming of the building Canada fund. The building Canada fund was started in 2014, and when I took office in November 2015, almost zero dollars of it was invested in communities.

We heard that public transit is important to people. Water and waste water is important to people. Affordable housing is important to people. Day care facilities are important to people. Roads, bridges, interchanges, and transportation corridors are important to people. Things that grow our economy and create jobs for Canadians, things that—

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:55 p.m.

Conservative

The Deputy Speaker Conservative Bruce Stanton

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:55 p.m.

Conservative

Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC

Mr. Speaker, I listened to my colleague, the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities, and what I heard was that he had to hire a chief of staff, and he had to hire staff. However, every minister who was appointed by the Prime Minister had to appoint staff. The issue here is that every other minister did not have extraordinary costs in setting up their offices associated with hiring these staff.

We have heard time and again that there is space available in terms of staff. There is a surplus of equipment, furniture, and artwork. Therefore, the reason we are talking here tonight is not because he had to hire staff, like every other minister had to, but because his expenses stand out extraordinarily high in comparison to every other colleague.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:55 p.m.

Liberal

Amarjeet Sohi Liberal Edmonton Mill Woods, AB

Mr. Speaker, I did state the day this issue came up, from that day to today, that ours is a stand-alone ministry with a dedicated minister and deputy minister, which did not happen in the previous administration. Infrastructure Canada was part of Transport Canada.

Therefore, we needed to create this whole ministry from scratch. The only person who was in common was our deputy minister. We were sharing space with Transport Canada for a little while, but we needed appropriate space to consolidate our staff on one floor as well as create a workable space for the staff we needed in order to deliver on those commitments.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:55 p.m.

Conservative

Blaine Calkins Conservative Red Deer—Lacombe, AB

Mr. Speaker, I am a hockey player and I have ragged the puck before, but I have never seen anything like this. I will get to my question really quickly.

I wonder if the hon. minister across the way can explain why, when the federal cabinet goes from 39 down to 30 and the next closest ministry has spent on renovations around $50,000 and when his division of his department is excised off from the transport minister, the transport minister did not need to spend 800-and-some-thousand dollars on a newly dedicated office? When we go to the Government of Canada website and look at surplus items, such as $20 for chairs minimum bid, times 32, is $640, $40 for work stations, times 32, is $1,280, $100 for boardroom tables, times 10 let us say, is 1,000 bucks, he could have refurnished pretty much his entire office for about 3,000 bucks.

Can he explain and justify to the taxpayers of Canada why, when there is extra office space, with nine fewer ministries, and the surplus items are already here, available to be used, he needed to drop close to a million bucks on an office for himself and 32 people?

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

6:55 p.m.

Liberal

Amarjeet Sohi Liberal Edmonton Mill Woods, AB

Mr. Speaker, we looked at different options. We continued to share the space with Transport Canada. The best option for us was to build a new space; a space where we could have a dedicated minister, a dedicated DM, and space for 32 people on one floor to bring the efficiencies and to bring the collaborative approach to working together. We did that under the guidelines of the Treasury Board. We did that under the guidelines that are followed by all other ministries, the procurement guidelines, and everything. We proactively disclosed that information in April, and that information was available. We are doubling our investments in infrastructure throughout the country.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to be sharing my time with the member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

The budget debate will come to a close this evening. In summary, contrary to its promise to create a small deficit of only $10 billion, the government will saddle Canadians with a budget deficit that could reach $29.4 billion this year alone. Canadians did not vote for that.

Just six months after it was elected, the Liberal government seems to be suffering already from an incurable Liberal disease: acute spendicitis. That is what I will try to show in my speech this evening.

By analyzing the expenses incurred to set up offices for the ministers in this cabinet after they were appointed, we realize, fortunately, that not all the ministers have caught the disease.

Let us take a look at the race to set up the beautiful offices for ministers. In last place, we find the Minister of Sport and Persons with Disabilities, who spent only $500 on setting up her office. I would like to congratulate her. That is to her credit. For once, coming in last is quite honourable. The first shall be last and the last shall be first in this case.

There is stiff competition among the other ministers. Even the Minister of Finance, who spent $12,000 on a superluxurious flight to New York, spent only $1,400 to set up his office.

At the back of the pack, ministers spent between $1,000 and $7,000 to set up their offices. Then there are the ones who wanted to spend a little more money. Four ministers spent between $12,000 and $19,000 on their new offices. Then you have those at the head of the pack. Here are the ministers who spent the most money on setting up their offices.

In third place is the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who spent $40,000 to refit his office. In second place is the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, who spent $57,000 on his office. In first place, the big winner is the Minister of Infrastructure, who spent $835,000 on his new office.

When I wrote my speech, the results were not yet official since the other ministers had lodged a protest, claiming that the minister was on spending steroids. They thought that he had cheated and padded the numbers. How is it possible to spend $835,000 on a single office?

Unfortunately, I have the official results here, which come from officials in the minister's department. A total of $835,000 was indeed spent to set up an office. According to what we learned today in question period, it might have been two, three, four, or even 32 offices.

We questioned the Minister of Infrastructure a number of times about how much was spent to set up his office. He said several times again this evening, with his hand on his heart, that the reason why he spent $835,000 was that there was no infrastructure minister in the previous government and therefore no office.

First of all, there was a minister responsible for infrastructure and that minister also had an office. The minister should also know that previously, there were at least eight additional ministers and so there were eight office spaces with furnishings for the staff of eight ministers' offices. That is a lot of ministers' offices that became available after the last election.

Why did the Minister of Infrastructure not take advantage of the eight completely furnished offices that were available and ready to receive staff? Was it because of vanity? Was it because those offices were not good enough for the minister? If there are at least 10 employees per minister's office, that means that in terms of office equipment alone, there were 80 desks, 80 computers and monitors, 80 chairs, and 80 telephones available to the new Minister of Infrastructure.

I do not understand the minister's decision given that his new department has not even announced a single construction site for this summer. There is nothing to stimulate the economy. There is nothing this summer for cities that are still waiting to find out when they can invest the money that was promised during the election campaign. The only thing that was announced was this big project to set up a new office for 32 people at a cost of $26,000 per employee.

Unfortunately, that is not all. When the associate deputy minister of Infrastructure Canada appeared before the Standing Committee on Transport, she told us that setting up her offices and hiring staff for this “new” department would cost taxpayers an additional $10.2 million. How many employees for that $10 million? The deputy minister said 20. Twenty employees for an extra $10.2 million. Some quick math says that is $500,000 per employee.

The deputy minister did not want to leave us with that impression. She quickly added that the money would be used primarily for computer systems and other expenses. I asked for a breakdown of those expenses at committee, but I still have not received anything. We still do not know how much of that $10.2 million will be used to further refurbish the offices of the minister and deputy minister, at $835,000 a pop. We need to get these answers. That is why we oppose this part of the budget.

In closing, I have a suggestion as to how the minister can quickly and effectively treat this acute case of spendicitis: have a look at the Government of Canada's auction website, GCSurplus.ca. Here is some of the furniture I found that could be used to furnish the minister's office: 16 full work stations with 33 office chairs for $550; five filing cabinets for $20; 58 cabinets for $100; two bookshelves for $20; a shredder for $100; 28 conference tables for $100, since they are so fond of meetings and consultation; an executive desk with a cabinet for the minister for $50; an executive suite with desk for $100; 12 bookshelves for $115; six briefcases for $10; 80 telephones, in case they are busy, for just $750; 13 tables, two printers, and a photocopier for $95, after some quick math.

There were no computers, so I checked Kijiji and found 10 computers for $2,000. If they need three times more, that would be $6,000 for computers. It was a little harder to find 10 monitors. I had to check another site. I will not advertise for that site, but I found monitors for just $100. That adds up to just $33,000. To furnish the minister's office and meet all of his needs with respect to meetings and consultations in the coming years, that adds up to $10,960 for an office that can accommodate 32 people, not the $835,000 the minister put in for.

Rather than worry about the colour of the walls, the minister should hurry up and find a way to put Canadians to work by announcing projects for the summer as his party promised during the election campaign. That is why we will oppose the budgets allocated for the minister's new offices.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7:05 p.m.

Honoré-Mercier Québec

Liberal

Pablo Rodriguez LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities

Mr. Speaker, the member just said that he has not heard any announcements lately.

My colleague and friend seems to have a very short memory because I was with him in his own riding at Saint-Fortunat to make an announcement about waste water treatment. He was there. We even had a conversation.

Where was he a few days ago when we announced a major investment in Saint Joseph's oratory? Where was my colleague a few days ago when we announced a major investment in Le Diamant, a performing arts centre in Quebec City? This is a very important project for the provincial capital.

What I find deplorable and a bit sad is that the member seems to have a selective memory. He remembers what he wants to remember and forgets the rest.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7:10 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Mr. Speaker, yes, I was anxious to reply to the member's question.

I was very pleased to welcome the parliamentary secretary to Saint-Fortunat for an announcement about work that is very important to that town. The people of that town will finally have clean drinking water. That announcement was easy to make, because everything had been set up by the previous government. All that was left was to announce it. Thank you very much, Mr. Parliamentary Secretary.

We are not looking for announcements. What we want are building sites and shovels in the ground. Announcements are easy to make. What matters is making them so that the projects can get going as soon as possible.

Almost nothing has been announced. Having been a municipal mayor, I know how long it takes to prepare files, calls for tender, and all the plans and specifications. We have missed almost the entire season, and that is what is most unfortunate.

Why is it that despite all their promises, the Liberals have not managed to invest in and improve the Canadian economy this summer?

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7:10 p.m.

Conservative

Bernard Généreux Conservative Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC

Mr. Speaker, I would like my colleague to explain to us in clear and simple terms how someone can furnish offices with equipment that we all have in our offices, but at such a ridiculous cost. How can someone spend $825,000 to set up offices for 32 or 34 new staff when it is not a new department?

Our colleague from Lac-Saint-Jean was the infrastructure minister in our government until last year, and he managed to spend and oversee an infrastructure plan worth $60 billion. The Liberals have doubled that amount.

Does my colleague think it will take 32 new staff to spend twice the amount we announced in recent years and spent for the most part?

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7:10 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for the question about the number of people in the new office of the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities.

Whether there are 32, 20, 10, or 60, I do not know how many people are needed. To make announcements, you need a minister, a press secretary, and an administrative assistant. However, seeing projects through requires more people.

If people can really be helpful in advancing the project, investing in our communities, and ensuring that Canadian taxpayers' money is truly being used to grow our economy, if that takes 30 people, then it takes 30 people. I have no problem with that.

The important thing is that the money is invested properly, not just in setting up an office in the only major summer construction site at the Department of Infrastructure and Communities.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7:10 p.m.

Liberal

Pablo Rodriguez Liberal Honoré-Mercier, QC

Mr. Speaker, my colleague knows full well that before we can get to a call for tenders or construction sites, projects need to be approved and announcements need to be made. That is what we have done.

These announcements translate into construction sites, job creation, and economic development, which my dear Conservative friends did not do in all those years because most of their famous $60 billion was never spent.

That is what we are doing right now by accelerating the projects and expanding the criteria to make different types of projects eligible. We are speeding up the process so that the money is available as soon as possible.

If they had the chance to do that in the past, then why did they pass it up?

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7:10 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Mr. Speaker, most of the $60 billion has already been invested.

There are still some announcements to be made, and the government is currently making announcements regarding old projects that were already ready to go. It takes a long time to plan these things. I know. I was a mayor. Several of us on this side of the House were mayors and we are worried. We want to know when these projects will be able to begin.

Rather than talking about announcements of upcoming projects, why do the Liberals not show us some boots, shovels, and tractors on work sites to let us know that work has begun? It is because there are no new projects with the new funding.

Concurrence in Vote 1—Infrastructure CanadaMain Estimates 2016-17Government Orders

7:10 p.m.

Conservative

Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB

Mr. Speaker, during questions and comments, I asked the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities what his definition of infrastructure was. After a rather flowery response, he concluded that infrastructure is everything Canadians use. Therefore, it is a pleasure in this debate to address the self-styled minister of everything about his no doubt important file, but perhaps not quite as important as he has invested it to be.

My colleague, the infrastructure minister, is actually my neighbour. Our ridings back in the Edmonton area are right beside each other. I know that he served for a long time as a city councillor in Edmonton and justly earned respect for his service. However, it is unfortunate to see that since coming here to Ottawa, he has been imbibing alarming quantities of Liberal Kool-Aid.

After arriving here, the minister joined his Liberal colleagues in voting against our motion to approve the energy east pipeline. Clearly he is in favour of infrastructure, except vital energy infrastructure that is needed to create jobs in his riding and in my riding in the Edmonton area. I very highly doubt that he was highlighting that vote in his communications with his constituents back home.

When the new cabinet was sworn in, the minister said, “I just want to make sure that Albertans understand that they have nothing to worry about”. Then he voted against the energy east pipeline.

The government had to be dragged kicking and screaming to finally extend EI coverage, at similar levels as the rest of the province, to the Edmonton region. Certainly that was not its initial intention.

Albertans are justly worried about whether the minister is actually respecting their hard-earned tax dollars and whether the government cares about what is happening in Alberta. As a city councillor, the minister spoke a lot about infrastructure, but as a minister, as I alluded to earlier, he is not even clear about what infrastructure really is.

Canadians can look at page 92 of the budget, which shows a pie chart of what the government means by infrastructure, and it really seriously seems to mean that infrastructure is everything Canadians use. When it talks about investing in infrastructure, that includes everything up to and including child care.

During the committee of the whole a few weeks ago, I asked the Minister of Finance if he thought child care was infrastructure. He said he did. I asked him if there is anything the federal government does that does not qualify as infrastructure. The best he could come up with was that the tax changes the government brought in as part of one of its bills did not qualify as infrastructure. It seems that the government really regards everything that involves the programming activities of the government as infrastructure. There is social infrastructure and cultural infrastructure.

It is not at all clear to me what the job of the minister is in relation to his colleagues, especially when he does not have a clear sense of what exactly he is supposed to be doing. That is one major concern I have about the communication and direction we have seen from the minister on this.

Building on that, when the minister was first elected, he took a $46,000 transition bonus from the City of Edmonton, despite the fact that he started collecting his MP salary the day after the election. Given how bad the minister is at getting deals on furniture, it is perhaps understandable that he needed the money. The outrageous expenditures of the minister for his office renovations and new furniture are beyond the pale. Really, they stretch credulity. He spent $835,000 for this newfangled, beautiful, I am sure, office, far eclipsing any other minister or what is ordinarily spent on this sort of thing.

Back home in the Edmonton area, Edmontonians and Albertans have seen this movie before. Indeed, we had a premier in Alberta who spent $760,000 on upgrades for a residential area at the top of Alberta's Federal Building. That premier was Alison Redford, and those upgrades were to her infamous sky palace.

I think the minister would have been wise to learn from the cautionary tale provided by the rather unceremonious end to Premier Alison Redford's political career, yet the minister went ahead to spend more on his office renovations than Premier Redford did on those particular upgrades to her proposed residential suite.

My colleague has quite rightly called this sky palace 2.0. Of course, anyone who watches movies knows that 2.0 has to be bigger than the first edition, and indeed, it was in this case. It is disappointing to see the minister show such flagrant disrespect for hard-earned taxpayers' dollars.

I do not mind sharing a little bit with the minister about the situation of my own office. Obviously, the situation is quite different. MPs have a much smaller staff. However, in my office situation. Including interns, I currently have six full-time people working in my Ottawa office, and that does not include myself. We have two rooms in our office in the Confederation Building where these people work along with me, and this includes our use of meeting room space. I am proud that we have no problem getting the work done in the space that we were given, and that is important.

The attitude of the minister, I believe, should be to dream big for Canada, but when it comes to his office, to make due with what he has. Yes, dream big, but do not dream big about the size of one's office. When the Prime Minister said that better was always possible, I do not think Canadians knew he was referring to the size of ministerial offices.

The minister's best argument that he can come up with in defence of his behaviour and the behaviour of his office in this context is that he says, well, in some sense there was not really an infrastructure minister before, which is patently not true. The fact that the minister had other responsibilities does not change the fact that we definitely had a minister of infrastructure. We not only had a minster, but a minister who was quite active with a clear sense of what infrastructure actually was, what infrastructure actually meant, and a minister who brought in the building Canada fund, which was the biggest long-term investment in Canadian real infrastructure ever.

When Canadians think about infrastructure, I think that they usually think of things such as roads, bridges, and the hard infrastructure that is vital for our transportation needs. It is not that this other stuff is not important, but we need to have a sense of what we are actually talking about when we talk about infrastructure.

There is a general point that needs to be underlined here and that is the point of respect for taxpayers. Of course, in the scheme of the total federal budget, the amount the minister spent is a relatively small percentage of the overall total budget. However, when Canadians see how ministers and members of Parliament spend their budgets, it communicates clear information about whether or not those ministers, those members of Parliament, respect taxpayers and understand and appreciate that the money we spend is not our money. It is money that Canadians had to work hard to earn. That is what is communicated when we see this kind of disrespect for taxpayers.

It is about the money, yes, but it is also about the message that it sends about whether or not we care about the people who sent us here and who work hard to pay for public expenses. Clearly, this action of the minister, spending $835,000 on sky palace 2.0, going beyond Alison Redford's sky palace, in fact, is not something that shows respect for taxpayers.

I have the minister's mandate letter with me. Part of his mandate letter is to “Support the Minister of Indigenous and Northern Affairs to improve essential physical infrastructure for Indigenous communities including improving housing outcomes for Indigenous Peoples”.

I wonder what kinds of housing improvements could have been achieved for aboriginal Canadians with $835,000. How many houses could have been built with that kind of money?

This is the kind of question we need to ask, because Canadians, Albertans, people in the Edmonton region, expect that when ministers come to Ottawa that they have respect for taxpayers' dollars, that they do not drink the Ottawa Kool-Aid so fast, and that they focus on representing their constituents, representing taxpayers, and representing the people who sent us here.

I think the minister needs to own up to this and he needs to recognize that this is not an appropriate expenditure of taxpayers' dollars. He also needs to provide some clear definition about what his department is actually talking about in the context of infrastructure.

I hope that going forward we will see a better job from the government, and that we will see actual respect for taxpayers.