Debates of Dec. 9th, 2020

COVID-19 Emergency Response

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, from the very beginning, we were clear on getting support out to Canadians. The rules did not change, but we have indicated to Canadians that we will work with them if people made good faith mistakes. We know that during this unprecedented time we needed to be there for Canadians, and that is the choice we made.

The Conservatives have said we should not have delivered as much money to Canadians as we did, but I know there are a lot of Canadians who look back on this year and understand that because we were all there for each other, it was much less bad. We are not going to call it a good 2020, but it was a less bad 2020 than it otherwise would have been.

Privacy

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

Mr. Speaker, we live in a country where the right to privacy is fundamental.

Today's youth are vulnerable, and some are victims of traffickers who post content online without consent. Bill C-11 could be amended to protect personal information.

Is the Liberal government prepared to protect these vulnerable members of our society?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, we are working tirelessly to protect vulnerable Canadians. That includes online activities.

We are going to implement regulations that will ensure that online platforms can behave responsibly and remove all illegal content, whether it be hate speech, child exploitation or other violent or terrorist acts.

We will give Canadians and the authorities the resources and tools needed to protect the most vulnerable.

Official Languages

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

Mr. Speaker, in an unprecedented, historic move, six former premiers of Quebec issued a clear and concise letter demanding that the Charter of the French Language apply to federally regulated businesses.

In agreement are the unanimous National Assembly, the Conservative Party, if I understand correctly, certainly the Bloc Québécois, and possibly the now self-professed member for “Montreal”.

I would like to know if the Prime Minister of Canada intends to put the Bloc Québécois's Bill C-254 to a vote.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, our two official languages are fundamental to our country.

We will always be there to defend the status of the French language across the country, including in Quebec.

We will always be there to defend our official languages, particularly for members of minority communities, and we will keep investing to protect it.

We introduced a bill to protect it and promote it online, and we will strengthen the Official Languages Act.

Health

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

Mr. Speaker, Quebeckers and all their former premiers know how they want to protect the French language.

On another note, tomorrow, the Prime Minister will be meeting with the Premier of Quebec and all the provincial premiers.

Is he going to once again show up with a confrontational and interfering attitude or is he going to show up with a proposal about how he can meet the demands of the premiers of Quebec and the provinces without interfering?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I know that the Bloc Québécois always wants to be confrontational and pick fights. We have been working extremely well with the provincial premiers for many months by transferring them resources and billions of dollars for the health care system and giving them personal protective equipment, rapid tests and now vaccines.

We are and will continue to be there to work with the premiers and the provinces to protect the health of all Canadians.

COVID-19 Emergency Response

[Jagmeet Singh, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberal government gave $1 billion to large corporations, which in turn gave $5 billion to their shareholders. However, the Liberals do not want to penalize them. Instead, they want to penalize the workers and artists who applied for the CERB in good faith.

Why are the Liberals protecting the ultra-rich and penalizing workers and artists?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, we have been there from the start to help Canadians who lost their income due to COVID-19 by providing the CERB and the wage subsidy for small businesses. We were there to support people going through extremely tough times during this pandemic, and we will continue to be there.

We will continue to support businesses, workers, our seniors and our youth. We know that this pandemic is not over. Although we are feeling very hopeful, because vaccines will start arriving next week, we must stay the course to get through this winter together.

[Jagmeet Singh, NDP, Burnaby South, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister's government is going after the self-employed and artists. It is literally doing that right now.

This government spent $1 billion on companies that turned around and gave $5 billion in dividends to their shareholders. Two of those were long-term care homes, which have had some of the worst conditions for residents and seniors. Why did the Liberal government not make sure that all public money went to protecting the vulnerable seniors and residents of those long-term care homes?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the member mentioned artists, and I want to point out that our government recognizes how much this pandemic has hurt our creators and artists. The pandemic has forced artists to cancel events, and they do not have the audiences to share their art with. That is why, in addition to creating the CERB, we were there for our artists with hundreds of millions of dollars more to support them during this pandemic and to ensure that we can all celebrate the end of this pandemic together.

Justice

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I have no doubt that the reports of young girls being abused, and those acts being recorded and viewed millions of times online, disturbs all of us. When I read about it last weekend, I was shocked. Frankly, I was disgusted that it was happening right here in Canada. I think all of us were.

The Prime Minister was informed of this last March. I am wondering if he can tell us why he did not, at that point, begin the process of stopping these images from being portrayed and viewed all around the world. I wonder why he did not start doing something back in March.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, we have been working for many years to fight child exploitation and abuse. That is why we continue to actively work to create new regulations requiring online platforms to eliminate illegal content, including hate speech, child sexual exploitation, and violent or extremist content.

Our approach will ensure that illegal content is removed quickly, that the platforms are monitored and that victims have access to a fast, transparent and independent process. We are working with our international partners as well, and we intend to introduce these regulations at the earliest opportunity.

[Candice Bergen, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we are hearing that these porn sites themselves will start verifying the content, but I do not think any of us have any faith in these porn sites. Their goal is to make money. It is clearly not to protect women and girls. None of us want this abuse to continue. We all have sisters and daughters.

The government has said that it is going to introduce legislation next year, but I am asking the Prime Minister if there is something he can do today to protect our nation's daughters. Can he do something for them, not next year, not in a few months, but today, to stop this online abuse from happening right here in Canada?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, over the past years we have stepped up in our fight as a government against abuse, gender-based violence and exploitation of minors. We have continued to put forward measures that protect all Canadians, particularly women and girls, and we will continue to do that.

Working with the Ministry of Women and Gender Equality, we have put forward many programs, but as the member opposite says, there is much more to do. We look forward to getting the support of all parties in this House as we move forward on strengthening measures to protect all Canadians.

Health

[Richard Martel, Conservative, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the pandemic showed that the provinces had significant needs in the area of health care. They need more and more resources. The Prime Minister is meeting with the provincial premiers tomorrow to discuss health transfers.

Is the Prime Minister prepared to do what our leader has done and commit to granting stable, predictable, unconditional funding to our provincial partners?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, since the beginning of the pandemic, we have been there with the provinces and territories to protect Canadians, to invest in the health care system. From day one, we transferred an additional half a billion dollars, and we also made record health transfers this year. Later, under the safe restart agreement, we added another half a billion dollars.

In total, we have transferred around $25 billion to the provinces, in addition to providing tests, PPE and now vaccines.

[Richard Martel, Conservative, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in his latest economic update, the Prime Minister threw the provinces a bone and announced $1 billion for long-term care homes. That $1 billion has a whole bunch of unacceptable strings attached. It is outright federal interference. The provinces are capable of administering their money themselves.

Has the Prime Minister lost faith in the provinces? Will he commit to stable, predictable, unconditional funding?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, our seniors' lives and dignity are not a jurisdictional matter. It is the federal government's responsibility to protect our seniors all across this country.

We are working with the provinces to provide Canadians with a better health care system, a system that will protect our seniors better than we were able to do during this pandemic, unfortunately.

I think all Canadians expect seniors to be protected no matter where they live in this country. We will be there to work with the provinces to make sure of that.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Mr. Speaker, five years ago and counting, the Prime Minister promised to end the blood ban against gay and bisexual men. All parties are united in ending this outdated stigma now, not in months or years. More than ever, safe blood donations are needed urgently. The Canadian Medical Association and the All Blood is Equal campaign have the science-based safe solution, which simply changes the questionnaire to ask about sexual behaviour instead of sexual orientation.

Will the Prime Minister finally keep his promise and put an immediate end to this discrimination?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, when we got elected in 2015, we made the commitment to end the MSM blood ban, and we are working towards that.

We dropped the ban from five years to one year, and then further dropped it to three months. We needed to do that based on science. Unfortunately, under the Harper government, the blood services were starved of the research money necessary to do that work.

Therefore, we funded them to do the scientific research necessary to be able to eliminate that blood ban altogether. That is our goal, and that is what we are going to do.

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

Mr. Speaker, my friend and colleague had a very reasonable question on the discriminatory blood ban against members of the LGBTQ community. The Prime Minister has made this promise several times over the last few years, but like with many things, there is never action. There is science, and there are several other countries following this procedure and ending discriminatory bans now.

Will the Prime Minister answer the serious question with a timeline to live up to the promise he made five years ago?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, in 2016, the deferral period was reduced from five years to one year. In 2019, it was further reduced to three months.

We have funded 15 projects to find the evidence necessary to eliminate it altogether. We will continue to work with Canadian Blood Services and Héma-Québec until we cross this finish line, which is in sight.

I am very pleased to see members opposite standing up for the rights of the LGBTQ2 community. I just wish they would talk to their members who continue to stand in favour of barbaric conversion therapy. It would be nice to see the Conservative Party stand with the LGBTQ2 community for once.

Official Languages

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Pierre Marc Johnson, Daniel Johnson, Lucien Bouchard, Jean Charest, Pauline Marois, Philippe Couillard—the only female premier and all the other living premiers in the history of Quebec have joined the Quebec National Assembly in asserting that the Charter of the French Language must be applied to federally regulated businesses in Quebec. The Bloc Québécois has introduced a bill to do just that.

Will the Prime Minister listen to all the premiers of Quebec and commit to supporting our bill?

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, we are waiting for the Government of Quebec to introduce its legislation in due course.

We will work with the Quebec government to protect the French language. That is a priority for the Liberal Party of Canada, and it always has been. As we made clear in the throne speech, we will continue to be there, as we always have been, to protect francophone minorities across the country, which the Bloc cannot do, as well as to protect the French language within Quebec. We will do everything we can to protect our beautiful French language.