House of Commons Hansard #312 of the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was iran.

Topics

(Return tabled)

Question No. 1710-Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

Conservative

Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB

With regard to the testimony at the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance on March 1, 2018, by the Assistant Commissioner, International, Large Business and Investigations Branch of the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), regarding monetary incentives and debt collection at the CRA: (a) what percentage and what absolute value of assessed taxes, including personal, corporate, and excise taxes, did CRA not collect between 2007 and 2017 inclusively, broken down by year; (b) of the taxes owing but not collected in (a), what percentage of debts (i) were collected in the following year, (ii) were collected within two years, (iii) were collected within five years, (iv) were collected after five years, (v) have not been collected to date; (c) what options or authorized measures can CRA deploy to recover tax debts; (d) of the debts in (a) which were eventually collected, what percentage were recovered by each of the measures in (c), broken down by year; (e) by what criteria are CRA employees evaluated with respect to success or failure to collect debts owing; (f) for auditors, assessors, and collectors at CRA, what performance metrics are considered for employee evaluations and how are they ranked or weighted; (g) on what evidence is the audit change rate of 75% based; (h) what is the acceptable error rate for audits and assessments respectively; (i) what measures exist at CRA to reduce the error rate of individual auditors and assessors; and (j) what protocols exist at CRA to correct errors made by auditors or assessors before objections or appeals are filed by affected taxpayers?

(Return tabled)

Question No. 1711Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

Conservative

Cathay Wagantall Conservative Yorkton—Melville, SK

With regard to materials prepared for Associate Deputy Ministers and Assistant Deputy Ministers from December 1, 2017, to present: for every briefing document prepared, what is the (i) date on the document, (ii) title or subject matter of the document, (iii) department’s internal tracking number, (iv) title of individual for whom the material was prepared, (v) sender?

(Return tabled)

Question No. 1712Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

June 11th, 2018 / 4:45 p.m.

Conservative

Cathay Wagantall Conservative Yorkton—Melville, SK

With regard to materials prepared for Deputy Ministers from December 1, 2017, to present: for every briefing document prepared, what is the (i) date on the document, (ii) title or subject matter of the document, (iii) department’s internal tracking number, (iv) sender?

(Return tabled)

Question No. 1713Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

Conservative

Cathay Wagantall Conservative Yorkton—Melville, SK

With regard to all expenditures on hospitality (Treasury Board Object Code 0822), since December 6, 2017, and broken down by department or agency: what are the details of all expenditures, including (i) vendor, (ii) amount, (iii) date of expenditure, (iv) start and end date of contract, (v) description of goods or services provided, (vi) file number, (vii) number of government employees in attendance, (viii) number of other attendees?

(Return tabled)

Question No. 1714-Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

Conservative

Cathay Wagantall Conservative Yorkton—Melville, SK

With regard to materials prepared for Ministers from December 6, 2017, to present: for every briefing document prepared, what is the (i) date on the document, (ii) title or subject matter of the document, (iii) department’s internal tracking number, (iv) sender?

(Return tabled)

Question No. 1716Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

Conservative

Dane Lloyd Conservative Sturgeon River—Parkland, AB

With regard to overtime pay for departmental communications staff since January 1, 2016, broken down by year: what is the total cost of this overtime, broken down by (i) department, agency, or other government entity, (ii) individual communication staff title?

(Return tabled)

Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

Liberal

Kevin Lamoureux Liberal Winnipeg North, MB

Madam Speaker, I ask that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.

Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

NDP

The Assistant Deputy Speaker NDP Carol Hughes

Is that agreed?

Questions Passed as Orders for ReturnsRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Standing Order 69.1—Bill C-59Point of OrderRoutine Proceedings

4:45 p.m.

NDP

Matthew Dubé NDP Beloeil—Chambly, QC

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I will try to be brief out of respect for our Conservative colleagues because today is their opposition day. I am taking this opportunity because of the vote that took place earlier today to adopt Bill C-59 at second reading and report stage.

I will quote what the Chair said in response to a point of order I raised a while ago about applying Standing Order 69.1 to this bill.

The Speaker said:

However should the motion in fact be adopted to send the bill to committee before second reading and should the bill be concurred in at report stage and at second reading, I could certainly, as the Speaker, apply Standing Order 69.1 at third reading of the bill. At that time, one would anticipate that after it came back from committee, the bounds of the bill and its principles would be more clearly established.

For that reason, I come back with the same point of order. I would simply refer the Chair to the statements I made on November 20, 2017 to the record of that day. I made the same points. I would only add that the point is even more strongly made following the committee process. As we went clause by clause, different officials from different departments had to be present on different days as we went through different elements. That only reinforces the fact that not only under this legislation, but also where there are disparate pieces that obviously pertained to different acts in different departments, so they would be deserving of different votes.

I hope the Speaker will agree that there should be separate votes because there truly are different elements, especially concerning the Communications Security Establishment, which reports to the Minister of National Defence. The minister had to sneak into the committee at 10 to midnight to make a presentation. I think even the government acknowledges that some elements are in no way related except for some vague national security connection, which I feel is not a good enough reason for Standing Order 69.1 not to apply.

Standing Order 69.1—Bill C-59Point of OrderRoutine Proceedings

4:50 p.m.

NDP

The Assistant Deputy Speaker NDP Carol Hughes

I appreciate the member's comments. We will certainly consider the information he just provided us and other information and deliberate on the matter. We will come back as needed.

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona, International Trade; the hon. member for Saanich—Gulf Islands, The Environment; the hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, Foreign Affairs.

The House resumed consideration of the motion.

Opposition Motion—IranBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

4:50 p.m.

Conservative

Steven Blaney Conservative Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC

Madam Speaker, I thank you for giving me the opportunity to finish my presentation on today's motion, which seeks to strongly condemn the current regime in Iran and more specifically a terrorist state.

It is often said that you have to turn on to politics, or politics will turn on you. The same can be said of terrorism. Unfortunately, yesterday we saw hate speech come out of the demonstrations that were held in a number of our major cities. It was an incitement to violence.

In Canada, we have freedom of expression, but sections 318 and 319 of the Criminal Code also state that promoting the genocide of or inciting hatred against an identifiable group is completely inconsistent with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Criminal Code. Unfortunately, that is what we saw yesterday when demonstrators called for the destruction of a democratic country in the Middle East, Israel, and its people.

I am raising this topic in debate because yesterday was the international al-Quds day, which was established in 1979 by Ayatollah Khomeini, an Iranian dictator. The purpose of this event, which originated in Iran but is financed in several western countries, including, unfortunately, Canada, is clearly to destroy a democratic country.

This is why it is important for every member of this House to take a strong stand and support the motion to strongly condemn terrorism and those who support it.

Opposition Motion—IranBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

4:50 p.m.

Conservative

Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB

Madam Speaker, I want to ask my colleague for his thoughts about a comparison. There has been a lot of discussion today about the question of diplomatic relations and when it is appropriate to downgrade our diplomatic relationship with another country. The current government, though, has downgraded our relationship with other countries in response to human rights abuses. In one case, we wish the government would be more vocal on these issues, but in the case of Venezuela, the government did announce that it was downgrading its diplomatic ties with the country in response to some of the very serious human rights violations happening there, including saying that Canada's embassy there will only be headed by a chargé d'affaires rather than an ambassador.

It is interesting that we have the government on the one hand seemingly open to upgrading our diplomatic relationship with Iran, at least based on some of the comments we have heard today about the language in this motion, but then clearly understanding, in the case of Venezuela, that it is sensible to downgrade the relationship, or at least not to upgrade it, when there are terrible violations of human rights. I wonder if my colleague has comments on this comparison, and why this illustrates further that we should not be moving forward in a way that the government has in the past talked about, in terms of warming up relations with Iran.

Opposition Motion—IranBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

4:50 p.m.

Conservative

Steven Blaney Conservative Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his thoughtful comments and for standing up for human rights. Canada must not ignore Iran's abuses, but unfortunately, the Liberal government seems to be numb to these abuses. We saw this during question period.

It is completely unacceptable for the organizations involved in yesterday's protests to promote hatred against the state of Israel to receive subsidies from the Liberal government. There is a real disconnect between their speech and reality.

I hope that members will support this motion, denounce terrorism, and walk the talk. Canadians must no longer indirectly finance organizations that promote terrorism here or abroad.

Opposition Motion—IranBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

4:50 p.m.

NDP

Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC

Madam Speaker, New Democrats believe that we should be talking to the people in countries we may not agree with. That is the only pathway to peace. When the Conservatives closed their embassy in Iran, it left Canada in a position, when we had consular cases, where we had nowhere to go. In fact, we have to use our agents in Italy or Jordan if we have a consular file in Iran, or the special interest section in Washington. We need to have clear communication directly with Iran when it comes to consular files. It would be like asking for the government to consider closing the Canadian embassy in the Philippines, or China or Egypt or Saudi Arabia, because we do not agree with their policies. We know that is not going to help us. Especially for Canadians abroad when they are in trouble, consular services are critical. We have seen that it hurts our ability to provide consular services to Canadians in Iran, certainly with Homa Hoodfar and other files that we have seen. How does the member expect that we are supposed to deliver consular files to people in Iran or other countries where we do not have diplomatic relations?

Opposition Motion—IranBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

4:55 p.m.

Conservative

Steven Blaney Conservative Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague appears to have a short memory. We must remember that the Iranian regime has threatened the lives of diplomats. Canada played a pivotal role at that time.

Our top priority is to protect our own diplomats and Canadians. That is the government's number one responsibility. It is also extremely important not to sanction regimes that endorse brutality and terrorize their own people.

I would advise my colleague to put the safety of our diplomats first. When we send our people to another country, we must ensure they are safe and that the country in question respects human rights.

Opposition Motion—IranBusiness of SupplyGovernment Orders

4:55 p.m.

Liberal

Michael Levitt Liberal York Centre, ON

Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the hon. member for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country.

I am thankful for the opportunity to contribute to this debate, and I am pleased to support this motion.

I want to begin by unequivocally condemning the Iranian regime. I condemn it for its incitement and its threats against Israel. I condemn it for its sponsorship and export of terror, for its support of Hamas and incitement of violence in Gaza, for its destabilizing efforts across the Middle East, for its egregious strike violations against the Iranian people, and for its imprisonment and murder of Canadians.

We need to distinguish that we are not condemning the Iranian people, but the theocratic, authoritarian regime under Ayotallah Khamenei. The Iranian people are the greatest victims of this regime and have their most basic rights and freedoms and aspirations crushed every day.

To start, I want to focus on Iran's clear call for Israel's destruction. Just last week, Iran's leader, Ayotallah Khamanei, called Israel a “malignant, cancerous tumor” that had to be eradicated. This is not a new position. Iran spreads this message around the world.

In Toronto, and across Canada, we experience annual al-Quds day rallies where demonstrators call for the destruction of Israel with blatant anti-Semitic incitement and hate directed toward Jews and Israel. These rallies were first initiated in the wake of a 1979 revolution, and are promoted internationally by Iran. I might add that this rally just took place this past Saturday in Toronto, and all of the things that I have just mentioned were on display.

Ayotallah Khamenei even stated that the mission of al-Quds day was to oppose “the danger posed by the usurper Israel”. This statement is not just hate, which it clearly is. This is a call to destroy the Jewish state. As the terrorist groups Iran funds say, they want to “drive Jews into the sea”.

This brings me to a point on the recent violence on the Israel-Gaza border. It is clear the terrorist organization Hamas, bears direct moral responsibility and culpability for the unfortunate loss of life. However, what many people tend to overlook is the role Iran plays as a destabilizing force in the region, in particular as a supply of weapons and money to the terrorist groups that threaten and attack Israelis on a near daily basis.

The rockets that Hamas indiscriminately fires into Israel, which is a war crime, are supplied by Iran. The rockets that the terrorist group Hezbollah fired into Israel during the 2008 war, and which it continues to stockpile today to threaten Israelis, those are supplied by Iran.

It is important to note that Canada has designated Hamas, in addition to the groups Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah, as terrorist organizations since 2002. This is a position that the government continues to hold. We strongly condemn Iran's culture of violence, its threats toward Israel, and its acts of terrorism.

I also want to acknowledge and thank the Prime Minister for his support of Israelis during this difficult time. He clearly stated, “Israel has every right to defend itself against these deplorable attacks by the terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad.” It is important to note that Iran is not just exporting terror to Israel. It is spreading it across the Middle East and around the world. Iran is an active belligerent in the Syrian civil war. It wholeheartedly supports its client, the Assad regime, and the brutal repression of the Syrian people.

In particular, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps and Quds Force, the first sanctioned under our Special Economic Measures Act, and the second listed as a terrorist organization in Canada, have caused immense suffering for millions of people.

In Yemen, Iran actively supports and supplies Houthi rebels with weapons, encouraging and enabling them to continue the bloody civil war under which millions of Yemeni suffer horribly.

Iran even exports its domestic repression. Under Iran's direction, the leader of the Houthis in Yemen has begun to publicly incite hatred against the Baha'i, a pacifist religious minority that are brutally repressed in Iran. A prominent Houthis strategist even tweeted that “We will butcher every Baha'i.” However, I have not even gotten to the regime's abuses in Iran domestically.

At the subcommittee on international human rights, we hold an annual Iran Accountability Week, and every year we hear of the constant and worsening human rights abuses.

Last December, over 3,700 Iranian demonstrators, calling for their democratic rights, were arrested, including women and girls calling for equal rights. Those protesters have become subject to Iran's vindictive judicial system, which includes the notorious Evin Prison where Canadian citizen, Dr. Kavous Seyed-Emami died in February, which the regime boldly claimed was a suicide. His wife, Canadian citizen Maryam Mombeini, remains in Iran against her will.

I am proud of the foreign affairs minister's determination to bring Ms. Mombeini home to her two sons. As the minister told the foreign affairs committee just last week, any contact that Canada has with Iran is focused on Ms. Mombeini and bringing her back to Canada. This is a principled position that all Canadians should support. We cannot tolerate the death of a Canadian in an Iranian prison, and we cannot tolerate the Iranian regime effectively taking a Canadian hostage and refusing to let her return to Canada.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs has been unwavering in defending Canadians, and I support her wholeheartedly.

There is no discussion with Iran outside of returning Ms. Mombeini. There is no resumption of diplomatic relations. Iran must allow Maryam Mombeini to come home, and must do it immediately.

This is not the first case like this. Canadian permanent resident, Saeed Malekpour, has been imprisoned since 2008; the tragic case of Zahra Kazemi, the Canadian journalist who was murdered by torture in Evin prison; and of course Homa Hoodfar, who was, thankfully, released alive.

What is clear in all of these cases is that the criminalization of descent in Iran has intensified and the persistent oppression of minority communities, including members of Iran's LGBTQ community and Iranian women, continues unabated. Iranian citizens exercising their rights of freedom of thought, conscience, and expression, as well as their freedom of assembly, face arbitrary detention, ill treatment, or much worse.

State-sanctioned discrimination against women and girls, ethnic and religious minorities, like the Baha'i, and human rights defenders continues unabated, and unencumbered by due process or any concept of fundamental principles of justice or the rule of law.

The Canadian government continues to hold the Iranian regime to account for its ongoing aggression and incitement by continuing to list Iran as a state sponsor of terror for the Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act. Canada also continues to have one of the strongest sanctions regimes to hold the Iranian regime to account.

Canada has and continues to be one of the strongest critics of Iran's atrocious human rights record. Since 2003, Canada has been the lead sponsor of the annual UN resolution on the situation of human rights in Iran, a tradition this government has proudly maintained.

Last, I want to reaffirm the point that we in Canada are a friend of the Iranian people and support them in their aspirations for a free and democratic Iran. Iranians are the regime's fist victim and deserve our support and solidarity.

I am proud to join our government in supporting this motion. I join the government in condemning the Iranian regime's unacceptable mistreatment of Canadian citizens, the deplorable terrorism and instability it exports across the Middle East and beyond, and the pain and suffering it imposes on the Iranian people.

At this difficult time, we should all stand with Iranians in calling for an end to the regime's violence and oppression.