Debates of Dec. 1st, 2020

Health

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

The hon. Leader of the Opposition.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is responsible for presenting a comprehensive plan for vaccine distribution for Canadians. So far, all we get are Liberal buzzwords like a “robust portfolio” and no details. Seven months ago, the Prime Minister announced with great fanfare its joint venture on a vaccine with China. The China deal fell apart at the end of the summer, and since then it has been scrambling to come up with plans for a vaccine.

Why did the Prime Minister put the lives of Canadians in the hands of Communist China when it came to a COVID vaccine?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition should not just make stuff up. The fact is that we secured contracts for vaccines in August, and right now we are moving forward with the approvals for four different vaccines, Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca and now Johnson & Johnson, at Health Canada so that we can be sure that as soon as those vaccines arrive we will be able to deliver them to Canadians. We know we need to get through this with vaccines and that is why the government has worked hard to ensure vaccines are there for Canadians.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, it is time for the Prime Minister to be honest with Canadians. Last May, they announced a joint venture with China, the CanSino deal. That was going to be their major vaccine distribution plan for Canada. That deal fell apart in August, and then in September, they changed the regulatory structure and started dealing with Moderna and all the other companies.

It is time for truth. Why did the Prime Minister put all of our vaccine eggs in the Communist China basket?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Again, Mr. Speaker, that is simply not true. We worked, as Canadians would expect us to, to cover all the bases to try and reach out to get the most diverse portfolio of vaccine candidates of any country around the world, and we did. Some of them did not pan out, but many others have.

That is why the four top vaccines around the world are now currently in regulatory approval from Health Canada, and we have secured tens of millions of doses of those vaccines. That is the work this government is doing. That is the plan we are delivering on.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, France has announced that it will vaccinate its entire population by June. The U.S. has said the same.

This morning, the Deputy Prime Minister announced that only a handful of Canadians will be vaccinated by next summer. This government's delays are putting lives in danger, and Canadian families want to see a plan.

Where is the plan for distributing the vaccine? Who is going to be vaccinated first, and when?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, with regard to the vaccines, we have been working with the provinces and experts since last spring, first to sign contracts and now to ensure that the vaccines are appropriately delivered as quickly as possible. We will continue to work toward that.

As experts have said, we expect most Canadians to be vaccinated by September of next year, but we hope it will be much sooner than that.

[Erin O'Toole, Conservative, Leader of the Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, this week, CNN revealed that China hid the truth about COVID-19, but this Liberal government is so pro-China that it chose to work with that country to develop a vaccine. That deal fell through in August.

Will the Prime Minister admit that Canada does not have a vaccine because of its partnership with China?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, once again, the Conservatives are playing political games. No one in the world currently has an approved vaccine. We are all working on different vaccines. Health Canada is currently working on approving four vaccines.

Yes, there was a partnership with CanSinoBIO, a company that was extremely effective in developing a vaccine for the Ebola virus a few years ago. That is something that we looked at, but we have vaccine deals with seven different companies around the world and they are the ones who will deliver vaccines to Canadians in the coming months.

[Yves-François Blanchet, Bloc, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a surprise for the government. We looked into this, and it turns out that health is the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces.

Quebec and the provinces are unanimous on issues around health transfers, which are crucial to taking care of society's most fragile and vulnerable members. The Prime Minister rescheduled his meeting with the premiers to December 10. That is convenient, because there will be no more meetings of the House after that, and we will not be able to ask him questions.

What will the Prime Minister be offering the provinces? Will he show up at the meeting empty-handed?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, for the past 10 months, we have been working with the provinces to help them provide health care with support from the Canadian Red Cross and the Canadian army, and we have transferred billions of dollars to help them run their health systems during the pandemic. We will keep working with them.

At the same time, I want the member to know that I will be engaging directly with the premiers, not with federal opposition parties.

[Yves-François Blanchet, Bloc, Beloeil—Chambly, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is true, we are merely elected members of the House of Commons.

The Prime Minister claims that he respects provincial jurisdictions and tells us how wonderful he is. However, Minister Girard said in Quebec City this morning that national standards are unacceptable to Quebec and the provinces. Regarding pharmacare and child care, he said he would definitely be invoking his right to opt out with compensation. It does not work exactly as the Prime Minister would have us believe. We are talking about health and human lives.

Will the Prime Minister acknowledge right now that he accepts Quebec's right to opt out unconditionally and with compensation?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the dignity and the lives of our seniors are not a jurisdictional matter. We will all work together to protect our seniors.

What happened last spring in long-term care centres all over Canada, including Quebec, was unacceptable. That is why the federal government was there to work with the provinces so that they could regain control of the system and be there to help seniors.

We will always work to protect seniors, no matter where they live in Canada, because that is what Canadians expect us to do.

[Jagmeet Singh, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we all know seniors have been particularly hard hit by COVID-19, not only because they are vulnerable, but also because of the isolation. Many seniors have seen their programs cancelled. They cannot come together and connect they way they were usually able to. We know the medical experts have said there are enough COVID vaccines to cover about three million Canadians. There are over 4.5 million seniors over the age of 70, so what is the plan? Which seniors will get the vaccine and which will have to wait?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, every step of the way we have worked with health experts and scientists to determine the prioritization of vaccines on the rollout. We need to get to the most vulnerable, we need to get to our front-line health care workers, and that is exactly what we are going to do. We are working with the provinces on establishing that list, but I can tell members the vaccines that are coming will go to those people who need them most urgently. Because Canada has secured tens of millions of doses of vaccines, we will ensure everyone gets the vaccine in the coming months.

Indigenous Affairs

[Jagmeet Singh, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Shamattawa First Nation community in northern Manitoba is faced with a COVID-19 outbreak and is in urgent need of help. It is already dealing with a housing crisis and TB. Like many other remote and northern indigenous communities, it is experiencing underfunding, under-resourcing and a lack of access to basic things like the Internet. The chief has asked for the military to be sent to the first nation to provide testing, contact tracing and safety measures. Will the Prime Minister heed the call of the chief and send in the military supports that he needs?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, from the very beginning of this pandemic we have worked closely with indigenous communities and indigenous leadership across this country to ensure they have everything they need. We saw the first wave hit far less hard in indigenous communities than in many other communities because of the leadership of the indigenous communities and the partnership we have been able to establish with them. We will continue to work with local and territorial governments, as well as remote communities, to ensure that everything they need they will have.

Health

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians want their lives back, but yesterday they got no plan to fix the vaccine mess that the government has made. They want paycheques, but, instead, yesterday they just got more credit card bills. The national credit card will grow by $10,000 per man, woman and child in Canada. The deficit is eight times bigger than the previous all-time record, bigger than any other country in the G20, and yet we will not have vaccines before billions of other people have them.

The only way to get Canadians safely back to work and paycheques in their pockets is a vaccine. When will every Canadian who wants one have one?

[Chrystia Freeland, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the leader of the official opposition claims to believe in unions and in supporting union workers, so I am sure the Conservatives will be interested in what the Teamsters had to say about our fall economic statement, “Today’s...numbers show that Ottawa is dead serious about supporting working-class and middle-class Canadians through this terrible crisis. The...pandemic is sadly far from over and, over the coming months, continued government spending will be the only thing keeping millions of honest, hard-working families from total ruin.” I could not have—

[The Speaker, Liberal, Anthony Rota]

The hon. member for Carleton.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the question was about when Canadians would have access to the vaccine. The only way to deliver pay cheques to people safely is by giving them a vaccine to protect them, if they choose to get one.

While Canada is running the highest deficit in its history and credit card bills are hitting record highs, will the government finally tell Canadians when they will have access to a vaccine?

[Chrystia Freeland, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, let me start by setting the record straight on what I said about vaccines this morning since the leader of the official opposition misconstrued my words, something which is becoming a bad habit of his. As Moderna's chief medical officer said this week, “Canada's in the front row” on vaccines. I know that and I know our rollout will be a success.

Since the leader of the official opposition mentioned France, let me inform him that the EU said this week its regulators will not take a decision on Pfizer until December 29 and on Moderna, not until July 12.

Finance

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the members across the way like to lecture people, but what they presented yesterday was essentially a political statement, not an economic statement. Canadians are no fools and they got the message.

According to columnist Emmanuelle Latraverse, Canada's unprecedented deficit is consistent with the Liberal government's ideological agenda; it is a decidedly election-minded deficit.

Canadians want answers on the vaccine, not a list of election promises in the style of a Christmas wish list.

When will we have a clear and precise vaccination plan?

[Chrystia Freeland, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, when will the Conservatives have a clear and well defined financial plan?

Sunday, on Tout le monde en parle, the Leader of the Opposition assured Canadians that, under a Conservative government, they would have received the same amount of support as we provided.

So what do the Conservatives really believe in, austerity or support for Canadians?

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Mr. Speaker, these comments prove that Canadians were really disappointed with yesterday's economic statement. It lacks certainty about vaccines, it lacks certainty about budget forecasts, it shows a glaring incompetence with respect to the economic recovery and, above all, it shows that the Liberals have lost control of spending.

The minister says that she has put in place budget safeguards, but she is not protecting Canadians from her future reckless spending.

When will we see a plan with dates and measures?