Debates of April 23rd, 2018

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, Minister of Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, the member opposite is on record as calling on our government to spend more money for faster processing of asylum claims and border security operations. Budget 2018 delivers exactly that. What is absolutely irresponsible is for that party to preach to us on border security when it cut almost $400 million from the CBSA, jeopardizing the same border security that its members are complaining about now. We will put our record up against the Conservatives' record any day.

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

Mr. Speaker, I do not think our former government had 400 people illegally entering Quebec every day. Every time we point out that the Prime Minister is allowing the flow of illegal border crossers to dramatically increase, the Liberals talk about how much taxpayer dollars they are spending. It is kind of like having a hole in one's roof during a storm but the plan is to replace the hardwood every day.

Why is the Prime Minister prioritizing Canadian tax dollars on making it easier for people to illegally enter the country and stay here for years with social benefits instead of stopping the flow?

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, Minister of Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, what a responsible party does is it invests in border security. We have done that in budget 2018 with an investment of $173 million in border security operations and faster processing of asylum claims. There is $74 million for the Immigration and Refugee Board so that refugee claims can be heard faster.

The Conservatives do not have that record. Their record is they left us with a massive backlog in asylum claims at the IRB. Their record is they left us with fewer border security operations as a result of cutting almost $400 million from CBSA. They have a shameful record on this issue.

Public Safety

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this weekend we learned that ISIS fighters returned to Canada with chemical weapons knowledge. ISIS terrorists are known to use commercially available toxic chemicals in attacks on civilians. It is unacceptable that Canadians only learned of this through the access to information process.

I will ask again, are those violent traitors under surveillance, yes or no?

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness]

Mr. Speaker, we are obviously constantly monitoring the situation to ensure that any individual who poses a threat to the country is immediately apprehended and brought to justice. I would hold out that when the party opposite was dealing with people of interest and concern, the 60-some individuals who were of concern during its mandate, not one charge was laid. We currently have two. Where we have evidence, we pursue that.

I would state as a last comment that with respect to the incident he is talking about, the risk level was rated as extremely low.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is ridiculous that any bit of information Canadians are getting on this is through an access to information request. It is clear that the Prime Minister has no respect for Canadians when he keeps refusing to be transparent on this file. The Prime Minister is prepared to accept these traitors as “an extraordinarily powerful voice for preventing radicalization”, but he has not even heard their confessions.

Again, who are these terrorists and where do they live?

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness]

Mr. Speaker, if there is a problem, if there is any evidence of wrongdoing or ill intent against Canada, then our government and our officials will take immediate action without question. The evidence is irrefutable. During the Conservative governments' mandates, no one was charged.

Under our government, there are two. Where we have evidence, we act.

Pensions

[Karine Trudel, NDP, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the government has so far failed to come up with any solutions to help workers and retirees who have been negatively affected by recent bankruptcy proceedings, such as the closure of Sears. At this weekend's Liberal convention, the party encouraged the government to finally do something. The NDP put forward a much more practical proposal in Bill C-384 that would put an end to pension theft once and for all.

Will the government support this bill?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Minister of Innovation]

Mr. Speaker, our government has been very clear when it comes to strengthening pensions. That is why in the last budget, we put forward a plan to make sure there was a whole-of-government approach when it comes to strengthening pensions. This goes above and beyond the measures we have taken to support the CPP. We will continue to work with other departments and officials to make sure we come forward with a robust plan to help provide more pension security for Canadian workers.

[Scott Duvall, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals have no plan in the budget. Workers and retirees expect their government to change Canada's bankruptcy and insolvency laws to protect their interests and to end the theft of their pensions. The government and the party's resolutions talk nothing more than consultations. Canadians do not need more consultations. They need action. The NDP has given the government the fix in Bill C-384.

When will the government get on with the job instead of fooling around with these meaningless “calls for inaction”?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Minister of Innovation]

Mr. Speaker, what is disappointing to hear from the member opposite is his lack of support for the budget measures we put forward to strengthen Canadian pensions. We have been very clear about income security, making sure that we provide the adequate resources for those individuals who retire to make sure they have the support they need to retire with dignity. The pension initiatives we have put forward in our budget reflect our government's commitment. We will continue to advance that in a meaningful way, and we hope the members opposite will support us.

The Economy

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, today the Parliamentary Budget Officer revealed that the carbon tax would erase $10 billion from Canada's economy by the year 2022. I filed access to information requests asking how much this tax would cost the average Canadian family.

The finance minister has the numbers, but he has redacted them from documents released. Will he reveal today how much that tax will cost the average Canadian family? How much?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians know that climate change is real and they expect their government to take responsible and effective action while strengthening our economy and creating good middle-class jobs.

Let us be clear: Canada's GDP is measured in the trillions of dollars. We are talking about roughly the same rate of growth with or without carbon pricing, and that is just one side of the coin: the PBO did not model the economic opportunities that are driven through the innovation that the carbon pricing will provide. Putting a price on pollution will help in addressing a critical environmental issue while concurrently unlocking enormous economic opportunities going forward for this country—

[The Speaker, Geoff Regan]

Order. I am afraid I have to remind the hon. members for Abbotsford and Durham that we wait our turns to speak and do not interrupt when someone else is speaking. Of course, the Standing Orders provide for not interrupting them, so they will not want to do that in the future.

The hon. member for Carleton.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, not only is the government redacting the cost of the carbon tax, but it is also redacting the minister's ability to answer questions on the issue here in the House of Commons. Most of us do not blame it for doing that, having heard some of his answers in the past.

The member across the way says that the PBO failed to calculate the wonderful opportunities that the carbon tax will bring to the economy, but the only opportunity that the PBO found in his calculations is the loss of $10 billion of annual economic activity.

How much will that tax cost the average Canadian family?

[Jonathan Wilkinson, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change]

Mr. Speaker, the memo that the hon. member refers to was released months ago, was discussed previously in exchanges in the House, was actually prepared under the previous Conservative government, and clearly thus does not represent the approach to the pricing of carbon pollution that we have negotiated and developed with the provinces and territories.

Carbon pricing works. It creates a powerful but low-cost incentive to cut pollution, encouraging people and businesses to save money by reducing their energy use and investing in clean solutions that will help to create good middle-class jobs.

The Budget

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if the government has nothing to hide, then it does not need to use all of that black ink to cover up the cost of the carbon tax to the average Canadian family.

Speaking of costs, we learned today that the government's already promise-breaking deficit will be even bigger than the finance minister admitted just a few months ago. He said it would be $18 billion; now the PBO says it will be $22 billion, almost a 20% increase in only a couple of weeks.

How did the finance minister get his numbers so wrong again?

[Bill Morneau, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the good news for Canadians is clear: there are more Canadians working and there has been better economic growth, and it has all been about the policies that we have put in place.

We put out our fiscal forecasts in our budget and we stand by those forecasts. It is important to listen to the Parliamentary Budget Officer, but in this case what we are saying is that we stand firmly behind the forecasts that we put out, the forecasts that show a declining level of debt to GDP over the five-year term, the forecasts that show that we are able to be fiscally responsible while investing in Canadians and helping Canadian families. We stand firmly behind those forecasts.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that was not the only bad news for Canadian taxpayers, present and future: we also learned today that Canadians will spend vastly more on federal government debt interest. By 2022, the cost of servicing our national debt will rise by two-thirds, to almost $40 billion. That is as much as we spend, as a government of Canada, on health care.

How is it in the interests of Canadian taxpayers to fork over more to wealthy bondholders instead of funding our treasured social programs?

[Bill Morneau, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, let us consider what is in Canadians' interests. What clearly is in Canadians' interests is to invest in Canadian families. What clearly is in Canadians' interests is to make sure that Canadians are working. Our country works when Canadians are working, and that is exactly what we are showing.

We are showing the highest rate of growth that we have seen in a long time, and that is because in 2015 Canadians made a decision to go against the failed policies of the previous government and to invest in Canadians' future. That is what we are doing.

Natural Resources

[Kennedy Stewart, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, 26 minutes into his April 15 news conference, the Prime Minister guaranteed Canadians that construction will finally begin on the Kinder Morgan pipeline within weeks, but he needs to explain how this is possible. The company has met fewer than half of the 157 required National Energy Board conditions, one-third of the final route has not yet been approved, and now the company is begging for relief on many conditions and wants to delay detailed route hearings.

Is the Prime Minister now going to override the authority of the National Energy Board so he can force this pipeline through British Columbia?

[Jim Carr, Liberal, Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, the pipeline was approved by the Government of Canada with 157 conditions because we believe that the pipeline will create good jobs for Canadians, will open up export markets so that we do not have to rely on only one single market, the United States, and at the same time will give us a better price for a our resources. It makes very good economic sense.

At the same time, there is the $1.5 billion investment to create a world-class oceans protection plan and a co-developed monitoring scheme with indigenous peoples.

Growth, environmental stewardship, and partnership with indigenous peoples—that is the recipe for growth.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Mr. Speaker, coastal communities are alarmed about the marine impacts of Kinder Morgan's new pipeline: a sevenfold tanker traffic increase, a terrible oil spill response, bitumen spill risks, traffic harming orca whales, and disrespec for indigenous rights. Instead of protecting these vital public interests, the Prime Minister is more concerned with protecting the interests of a Texas-based oil company.

Why will the Liberals not stand up for B.C.'s coast and keep the promises they made to indigenous leadership?

[Jim Carr, Liberal, Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member said a sevenfold increase in tanker traffic. Actually, it is one more tanker a day—one—which will be surrounded by world-class spill response at a time when indigenous people, for the first time, have been involved from day one in becoming a part of the monitoring of the safety of the line, and we believe that we are going to leave the backyard of indigenous people better than we had found it.

Infrastructure

[Filomena Tassi, Liberal, Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas, ON]

Mr. Speaker, our government came into office with a promise to make investments in our communities to make them stronger, more sustainable, and more inclusive. In Ontario and in my riding of Hamilton West—Ancaster—Dundas, communities have benefited by these early investments.

Provincial and municipal leaders have said that they require long-term and predictable funding so they can plan ahead. Can the Minister of Infrastructure and Communities update this House on investments the government is making in Ontario?