Debates of Oct. 26th, 2017

Speaker's Ruling

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to be speaking today on Bill C-24, An Act to amend the Salaries Act and to make a consequential amendment to the Financial Administration Act. Part of the reason I am happy to do so is that it is the middle of the day. The last time I spoke to this bill, I believe it was about 11:30 at night last spring when the government decided that it needed to keep Parliament sitting until midnight every night for weeks, not because it was trying to bring forward any legislation that would allow it to keep its campaign promises, but to fill the time, which I do not think was very useful.

The first thing about this bill that I want to cover is the total hypocrisy of the government bringing this legislation forward at this time. This legislation would pay junior ministers the same as senior ministers, and would remove six regional economic development positions and add three mystery positions. The reality is that two years ago the government already made those salaries the same and eliminated those economic development ministers, and so this is just a cover. It shows a total disrespect for Parliament. The government should be coming here to discuss issues of importance to Canadians, issues that would change the way we do things in Parliament, but instead the Liberal government does whatever it wants. It makes decisions without duly consulting Parliament, and then tries to cover up.

This is not the first case of this nature. I remember when I was just a new parliamentarian debating the withdrawal of the CF-18s from Iraq. On the first day, I showed up with my speech to talk about this and found out that the government had already withdrawn them. There was absolutely no point to debate it for two to three days, which we did anyway, because it had already withdrawn them. It showed a total disrespect for oversight by Parliament.

Let us talk about some of the other examples such as the payment of $10.5 million to Omar Khadr, a terrorist. That was obviously very controversial in Canada. There was no consultation on that either. What about giving Bombardier $372 million? There was no consultation there either. The Liberal government continues to spend Canadians' money, make decisions about changes and not consult, and then when it is convenient, several years later, it will come with a bill and ask us to get up and speak to it.

That said, let me talk about the specifics of the bill. I wish I had an opportunity to make all these comments before the government had taken action. First of all, let us talk about paying the junior ministers the same as senior ministers. This has absolutely nothing to do with gender. In the real world, where people work in their professions, there are multiple different ways of evaluating jobs, based on skills, experience, level of responsibility, the demands of the job, and whether or not the job is in an isolated location. All these things are taken into account. There are lots of different job skills we can look at such as the Hay scale. There are various items like that.

When we think about the ministers, let us look at the skills and experience of the ministers we are talking about. Let us look at the responsibility level and see if there is a match. Then we can also talk about competence, because in some cases people are paid more for their competence and the amazing things they have been able to accomplish in the role.

First of all, if we talk about the Minister of Status of Women, for example, versus the finance minister, the latter manages a budget of $373 billion. The status of women minister has a far smaller budget. I know of $38 million of it, but it is hidden in so many pockets it is hard to add it all up because the government budgetary system is so confusing. Clearly, if the finance minister introduces things like unfair taxes, these could have a huge effect on small businesses, and could even cause a health crisis if all the doctors leave the country. These things are serious. What impact will there be if the status of women minister does not do her job appropriately? Really, I do not see it.

We can talk about the democratic reform minister versus the defence minister. Now, if the defence minister does not do his job, people die. We go to war with countries and serious situations develop. When the democratic reform minister does not do their job, no one notices.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

We noticed.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

My colleagues in the NDP are correct. They did notice this is not going to be the last election under first past the post.

Let us talk about the Minister of Sport and Persons with Disabilities versus the Minister of Health and the fact they are handling different levels of things. When the health minister does not do her job, it can be a huge issue for all Canadians because we all are impacted. I do not see the sports minister as having the same impact. Obviously, the responsibility level is different, so the pay level should be different as well.

One really insulting thing about the way the government has organized the ministers, especially one of the junior ministers, is to put small business together with tourism, together with the House leader's role. Small businesses create 90% of the jobs in this country, so that is a huge area of opportunity. That is something that is continually changing with the changing competitive environment in the U.S. One-third of the Liberal House leader's time can be devoted to that. Tourism is supposed to be a great growth opportunity. We hear all kinds of rhetoric about how great it could be for Canada's GDP and how much more there is to do, but that minister can only spend a third of her time on that. That does not really line up.

I really do not want to talk about the competence issue because we have all had our bad days, but when I look at some of the junior ministers and the women who were put in those roles and the things they were supposed to do, such as implementing democratic reform, those things did not happen. What has the Minister of Status of Women done for women? I was on the special committee that studied pay equity and made recommendations. In budget 2017 how much money was there for pay equity? Zero. The government had a chance to do something but did nothing.

Let us talk about eliminating violence against women and girls. The Liberals gave $200 million to Iraq for economic development, but $100 million over five years to eliminate violence against women and girls in Canada. For those who cannot do the math, that amounts to $20 million a year to eliminate violence against women and girls and $200 million on the spur of the moment for economic development in another country. Seriously, do not even take me there.

I only have a few minutes left, so I want to talk a little about the ministers for regional economic development. The idea was to have regional ministers who would focus on economic activity within those regions. In Atlantic Canada, for example, perhaps they would have heard the voice of Atlantic Canadians on energy east if the ACOA minister's job had not been eliminated and moved to Mississauga.

How about B.C. and Quebec? They are still waiting for a softwood lumber agreement and have no one to advocate on their behalf for the 400,000 jobs that are threatened in that industry, in addition to the ones that have already been lost. Two years on the file and absolutely nothing has happened, because there is a logjam with the one position that filled in for those other six positions.

Alberta's oil and gas industry has been totally decimated. There is no one to stand up and advocate on its behalf because, again, it is all coming out of Mississauga. We can also talk about Ontario's manufacturing performance and the number of jobs that have been lost and the dismal performance in that regard.

It was a huge mistake to eliminate the regional development ministers, but again, it was already done two years ago so this is just a cover-up.

If we talk about the three new ministers, I would have a couple of suggestions. First of all, it would be great to have a minister for seniors, because seniors are struggling. The government goes on and on about the amazing GIS increase of about $60 a month, when the cost of hydro in Ontario has gone up 170%. The GIS increase is nothing in comparison. There needs to be more of a focus on seniors, because one in six Canadians is now a senior, and that will rise to one in four in just a few years.

I would also like to see a minister dedicated to getting the independent watchdogs of the House hired, because we have been extending the terms of the current Ethics Commissioner and Lobbying Commissioner, and these people are clearly not coming to any decisions anytime soon. It would be nice to have a minister dedicated to making sure that the House has independent people to ensure that everything happens according to the rules.

Finally, I would say that we maybe need a minister of math because it looks like there is a big problem with math on that side of the House when the Liberals implement taxes that are supposed to increase taxes on the wealthy 1%, yet tax revenues from the latter actually decrease by more than $1 billion, and the new taxes do not even touch the Prime Minister.

[Celina Caesar-Chavannes, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Development]

Mr. Speaker, while I do want to thank the hon. colleague across the way for her speech, I am offended by the compare and contrast between ministers' roles, and member's point about who will die and who will not die. We are talking about the status of women, about women who struggle every single day to make ends meet, women who are in shelters, and women who are abused. Our Minister of Status of Women stands up for those women. She put together a plan to ensure that we have a gender-based violence strategy.

If the member says that another minister looks after people's lives, what does she say to her constituents who are part of that group of women who do not make it to the end of a week without struggling? What does she say to our constituents who fall into that group of women?

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, when it comes to what the status of women minister has done about violence against women, let us just look at some of the numbers from this government. Remember, the government is spending $20 million a year to eliminate violence against women, despite the violence impacting one in three indigenous women and one in four Canadian women. However, $12 billion was given to other countries, and $400 million more was spent to collect Statistics Canada data. Does that tell us the priority the Liberal government is putting on violence against women?

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is hard to get into a debate about which member of cabinet is more influential and important, because sometimes that changes with personalities. We all know that different cabinets take on different structures. Sometimes a member with a so-called lower level portfolio has more influence at the cabinet table and with the Prime Minister. One way is to follow the money. Sometimes it matters quite a bit. As my colleague pointed out, ministers with portfolios that have a large department and large impact, such as defence and finance, typically have proportionate influence.

I am confused about this whole bill and wonder if the member can help me out. I am often confused by Liberal doublespeak. I am unsure how to phrase this. At committee when this bill was going through, questions were put forward. Is this bill about gender equality? Has it been put through a gender lens? Is that what this legislation is about?

The Liberals at committee said absolutely not, that this bill was not about that. However, with the bill now in the House, other Liberals have stood to say that this bill is about all of that. Can she help me and Canadians understand what this bill, which is consuming so many hours in the House of Commons, is actually about? Is it about what Liberals did not apply, which is a gender analysis lens to this piece of legislation, or virtually any piece of legislation which they promised to do, or is it about what Liberals studying the bill are now saying it is about?

The Prime Minister made this great commitment that the cabinet would be balanced. However, a reporter pointed out that the cabinet was not gender balanced; rather, the Prime Minister was including some ministers at the secretary of the state level, as what have traditionally been called “junior” ministers. They were included in that number to make the cabinet look balanced. Is this not to repair their claim, and to make what was false now true by simply changing the designations and the pay of each of the individual members of this now larger cabinet?

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for that excellent point. He has pointed out the utter hypocrisy between what the Liberals say and do, and the way the message changes as they go along. We saw this during the recent disastrous tax changes that the finance minister introduced. At the beginning he said, “We are going after the wealthy 1%. People are not paying their fair share of taxes.”

The Liberals were very strong and chose to double down on that. However, when they started to see the huge fire created across Canada, they said, “We're consulting with Canadians. We're going to listen to Canadians”. Then, when it became the climbdown that it was, they said, “Well, there are a few tweaks that we've got to make to our proposals.”

We saw the same thing when this bill came forward, namely, that it was not about gender parity. In reality, it should not be about gender parity because jobs are evaluated based on one's skills, experience, and levels of responsibility. There are many global systems that people use to determine what the pay grade should be based on those factors, and not based on gender.

However, when it is convenient and the Prime Minister wants to look like a feminist or as if he is doing the right thing for a photo op or a headline, and not for the actual money on the bottom line that he is putting into the budget, he does exactly what the member said he does.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the reason feminism is material to this bill is that colleagues in the Liberal Party have talked about the Prime Minister's feminist bona fides. Colleagues in my party have talked about whether this bill is actually feminist. Colleagues in the NDP have raised the same question. I want to have a more honest conversation today.

Two days ago, in the House of Commons, the Minister of Status of Women was asked a question by one of her colleagues on the Liberal backbench about feminism and different slurs that have been used. She made a reference to two things that have made the news recently. One was calling parliamentary colleagues Barbies. I have had the great pleasure of being called that before. In fact, an artist in Manitoba, who I understand actually had grants at the time, although I am not sure, from the Manitoba Arts Council, put together a movie that insinuated that I was a talking-point Barbie, so I have some sympathy. The minister also talked about a very derogatory term, “feminazi”, being used.

The problem I had with the Minister of Status of Women's response was that she made a glib comment that I think was designed to absolve her party of guilt on this aspect. To me, rather than being honest about the fact that none of us, to put it politely, is perfect in this regard, and no party is fantastic about this, the minister herself stood very proudly and very glibly ignored this key fact. I raised comments made by one of her colleagues. If I had had more time to find the quote, I could have raised the fact that one of her colleagues may have insinuated that one of my colleagues was akin to a stripper. Some of my colleagues opposite are now sitting on the independent benches for various reasons.

We are all uncomfortable here now, and we should be, because when we talk about being feminist and standing up for women's rights, we cannot pay lip service or make it a partisan issue. That is what we do here over and over again. I am not going to pretend that my party has been perfect, and I am also not going to wave the stick at just the Liberal Party. I am going to ask all members in the House to do a lot better.

With regard to this bill, if my colleagues in the Liberal Party really support women's rights, they are going to tell the Prime Minister that maybe it is not right to pass a bill that calls female ministers equal when they do not have the ability to bring memoranda to cabinet. For my colleagues on the Liberal backbench who do not understand what that means, it means that there are people in the “gender-parity cabinet” who are called full cabinet members, and are included in the count of their quota, who do not have the right to bring a topic to cabinet for consideration without the approval of a senior, and in most cases male, minister.

They also do not have the right to chair cabinet committees. In fact, if we look at the chairmanship and composition of the Prime Minister's cabinet committees, which is where the real power is in government, which you know, Mr. Speaker, and all of us in this place know, it is actually a lie and an affront to say that there is gender parity in that cabinet. If we are going to be uncomfortable, let us talk about that fact.

Rather than enshrining this in law and having people stand here and extol the virtues of it, let us call a spade a spade. This bill would not create gender parity. It would make women in cabinet say that they are equal, even when they are not, because of the Prime Minister's ego. That is the antithesis of feminism. That is making women cover over inequality for the political gain of a man. I do not care what political stripe members are in this place, that is wrong.

I have had to roll my eyes and facepalm when some of my male colleagues have said things that made me absolutely and completely angry, things that were cringeworthy. I have talked to them afterward and said that I was not going to carry the bag for them. They know that.

I am very proud of the advances my party has made for women in this country. We might not agree on how to achieve gender equality, but if we are going to move forward on that, I would like to think that we are going to agree that a bill like this does not do it.

I do not care if the Prime Minister calls himself a feminist. He should be putting his money where his mouth is all the time, and this bill does not do it. I cannot support it, nor should any member of the Liberal caucus. I would like to see them talk to the minister and say that I have a point and this should be tweaked.

I was appointed as a junior cabinet minister. I was appointed as a minister of state. I was really glad to do that, because it gave me time to understand how the bureaucracy worked, how government worked, and how the cabinet table worked. Male colleagues were appointed by former Prime Minister Harper to the same role. It was not about gender. To me it was about career progression. I had someone who believed in me and thought I had the potential to be a senior member of government but who also gave me time to learn how government worked before the onslaught of question period and media scrums.

We know that there are ministers in the government, and I am sure they are well-intentioned and came to Ottawa wanting to effect change, who do not know how to do their jobs. They do not understand that bureaucrats are going to put out memos for them to sign off on about things like taxing employee discounts. They are not going to understand that it means that they should not sign off on those memos and should review things.

I had time to learn how that worked before I was stuck in as a minister of national revenue. That is not a bad thing. That is a good thing. I am so honoured that I had the opportunity to learn how to do that while contributing to government.

Here we are today with a bill that says that it would create gender parity in cabinet, and it would not. How can people across the way stand and say that it is a great advancement for feminism, when it is not?

A better way to have more women in politics and around the cabinet table would be if we understood that there are tools at our disposal right now. Earlier in the debate, one of my colleagues talked about the fact that the Prime Minister already has in his toolkit the ability to have full cabinet ministers. Hopefully they would be, as they have been across different governments, people who have a degree of experience in this place and in parliamentary committees and an understanding of how government works. That is a different skill set than they would have in any private sector industry or NGO. This place has a learned skill set, and that is okay.

Focusing on tokenism, and then trying to cover it up with a thin veil of feminism that is false, is actually doing a disservice to Canadians, because we are throwing people into situations when they are not ready to govern. That abdicates our fiduciary responsibility to Canadian taxpayers. It abdicates our responsibility to the public service to understand how to translate a political mandate into change within the public service. It abdicates our responsibility to Canadians in that ministers have to understand how those two things work together when they are bringing bills forward in the House of Commons and through committee. It abdicates our responsibility to women, because we are calling something feminist when it is not.

I am not going to stand here and say that I am perfect or that anyone in this House is perfect, but by standing here pretending that this bill is feminist, we are doing a disservice to all Canadians.

My colleagues opposite should go into their caucus room next week and say that maybe they should make some changes to this bill. It can be done in committee. It does not work right now. It is not doing it for me, it is not doing it for the NDP, and I am sure it is not doing it for a lot of people in the Liberal caucus.

Let us do something that resembles work in this place. Let us have a debate, translate those changes at committee, especially given the testimony we heard at the government operations committee, and have a bill that creates, not stymies, gender equality.

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, a central focus of the member's concern about the bill was memoranda to cabinet. Within our government, with our Prime Minister, all ministers within the ministry can provide a memorandum to cabinet. I was wondering if, given that fact, it changes the hon. member's view of the bill, as that was a central focus of concern for her.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that under the structure created by the Prime Minister, there are certain ministers in cabinet, many of them women, who have to report to senior members within the cabinet who are men. That is not gender equality.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to continue on the theme of gender equality, which I was surprised to hear Liberals bring up in today's debate. We had a witness at committee, Professor Margot Young, from the Allard School of Law at UBC, who said:

Framing this as a bill that somehow addresses issues around gender equity in the current cabinet composition is a mistake, and it's a mistake of significant ideological character....

...to respond to a question about women in the cabinet by saying simply “because it's 2015” loses a key leadership moment to articulate and shape opinion about what it means to actually have women in positions of equality, in positions of leadership and power.

In response to that, the Liberal member for Don Valley East said:

I thank you for being here, but I don't think we have the relevance to our study for Bill C-24....

If you have any additional points to make.... They would not be regarding this bill, because it is irrelevant to what you are saying. There is nothing that says it is a gender-balanced bill; there is no indication that it has anything to do with gender equality.

Members might forgive me for being surprised to hear Liberals saying today that the bill has everything to do with gender equality.

The member for Newmarket—Aurora said, in response to the same witness:

I don't disagree with anything you've said. I'm not sure the purpose of this bill was at all to express gender equality.... I don't think it's meant to be a tool that's going to address gender inequality, pay equity, or any of the other issues you raised in your opening [statement].

I would like to know what the member thinks about that.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am tired of feminism being used as a word and a tool for political gain by all parties in the House. I am tired of tokenism. I am tired of having worked my way up to where I am and having bills like this come to the House of Commons. I am tired of having Liberal colleagues, colleagues of all political stripes, stand up on technicalities, saying that maybe this is not this and that.

If we are going to get serious about gender equality, this debate has to stop. We have been having this debate for 30 years. We need to stop putting bills like this forward, stop technicalities, and stop having announcements about gender parity when it is not gender parity. We need to start empowering women and overcoming systemic barriers to allow women to participate in all facets of society. The Prime Minister needs to stop saying that he is a feminist to sell his socks on the cover of international magazines.

That is the difference between this and a true conversation about feminism that we can achieve through different policy mechanisms. It is not based on one political stripe or one political ideology. We cannot gloss over the fact that it is a convenient label to sell votes. That has to stop.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to switch the channel a bit and ask the member if she could talk about the days when she was minister of state for western economic development, which is a regional development agency that is going to be cut off. Under this legislation, there will not be ministers for regional economic development agencies. What if a minister from Toronto had been the minister in charge of WED? I wonder if my colleague could talk about that and the work she did in that portfolio.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Mr. Speaker, sadly, there are a lot of Calgarians and Albertans who are used to Toronto telling them what to do. I will leave it at that.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Calgary Nose Hill for pointing out the vacuousness of the Liberals' position on gender equality. It is all show and very little tell when it comes to their position. I thank her for that very gracious yet succinct effort to expose what the Liberals have really done on gender equality, which is very little.

I want to go to the other part of this bill, which addresses the regional economic development facilities we have across the country. Bill C-24 effectively does the following. It abandons a decentralized decision-making process and replaces it with a highly centralized top-down decision-making process when it comes to the regions of our country, to my region of the country, British Columbia, in the west, to the northern areas of our country, to eastern Canada, and to the Atlantic provinces. What this bill does is effectively create eight new Liberal ministerial positions, which reflects the five minister of state roles that were filled after the 2015 election. It also does something else. It adds three Liberal ministers yet to be named. I will get back to that in a moment, because it comes down to transparency. I can say that, after 12 years in this House, it is the first time I have seen legislation come forward that creates undefined ministerial posts without any idea of what purpose they will serve.

Also, Bill C-24 formally eliminates the positions of the six ministers for the regional development agencies across the country, agencies like Western Economic Diversification Canada, FedNor, and ACOA in Atlantic Canada. That must be concerning to everyone in this House, because it reduces the accountability of government to the regions and the communities across this country.

In my early years as a politician, I was a member of city council. It has been said, quite correctly, that city council is the level of government closest to the people. When I was sitting on city council, we had residents of our communities come forward and make their concerns known. They would bring us their proposals as to how they wanted to see our city develop. We could make decisions that very night or day, and the next day we could start implementing those decisions. What was great was that, as a municipal councillor, because we were from that very community, we could hear directly from the people affected by our decisions, and we could tailor our policies and programs accordingly.

What is happening now federally is the exact opposite. The ministers who were appointed to the various economic development agencies in the main regions across the country were the ones who had their ear to the ground. They were the eyes and ears of the government when it came to that region of the country. What the current Liberal government has done is quite arbitrarily said, without any consultation with the regions, that it will not have any ministers for the regions but will simply get rid of them and appoint a minister from Toronto to make all major decisions relating to those regions. I do not want to begrudge Toronto and Ontario with a minister responsible for economic development, but I can say that once we get out into the other regions of the country they will be saying, “What happened? What about us? There is somebody in Toronto making decisions for us out here in the region.” That should be embarrassing for the Liberal government.

What should be even more embarrassing is this. In the last election the Liberal Party elected 32 members of Parliament from Atlantic Canada. One would figure that out of 32 members of Parliament, the Prime Minister could find one who would be the representative for ACOA , and represent the interests of Atlantic Canada.

He just could not get his mind around that and said that it would be better, rather than having an Atlantic Canada minister, to appoint someone from downtown Toronto to make these decisions. I think of our democratic process, about the accountability that governments should be focusing on, and about responsiveness to the very people whom each one of us serve when we are establishing ministries that are focused on ensuring that every region of our country benefits from economic development. We should make sure we also appoint people to represent those regions and to be the voice in cabinet of those regional development agencies and of the people who live in those regions.

How do I know there is a lot of concern? We just have to ask the people from Atlantic Canada. For example, Conservative leader Jamie Baillie, said, that appointing an ACOA minister from Toronto, “is yet another sign that the Liberals are taking Atlantic Canada for granted.” We saw that with the appointment of a Supreme Court justice from that region and how long it took for the current Liberal government to finally understand that Atlantic Canadians needed to have a voice on the Supreme Court.

We go on to Éric Tétrault, president of the Quebec Manufacturers and Exporters. He indicated that he hoped that the situation would not be a total loss and that a Quebec MP might be put in charge of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the regions of Quebec. Did that happen? Of course it did not. He went on to say, “We have quite a few development programs with them [being a government] in areas such as innovation and skilled labour. We are afraid they'll get mixed up with a national policy that won't necessarily work for Quebec. If we have to deal with officials as far away as Toronto or Ottawa to get the government to pay attention to problems with the Quebec economy, we're in trouble.”

We are hearing that across the country.

Let us go back. I was reading the Cape Breton Post, and this is what it said:

The more you push...out to big centres, like Toronto, Ottawa, or maybe, Montreal, as the base of decision-making for those organizations, the less in tune they are with the regions that they're trying to help the most.

As we focus on developing an economy that is truly going to share the prosperity of this country with every Canadian, with every community across this country, and with every region, the government has to understand that the government members need to have their ear to the ground in each of those regions. It is not enough to say, as the member across the way just suggested, that they have 32 MPs from the area. Do the Liberals have any representation when it comes to economic development?

The previous government understood full well how important it was to have a member of cabinet who was also designated the person to represent the interests in that person's region. That is why there were not a lot of complaints heard across Canada. One of the concerns I have is that this decision was taken because the Prime Minister has completely capitulated to our public service. We know that for years our public service has not necessarily been a big fan of these regional economic development agencies. Now of course the public service has the Prime Minister, who will do its bidding, and has eliminated the key ministers who could have provided the ears to the ground and the eyes in the region that would have allowed the government to make good decisions for economic development in every part of our country.

I have one last thought. Bill C-24 also lacks transparency. As I mentioned earlier, the bill would appoint three mystery ministers for whom the job description has not been defined. That is a lack of transparency. The government, by stealth, is trying to introduce ministerial positions and Canadians have no idea what the positions are going to entail.

Therefore, this bill, Bill C-24, is very disappointing to me, to our Conservative Party, and certainly to Canadians across this great country of ours.

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have heard a number of Conservatives refer to the Minister of Innovation as the minister from Toronto. We would be more than happy to bring forward a map for hon. members on the other side, because his constituents would think differently about where they are from.

The hon. member was concerned about Atlantic Canada, an area of the country in which the Conservatives did not win any seats. In terms of the hard work of 32 members of Parliament from Atlantic Canada standing up and demanding better than the previous government, we have seen $282.7 million invested in ACOA for innovative, evidence-based growth, working with the Atlantic immigration pilot project to increase immigration, which the Atlantic provinces want. Our minister is listening to the hard-working MPs who are bringing forward those concerns. Is that a concept that did not exist in the previous government? The results speak for themselves.

With the economy firing on all cylinders, how can the hon. member be opposed to this particular plan?

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we see the disingenuousness of that question when we think about energy east. Energy east was strongly supported in the Atlantic provinces but the Atlantic provinces did not have a regional minister who could advocate for them. What happened? The federal government stuck its finger into the pie, messed around a bit, interfered in the process, and energy east threw up its hands and said it is no longer going to invest in Canada. That is what comes from a Liberal government, a top-down, centralized government not in tune with the regions.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that the focus of the member's speech was more on the issue of regional economic development ministers. With respect to that, one of the funny things about this legislation is that the Liberals are keen to eliminate the option for separate economic development ministries to reflect the current practices of government, but they are not doing other things that would reflect the current practices of government, like getting rid of ministers of state. That would be a bad idea in our opinion, but it would reflect the current practice of the government. There is a double standard when it comes to what they want the legislation to reflect and what they do not want it to reflect.

I do want to come back briefly to the issue of gender equality in cabinet and back to the committee meeting where we learned some interesting things from some of the Liberals on that committee. One witness at committee said:

The second point I want to make is that to claim that it is about gender equality [not only is a mistake but] is dangerous. I think it's dangerous because too often we cut off the really important, substantial, and tough conversations about gender equality by claiming that we've already dealt with it and we've dealt with it in some more formalistic way.

That is why I suppose Liberals on committee were quick to deny that the bill was about gender equality, because they did not want to be doing that very thing, where they pretended that we had dealt with substantive gender equality issues when we had not in fact. That is why it is such a surprise to hear Liberals making that argument again.

I am wondering if the member has any thoughts on why Liberals today in the House would be so keen to muddy waters that their colleagues at committee thought it was important to keep clear.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, as the father of four wonderful grown daughters who have their own careers and who have really blessed our lives and blessed the lives of people around them, I know how important gender equality is, but it cannot be artificial gender equality and that is what happened here with the Liberal government. The Liberal government is great at photo-ops. It is great at using slogans, but when it comes to addressing the underlying reasons why women are not rightfully taking their place in our society, the Liberals are an absolute failure.

We need to empower women to understand that they can aspire to anything in this country, whether it is to be in the House of Commons, whether it is to be the CEO of one of the most powerful corporations in our country, whether it is to be the principal of their school, or whether it is to be in their home providing leadership as a mother, as a mentor, to their kids.

I concur with the member. Even though Bill C-24 pretends to be a bill that would strengthen the Liberal government's reputation for gender equality it actually undermines it, because it is fake.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-24, an act to amend the Salaries Act, also known as the “Seinfeld act”, as it is a bill basically about nothing.

Let us go back to the origin of the bill.

It is 2015, and the Prime Minister announces with great fanfare that the new cabinet will be gender equal, but it turns out the Prime Minister has reserved the five minister of state slots, the junior ministries basically operating inside other full ministries, toward women. However, no fear, the government quickly says that it is an error and they are made full ministers. Perhaps this was the very first recorded example of the early administrative confusion excuse the finance minister rolled out for his issues in missing out on announcing his villa in France. While I will note that it is gender equal, it had the highest percentage of women in the junior minister roles since Trudeau senior was in power.

Now I have no issue with the makeup of the cabinet being gender equal in number. However, I am disappointed the Liberals went with a quota system that excluded so many qualified women MPs in order to find roles for what was shown to be poorly chosen male ministers.

Think where we would be if the Liberal quota system had not foisted upon us the current finance minister, no ethical skulduggery, no conflict of interest by having the finance minister make policy decisions that just happened to enrich his family fortune while hurting average Canadians.

The government would not have had to appoint the member for Vancouver South as Minister of Defence, where he repeatedly claimed the glory of other battles of soldiers who risked their lives for Operation Medusa. We certainly would not have had the ongoing bungling of the sole-source Super Hornet debacle either.

However, when it comes to gender equality scandals and broken promises, like using taxpayer dollars to rent limos from party supporters, the Phoenix pay fiasco, and electoral reform, the Liberals have it nailed. Let us go back to Bill C-24.

I call Bill C-24 the Seinfeld bill because it is a bill about nothing. However, at least with Seinfeld, we got to have fun with Festivus, the Soup Nazi, and Kramer. With Bill C-24, it is basically a waste of time, a whole-of-government approach to a waste of time. Everything the bill would accomplish can be or already has been done. Equal money for ministers and ministers of state has been happening for the past two years: ministers of state through appropriations, and regular ministers, as before, from the general consolidated revenue fund.

The government House leader told us that all 30 members already “receive the same salary” and that this had been the case since the first day in office and would not change with the bill. So why the need for Bill C-24? Why take up time in committee and the House when there are so many other pressing matters?

We are told that the five junior minister of state titles need to be changed in order to have a voice at the cabinet table. How does this make sense? Are we to believe a minister of state with a groundbreaking idea or policy would be ignored at the cabinet table just because he or she had a different title? Surely the Prime Minister does not differentiate between opinions coming from ministers and ministers of state based on title alone. Gerry Butts seems to be heard loud and clear at the cabinet table, and he does not have a minister's title.

On second reading of Bill C-24, the Liberals spoke to the virtues of the bill, saying things like “we're committed to pay equity in our cabinet”. The Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board said, “This government is also committed to ensuring that pay equity extends to the cabinet table.” A Liberal colleague on the operations committee said, “we have chosen is to say that women deserve equal pay for an equal voice at the cabinet table.”

It was abundantly clear that Liberal after Liberal stood up and spoke to Bill C-24 with the intent of framing it in terms of gender equality, which was the message they wanted to send. The Liberal members of the government operations committee must have been just giddy with delight when the NDP requested a professor of law from UBC, who is an expert on gender studies, to appear to testify on Bill C-24. However, I was a first hand witness to their meltdown and disappointment when the witness tore into the government's legislation and communications regarding the framing of Bill C-24 in gender terms.

The expert witness said:

...this particular piece of legislation really doesn't...have much to do with gender equality...to claim that it is about gender equality is dangerous...because...we cut off the really important, substantial, and tough conversations about gender equality by claiming that we've already dealt with it

She went on to say that:

...women need these positions of leadership, not because of the actual amount of dollars, but because of the responsibility, the profile...the authority that those positions command.

It is very much like a CEO and a branch director being paid the same wage. They receive equal pay, but they are not equal. The CEO has to manage the company. The branch director manages one portfolio. While they receive the same pay, they are not equitable because the scope and responsibilities are not the same.

That is what the Prime Minister has done, and his party, dangerously, claims it is about gender equality. We heard in committee that to frame it as legislation that speaks substantially to the issues of gender equality and cabinet composition was wrong and dangerous.

In response to a question about whether the Prime Minister's claim of gender equal cabinet was cynical, the witness expert replied that it was dishonest on behalf of the government.

The Liberals immediately attempted to walk back the previous statements made by dozens of Liberal MPs in this very place that Bill C-24 was about gender equality. The member for Newmarket—Aurora said, “I don't think anyone was proposing that this was a gender equity bill.” The member for Châteauguay—Lacolle tried to simultaneously claim that Bill C-24 was a good first step, which the witness rejected, and then tried to reframe the question by asking if the junior ministries were more emerging ministries. Yes, all ministers are equal but some are more emerging than others.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, Anthony Rota]

I hate to interrupt the hon. member but I am having a hard time hearing that riveting speech. People are talking among themselves. It is nice to hear people talking among themselves, but maybe just reduce it to a whisper.

I will let the hon. member continue.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I am shocked. Mr. Speaker.

As I was saying, all ministers are equal but some are more equal and emerging than others, it appears.

The member for Don Valley East, to her discredit, labelled the witness's testimony as disingenuous because Bill C-24 had nothing to do with gender equality. If it is not about gender equality and it is not actually needed to do anything about what the government has already been doing pay and organization-wise the last few years, what is it for and what does it do?

It also formalizes the centralization of regional ministries under the minister from Mississauga. If ever there was a more perfect analogy for the Liberals' attitude toward the rest of the country, I cannot find a better example than a minister from suburban Toronto holding regional ministries from the west, Quebec, and Atlantic Canada. It is a slap in the face to these regions in Canada. I would much rather have a ministry of western economic diversification to advocate on behalf of the west than the three Liberal MPs from Alberta, who deign to represent their province second and toeing the party line first. The Liberal government has been AWOL when it comes to Alberta.

The government House Leader insists that a whole-of-government approach will serve regions better because everyone will be in on the conversation. Of course she did not fail to mention that diversity was our strength, although she was referring to regional diversity in Canada this time. She said, “Regional expertise with national expertise is a way for it to work better together to create a synergy, to take a whole-of-government approach.”

I apologize for those sitting at home watching this on CPAC. I know people are rolling their eyes so far back in their head listening to this statement that they have probably sprained their eye muscles.

They then went on to use the words “whole-of-government approach” 11 more times in justifying having the minister for western diversification being based in Toronto. Except with this whole-of-government approach, we have no one to step up and advocate for Alberta. Certainly not the three Liberal MPs we have from Alberta, all three who did Oscar-worthy impressions of mimes when it came time to speak up for energy east.

Alberta Conservative MPs presented to the government the Alberta jobs task force, with many recommendations for help with our jobs crisis. We asked for infrastructure funding to tackle the issue of orphaned wells. It would have put highly-skilled people back to work in Alberta and Saskatchewan and helped the environment. What did our minister of economic diversification based in Toronto get us? Well, he managed to find taxpayer money to pay out bonuses to the billionaire owners of Bombardier.

What about those superclusters we hear so much about? Well, a few weeks back I received a text from a friend of mine who was flying in to Calgary. He noted that the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development was on the same plane. I figured, great, he was going to Calgary to announce that we were getting a supercluster. Unfortunately we heard that the Alberta supercluster application, which is the clean resource innovation network made up of a consortium of think tanks, universities, the provincial government, and oil and gas bodies, was shot down. The minister commented that it was rejected because of an overlap of superclusters for agriculture and construction. That is regional expertise working with a synergistic conversation for a whole-of-government approach working for Alberta.

Rather than present legislation that addresses the job crisis in Alberta, or helps with these parts of the country struggling with the opioid crisis or the myriad of other issues affecting livelihoods and survival of Canadians, we get Bill C-24, focused on upping salaries in attempt to fix a mistake the Prime Minister made, legislation on titles and salaries that really does nothing that the government has not already been doing for the past couple of years.

I await the day that the Liberals move beyond government by words, tweets, selfies, and feel-good statements. Retracting Bill C-24 would be a good first start.

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

Mr. Speaker, the member is correct. We do not have that regional minister in western Canada. However, we have had more development in western Canada in the last couple of years than we had in the last many years of the Stephen Harper government. We can talk about the increases of western diversification. We can talk about infrastructure dollars going into rural western Canada. We can talk about so much—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!