Debates of Dec. 9th, 2019

Resumption of debate on Address in Reply

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my friend and colleague who sat on the veterans' committee with me. We did hear clearly that the government put forward a motion in June to end homelessness for veterans. Veteran homelessness was not in the throne speech. Veterans are mentioned vaguely in the speech. The government put forward a motion to end homelessness for veterans. Where is the plan? It wants to do it by 2025. We want to hear the plan.

Both the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition supported our motion last November to end lapsed spending. We hope the Liberals are going to honour that when they go to supplementary estimates, because we know there is money left over that they did not spend. They made a commitment they were going to end lapsed spending for veterans, so we are expecting that to take place.

The government is still only meeting six of the 24 service standards. While it is taking pride in its track record on veterans, maybe it could do something about it. It could take the money from the end of last year and apply it to meeting the 18 of the 24 service standards it is not meeting. That is what the Liberals promised to do when they voted for that motion, including that member.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to congratulate my hon. colleague on a powerful speech that reflects some of the most profoundly important issues facing his riding and British Columbians.

Two weeks ago, I was visited by a large group of citizens who are very concerned about the continued use of open-net fish farms in British Columbia and the devastating impact it is having on our wild salmon. They were urging us to raise, at the first opportunity in the House, the need to go to in-ground closed containment as soon as possible.

My question really is about housing, because that is literally the number one issue that I heard on the campaign trail. In my riding we have very many successful co-ops that were built with federal funds in the 1970s and 1980s and provided thousands of affordable units for families of all types.

I am wondering if my hon. colleague agrees with me when I call on the current government to bring back federal funding for a national co-op housing program so that we can build the hundreds of thousands of co-op units that are so desperately needed by so many people in this country.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for bringing that question forward. I am someone who was fortunate enough to live in co-op housing. It provided safe, secure housing.

Back in the seventies and eighties, when he was talking about that era, over 10% of our housing stock was non-market housing. Most of it was co-op housing. Today, we are at 3%. In Europe, they are at 30%. Europe sees housing as something that is a right, that everybody deserves safe, secure and affordable housing.

Making sure we have non-market co-op housing ensures that people will have a safe, secure place to live. It works because we can have all different types of income levels living in a housing co-op, all different types of needs in a housing co-op. We can build them right across the country, like we did in the seventies and eighties.

Of the many people who I talked to who are privileged to live in co-op housing today, a lot of them graduated into the free market, and a lot of those who could not are still living there today. Therefore, we need to do everything we can to make sure that we provide safe, secure and affordable housing. The co-op model makes sense.

One thing I did not mention in my speech is that we desperately need the government to come to British Columbia and listen to people about the housing issue.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to rise in the House.

I want to begin by thanking my constituents for sending me back here. I received one of the strongest results in Canada. I want to thank all of them for showing me that support and for helping me out on the campaign trail. I thank my volunteers and my supporters and of course my family, without whom I would not be able to stand here in the House. This is the second term that I will be serving in the House of Commons.

I want also to take the time to thank all Calgarians and all Albertans for sending back a strong Conservative team of 33 out of 34 members of Parliament. They have chosen very wisely in this Parliament to make sure that their voice is heard on the floor of the House of Commons in the Parliament of Canada. Albertans will no longer be taken advantage of.

Before I continue, Madam Speaker, I want to say that I am splitting my time with the member for Durham. I am sure he will have many important contributions to make to this debate, and also no doubt will provide the perspective of Ontarians on what their expectations are in the Parliament of Canada.

The Speech from the Throne was a very deep disappointment, a slap in the face to Albertans. We have faced some of the hardest economic times our province has faced in multiple generations. Albertans are used to downturns in the oil and gas sector. They are used to downturns in the energy sector. That is nothing new. When I moved to Alberta in 2005, it was something that every single energy worker would tell me. I remember in the last downturn, they would say to save for the next downturn, to put aside some money to weather it. It would come and go and the boom would come back. Projects would get built. We would have new opportunities to grow the economy to create well-paying middle-class jobs in the energy sector.

We have seen a government in the past four years that has failed to do that. We have seen a government that has made it its intention to phase out the energy sector, despite the fact that oil and gas companies invest in renewable energy and invest in their people. We will find no other companies as interested in maximizing the knowledge, the abilities and the type of work that people will be doing. I always tell people back home and all those whom I visit all across Canada that we spent a generation convincing young men and women that it was worth their while to pursue a degree in science, technology, engineering and mathematics because there would be well-paying jobs waiting for them when they finished. When they went into the private sector, they had co-operative jobs and internships ready to go. Some of them did not even finish their degrees and they already had six-figure salaries in engineering jobs waiting for them in oil and gas at the Suncors of the world.

Now we have heard terrible news. Haliburton announced that it was shutting down its cement operations in Alberta. We have news from companies like Suncor Energy. Encana has renamed itself and is moving to the United States. It has already moved most of its board of directors down there. Decisions are being made there for a Canadian company. It was once what we would say in French le fleuron, the main natural gas company in Canada and now those decisions are being made in Denver. Trans Canada dumped “Canada” from its name because it no longer has faith in doing business in Canada. Now it is called TC Energy to hide the fact to American investors that it is a Canadian-based company. That is a lost opportunity. I have come here to make sure that opportunity rings out again in these hallways and that there is opportunity for Albertans within Confederation, within a united Canada.

On every single street I was on and at most of the doors I went to, people would talk about it. People are fed up with being taken advantage of. I have said on the floor of the House of Commons before that people in Alberta are tired of being treated like colonials. We are not colonials. We have made an immense contribution to Canada. Over $600 billion has been transferred out of our province. Albertans do complain about it; it is just something that we do. It is true. We want to be able to create the wealth and then we are okay to share a slice of that wealth with the rest of Canada to make a contribution to Confederation. We contribute more than our fair share right now and all we are asking is that the government listen. Premier Kenney, who is here today in Ottawa, is making five simple requests, none of which happened to be in the throne speech. The federal government has listened to none of them. These are not new things. These are things that the premier has repeatedly asked for.

One request is to remove the cap on the stabilization fund. The Government of Alberta at the moment is forced into deficit spending as it is closing its deficit, which is something the current federal government is incapable of doing. Removing the cap on the stabilization fund would allow the province to get that money back, the “over-contribution”, I would call it, into Confederation, so that we can stabilize our health care system, our education system and the social services that Albertans depend on.

These are extremely important things that must be done. The premier has asked for a major significant amendment to Bill C-69 to ensure that certain major projects will not fall under the Bill C-69 rules. The “no pipelines” bill, as it is called in Alberta, ensures that there are no new projects being proposed. When I go into downtown Calgary and I talk to managers, directors and people making the decisions on whether to pursue a project in Canada, they say that there is no thought about any new projects being suggested for the Canadian market.

Most of the well-paying jobs in the oil and gas sector are in construction. Brand new projects that come online cost tens of thousands so that people can be hired for the length of the construction season to build it. For the past four years, all the government has to show for it is that it has expropriated one pipeline company and taken over Kinder Morgan's TMX contract. After dithering for years and trying to block the pipeline from being built, suddenly, the Liberal Party had a deathbed conversion. Suddenly the government is now in favour of building a pipeline, but only one pipeline. It cancelled energy east. It cancelled Enbridge's northern gateway. It cancelled more kilometres of pipeline than it actually had built. The only one that is kind of pitter-pattering away on getting built is really the last major energy infrastructure project in Canada. The same thing happened with LNG with well-paying jobs. For a generation we have been convincing people to go into the STEMs.

We also spent a heck of a lot of time convincing people to move from other parts of Canada and from parts of the United States to Alberta and earn a living there. We do not have the advantage of beautiful provinces like British Columbia which has the mountains and the ocean. Alberta is just rolling foothills and they are pretty flat on the east side. However, what we did have was an excellent quality of life, an excellent opportunity to work in a sector that was always trying to do its best, on the cutting edge of everything. There are wildlife biologists and people interested in environmental remediation. Those are the people I met at the doors, people who worked for oil and gas companies trying to remediate the land. They were proud of the work they were doing and the contributions they were making to ensure that with every single project that came online, at some point the land would be remediated and returned as close as possible to its original state.

Suncor was one of those great companies that managed to do that and earned an environmental certificate two provincial governments ago. Now there are wild bison on the territory, something we had not seen for an extremely long time. It is a bison population, by the way, that is healthier in the wilds of Wood Buffalo National Park.

This throne speech has very, very little for Albertans, so we will be looking for the government to actually reach out to Albertans and make an effort, a true effort, at bridging the gap between what Albertans are feeling and seeing on the ground, the experiences they have had over the past four years, and what we expect from the minority Parliament. There is an entire province right now that is feeling neglected. We are not asking for a handout. We are asking for the federal government to get out of our way and let us create the wealth. Let us create the jobs, well-paying private sector jobs that we have been known for over the past two decades.

It has been amazing to see how fast Calgary has grown even since I moved there. I represent the deep southeast suburbs of Calgary. There are entire communities that did not exist when I moved there. There is a hospital that was built in my riding. It did not exist back in 2005. Some 30,000 to 40,000 people have moved into my area. Cranston, Mahogany, Auburn Bay, Seton, Rangeview and Copperfield are communities that did not exist before.

Tens of thousands of people chose Calgary. They chose Alberta for those well-paying jobs in the energy sector. We have diversified our economy much more than people could ever believe.

The oil and gas sector is a much smaller proportion of Alberta's economy than it was back in 1997. We have diversified our economy. We were moving in the right direction, and we have a federal government that has impeded our ability to continue to create that wealth.

This throne speech is just not good enough. There is not enough concrete action in it that would actually provide any certainty or comfort for the people back home who have lost their jobs and whose severances have run out. They are finding no opportunities to work in the sector where they have spent 20 years, between their education and their early career opportunities, to actually make something of themselves and contribute to their families.

I will be proudly voting against the throne speech, because it has nothing in it.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, I welcome the member for Calgary Shepard back to the House.

He talked about ensuring that there was a sense of opportunity for Albertans and coming to this House for that purpose. However, he seemed to focus his entire speech on assuming that opportunity is built purely in the oil and gas sector. He also talked a lot about Suncor, which I find very interesting because Suncor on December 5, just a few days ago, announced that it was building a $300-million wind farm in southern Alberta.

Notwithstanding the fact that the member is extremely passionate about the oil and gas sector, which I can appreciate, does he agree that this sense of opportunity that he talked about can come in other sectors and not just the oil and gas sector?

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Madam Speaker, the member points out that Suncor has indeed started this one project. The problem with the member's thinking is that oil and gas companies are just as interested in renewable energy and have been making investments for the last 20 years in it. It is nothing new.

What he should be doing is noticing the fact that he has no colleagues from Alberta. Albertans have spoken. They reject the Liberal government's four years of failure. On every single street, I heard the same thing. Whether it is renewable energy or fossil fuel energy, people just want to get back to work with the federal government out of their way.

[The Acting Speaker, Carol Hughes]

I would like to remind members that when someone has the floor and is answering a question, I would hope that the member who asked the question would take the time to listen and that there not be any going back and forth between the parties.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Vancouver East.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, I congratulate the member for Calgary Shepard on returning to the House.

The climate emergency is not going to address itself. That is something we all know. It is our reality. We also know that the Liberal schedule to address the climate emergency is not going to do it. We are not even on pace to meet the target that has been set by the Paris Agreement. At this rate, we will be 175 million tonnes away from our emissions reduction target in 2030.

Having said that, what we need is bold action to avert a climate catastrophe. We can begin with real investments. Investment in transit is an example. We can stop the subsidies to the fossil fuel industry. That is something the Liberals promised in 2015. We can actually put in a real just transition plan for the workers.

The member talked about the workers and the need to ensure that their families are taken care of. What about the government putting forward a real just transition plan for those workers, so that they do not have to worry about the future? What about saying to them that their future can exist in the reality of us tackling the climate emergency?

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Madam Speaker, I am first going to take exception to the use of language like “climate emergency” to describe the real problems of climate change. Often I get emails and they are usually form emails from people who have good-hearted concerns about the environment. They are worried about climate change. I believe, in their hearts, they really are worried, but the language of “emergency” and “crisis” is often used to suggest massive government interference in the economy and the government dictating to provinces and companies what they will and will not do. I reject the whole premise underlying the notion that this is the only way we can address climate change as an issue.

I also want to reject the notion that it is up to the government to provide what is called a “just transition”, which I think is a very subjective term in the first place. We have people who are looking to international markets and the International Energy Agency says that for the foreseeable future, the demand for both natural gas and oil is going up, not down.

The expectation all across the world is that the world will need more energy, not less. Why not just make more of all of it, whether it is renewable energy through wind and solar or fossil fuels? We can do those at the same time and manage those different expectations people have, while trying to do our best to meet our Paris accord goals.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Durham, ON]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the residents of Durham, my constituents, for giving me the honour to rise again in this House in the 43rd Parliament. It is a profound honour for me to represent my hometown in Parliament.

As someone who attended the Churchill Society award dinner honouring David Crombie last week in Toronto, and as the former director of that committee, I am very happy to start my first speech of this session with a quote by Winston Churchill.

It is self-deprecating, because Churchill once said, “It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations.” I have read many books of quotations, not just by Churchill but also by the government and the Prime Minister.

I am going to seize upon one of the quotes from the throne speech, which I actually took away in a positive sense. The throne speech ended with a remarkable passage by Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson's speech at the opening of the Centennial Flame, just beside us in West Block, which read:

Tonight we begin a new chapter in our country’s story. Let the record of that chapter be one of co-operation and not conflict; of dedication and not division; of service, not self...

The irony is that speech was kicking off our centennial year, lighting a centennial flame using natural gas from Canada. I am not sure that irony was found by the Prime Minister's Office when it chose that aspirational quote, but that was how people celebrated. The Centennial Flame has all of our provinces and territories, now including Nunavut, around it and is burning Canadian natural gas, allowing that fountain to burn throughout the coldest winters in Ottawa.

Earlier in that speech, Pearson complimented our industrial capacity and our resourcefulness as a country. Sometimes we have to ask what was said before the quote that the government used for its throne speech. In the same speech, kicking off the celebration of Canadian natural gas in many ways, Pearson said:

Economically, we have become a rich society and a great industrial power. We have built new dimensions of progress and welfare into the Canadian way of life. The boundaries of freedom and opportunity have been expanded for every Canadian.

That was Lester B. Pearson's remark, speaking about the balance that Canada had been able to have by being resourceful, tapping our natural resources and being industrial, celebrating our industrial sectors, in order to provide for the welfare of the country.

One thing people on this side of the House have been saying, both through the first term of the Prime Minister and this one, and what is missing in the throne speech, is recognizing the economic diversity of this country. There is no mention of the serious national unity issues we are facing as a result of the Prime Minister and the Liberal government's opposition to our resource sector in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and beyond. There is not one mention of it. This is unlike Pearson who actually understood that resourcefulness, industry and celebrating it, the hard work of Canadians allowing us to have new dimensions of progress for the welfare of our people.

The Premier of Alberta is in Ottawa today. Alberta has been very proud to share not just that wealth with the rest of the country as part of the resourcefulness of its industry, but at times, when the auto industry was struggling in my province, more manufacturing jobs in Ontario were attributable to our western resource industry than into auto assembly. When our national economy was struggling, the global recession, it was actually our resource economy that allowed us to lead the G7. That is allowing new dimensions of progress, embracing that.

The Prime Minister and his whole cabinet should read the entire Pearson speech, not just cherry-pick some aspirational sections. We need a Prime Minister who does not divide the country.

The disappointment and the frustration we see in many parts of the country are the direct result of the Prime Minister hindering the progress of provinces already struggling with global resource prices, a range of issues, pipeline challenges. They have seen a government that has had policy decision after policy decision holding them back. That is how the Prime Minister started.

I spoke about this in my speech four years ago, in January, 2016. I spoke about how disappointed I was that the Prime Minister talked about diversity except for recognizing the economic diversity that our country had. In the Prime Minister's first speech abroad as the Canadian prime minister, at Davos in January 2016, he said, “My predecessor wanted you to know Canada for its resources. I want you to know Canadians for our resourcefulness.”

What was disturbing was that only a few minutes after he went to an international forum, he essentially attacked his predecessor. What mades it worse was afterward the Prime Minister's Office changed the speech to take out the reference the Prime Minister made to his predecessor and to just put “Canada” in the quote in the official record. We know press releases often will say “check against delivery”. The Prime Minister delivered something that he should not have delivered. More important than the slight against the previous prime minister was the fact that he mocked the resource industry in Canada in his first remark at Davos. That is division.

I said at the outset that I was going to look to quotations for guidance much like the throne speech used in the Pearson speech. Here is a quote I used four years ago, which rings even more true today, from Robert Stanfield in March, 1969. He said, “Let us be quite clear that national unity does not mean uniting most of Canada against part of it.” What wise words when the division in the country at that time was caused by a Trudeau, Pierre Trudeau, and I can say that safely in the House.

We see that in practice from the present Prime Minister from his first speech at Davos, playing off resourcefulness and the resource sector as if steam-assisted gravity drainage and the ability of our oil sands to minimize the mining operations, minimize water usage and minimize greenhouse gas, those innovations somehow did not count to the Prime Minister.

The resourcefulness of our resource sector and the capital markets that developed in Canada as a result of our resources have given us the new dimensions of welfare that Lester Pearson talked about on the eve of Canada's centennial.

What has the Prime Minister done in four years to cause this national unity crisis?

After the Davos speech, there was the cancellation, unilaterally, of northern gateway; no consultations with the one-third owners, indigenous communities; and zero consultations before taking that opportunity away from them. There was the cancellation of energy east as a result of Bill C-69, which is still being brought up in question period today. Why? Because the majority of the country opposed that legislation, including my premier. With respect to Trans Mountain, the company withdrew because of a lack of confidence in Canada. We had Bill C-48, the tanker moratorium, and the 2016 Arctic ban where unilaterally the Prime Minister took away 17% of the landmass from Inuit and northerners to develop.

In fact, previous Liberal Senator Charlie Watt said this about the Prime Minister's unilateral action in Washington:

There have never been clear consultations. As a matter of fact, when the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of Canada made that decision, we were not too happy. Without even coming to us, they just turned around and said, “This is what's going to happen.”

That is not exactly reconciliation.

We can see why Canadians are upset. What is missing from the Throne Speech is a recognition that Canada can and must balance our economic diversity. This means getting our resources to market. It means prioritizing pipelines. It means ending the divisive Bill C-69. That is what we want to see from the Prime Minister.

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Madam Speaker, I welcome my colleague back to the House. I know we will have fun over the next months and years to come.

It is interesting that in his speech he accused the government of cherry-picking a quote used in the throne speech, but then went on to try to split a hair between the phrases “using our resources” and “the resourcefulness of our people”. I found that to be quite interesting in a description about unity, of all things.

Could the member point to some examples of what the Conservative Party has done to help the unity within our country? How have the Conservatives contributed as parliamentarians and as a party to actually improve upon that unity as opposed to what many, quite frankly, would look at as driving the wedge even further into the issue?

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Durham, ON]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands for such an easy question for me to answer.

The fact that the Prime Minister's Office had to change the speech that he gave at Davos, to take out the reference to his predecessor, was because previously Prime Minister Harper had used the Davos platform to talk about Canada as an energy superpower: liquefied natural gas from British Columbia and western Canada offsetting coal-generating electricity in Asia. That is good for climate change and the fight against greenhouse gas emissions and it is good for our sector.

We are world leaders in nuclear energy, small modular reactors, oil and gas, traditional forms of resource energy. We are an energy superpower, but we have a Prime Minister that will not even mention it in his speech. That is what is shameful. I am not cherry-picking. He had to doctor his own press release to take out his little dig. We should recognize that our country is diverse. Whether it is a fisherman in Atlantic Canada or someone in the north in the resource industry, we should be proud that they are contributing to our county, like Lester Pearson was.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for talking about resources and jobs, especially fishers. We have the perfect storm going on right now in British Columbia. There is a downturn in the forest sector, especially for coastal communities. We have the collapse of our salmon sector, as everyone heard me say earlier. We have a salmon emergency taking place. The fishers, the people trying to make a living, have had no help from Ottawa. EI was not extended. The commercial fishing season was extended to August 20 and they did not get any support. Fishers are losing their boats and homes, and the government is completely absent.

We need an emergency package for those fishers and their families, to get people back to work and restoration. We need to take concrete action, fix the mismanagement that took place over decades by both Liberal and Conservative governments, take a whole-of-ecosystem approach and protect the bedrock species on which salmon rely. We need urgent action.

Does my colleague and the Conservative caucus join me in calling on the federal government to come up with an emergency package in light of the fact that we have had half of the lowest return in recorded history in the Fraser, which is the world's largest salmon river? I hope my colleague will join me in the call to action.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Durham, ON]

Madam Speaker, my colleague from British Columbia mentioned the importance of fishing and our offshore resources. These are types of resources of which we should be proud. We should manage them effectively and give predictability to families that rely on that industry. That is our economic diversity.

He also mentioned softwood lumber and the lumber industry. This is a government that when renegotiating the most important economic agreement upon which Canada relies, the NAFTA agreement, it did not mention softwood lumber as a priority. It did not mention the auto industry as a priority. It did not mention the resource industry as a priority or agriculture for that matter. It put in the progressive agenda that was more about the Prime Minister's own brand and political opportunity than anything else. We have seen that same approach fail in China and India. It is about time the Liberals put Canadian jobs and opportunity ahead of their own political fortunes.

[The Acting Speaker, Carol Hughes]

The member for Sherbrooke has just five minutes for her speech. I will then have to interrupt her.

The member for Sherbrooke.

[Élisabeth Brière, Liberal, Sherbrooke, QC]

Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate you and the Speaker on your appointments. I know that you will uphold law and order in this most sacred temple of democracy.

I am honoured to rise today for the first time in the House to represent my constituents in Sherbrooke, who are engaged, dynamic people. I want to take a moment to congratulate Kim Boutin of Sherbrooke, who won several medals this weekend at the short track speed skating World Cup in Shanghai. She is a model of strength, discipline and determination.

Now I want to thank some people without whom I could never have aspired to represent the people of Sherbrooke. First I want to thank my family, who have given me support and unconditional love throughout my journey into politics. I also want to thank all of the volunteers, as well as my campaign team, who worked non-stop to share our vision of Sherbrooke and Canada. Thanks to their excellent work, we were able to convince the people of Sherbrooke that we were the best team to represent them.

My team and I have been on the job since October 22. I plan to be very active and present in my riding, to listen to people's concerns and to advocate for their projects and issues.

I want to do my part to build a better future for my community, for Sherbrooke, for Quebec, for our country, for our planet and first and foremost for the next generations. This is why I chose to enter politics.

I have a clear plan and vision for Sherbrooke. I will use my term to propose several initiatives. Without a doubt, the main issue that pushed me to run for office is the environment. I love nature and outdoor activities, so the issue of climate change really resonates with me. I wanted to be part of the team put together by our Prime Minister, who has a real plan for Canada and who is leading the fight against climate change. Every action counts, no matter how small or large.

We must continue the electrification of public transit in Sherbrooke, particularly with hybrid buses, ban single-use plastics, and promote and support the development of green technologies by getting behind our university and college researchers. Above all, we must continue engaging with Canadians to make them aware of the challenges involved in the fight against climate change.

The status of women is also a key issue for me. I am proud to be part of a political party that is not afraid to introduce feminist policies. Consider, for example, Canada's feminist international assistance policy, brought forward by my colleague, the member for Compton—Stanstead. The presence of women in the public arena, and particularly in politics, is a very important issue. I want to work with my colleagues to improve how we do things, so that young women and young mothers can become MPs without neglecting their families. We need to continue to encourage women to run for office, and I want to serve as a positive role model for anyone who wishes to do so.

Another important challenge relates to the labour shortage and immigration. We must continue to welcome newcomers with generosity and support the harmonious integration of immigrants into our society. Throughout my campaign I had the opportunity to meet business people, and many of them talked about the labour shortage. They all expressed an openness towards welcoming immigrant workers.

Lastly, there is also economic development. We need to make Sherbrooke a centre of innovation and research and development for green technology industries. We also need to support economic development by supporting innovative start-ups. The strategic innovation fund is already helping many businesses in the region, and our government will build on that.

Our Prime Minister's throne speech was unifying. Our government's priorities, including the fight against climate change and lower taxes for the middle class, reflect the priorities of the people of Sherbrooke, and that is why I am going to support it.

[The Acting Speaker, Carol Hughes]

Pursuant to the order made earlier today, the question on the amendment to the amendment is deemed to have been put and the recorded division requested and deferred to Tuesday, December 10, at the ordinary hour of daily adjournment.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I suspect if you were to canvass the House, you would find unanimous consent to see the clock 6:30 p.m. so we can move to the next item on the agenda.

[The Acting Speaker, Carol Hughes]

Is that agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker, Carol Hughes]

Pursuant to Standing Order 81(5), the House will now resolve itself into committee of the whole to study all votes in the supplementary estimates (A) for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2020.

I do now leave the chair for the House to go into committee of the whole.

(The House in committee of the whole, Mr. Bruce Stanton in the chair)

Supplementary Estimates (A), 2019-20

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Order. Today's debate is a general one on all votes tabled before the House on Thursday, December 5, 2019.

Pursuant to the provisions in the motion adopted on Thursday, December 5, 2019, the total length of time for debate will not exceed four hours. The first round will begin with the official opposition, followed by the government, the Bloc Québécois and the New Democratic Party. After that, we will follow the usual rotation.

Each member will be allocated 15 minutes at a time, which may be used both for debate and for posing questions. Members wishing to use this time to make a speech have a maximum of 10 minutes, leaving at least five minutes for questions to the minister.

When a member is recognized, he or she should indicate to the Chair how the 15-minute period will be used, meaning how much time will be spent on the speech and how much time will be used for questions and answers.

Members should also note that they will need unanimous consent if they wish to split their 15 minutes with other members.

When the time is to be used for questions and comments, the minister's response should reflect approximately the time taken to pose the question, as that time counts toward the member's allotted time.

I also wish to indicate that in committee of the whole, comments should be addressed to the Chair, much as in debate in the usual House. I ask for everyone's co-operation in holding all established standards of decorum, parliamentary language and behaviour.

Just as another note to hon. members, as we are in committee of the whole, members will in fact be recognized from the seat in the chamber they choose.

We will now begin tonight's session. The House is in committee of the whole, pursuant to the provisional Standing Order 81(5), consideration in committee of the whole of all votes in the supplementary estimates (A) for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2020.

Debate, the hon. member for Edmonton Mill Woods.

[Tim Uppal, Conservative, Edmonton Mill Woods, AB]

Mr. Chair, I will be using my time for questions and answers.

The people of Alberta are going through an economic crisis right now. Over 150,000 jobs have been lost in the energy sector and billions of dollars of investment has left Alberta. While the supplementary estimates outline an additional $5 billion in spending, they only mention the province of Alberta once: the cost of implementing the carbon tax of $17 million, which will only make things worse for Alberta. Why is the government not addressing the job crisis in Alberta?

[Jean-Yves Duclos, Liberal, President of the Treasury Board]

Mr. Chair, I am delighted to be part of this committee of the whole and very pleased to hear this very important question on how we will grow the economy in Canada in the 21st century. That involves working with all Canadians and investing in middle-class Canadians, as we are doing again today, in order to grow the economy while protecting the environment. We will be extremely pleased to work with our colleagues on the other side to make sure this happens across Canada, including Alberta.