Debates of June 14th, 2017

Concurrence in Vote 1—Privy Council Office

[Phil McColeman, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Madam Speaker, absolutely, I do. We do reconcile them, through the supplemental estimates that we have right now. The process we have has worked well. As the parliamentary budget officer said in his quote, parliamentarians have done an admirable job in lining them up. They will never be lined up totally. That would depend on when the Minister of Finance decides to table a budget. It will never be perfect. This by no means even comes close to those alignments being perfect.

Frankly, The Globe and Mail is wrong about that. I have been here nine years, and I have worked through the supplemental estimates process, lined up what the spending has been relative to, what the budget presentations have been and, frankly, I agree with the parliamentary budget officer and not The Globe and Mail.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Madam Speaker, I want to read further from the PBO report on estimates reform. He said:

Before agreeing to changes proposed by the government, parliamentarians may wish to visit the core problem that undermines their financial scrutiny: the government's own internal admin processes. President of the Treasure Board's policy papers mention these can materially delay the implementation of government programs...Supplementary (B) tabled on November 3 contained 51 measures worth $1.7 billion that was originally proposed seven months earlier in the budget.

It is very clear that changing the date of the estimates is not going to help with the alignment if the government is still taking 7 to 18 months to get programs out the door. Why does my colleague think the government is trying to change the Standing Orders and preventing parliamentary oversight?

[Phil McColeman, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Madam Speaker, it kind of goes back to the question of, what is the motive here? Is it truly pure, as has been attempted to be presented, that this would truly make things more understandable for parliamentarians?

There is nothing in these changes to simplify how the numbers are reported. Frankly, if we look at the size of these documents, and the detail to which they go, they are not an easy read. They are not easy for people who do not have an accounting numbers orientation to be able to sort through. I would rather see the emphasis of the government to try to make them more understandable, make them more readable, than with the alignment.

The alignment is a good thing. I am not suggesting it is a bad thing. However, the real motive here is to actually chip away at the scrutiny that we have as parliamentarians, all parliamentarians, not just the government, because the government can do what it wants when it has a majority. However, the question has to be asked, if we make these changes, and we have a minority government, what are the long-term effects of these changes? In this case, it is taking away some of the scrutinizing powers that opposition has if we go with these changes, as written.

There has been some talk of them being open to amendments, and open to negotiation on certain things. I await what those might be. However, the reality is that, as proposed, the real motivation is just to make life a little easier for them.

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Madam Speaker, I find it somewhat ironic that we are tonight debating the main estimates, or the government's projection for what it is going to spend this year. It is ironic, because there is little if any chance the Liberal estimates bear any relation to reality.

Perhaps we need to change the parliamentary wording. All of us on this side of the House, and probably on the other side, would be more comfortable if we were to refer to it as the wild guesses put forward by the government. Perhaps, given its desire to legalize marijuana, we could call it pipe dreams. That would probably be a better description. Certainly, this spending program has no basis in reality.

If we want reality, I would encourage members to look at the accomplishments of our previous Conservative government under the leadership of Stephen Harper. During the worst economic downturn since the great recession, Canada had the best job creation and economic growth record among G7 countries. We reduced taxes to the lowest point in 50 years, with a typical family of four saving almost $7,000 per year from what they were paying under the previous Liberal government. Also, after running a targeted stimulus program that created and maintained approximately 200,000 jobs, we kept our promise to balance the budget, and we handed the Liberals a surplus in 2015.

Of course, we all owe our thanks to the late, great Jim Flaherty for his steady guidance over several years. Today, that surplus is a forgotten memory, lost to history, as are the Liberal promises of electoral reform, or a small budget deficit. Instead, we have out of control reckless spending with no plan to bring any fiscal order to Canada's finances.

The government may realize that money does not grow on trees, but it is hazy on where it comes from. Certainly, the basic economic fact that borrowed money must eventually be repaid, and with interest, does not seem to have made its way into the Liberal financial handbook. From what I can see, the Liberal economic plan is a simple one, stumble along blindly and hope the Conservatives will come back and fix it in 2019.

The Liberals have failed to grow the economy. According to the parliamentary budget officer, economic growth forecasts for 2016-2021 are lower today than they were when the Liberals started their spending spree. The PBO says the Liberals' infrastructure plan added only .06% to GDP, and created only 1,900 jobs in 2016-17, far lower than promised in budget 2016.

Philosopher George Santayana is often quoted as having said, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” I do not know whether he had the Liberals in mind when he made his observation, but the government certainly proves the truth of his observation. As in the 1970s, the Liberals' reckless spending is causing public debt to grow uncontrollably. Our nation still has not repaid the massive Liberal debt incurred then, and the government is adding to it and repeating it.

I have a message for the Minister of Finance, information that may be new to him that he might find helpful in his planning. Borrowed money must be paid back. At some point in time, those who have been so eager to lend him money are going to want their money back, and definitely with interest. When that happens, he is going to have to find the money. He is going to look like crazy for money everywhere, and no better place, as the government has a history of doing, but to reach deeply into the pockets of Canadians to make up for its crazy spending it always repeats.

What has happened is that money has to be repaid. The obligation is obvious to us. The government has no idea how it will pay the debt back.

Madam Speaker, you and I both know how the Minister of Finance is going to pay for this reckless spending. I suspect he knows, too, but he does not want to admit to Canadians that he has no plan. I am sure he knows Liberal governments have historically paid for overspending only by raising taxes.

In the words of Ronald Reagan, “Death and taxes may be inevitable, but unjust taxes are not.” We have seen this already.

The Liberals have already raised taxes on middle-class families, students, and small business owners, whether it is the CPP tax hike on youth, middle-class families, and small businesses, killing jobs and small businesses. They have cancelled incentives such as the children's fitness tax credit, the children's art tax credit and the textbook tax credit. The Liberals are raising taxes, all the while claiming they are not. The irony is that they claim they are not, while they are doing it, and doing it badly.

When they kept the small business tax rate at 10.5%, when it was supposed to down to 9%, and ended the hiring credit for small businesses, they showed they did not understand the importance of small businesses to the Canadian economy.

I was a business owner before entering political life, so I know how business works. The finance minister apparently does not understand that increasing taxes on businesses is not the way to create jobs. Increasing taxes on businesses kills jobs. That may be why the job-creation record of the government is so dismal, so low, and a disaster. I suppose that lack of understanding on the Liberals' part explains why they are so eager to impose a carbon tax on all Canadians, a move that will increase consumer prices on practically everything, while killing jobs in the process.

We need to protect our environment. However, I fail to see how a carbon tax, which will put people out of work, will help Canadians and our economy. I must admit the financial numbers the government has put forward are impressive. They are certainly not based on reality and are certainly not what Canada needs, but they are still impressive.

Looking at them, I can only come to the conclusion that the finance minister has missed his calling in life. He is obviously wasted in this place where the true nature of his talent is not appreciated. I would suggest that in the future, he present his budget, his estimates, his fiscal updates, and other financial statements not to the House, but to His Excellency the Governor General.

The minister may be unaware of it, but each year the Governor General presents an award for the best work of Canadian fiction published for that year. From what I can see from the numbers being presented to the House, the minister would be guaranteed to win this year's fiction award. Maybe in the future the Liberals will adopt some economic policies designed to help, rather than hurt, the Canadian economy and ordinary Canadians. I look forward to that day, no matter how unlikely it seems.

We really can learn from the lessons of history. That is why, after a few years of reckless Liberal government spending, we know the Conservative Party will be trusted by the Canadian people to put together a fiscal policy that will be in the best interests of all Canadians.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Madam Speaker, I do enjoy some time on the finance committee with the member for Edmonton Manning. He mentioned fiction. There really was a lot of fiction in that speech.

I will give the member a little history about debt in our country.

During the Mulroney years, the debt went up, and that was a Conservative government. Then the Chrétien and Martin years was when the government had to make hard decisions. I come from a region where those hard decisions really hurt. The government made those decisions, balanced the books, and had a surplus for eight or nine budgets.

Then Mr. Harper came along and drove us into $170 billion dollars worth of additional debt in the country. It was not just the debt that was the problem; it was the services he cut. He cut back on the military. He had the lowest spending on the military of any prime minister in 50 years. While he talked a different line, he cut the investments into science and research.

The budget from the Liberal Minister of Finance makes investments. The target for balancing the books is not there yet, but we will not create fiction. We will take our time and do it right. We have invested in infrastructure and research and science. Why can the member not see that this investment is there for the future, for our children and grandchildren?

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Madam Speaker, you probably could have given the chair of the finance committee a few more minutes to make his own speech. I am really enjoying what the member has just said.

The member talks about cutting down. We all know that when there are financial difficulties and we are going through a recession, the worst since the first great recession, people need to take all the proper measures if they are truly good managers, businessmen, and financial managers. Those measures were taken by the Conservative government to fix the economy. We came back with a surplus in 2015 and balanced the budget.

Since the hon. member mentioned balancing the budget, why do you not stick to the old rules and why do you not read the books of the previous government on—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order, please. I remind the member that he is to address his comments and questions to the Chair.

The hon. member for Hastings—Lennox and Addington.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member opposite likes to talk, as the previous member said, a little fiction. I would like to remind the member about some of the investments our government has made in infrastructure, billions into innovation, into the Canada child benefit, where $5.9 million goes into my own riding every month to help 9,600 families. Seventeen thousand children will benefit. All that money is spent locally in my riding. That has had a huge economic impact on my riding.

I would like to remind the member as well that economists keep upping their growth projections for Canada, going from 2.6% in January to now 3.5%. In his mind, are these investments not making that kind of a difference?

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Madam Speaker, in reality, what the member calls investment, we call crazy and unnecessary spending. If this can really be called investment, it should come with good results on the ground. We are not seeing those results.

The reports from the PBO show that your return on investment is next to nothing and is therefore not helping. The strategy the Minister of Finance is using is not the right one, is not working, and you must reconsider.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Again, I want to emphasize that the member should not use the word you. It would be so much easier to address the questions and comments to the Chair. That way there would not be any interruptions.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona.

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

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to the main estimates tonight. I will pick up on a theme of the discussion so far, at least for part of the evening, on the topic of the estimates, particularly estimates reform and how we could do a better job of bringing financial transparency and therefore accountability to Parliament.

It was a theme of the President of the Treasury Board early on in his mandate. He reached out to other parties to talk about it. He even presented a briefing package on some ideas he had for reform and how to address some of the problems, which had to do with a number of things. In some cases it is the alignment, as we have discussed tonight, between the budget document and the estimates documents. There is also a difference in the way the accounting is performed for each document. The budget is done under accrual based accounting, whereas we have cash accounting in the main estimates. There is sometimes confusion for parliamentarians around some of the line items because they are not attached to particular programs.

All these issues were identified by the President of the Treasury Board, with some proposals to fix them. I, along with my fellow Treasury Board critic from the Conservative Party, noted that a lot of these reforms really were things that needed to be done administratively by government. They were not things that required a legislative fix.

In the beginning of this reform, if we looked at the President of the Treasury Board's reform package as a whole, it really was not a bad package. It is fair to say that if we could adopt it holus-bolus, it would move us in the right direction for parliamentarians and Canadians to better understand Parliament's financial documents and therefore provide more openness and transparency. The proposal for moving forward ended up being not the kinds of things a government could do administratively, which are ultimately required for those reforms to be a success.

However, the first ask was that we change the Standing Orders to simply allow the main estimates documents to be tabled later. That, in and of itself, does not provide any guarantee of better financial documents, financial documents that are easier to read. It does not provide a guarantee that the budget and the estimates will align. It simply allows the government to take more time to table the main estimates, which may well be used by a sincere well-meaning government to make those documents cohere. However, it may be abused by other kinds of governments we have seen in this place from time to time.

It is hard to understand why, with a well-outlined program for reform, the only thing the government seemed to be trying to aggressively advance, and in some ways it was putting the cart before the horse, was the one thing that would diminish accountability unless there was a lot of serious follow-up from the government.

We have cause to be skeptical at this point in the government's term about its good faith with respect to these kinds of things. The mood here, rightly, is far more skeptical about its commitment to openness and transparency than it was at the beginning of the term.

I offer up the example of Glen McGregor, a reporter from CTV. He recently asked, under an access to information request, to get an itemized list of the overall number of staff, not the particular staff, in the Prime Minister's office and their salary range. What he got was a list with every name blacked out. That is hardly a step in the direction of accountability and transparency.

When the President of the Treasury Board comes forward and asks us to trust the government and consent to backing up the date for the tabling of the main estimates, because it believes in being more open and transparent, and then a reporter wants to know how many people are employed by the Prime Minister's office and what their pay range is, not the specific people and the specific pay, and receives an answer that clearly flies in the face of openness and accountability, we have a reasonable cause to doubt the sincerity of the government and its proposed change.

This was the same tactic used by the Harper government when it was asked similar questions about the PMO.

When the Liberals were elected, they said they were going to make changes, that they were going to be more transparent and provide more accountability. Now the Liberals are asking us to change the Standing Orders in a way that would allow an insincere government to simply reduce time for scrutiny, and then they pull stunts like that, not providing legitimate information about their staffing and their spending when they easily could. It becomes hard to trust them.

The government is also becoming notorious for making big funding announcements but back-ending the funding. The Liberals talk about big numbers, such as $180 billion being invested in infrastructure, but just a tiny fraction of it will actually be spent in this Parliament, never mind this budget year.

The government says we should trust it when it wants to change the tabling date of the main estimates. It claims to be sincere. It says it wants more openness and more transparency, yet every day in question period ministers get up and misrepresent the amount of money the government is actually investing. We could pick any issue. The government is doing this with respect to defence, to housing, to child care, and it has done it with a number of other issues. I could spend a full 20 minutes just listing the policy areas where the government is daily misrepresenting information and executing a lack of transparency.

It makes me wonder, and I think fairly, whether we can trust the Liberals when they present their big shiny package of reforms to make the estimates better. They just want to do this one little thing for themselves first, and then they expect us to trust them that the rest will come.

We heard that from the President of the Treasury Board apparently quite sincerely at the beginning of his mandate. He came to the access to information, privacy and ethics committee many times to say that he wanted to reform access to information laws in this country. He said he wanted a government that was open by default and that the Prime Minister shared his views. He stated it was in his mandate letter. He told us at committee that the government was going to move forward with its reforms to access to information and it was going to be done in a two-stage process. Incidentally, no reform is needed for access to information requests in order to disclose of the number of staff in the Prime Minister's Office and their salary ranges. They can just do it. They do not need to wait on reform for that.

If the Liberals wanted to model the kind of open and transparent government that they foresee by changing the Standing Orders and by changing the law, they could do it tomorrow. In fact, they should have started doing it well before yesterday, but they did not.

In terms of the commitment by the President of the Treasury Board to have a two-stage reform to access to information, he made a couple of administrative reforms, but nothing in the law itself. We have waited a long time. In fact, we were supposed to be debating legislation in the House by now that would have changed the access to information regime, but we are not. Not only are we not debating it now, but we are not going to be debating it any time soon. That announcement was made by the minister himself. He announced that the changes will not be coming, at least not any time soon.

I raise this point because it is important. If we are being given the “just trust us” line by a government that wants to change the estimates process in a way that would ultimately reduce scrutiny unless the government was acting in very good faith, then as an opposition party it is our duty on behalf of Canadians to ask if we can trust the government on this proposal.

When we take into account the Liberals' behaviour in disclosing information under the current access to information regime, which they could do much more readily than they do, and when we take into account their record on other issues where they have said they were going to do something and then reneged, any right-thinking Canadian would look at their record and say we need to stick with what we have until they are ready to bring in more of the package at the same time so that some of the other elements that introduce more accountability and more transparency come with the change. That change would be tolerable if the other measures were in place. What is not tolerable is to move ahead with that alone and expect to get openness and transparency from the government later.

We just saw today a vote on a way to make appointment processes more open and more transparent. That did not come out of nowhere. That came out of a catastrophe on the government's part, in trying to nominate a candidate to become an independent officer of Parliament and failing miserably to select a candidate who could perform that function, because in order to be an independent officer of Parliament, the person has to enjoy the confidence not just of the government but of all the parties in Parliament.

There are ways of establishing processes that would allow them to nominate candidates that could hold the respect of all the parties in Parliament. We suggested one yesterday in our opposition day motion. After they criticized it, they said, “Everything else is good, but there is one thing we cannot agree to”, so we amended it to solve that problem for them. They still would not support that motion.

Again we hear, “Just trust us on the estimates reform. We are going to move ahead with this one tiny piece of the whole package.” The package together actually makes a lot of sense, but they are asking us to just trust them that they are going to follow up. It is simply not believable. On access to information, for instance, we just heard recently that in the Liberals' first 18 months in government, their track record on access to information is worse than the previous government's track record in its last 18 months of government. We are just not at the point anymore where the “just trust us” line is adequate.

It is important to try to understand these documents better, because significant things end up happening within the context of the main estimates. One of the consequences from these estimates in my home province is that the Coast Guard facilities in Gimli, Manitoba, and in Kenora are going to be shut down. An open and transparent government that was serious about having people understand what it was doing when it came to the finances of the country and the financial decisions that it was making would have gone out and consulted with people in the community and made it clear. It would not have buried it in a line item in the main estimates or in the budget. Government members would have gone out and talked to people in the community about the reasons for the closures.

It could be that the government felt those services were not effective. That is not what we hear if we talk to people in the community, who, with respect, know better than people here in Ottawa. I have asked before in this House, and I will ask again: how many of the seven Liberal MPs from Manitoba knew before it was announced that those Coast Guard stations were going to be closed, and what lobbying did they do to prevent it from happening? Clearly they failed, if they made any effort at all, but it would be nice for people back home to know what the Liberals are doing to represent people back home.

There is a story that just broke in the Winnipeg Free Press about Canada 150 money. A reporter who has followed the money said that Manitoba is clearly not getting its fair share of the Canada 150 funding. Again, where are the seven Liberals from Manitoba who ought to be advocating for us to make sure that we are getting our fair share? It was not until I raised the issue of the post-secondary institution strategic investment fund here in the House that we started to see at least some announcements being made in Manitoba under that fund. When we are talking about how the government spends its money, it is right to ask where the Manitoba Liberals are on those files and why it is that in a number of cases Manitoba has been consistently under-represented in terms of its fair share of funding.

It is another fair question to ask where is the federal government is when it comes to meaningfully dealing with OmniTrax, which has not been doing its fair share in terms of the community in Churchill. OmniTrax, after getting a sweetheart deal to take over the railway, has been getting a lot of money in public subsidies, and that money has been going to Denver, Colorado. It has not been reinvested in that railway. Now that there is a flood, the rail infrastructure is inadequate and the town of Churchill is in crisis because the people cannot get food and other supplies to town. We just have not heard the quick response that is needed to provide assurance to people in Churchill that they are not going to be left out in the cold by the current government. I say again, where are they and where is the money when we are talking about estimates and we are talking about a budget?

Those are just some of the problems.

I appreciate my colleague from the Conservative Party bringing up the issue of estimates reform, because it is an important issue and it is something we have to tackle. However, I emphasize that what it comes down to when we talk about reform is sequencing that reform properly to ensure that members of this House who are not in the government have the appropriate tools they need to hold the government to account all the way along. Otherwise, we are in a position of having to press them on reform.

Another important reform issue in this Parliament was the government's commitment on electoral reform. I think that speaks quite clearly to the character of the government and why people on this side of the House cannot trust it.

The government made a black-and-white promise that 2015 would be the last election under the first-past-the-post system. The Liberals spent a lot of money to break that promise. They struck a special committee that travelled across the country. It took up the time of Canadians who were calling for action and who were not paid to go to testify at that committee. If they had been paid for their time, because their time also matters, the bill would have been that much higher. The committee came back and put the report together, and it was tossed aside by the minister at the time.

Then the Liberals had the gall, I think knowing already they had no intention of keeping that promise, to go out and spend literally millions of dollars on a bogus survey that was designed to obfuscate the issue and give them an out, which was the special committee, because the Liberals, despite saying that they wanted Parliament to be a place where people would work together, were hoping that the opposition parties would not work together. The opposition parties went out, did that, and showed them a way to keep their own promise.

It is pretty wild when the opposition parties are working harder to keep government promises than the government itself. However, that was the situation. Not only were opposition parties working hard, but they were also willing to compromise in order to help the government keep its promise. Instead, the Liberals threw that out. They spent millions of dollars on a survey trying to hide the fact that there was the potential for consensus if the government would show leadership.

How can we have a government that shows leadership? I imagine the process looks something like having the leader of a party promising something during an election, putting it in the party platform, and having candidates across the country repeat that promise ad nauseam. Then that party would be elected and follow through on that commitment. That is how it would be done, and that is exactly what Canadians did. To say there was no consensus or that the government did not have a mandate to provide leadership on democratic reform is just obviously false.

Nevertheless, the Liberals broke that promise. They let down all the many Canadians who elected them for that express purpose. Then, when it comes to something as important as the scrutiny of their spending, they ask us to trust them to get around to the rest of the program if we do this one thing that could reduce the scrutiny of a government if it is not acting in good faith in the face of all of the broken promises and everything else. That is what the Liberals are asking us to do, and they should not be surprised if the answer is no, we do not believe we can.

It is for at least those reasons, and those that I have not had time to get into, that the NDP will be opposing the main estimates.

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

Madam Speaker, I believe the NDP are being true to form in the sense of opposing, even though what we are proposing is something that is very good for all Canadians.

My colleague from across the way challenged what it is that Liberal MPs in the Province of Manitoba are doing for that province. I can tell the member that we have a very strong representation in the province to ensure that the issues of Manitoba are in fact being raised at the cabinet table, in the caucus, on the floor of the chamber, and in many different ways.

I would suggest that these are things the member should be voting for. However, he is voting against issues such as the Canada child benefit, which thousands of children in Manitoba will benefit from. He is voting against the middle-class tax cut, which thousands of Manitobans benefited from. He is voting against the increases to the GIS, which thousands of Manitobans are benefiting from, and the list goes on. Therefore, when we talk about the main estimates and the types of things the member will be voting on, he needs to be aware that, through his vote, he would take away the opportunity for Manitoba to be a part of the national scene in which people are receiving great enhancements.

We are doing things, such as infrastructure, that is making a difference for Canada's middle class and those who are aspiring to it. The member across the way, along with his NDP cohorts, have made the decision that Canada is not going to have the types of activities that we are proposing within this budget, which would in fact enhance the lifestyle of all Canadians, including those who live in Manitoba.

Why is he opposing that?

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

Madam Speaker, the member has been in the House for some years now. I would encourage him to revise his speaking notes for the budget when he decides to get up and speak to the main estimates.

While it is true that there is a lot of money in the budget for some things, it is all back-loaded to 10 years from now. The main estimates actually speak to the spending this year, and the spending in the main estimates, as opposed to what is projected for 2027, 2034, or 2058 in the budget, is far less.

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

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague for his speech and for his passionate work in the House. He is advancing the cause of democracy by his common-sense approach when he comes here and calls it like it is.

My benchmark is from global business. I worked for several multinational corporations. When it came to budgets and estimates, it was clear that we were able to see all the money that was planned to be spent, and we were able to drill down on the line items and know exactly what was going to be spent. However, that is not possible with the government, because we have main estimates, supplementary estimates, and we have supplements that come after the supplementary estimates. There is absolutely no way for Canadians to understand how their tax money is being spent.

I would ask the member how that represents openness and transparency.

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

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for giving me the opportunity to return to the issue of estimates reform, because the member is quite right. I do not think that is the opinion of just the opposition parties. In fact, it is the opinion of the government, or at least the President of the Treasury Board, that the estimates process is quite convoluted, and that opinion is shared by many people in civil society who are at the forefront of examining government spending. The question becomes how do we change it.

It was promising, initially, to see the President of the Treasury Board present a package on how we could have a better estimates process. I said in my speech, and I will say again, that as a whole package, it looks pretty promising in terms of being able to get a better system that is more comprehensible for not just us here but also for Canadians generally. However, as always, the devil is in the details. How do we implement it?

When the government says that it has this great package that has a number of reforms, most not requiring Standing Order changes and which would actually advance the cause of transparency and openness more than a simple change to the Standing Orders, but that is what the Liberals want to start with and that alone, then the issue is whether we trust the Liberals to follow through on the rest of the package. Then we go to some of the examples I raised in my speech where they have promised a two-stage reform, for instance, on ATI, but have not done it, where they promised democratic reform and launched a whole process that came to naught.

This is why we have to assess the character of the government, and when we do, based on its record, we come up with the answer that we cannot trust the Liberals to go ahead with that one little piece first. We have to have more substantive reform that comes with it.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, in the Province of Manitoba, they have the estimates. The member would be very familiar with that, and I served there. Under the estimates, what would happen is that they would present the budget and then, shortly thereafter, they would start to debate the estimates.

I will not be critical of the NDP, which reduced the number of hours from, at one point, 240 hours of line-by-line debate down to about 100, and I think it might have reduced it further than that. I will stay away from that for now.

It seemed to be a proper procedure. I wonder if my colleague from across the way would agree that what was happening in Manitoba with respect to having estimates brought in after the budget is a good principle?

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

Madam Speaker, my understanding of the estimates process in Manitoba is that members get considerably more time with ministers to interrogate them about spending than we do here. For instance, here, we are lucky to get a minister at committee for an hour or so. In Manitoba, they just went through an estimates process where ministers were before committee for days, being asked questions.

If the member is recommending that we adopt a model like that here, then I would be quite interested in hearing more about that proposal. I think there are many members in the chamber who would love to have a minister before committee for days because, he is quite right, there is a lot of departmental spending, departments are very large, and it is difficult.

For instance, we are debating the main estimates here in the chamber tonight for four hours. That is the sum total of the main debate on the main estimates. Some committees will have a minister before them and examine their spending for probably not much more than for an hour. That is not actually a lot of time.

He is right to notice that there are substantive differences between the estimates process here in Ottawa and in Manitoba. Manitoba grants far more access to ministers during that process than is done here. I take that as a point of interest. Perhaps it is something we will return to.

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

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the words of my colleague from the NDP. He and I have served together on committee, notably, the ethics committee, for the better part of the last two years, and he brought up some of the issues that we faced on that committee. The committee has actually done excellent work. All members from all parties in the House have actually done excellent work. We made recommendations on changing several pieces of legislation, the Access to Information Act, the Privacy act, and now we are undergoing a study of PIPEDA, as well. The government has stated quite clearly that it has no intention of actually bringing back any of the legislative changes in response to any of the committee reports that we put forward.

My question for my colleague, and he brought it up in his speech, is this. How can we, in good faith, when the estimates process is again up for debate by the Liberal government as something it wants to change, know that it is going to keep its word when it has not kept its word on anything? It wants to change the process of how the House works, yet it cannot even nominate a new commissioner. It cannot even get that process right. I wonder if my colleague thinks it can get any process right.

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

Madam Speaker, I am a very hopeful person, so I will hope that it can and it just has not yet. However, that remains to be seen. It is up to the government to make good on that hopeful remark. It is frustrating.

I will maybe just examine another angle of my frustration with the position of the government, and not just in respect to access to information, but I think it makes the point well. We hear often, when it is convenient for the government, that it appreciates the work of committees and it wants to send things to committee and it wants to have it studied, and that is a great virtue. The government did not feel that way about the infrastructure bank because it did not want to break that off and actually have a committee have more time to look at it. The government cherry-picks. It liked the work of the committee on Bill S-217, which we voted on earlier. It cherry-picks when it likes the work of a committee and when it does not.

Interestingly, the work that we have done on the access to information, privacy and ethics committee generated, and members can correct me if I am wrong, two unanimous reports. One report was on access to information reform. It was a commitment of the minister that he would bring forward legislation this spring, which he has subsequently changed and has not given a new date by which he will bring that legislation in. We also had a unanimous report on reform to the Privacy Act.

In no case has the government taken that work of the committee, unanimous work, which means six Liberals on the committee endorsed all of those recommendations, and picked one recommendation that it would put into law. Again, the government's word is not worth much.

[Andy Fillmore, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Democratic Institutions]

Madam Speaker, after nearly a decade of partisan exploitation by the previous government, we are following through on our commitment to Canadians to build a more effective and less partisan Senate that works for everyone.

Canadians elected our government on a promise of openness and transparency, and it is our job to stay focused on those who have put trust in us. The interests of Canadians should always be placed above political allegiances, and our government is committed to restoring and creating a less partisan Senate appointment process.

Canadians were clear in the last election. The status quo of the Senate needed to change, and since then we have made major strides to deliver on that promise. Believing that our government should focus its efforts on the priorities of Canadians and not on more rounds of constitutional negotiations, we have implemented meaningful changes and have developed a process to appoint senators that is merit-based and non-partisan, while also being more open and transparent than ever before. These advances are crucial to restoring the confidence of Canadians in the Senate and to reinvigorating an institution that performs vital functions in our parliamentary democracy.

Shortly after taking office, our government announced the establishment of an Independent Advisory Board for Senate Appointments in order to provide advice to the Prime Minister on potential candidates to the Senate. This independent advisory board is guided by merit-based criteria in order to identify qualified, hard-working Canadians who can make a significant contribution to the work of the Senate. Additionally, this criteria has helped to ensure that a high standard of integrity, ability to collaborate, and non-partisanship have become central qualities in every Senate appointee. This new Senate appointment process has also aided in reinventing the Senate's fundamental role in our parliamentary democracy, and has done so while staying within the framework of our Constitution.

Our government knows the important role the Senate plays in our Parliament, so following the announcement of a new Senate advisory board, our government moved quickly to appoint seven new senators whose appointments immediately helped to reduce the partisan nature of the Senate, while also greatly improving the representation of the provinces that currently hold the most vacancies.

Additionally, as part of our government demonstrating its commitment to the new appointment process, we named one of these initial independent appointees, Senator Peter Harder, to serve as the government's representative in the Senate. Born in Winnipeg, Senator Peter Harder was the first independent senator appointed under the new selection process, coming into the red chamber with nearly 30 years of experience in federal public service in addition to a decade serving as a volunteer in various organizations and as a member of several boards of directors. He also served as president of the Canada China Business Council.

Senator Harder was first appointed as a deputy minister in 1991 and continued with this role under five different prime ministers and 12 different ministers over nearly 16 years. This included time in the Departments of Immigration, Public Safety, Industry, the Treasury Board, and Foreign Affairs. As deputy minister, he oversaw the legislative process of countless bills and has appeared before the standing committees of the House of Commons and the Senate. In his current role as government representative in the Senate, he is leading efforts on reform for a more accountable and transparent institution, while also working within existing Senate rules to ensure Senate business can be effectively coordinated with the government.

Over the course of the three months leading up to the announcement of these seven new senators, the Independent Advisory Board for Senate Appointments undertook broad consultations in Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec, and provided the Prime Minister with a number of qualified candidates. This process was designed to help ensure the Senate is reflective of Canada's diversity. From that pool of candidates, the Prime Minister selected the seven new senators to be appointed by the Governor General.

In addition to Senator Harder, this group included the likes of Chantal Petitclerc and André Pratte from Quebec, Justice Murray Sinclair and Raymonde Gagné from Manitoba, and Ratna Omidvar and Frances Lankin from Ontario. These senators are not only qualified appointments, but over the past year that they have spent in the Senate, they have embodied the true, hard-working nature that I know all parliamentarians aspire to.

As a result, I would like to take some time to highlight a few of these exceptional individuals. Having served in the justice system of Manitoba for over 25 years, Justice Murray Sinclair represents this hard-working nature. As the first indigenous judge to be appointed in Manitoba, in addition to being only the second in Canada, he served as the co-chair of the Aboriginal Justice Inquiry in Manitoba, and as chief commissioner of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. As head of the TRC, he participated in hundreds of hearings across Canada that culminated in the issuance of the TRC's report in 2015. He also oversaw an active, multi-million dollar fundraising program to support various TRC events and activities and to allow survivors to travel to attend TRC events.

I would also highlight Senator Ratna Omidvar. Since arriving in Canada from Iran, Senator Omidvar has proved to be experienced in issues concerning immigration, multiculturalism, diversity, citizenship, integration, and minority rights. Recognized in 2010 by The Globe and Mail as one of Canada's top nation builders of the decade, she was also chosen by The Economist magazine in 2015 as one of the top 10 diversity champions worldwide.

Senator Sinclair and Senator Omidvar not only represent the true importance of merit-based appointments but also demonstrate, above all, the impactful role a less partisan Senate can have in tackling some of the most important and pressing issues facing our country.

The appointment of these initial seven senators and the introduction of the independent Senate advisory board in the spring of 2016 was followed by the launch of the second phase of the independent Senate appointments process, which opened up the ability to apply to be a senator to all Canadians.

In recognition of the important role the Senate plays in regional representation, the second phase also included the appointment of eight additional provincial members of the Independent Advisory Board for Senate Appointments. The appointment of these additional provincial board members not only improved the representation of all regions across Canada but also brought more voices to the table to contribute to making these important decisions.

Since taking office, our government is proud to say that we have made a total of 27 non-partisan, independent, merit-based appointments to the upper chamber through the new process. In doing so, we have respected the constitutional framework while also ensuring that our provinces and territories have increased representation in the process.

Our government knows the important and valued role the Senate plays in Parliament and in our democratic institutions. We greatly applaud the work the Senate itself has done in transitioning toward a more independent and less partisan institution. We respect that more senators from all political stripes have chosen to sit as independents. Above all, it is clear that these changes reflect a move toward a more open and transparent institution.

Take, for example, the nine current Senators who were previously chosen as partisan appointees but now sit as independents. These now independent Senators, many of whom were appointed by previous prime ministers as partisan nominees, chose to put partisanship to the side and instead focus on the importance of integrity, collaboration, and strength in Canada's democratic process. This choice not only respects Canada's constitutional framework but represents monumental strides toward a truly effective and less partisan upper chamber.

I would like to take some time to highlight some of these individuals. Appointed in 2013, after being nominated by former prime minister Harper, Senator Douglas Black is an example of someone who was originally appointed as a Conservative but chose to drop partisan stripes and become an independent in the interest of non-partisanship. As one of Canada's most influential lawyers prior to joining the Senate, Senator Black exemplifies non-partisanship by continuously working with members of all parties and putting the interests of Canadians first.

The same can be said for Senator Larry Campbell. A Liberal partisan appointed by former prime minister Paul Martin, Senator Campbell has spent his time in the chamber doing valuable work on topics ranging from drug policy to mental health and aboriginal issues. Much like Senator Black, Senator Campbell also chose to put the interests of Canadians ahead of political allegiances when he dropped his partisan stripes and became an independent. Building on this, our government has made clear that our new independent and non-partisan Senate appointment process will, above all, respect the independence of senators like Senators Campbell and Black.

Our government has time and again recognized the importance of a truly effective Senate and its fundamental function in our valued democratic institutions. Through its role in representing regional and minority interests in our legislative and democratic process, it is foundational to the framework of our parliamentary democracy.

The interests of Canadians should always be put before partisanship. Our government has been crystal clear on this fact and in our commitment to fixing the damage done by the previous government. We were elected on a promise to change what had become the status quo in the Senate. To meet the expectations of Canadians, we developed this new Senate appointment process.

This new Senate appointment process, in addition to the work the Senate itself has done to transition toward a more independent and less partisan institution, is crucial to restoring the confidence of Canadians in the Senate and to reinvigorating an institution that performs vital functions in our parliamentary democracy. Furthermore, it shows that a less partisan Senate is possible. As we move forward, we can continue to work toward a future in which the Senate can truly be seen to conduct itself as an effective legislative body.

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

Madam Speaker, the member talked a lot about the selection of senators and how wise they are, how qualified they are, and how they are able to bring that independent view we are looking for. I would ask why the government is rejecting all the amendments the senators are bringing.

[Andy Fillmore, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

Madam Speaker, right now we are extremely focused on engaging senators and improving both Houses. That is the path forward. Fundamental to that is this new process of merit-based appointments we have put in place. As these appointments continue, we will find that we have a Senate that is able to work more effectively over time. The government will be working with that place to ensure that government priorities and legislation will proceed through the House.

[Kennedy Stewart, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Madam Speaker, continuing an earlier theme, I wonder if the government has any plan to achieve gender balance in the Senate. Does it have any plan to make sure that as we replace members, the Senate will be 50% men and 50% women?

[Andy Fillmore, Liberal, Halifax, NS]

Madam Speaker, we are actually coming very close to gender parity in our Senate appointment process. It is a goal we in the House all hold closely. As we go through this merit-based process, based on fairness and accomplishments and geographic representation, I think we are going to achieve gender parity in the Senate.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am very interested in how the Senate has made a change in the government, after 150 years of history, in moving toward a more open process and the merit-based system. We now have a mix of senators. Some are partisan appointments and some are from the new system. Could the parliamentary secretary expand on where we are heading in terms of the appointment process and how the Senate will evolve in the future?