Debates of Feb. 2nd, 2017

Housing

[Wayne Long, Liberal, Saint John—Rothesay, NB]

Mr. Speaker, homelessness is a terrible, preventable situation lived by too many Canadians. I was proud to see our government increasing the homeless partnering strategy funding by $111.8 million.

Could the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development (Housing and Urban Affairs) give us an update on our government's work on this very important file?

[Adam Vaughan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for Saint John—Rothesay for his concern and advocacy on this issue, and in particular his strong support for the Outflow and Coverdale shelters in his riding.

Homelessness affects all of our communities, and all of us have a role to play in ending it. Yesterday, we announced the call for nominations to establish an advisory council of experts and stakeholders to help the government as it reviews and renews the homeless partnership strategy.

This committee, which I will chair, will have members chosen through an open and transparent process. Canadians with lived experience and people with knowledge of the program and who deliver front-line services will be encouraged to apply. I would also stress that indigenous and Inuit voices must be heard through this process. People can check Canada.ca for information.

Regional Economic Development

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

Mr. Speaker, if the Liberal government had not imposed arbitrary deadlines on the Connect to Innovate program, and if it had listened to the regions in Quebec and Canada, there would be no need to change the dates today as it just did. By all accounts, the minister from Toronto knows very little about Canada's regions.

Will he extend the deadline by another two or three months, since the municipalities are unable to submit plans under the current program?

We had also asked for more money to build cellphone towers in our regions because of the significant problems we have in Canada.

Can the minister tell us when we can expect to have that money?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Minister of Innovation]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for again talking about the connect to innovate program.

We had extensive consultations with municipalities and stakeholders when we designed the program. We actually announced the program in our 2016 budget, so people are well aware of this initiative and our government's commitment to deal with that digital divide and make sure we invest in our rural and remote communities.

This is a significant investment. When leveraged with the private sector, it has the potential of a billion-dollar investment. This is significant for our regions. We are listening to our regions. That is why we extended the date to April 20.

International Trade

[Monique Pauzé, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be very brief, but very clear.

Will the government honour Quebec's requests and formally undertake to fully compensate the losses of our dairy producers before, with the emphasis on “before”, the vote on the free trade agreement with Europe?

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food]

Mr. Speaker, I think my hon. colleague is fully aware that this government has been consulting dairy farmers right across the country, including in Quebec. With that consultation, we put a program in place that involved $350 million to make sure the dairy farmers and processing sector were innovative.

We have worked with the supply management sector, particularly the dairy sector, and we will continue to work in support of the dairy sector.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the European free trade agreement could help promote Quebec. We have an opportunity to build a bridge between Europe and America. However, we will not abandon our people. We will not support the agreement if the government sacrifices our agricultural and dairy producers. Canada-Europe relations must not be forged by creating hardship for the families in our regions.

Will the government fully compensate Quebec producers and, ultimately, not deem them to be collateral damage?

[François-Philippe Champagne, Liberal, Minister of International Trade]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague knows very well that CETA is in the national interest and that we have listened to all Canadians. I can guarantee one thing: trade brings growth and growth brings jobs to ridings across Canada. We will continue to listen to our agricultural producers and we will continue to have a trade vision that includes the entire country.

Business of the House

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the government about the business for this week and next week. However, you may recall that before we rose for the Christmas break, I asked the government if it would consider a take-note debate regarding the job situation in Canada and, specifically, the job losses in the energy sector.

Again, I ask the House leader if she would please let us know the business for this week and next week, and when we will be able to have that important take-note debate.

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and Minister of Small Business and Tourism]

Mr. Speaker, this afternoon, we will continue the debate that we began this morning on the Conservative Party's motion. Tomorrow, we will begin the report stage debate of Bill C-30 on the Canada-European Union comprehensive economic and trade agreement. Monday, we will resume debate of that bill.

Next week, we will also continue the second reading debate of Bill C-36, an act to amend the Statistics Act, and Bill C-31, an act to implement the Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine.

Next Thursday, February 9, shall be an allotted day.

Last, there have been consultations among the parties and I believe you would find agreement for the following motion. I move:

That a take-note debate on the subject of job losses in the energy sector take place, pursuant to Standing Order 53.1, on Wednesday, February 8, 2017, and that, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, (a) any member rising to speak during the debate my indicate to the Chair that he or she will dividing his or her time with another member; and (b) no quorum calls, dilatory motions, or requests for unanimous consent shall be received by the Chair.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

Does the hon. government House leader have the unanimous consent of the House to propose the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

The House has the terms of the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

(Motion agreed to)

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

The Chair has received notice of a question of privilege from the hon. member for Red Deer—Lacombe, and we'll go to that now.

The hon. member for Red Deer—Lacombe.

Alleged Use of Office Space in Parliamentary Precinct

[Blaine Calkins, Conservative, Red Deer—Lacombe, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege regarding a tweet by Canada 2020 advertising that it was opening offices in the parliamentary precinct. The tweet, dated January 27, 11:47 a.m., states, “@Canada2020 almost there! New floors next week - 2100 Sq ft of meeting space #canada2020 in the Parliamentary precinct #cndpoli”.

Section 79.51 of the Parliament of Canada Act with respect to the Parliamentary Protective Services, defines the precinct as follows:

parliamentary precinct means the premises or any part of the premises, other than the constituency offices of members of Parliament, that are used by the following entities or individuals or their officers or staff, and that are designated in writing by the Speaker of the Senate or the Speaker of the House of Commons:

(a) the Senate, House of Commons, Library of Parliament or Parliamentary committees;

(b) members of the Senate or House of Commons who are carrying out their parliamentary functions;

(c) the Senate Ethics Officer or the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner; or

(d) the Service.

On the Public Works website, it defines the parliamentary precinct as “home to Canada's federal legislature and is an iconic symbol of our country's commitment to democracy and peace.”

As you know, Mr. Speaker, Canada 2020 cannot take up shop in the home of our federal legislature, and the only commitment it can boast of is receiving largesse from the Liberal government. Apparently, it is not good enough for Canada 2020 to be an entity of the Liberal Party of Canada; it now wants to give the impression that it is part of the parliamentary precinct.

My question of privilege touches on two points: one, the misrepresentation of Parliament; and two, the breach of subsection 80(1) of the Parliament of Canada Act.

A prima facie case of privilege was found on May 6, 1985, when the appearance of a newspaper advertisement identified as a member of Parliament someone other than the sitting member. Canada 2020 tweeted out that it was part of the parliamentary precinct, misrepresenting itself as part of the parliamentary family. I would argue that this misrepresentation constitutes an affront to the House and to members of Parliament.

In the Ontario legislature, Speaker Stockwell dealt with a question of privilege concerning a pamphlet that was issued by the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing regarding the government's program for reforming municipal government in metropolitan Toronto. On January 22, 1997, Speaker Stockwell ruled the matter to be a prima facie question of privilege since the pamphlet gave the impression that passage of the required legislation was not necessary.

Simply put, no one or organization, even the government itself, can misrepresent what Parliament does or who is a member of Parliament, or as Canada 2020 is attempting to do, misrepresenting its role in relation to Parliament.

Further, and this is my second point in relation to the use of such references as Canada 2020 tweeted, the principle of Canada 2020's offensive tweet can also be explained in subsection 80(1) of the Parliament of Canada Act:

Notwithstanding anything contained in any Act of Parliament or regulation made thereunder, no person shall use the words “Parliament Hill” in combination

(a) to describe or designate a property, place, site, or location in the National Capital Region described in the schedule to the National Capital Act other than the area of ground in the City of Ottawa bounded by Wellington Street, the Rideau Canal, the Ottawa River and Kent Street;

(b) to identify any goods, merchandise, wares, or articles for commercial use or sale; or

(c) in association with a commercial establishment providing services.

No one would be surprised if Canada 2020 advertised the opening of a new office in the Liberal Party's headquarters, for example, and as I said in my opening remarks, no one is surprised that Canada 2020 is essentially an entity of the Liberal Party, but it is an affront for Canada 2020 to be passing itself off as an entity of Parliament. It is there where it has crossed the line.

Mr. Speaker, if you find this to be a prima facie question of privilege, I am prepared to move the appropriate motion.

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

Mr. Speaker, I think what we will do is take this as notice from the member and if we have something to add, we will do it at a future time. I am a bit reluctant at this point to add further comments. Suffice to say, beyond the social media, I suspect there are all sorts of entities and individuals and so forth that might make reference to the sense of pride they have for our parliamentary precinct and the Parliament Buildings and so forth.

Without reading too much into it, if there is a need for us to respond to it, we will in time.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

I thank the hon. member for Red Deer—Lacombe for his intervention and the background on his question of privilege. I also note that the parliamentary secretary to the government House leader has indicated to come back at some time in the near future and address the question.

Accordingly, we will take the matter under advisement and get back to the House in due course.

Message from the Senate

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

I have the honour to inform the House that a message has been received from the Senate informing this House that the Senate has passed Bill S-2, An Act to amend the Motor Vehicle Safety Act and to make a consequential amendment to another Act, to which the concurrence of the House is desired.

The House resumed consideration of the motion, and of the amendment.

Opposition Motion—Taxes on Health and Dental Care Plans

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I wish you and your family a happy 2017. This is the first time that I have had a chance to address you in the House.

I am very pleased to participate in today's debate on taxation. I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, who will contribute to the debate in her own way.

First, I would like to assure the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent that the government does not intend to tax health and dental benefits, as the Prime Minister indicated in the House yesterday. I must admit that I am a little puzzled by the motion moved by the hon. member for Louis-Saint-Laurent since we have already made a commitment in this regard. He said that he was concerned about the middle class, but he and his colleague have made decisions in the past that have been harmful to the middle class.

For example, in December 2015, the Government of Canada took an important first step to strengthen the middle class by cutting taxes for nearly nine million Canadians. The member for Louis-Saint-Laurent and his Conservative Party colleagues voted against that measure.

Next, we raised taxes on the richest 1% of Canadians, those whose taxable income exceeds $200,000 per year, to finance the Canada child benefit. Again, the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent and his Conservative colleagues voted against that measure.

We stayed on course with budget 2016, which invested in Canadian families by replacing the old child benefit with the new Canada child benefit, a simpler, more generous, better targeted, completely tax-free benefit. As I said, the Conservatives voted against it.

In budget 2016, we also indicated the importance of enhancing the integrity of Canada's tax system to protect the nation's tax base for us all. What did the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent and his colleagues do? They voted against it.

In contrast, the Liberal government knows that the middle class is the very foundation of a strong economy. That is why our number one priority is building an economy that works for Canadians and their families. A stronger middle class means that hard-working Canadians can enjoy a good standard of living and a better future for their children. Who could find fault with that? The answer is: the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent and his Conservative colleagues.

We on this side of the House know that when the middle class is doing well, everyone does well. We believe that investments are needed today in order to strengthen and grow the middle class, help young Canadians succeed, and support anyone who needs help to get ahead.

Not only did we make those decisions, but we also thought of ways to strengthen Canadians' desire to follow the rules. We all know that Canadians have no respect for people who break the rules and that they expect their government to crack down on people who do not play by the rules. That is why our government is committed to combatting international tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance. To achieve that, we presented an action plan that strengthens existing efforts at home and abroad and includes new measures that were announced in budget 2016.

That is what we are doing. The Minister of National Revenue announced a series of measures that the Canada Revenue Agency will take to fight tax avoidance and tax evasion thanks to a dedicated investment of $444.4 million in budget 2016.

This funding will allow the Canada Revenue Agency to hire additional auditors, develop a robust data collection infrastructure, increase audit activities, and improve the quality of investigations in Canada.

With this additional staff, the CRA will be able to increase the number of audits of high-risk taxpayers by 400%. Furthermore, the government will streamline its efforts by including lawyers on its investigative teams so that cases can be quickly brought before the courts.

We have taken measures to hire auditors to ensure that we can address these issues and to see whether people are avoiding paying their fair share of taxes along with all Canadians. We are also taking measures to streamline this process so that cases can be brought before the courts as soon as possible.

We are also looking beyond our borders. That is why Canada was a very active participant in international efforts to fight tax evasion. All these changes prove that we are doing something about this.

I will come back to the question from the hon. member for Louis-Saint-Laurent. What did he do to support these measures? Did he vote in favour of the budget to improve our system and ensure that people pay their fair share of taxes? No, he voted against the budget. Did he vote in favour of reducing taxes for the middle class? No, he voted against that. It is ridiculous.

I am puzzled by the debate proposed by the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent. He is a very experienced politician, having been a member of the National Assembly of Quebec, the province where I was born. I must say that it is rather odd that such an experienced man has moved this motion for debate when he and his colleagues did nothing to lighten the tax burden for the middle class. We, the Liberals, have done our part.

I will continue talking about our international efforts to reduce tax avoidance for a few minutes, because I know that is of interest to the hon. member for Louis-Saint-Laurent and all my colleagues in the House.

We cut budget 2016 by $221 million thanks to the elimination of unnecessary government travel, government advertising, and excessive consulting fees. These cuts were made because we saw that the former Conservative government needlessly spent a lot of money on partisan advertising. It spent three quarters of a billion dollars on advertising between 2006 and 2015. That is incredible. Among other things, $750 million was spent on partisan signs for the economic action plan.

That money could have been used to implement measures to ensure that Canadians pay their taxes. A good portion of that money could have been used to improve the lives of middle-class Canadian families, particularly families with children. That money could have been used to fund tax cuts for the middle class.

Canadians are not stupid. They cannot be taken for fools. Canadians saw things clearly during the 2015 election. They voted for the Liberal Party. They voted for measures to help the middle class. Since we took office, they have known that our main goal is to always help the middle class.

I am very proud of that. I know that all of my colleagues on this side of the House are very proud of the fact that we are helping the middle class. I am sure that we will continue to do so with these measures. We will ensure that middle-class Canadians are well treated.

In closing, it is an unbelievable waste of time to have the House debate something that was already decided yesterday when the Prime Minister announced that he did not intend to tax health benefits.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to note that we have heard the Prime Minister say many things over the course of the election and over the last number of years, whether it be on electoral reform or many other areas. Then, of course, he has done the opposite.

Having a vote would be very comforting for the many Canadians who are concerned about what might be happening with not only this but perhaps some of the other tax grabs they are looking at.

My question is more focused. The member talked a lot about the so-called middle-class tax reduction. I want to know two things. When he was campaigning, did he tell his constituents that it would benefit people who made around $180,000 or $190,000 the most? Did he also reiterate the promise that it would be revenue neutral, when it ended up costing billions of dollars? It was a very bad math mistake.

I would really like to hear what the member said to his constituents about that.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Hull—Aylmer, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I can say that I had a great time meeting with Canadians, knocking on doors, and talking to them about what we would do if we had the opportunity to form government. One of the very solid promises we made to Canadians was that we were going to come to the aid of Canada's middle class, and that is exactly what we did.

Our first measure in the House of Commons as a government was to reduce taxes for middle-class Canadians.

I find it a little odd that the hon. member and members of her party, who claim that they are so concerned about those things, voted against that measure. It is a simple measure. It is not a partisan measure. It is a good measure that would have helped out all Canadians, yet they voted against it.

If we are going to be talking about comforting ideas, one thing that left me very uncomfortable was seeing those members vote against a good—

[The Deputy Speaker, Bruce Stanton]

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Courtenay—Alberni.