House of Commons Hansard #34 of the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was chair.

Topics

Proceedings of the House and CommitteesGovernment Orders

3:40 p.m.

Some hon. members

Nay.

Proceedings of the House and CommitteesGovernment Orders

3:40 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Anthony Rota

In my opinion the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Call in the members.

(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)

Vote #22

Proceedings of the House and CommitteesGovernment Orders

3:40 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Anthony Rota

I declare the motion carried.

Pursuant to order made earlier today, the House will now proceed to statements by ministers.

The hon. Minister of Health.

COVID-19 PandemicRoutine Proceedings

3:40 p.m.

Thunder Bay—Superior North Ontario

Liberal

Patty Hajdu LiberalMinister of Health

Mr. Speaker, I would like to start by joining my voice with that of our Prime Minister and offer my sincere condolences to the people of Nova Scotia, following this weekend's horrific events. My heart goes out to the families, friends and colleagues of the victims. It is beyond comprehension that the people of Nova Scotia should have to deal with this mass shooting and the loss of life while coping with the COVID-19 pandemic.

This pandemic has changed how we live, how we work and how we interact with each other. It has created great uncertainty and hardship for many Canadians and indeed people all around the world.

Over the past few months, we have seen a steady increase in the number of positive COVID-19 cases, especially among vulnerable Canadians, including our beloved seniors who live in long-term care homes and the workers who support them. As Dr. Tam, our chief public health officer, reported earlier today, there are now 36,216 confirmed cases in Canada and 1,611 deaths. Though these are numbers, behind each number is a story of a life, a family and a journey interrupted.

To respond to a crisis of this magnitude, the Government of Canada has taken a whole-of-government approach that allows us to act quickly and decisively while remaining flexible so we can adapt to emerging science and the changing circumstances. As Minister of Health, I will speak to some of the actions we have taken from a federal health perspective.

Since the onset of this pandemic, the Public Health Agency of Canada has been providing Canadians with clear, concise and timely information about how they can protect their health and our broader health care systems. The agency bases its information on the latest scientific evidence, and this advice can and does evolve as we learn more about this new coronavirus.

Our dedicated website, Canada.ca/coronavirus, has had more than 100 million visits since its launch, and the toll-free COVID-19 information line has fielded more than 100,000 calls. We also launched the Canada COVID-19 app, which to date has been downloaded more than 430,000 times. This app includes a link to the recently launched wellness together Canada portal. This mental health and substance use support portal provides Canadians with access to tools to support their mental health and well-being, allows them to obtain credible and reliable information about mental health and substance use and even acts as confidential mental health and substance use support services.

From the beginning, Canada has recognized the need to work closely together with our global partners and the need to support international organizations like the World Health Organization and other international bodies. Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada's public health officer, is an expert adviser to the World Health Organization committee and is in almost daily contact with her international counterparts. I am very grateful for her leadership as well as that of Dr. Njoo, the deputy chief public health officer. Our public health officials, including both public health officers, are working day and night, seven days a week, and we should be extremely proud of our public service now, as it is working harder than it ever has to support and serve Canadians.

The federal health portfolio has also been working hand in glove with provincial and territorial governments to coordinate our response across a wide spectrum of issues, including the purchase of personal protective equipment, essential drugs, medical devices and ventilators. To ensure that we have the right tools to fight COVID-19, Health Canada streamlined the regulatory process to expedite the review and approval of needed drugs and medical devices in Canada. If shortages do occur, these amendments give us the flexibility to quickly facilitate rapid access to an international supply of health products in exceptional circumstances.

I also put into place an interim approach that allows Health Canada to facilitate access to hand sanitizers, disinfectants and other kinds of personal protective equipment to respond to the unprecedented demand for these products. In addition, I signed an interim order that has enabled the authorization of new diagnostic test kits. This has greatly sped up access to COVID-19 test kits, which allows the provinces and territories to identify new cases of the virus. As of today, April 20, Canada is testing an average of 20,000 more patients per day across the country, with a total of more than 550,000 people tested to date.

It is important to note that Canada's total case counts have been increasing more slowly than many other countries'. Canada has had the opportunity to watch and learn from the experience of other countries, the approaches they have taken and the lessons they have learned. This has allowed Canada to act early and decisively as the situation has evolved globally and at home.

As the world struggles to understand and control COVID-19, it must also understand so much more about immunity, mutation and many other scientific aspects. In that regard, our government is investing heavily in research. More than $52 million was earmarked for the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, and this money is supporting 96 projects that are working on countermeasures to COVID-19. This is part of our $275-million commitment to enhance the capacity to advance work on antivirals, develop vaccines and support clinical trials and manufacturing in Canada.

This is just a snapshot of some of the actions that have been taken to protect the health and safety of Canadians from COVID-19. As members can imagine, an incalculable amount of work is going on behind the scenes with our many partners across all orders of government. All of this work will deepen our understanding of the disease and give us the scientific evidence and data that we need to inform our public health responses, decision-making and planning at local, national and international levels.

I can assure members that the Government of Canada will continue to do everything in its power and jurisdiction to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic; protect the health, safety and well-being of Canadians; and help guide them through these difficult and uncertain times.

It is up to all of us to ensure that Canadians come through this crisis healthy and strong.

COVID-19 PandemicRoutine Proceedings

3:50 p.m.

Conservative

John Brassard Conservative Barrie—Innisfil, ON

Mr. Speaker, today, MPs from across the country once again demonstrated the importance of continuing to hold in-person sittings.

We put questions to the Prime Minister and his ministers. Even though we did not get all the answers we were hoping for, we exercised our right as parliamentarians and got to fulfill our role of representing Canadians. We, the opposition members, were not elected to blindly support the government. We play a crucial role, namely to monitor the government, hold it accountable, and secure better results for Canadians.

Canadians have serious questions about the government's response to the pandemic thus far. My constituents were shocked to learn that the government destroyed stockpiles of medical supplies without replacing them. After all, the Prime Minister has warned of a second and third wave of this pandemic. Are we going to be ready for that? Has the government learned from its mistakes? Does it have a plan in place to get Canadians through the crisis?

Canadians across the country have been following physical distancing guidelines and are trying to keep up with the government's ever-changing recommendations, because they were told we needed to flatten the curve in order to give the government time. However, while announcements keep getting made, the government has not been able to provide clear timelines. Provinces have received defective masks and contaminated test kits. New benefits get announced, but the eligibility criteria keeps changing. The government seems so focused on fixing its own mistakes that it does not seem to have a plan to restart our economy when the health crisis passes.

The United States has already announced a plan to reopen its economy. Other countries are doing the same. Yes, we must address the very real and immediate danger of COVID-19, but not while ignoring the other impacts of this shutdown.

We cannot do this without recognizing the impact that it has had on Canadians suffering from other serious health situations whose surgeries and treatments have been postponed, not without recognizing the mental health toll that this is taking on Canadians across the country and not without recognizing the long-term impacts of a historic economic recession.

What is the government's plan to help Canadians who are facing bankruptcy? No amount of government aid can fully replace the power of the Canadian economy. For example, the Connexus Credit Union has already received 700 applications and processed $28 million in loans for businesses. Only a quarter of that is eligible for complete forgiveness. Those businesses will need to make around $21 million collectively in profits by the end of the year in order to avoid paying interest on their loans. It is nearly May. How should they plan to do that with a government that has ordered the shutdown to continue?

Will the government finally accept our proposal to rebate the GST to small businesses that it has collected in the last year so that they have the immediate cash flow to pay their workers?

Canadians deserve to know what the plan is to get this country back to work. Will the government continue to listen exclusively to the recommendations of the World Health Organization or will it start to look to countries that are listening to their own experts and finding creative solutions to minimize the spread of infection and enable society to function much more freely?

From the beginning of this crisis, the Liberals have been slow to react, slow to close our borders, slow to put in place enhanced screening measures at airports, slow to admit that masks could prevent the spread of this disease, slow to work with Canadian companies to retool and start producing much-needed medical supplies, slow to increase the wage subsidy and devastatingly slow to offer any help to the energy sector. The government was consistently slow to react in the early days of the crisis and Canadians have paid the price. It will be disastrous if it is slow to put a plan in place for Canada to come out of this crisis.

Let me be clear. The Conservatives do not want everything to go back to normal today. We are seeing signs of hope only in a few areas of the country. We must continue to help Canadians deal with the health impacts of this crisis, but that does not mean that the government should not come up with a plan to get the country back on track when the time comes.

The government cannot revitalize the economy on its own. That will be up to Canadians: the business owners who are just trying to scrape by until they can reopen and the employees hanging on until they can go back to work. It is hard-working and innovative Canadians who will get this country and our economy back on track, and the government's job is to put them in the best possible position to do just that.

That means listening to Canadians, working with opposition parties, implementing our constructive solutions and actually taking a team Canada approach. The men and women working in our health care system, like the nurses, doctors and suppliers, and everyone working in essential services, like the truck drivers, pharmacists and grocery store workers, have all gone above and beyond to allow us to stay as safe and healthy as possible. They have bought us time, and I hope the government will use it well.

Today is another difficult day for Canadians across this country and they deserve a plan for a better tomorrow.

COVID-19 PandemicRoutine Proceedings

3:55 p.m.

Bloc

Yves-François Blanchet Bloc Beloeil—Chambly, QC

Mr. Speaker, 19% of Quebeckers are 65 years of age or older. I want to focus on them. I do not want to create what I feel is an arbitrary distinction within this group, meaning I do not want to create one category for those who are between the ages of 65 and 75 and another for those who are over the age of 75, which is what the government's approach seemed to be during the election campaign and even after that.

That 19% of the population has not gotten much attention since the outset of the crisis, but today we saw that, although enthusiasm may be lacking, honourable compromises are possible. Let us try to do just that. Let us work together to come to a compromise, a position, an idea, a series of suggestions that will help seniors.

I reminded the Prime Minister a little earlier that we published a series of measures about two weeks ago. I wrote to him directly to ask him to support seniors in Quebec and Canada. These measures basically fall into six different categories.

The first was to increase the old age security pension by $110 a month. That was our position during the election campaign, but now we are prepared to make it a temporary measure.

The second measure is an improvement to the guaranteed income supplement. The third measure, which my colleague from Joliette touched on a bit earlier, would protect private pension plans. Some businesses that have pension plans are particularly vulnerable. Some may not make it through the crisis. We hope that is not the case, but we need to be realistic. There is a serious risk that business ownership will become concentrated. There will be some takeovers that are not necessarily hostile but that may be facilitated because businesses are financially vulnerable. When businesses are driven to the brink of bankruptcy as part of these takeovers, the new owners will try to avoid having the pension plans managed by the company be treated as preferred creditors. This means that the people who contributed to these plans for years will lose all or a large part of what they are owed. We need to prevent this.

People with pension plans are required to withdraw a certain amount every year. Since most plans are currently seeing negative returns, it seems cruel to tell these people to reduce even further the capital on which they are supposed to build their own future.

There is the issue of drug prices and also the issue of isolation.

Nowadays, everyone recognizes that going online at anything but high speeds is a bit like riding a bicycle on the highway. We all recognize that high-speed Internet has become an essential service. In the past, when we talked about an essential service, we would say that something is essential if everyone needs to have it. When the power goes out, everyone agrees that that is a problem. No one would accept that a community should be deprived of something essential like electricity. Running water is an essential service, and we keep insisting and telling the government that it must ensure that all indigenous communities have access to it. Telephones are also widely considered to be essential. Today, high-speed Internet falls in that same category. Seniors, who are often isolated, need it at least as much as everyone else. In our measures, we are calling for high-speed Internet to be deemed an essential service and for the isolation of seniors to be broken.

Speaking of isolation, I want to come back to the main measure, which concerns the old age pension. One hundred and ten dollars a month is not a lot, but for everyone who gets it, particularly in the regions of Quebec, it supports purchasing power that is used immediately and spent in the community. Lord knows that seniors are not able to set any money aside given what they receive from the government.

It supports the regional economy. It is a way of addressing the isolation felt not only by seniors, but by people in every region right now, as we all well know.

Of course, we might ask whether these measures, or this measure in particular, are not too expensive. I will provide a few numbers. All the measures the government has taken to release cash total roughly $270 billion. The government's direct spending to support the economy is somewhere around $107 billion. An annual increase in the old age pension for all seniors over 65 in Canada would cost $4 billion. If we make this a temporary measure, like the other measures, we are talking about $1 billion.

One billion dollars is not nothing. No one is saying that it is not a lot of money, but we have to compare that to the $250 billion in released cash flow so far. That $250 billion went everywhere except to seniors.

The government cannot even tell us what it will cost to pay for the measures it has announced. To say that the measures it has brought in are insignificant would seem ungrateful, but that is a drop in the bucket. Twenty-five dollars a month per senior in a couple—frankly, I am not sure that would even cover the change in the price of vegetables. We need to do better and we need to do more.

I invite the government to provide funding for this measure by following the suggestions made by our NDP colleagues. If the government would do something to stop corporations, and particularly the banks, from engaging in tax avoidance, my goodness, it would be able to fund this measure several times over. It might even be able to fund all the measures.

People say that tax avoidance is not illegal, but that does not mean it is not immoral. Tax avoidance costs the Canadian government billions of dollars, and that money could be used to support this critical effort for seniors.

This morning I wanted to talk a bit about science and research—which does not happen very often—but I ran out of time. It was brought to my attention in recent days that every year, in the month of March, there is a deadline for something called the competitions. It is not a lottery; it is more like submissions. Research centres submit projects, certain applications are accepted, and funding is distributed among the recipients in all regions of Canada and Quebec.

Last month the competitions were simply postponed or cancelled, and this was a serious blow for the research community. In addition, research centres are not eligible for either the Canada emergency response benefit, which people cannot access, or the wage subsidy, because in some cases, these are considered to be public organizations. Research and science, which will be so crucial, are therefore being overlooked to some degree. Targeted support must be provided to innovative companies.

I will always come back to these themes, time and time again. Considering all the measures implemented to support the economy and the purchasing power of Canadians and Quebeckers, it is hard to understand why the government did not choose to specifically help the most fragile and most vulnerable among us in terms of both health and finances, in other words, our seniors.

I therefore call on the government and all parliamentarians to be particularly sensitive to seniors, because we in the Bloc Québécois will not back down on such an important issue.

COVID-19 PandemicRoutine Proceedings

4:05 p.m.

NDP

Jagmeet Singh NDP Burnaby South, BC

Madam Speaker, I want to begin by talking about how the COVID-19 crisis has gripped this entire country. Coast to coast to coast, we are grappling with its impact. In the face of this really difficult challenge, I have been inspired by the courage, compassion and kindness of Canadians. I want to focus on one area in particular where we need to do more than just say thanks. We have heard governments thank front-line health care workers, but those health care workers need far more than just our thanks.

Expressing gratefulness for front-line and essential workers is important, but not nearly enough. What these workers need is to be assured that they have the equipment to stay safe during this pandemic.

I am talking about the people who are delivering our groceries, those who are working in grocery stores, those who are in the transportation sector, those who are delivering meals. I am talking about the cleaners and janitors, all the people who are helping to ensure that our workplaces and places of shopping are clean, who are doing their part to prevent the spread of the illness. There are the health care workers in personal care homes, the workers who are providing support to those living with disabilities. All of these workers from all sectors, including health care, transportation, food and janitorial services, need more than just thanks. They need the protection to stay safe while they are doing their work. They need access to personal protective equipment of the highest quality to ensure their safety is protected.

We also need the federal government to act now for essential workers who are on the front lines, whether they are delivering food services or providing financial services in credit unions. We need to ensure that workers on the front lines receive a courage bonus, a top-up to acknowledge the hard work they are doing in this crisis, and the risk and the danger they are faced with. We have called for this previously and we are calling for it again. We need to ensure these workers receive extra support during this time. While it is essentially important that those who cannot work receive access to financial supports like the CERB, we need to also help out the people who are still working and helping communities in such dramatic and important ways.

It is also important to note that for some of these workers, they are not working because of choice, because they have no choice. They need to work to be able to provide for themselves and their family. That is why it is crucially important they get extra financial support.

There are many stories of essential workers who do not have access to personal protective equipment or who are not protected by health and safety measures. Some of these workers have already lost their lives to COVID-19. They died because they went to work.

This crisis is highlighting the defects in our existing system. The most important job in our society, the job of taking care of other people, is also one of the lowest paid.

That is a shocking reality that we have to come to grips with. Those who are providing some of the most essential services are among the lowest paid.

I want to point to a particular group of workers who are working very hard during this time with inadequate protections, and in some cases, very insufficient work conditions.

Jeff Bezos, the owner of Amazon, takes $250 million a day of profit. Nobody earns that much money. He takes it from the people who work for him. He is the richest person on the planet and his workers do not have paid sick leave. He asked for public donations. Madam Speaker, imagine having the audacity to ask for public donations to cover workers who have to be isolated, and he is the richest human being on the planet.

Amazon workers report that they do not have protective equipment and some workers have been fired for speaking out, but this is a company that the Liberal government is giving Canadian tax dollars to. Instead of using our own public service, our postal service, the government is going to this private company with a very poor track record of treating its workers fairly.

I want to talk a bit about long-term care. In the face of the COVID-19 crisis, long-term care homes are now at the centre of the desperate loss that we are seeing. The impact to human lives, and the loss of lives, has been concentrated in the most dire way in long-term care homes. Our seniors, people who have contributed their whole lives and have sacrificed their whole lives, are in long-term care homes where there are deplorable conditions. These are seniors who should be treated with respect and dignity and they have not been treated that way. Nowhere is the desperation of the situation more clear than in long-term care homes.

The federal and provincial governments have known for years that our long-term and home care systems are inadequate to provide safe, dignified care to our seniors. Some of our most vulnerable citizens, who cannot defend themselves, live in long-term care homes. Even with dedicated, compassionate staff, many members of our long-term care system simply do not have the time or resources required to do work that they know is necessary.

Federal and provincial governments across the country, particularly Liberal and Conservative, have allowed for-profit operators to run these homes that cut corners and put families at risk. These for-profit businesses have a motive of making profits, so they are not concerned with the highest-quality care. They are concerned with the highest return on their investment. That means people suffer, and we are seeing it across the country.

New Democrats have talked about the importance of head-to-toe health care coverage, and it is nowhere more glaring and important than when it comes to the treatment of seniors. That is why we have called for national standards to be established across the country. Once those national standards are established, we need to roll long-term care homes into our Canada Health Act so that there is federal accountability for the treatment of the seniors in these homes.

I want to point out that the COVID-19 pandemic crisis has laid bare the inequalities in our society and made very clear the inadequate social programs. It has become clear that Canadians want to take better care of one another, but the existing programs and our existing health care have not been sufficient. It has not been good enough, and this is not by chance. This is a decision made by governments to starve public health care of the crucial funding it needs.

In closing, what type of Canada do we want to build? Let us not return to the old normal. Let us not go back to normal. Let us move forward to a new normal, and let us ask ourselves what that new normal looks like. It looks like health care that is well funded, that covers people from head to toe. It means social programs that take care of each other, and taking better care of each other by expanding EI to something broader and more universal. It means making sure paid sick leave is not a luxury but a right that all workers enjoy. It means better wages for the essential services and those working on the front lines to ensure they get paid in a dignified manner with a good salary that allows them to earn a good life.

I believe we can come out of this crisis stronger than before. We need to take care of each other. That is what Canadians have told us. That is our job. If we make the right choices, we can build a brighter future and more justice and equality for all Canadians.

COVID-19 PandemicRoutine Proceedings

4:15 p.m.

Green

Paul Manly Green Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC

Madam Speaker, this is a very surreal time here in the House of Commons with just a few members. I had a very strange trip across the country to get here. I had the choice of taking a 16-hour red-eye trip overnight sleeping on the plane or dividing it into two days and going through airports that were empty.

The Green Party represents 1.1 million voters, so it is important I am here to represent those voters. On average, 387,000 voters voted for one MP. If we break down those numbers to other parties, we see 38,000 for the average Liberal and 50,000 for the average Conservative. I have a lot of people to speak for, so I am here to speak for those who voted Green.

We need to respect the directives of the health authorities, and we need to respect our health care workers and our front-line workers who are risking their lives to fight this pandemic. We have been working with the Liberal government behind the scenes, not playing politics during this pandemic but contacting ministers and parliamentary secretaries and bringing forward issues.

We have seen some of these programs come forward, and we have put forward ideas about how they need to change and where they are missing the mark. We have seen those changes come, sometimes not as quickly as we would like and sometimes not all that we want, but we are working together. We are all in this together.

Grocery store workers, front-line health care workers and nursing home workers all do essential work that cannot be done remotely. In addition to that, none of these workers has to go through two or three airports to get to work like I did. Corporations all over the world, including some of the biggest in the world, are working remotely. Classrooms are holding meetings on Zoom and teachers are able to give their students a chance to speak and interact. We should be able to work remotely, as well.

MPs who have limited access to the Internet could work remotely from a hotel or motel close to where they live and cut down on their travel across the country. We would save some money as well. MPs have worked effectively to this point to provide oversight, yet some of the members of the House are trying to instill fear and create a problem that does not exist.

We have a way to hold the government to account, and all one needs to do is watch the videos of the finance committee meetings to see that.

This pandemic has laid bare many of the problems we have in this country. I have spoken about the conditions in a seniors home in my own community, the Nanaimo Seniors Village. Thankfully, that operation was taken over by the Vancouver Island Health Authority, so it was able to fix the problem before the pandemic happened.

That seniors home was flipped multiple times by private operators. Every time that happened the workers were laid off, the union was decertified and then the workers were rehired at lower pay for part-time jobs with no benefits. Those workers had to go to work at multiple care homes. We are seeing this situation play out in different places across the country, and what has now happened is that those workers are spreading COVID-19 from one seniors home to another, creating a tragedy that was completely avoidable.

Students are falling between the cracks, students who did not have work and were hoping to work this summer. Students who are graduating and had jobs lined up are not eligible for any programs. Seniors and people with disabilities are facing higher costs due to COVID-19 and are not receiving the help they need.

Micro-businesses and new businesses are falling between the cracks. A microbrewery in my community started up in November. It does not meet the $20,000 payroll requirement for last year, but it paid $13,000 in payroll in December, it paid $13,000 in January and it paid $13,000 in February. These people are going to lose their life savings and hard work, all of their commitment, because there is nothing to help them.

I have a constituent in my riding who is a senior who has worked her entire life. Last year she was off for eight months due to an operation. She got back to work in January but does not qualify for the CERB because she did not make $5,000 last year, even though she earned more than $5,000 every other year of her life and paid taxes. Now she needs support but there is nothing there for her.

We have a solution to that. What we are seeing is the glaring inequality in our communities. We have a crisis of homelessness in my community and in communities across the country. A guaranteed liveable income is a way that would help to make sure that no Canadian ever falls below a standard of living that gives them a place to live, good nutritious food to eat and quality of life.

We could do an emergency guaranteed liveable income and send a cheque to every Canadian and use it like reverse billing where those who do not need it return it. In the end, next year in tax season those who did not need it and did not return it would be taxed back on it. That would mean that we do not miss these people. I can give a long list of people who have been missed by these programs. We need to get our economy up and running again, and we need to do it safely.

We should be looking at the example of Taiwan. My brother lives and works in Taiwan. It was in the top 10 countries affected by COVID-19 in February. It had the first presumptive case the same day that Canada did in January. When people saw the virus starting in Wuhan, Taiwan ramped up production in their factories. They used the military to help ramp up production of PPE in their factories. They stockpiled personal protective equipment.

My brother missed two weeks of teaching at school. His wife missed no work at all, so two weeks after the winter break the students all went back to school with masks on. My brother teaches class with a mask on. He goes to the pharmacy every week and he gets three masks. That is his ration. Taiwan banned hoarding and made it so that people who were price gouging would face seven years in jail or a $700,000 fine. They took it seriously. Taiwan is now 106th on the list of countries affected by COVID-19. It has had 422 cases and six deaths. Canada is number 13. We have 36,000 cases and 1,600 deaths.

There will certainly be time, at the end of this crisis, for analysis and lessons learned. The government has been humble in acknowledging that its original response was not perfect, and it solicited advice from opposition MPs to make the programs better. Many Canadian individuals and businesses are still falling between the cracks.

Now is not the time for finger pointing and partisan bickering. We need to continue to focus on flagging the groups of individuals and businesses that are not covered by the COVID-19 assistance programs and make sure they get help.

We face an even larger crisis: the climate emergency. We have all acknowledged that. Scientists and epidemiologists have warned for years that climate change will create the conditions for pandemics. Wildfire season has already begun in B.C. Flood preparations are happening around the country. We need to listen to the scientists in this case as well and take action to avert disaster.

The COVID-19 crisis has shown us that we can do that. We can all work together. We can act. Our future, and the future of our children and grandchildren, is dependent on our action.

We have also seen that funding in health care is very important. We need to make sure that our health care system is robust, and that our infrastructure for health care is robust. It is important.

There are many lessons we can learn from this difficult situation. Right now, those are lessons that we should not forget as we navigate our way through this crisis and hold fast to the belief that we can emerge from it better together. Together we can do this.

COVID-19 PandemicRoutine Proceedings

4:25 p.m.

Liberal

The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès) Liberal Alexandra Mendes

Pursuant to order made earlier today, the House will now resolve itself into committee of the whole to consider matters related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

(House in committee of the whole to consider matters related to the COVID-19 pandemic, Ms. Alexandra Mendès in the chair)

COVID-19 PandemicGovernment Orders

4:25 p.m.

Liberal

The Assistant Deputy Chair Liberal Alexandra Mendes

Before we begin this debate, I would like to remind hon. members of how the proceedings will unfold. Pursuant to an order made earlier today, during the proceedings of the committee no member will be recognized for more than five minutes at a time, which may be used for posing questions to a minister of the Crown or a parliamentary secretary acting on behalf of the minister.

Members may split their time with one or more members by so indicating to the Chair. Furthermore, because of the fast-paced debate in committee of the whole, we will suspend proceedings every 45 minutes to allow employees who provide support for the sitting to replace each other safely.

The debate will end after 27 interventions or when no member rises to speak. We will now begin the debate.

I invite the hon. Leader of the Opposition to take the floor.

COVID-19 PandemicGovernment Orders

4:25 p.m.

Regina—Qu'Appelle Saskatchewan

Conservative

Andrew Scheer ConservativeLeader of the Opposition

Madam Chair, I wanted to point out several shortcomings in the government's wage subsidy program. There are many reports from small businesses across the country: family businesses that receive dividends, self-employed people who own and operate businesses, seasonal businesses and project companies that receive lump sum payments.

Is the Prime Minister going to continue to broaden the eligibility criteria to look at other measures so that these struggling businesses will not have to lay off Canadian workers?

I would like to point out a very specific example. Brandt Tractor is a company in my riding and a great Canadian success story. They purchased another business in October 2019, so they are not able to show a 30% drop in revenue specifically because they now have on their books the operations from the company that they purchased. However, if we take all of the activity together it is far beyond a 30% drop, yet because of the eligibility criteria, they will be unable to keep hundreds of workers on the job.

Will the Prime Minister continue to look at these types of cases to make sure this program catches as many people as it possibly can?

COVID-19 PandemicGovernment Orders

4:30 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Madam Chair, when this pandemic hit, we realized we had to move extremely quickly to get help out to Canadians, so that they would be able to take the actions necessary to isolate themselves, to stay at home and to prevent the spread of this virus. In order to do that, we needed to make sure we sent supports to Canadians so that they could do that and not have to go to work in risky positions if they did not absolutely have to in order to buy groceries and pay their rents.

We also recognized, however, that this slowdown, or almost stoppage, of the Canadian economy would need to end and we would need to come back as quickly as possible. That is why we made the decision to keep people tied to their jobs as much as possible with the wage subsidy. It would allow employers to keep people on the payroll so that when we come back to restart and reopen, they would be able to get to work almost right away.

We moved very quickly and we moved very broadly, but in both the CERB and the wage subsidy, we recognize that there is a need to improve, to tweak and to fill gaps. Even though we helped the vast majority of companies and individuals right away, we realize we need to keep refining and improving to make sure that everyone who needs it gets these programs. That is why I thank all members for making suggestions as we improve the programs.

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4:30 p.m.

Conservative

Andrew Scheer Conservative Regina—Qu'Appelle, SK

Madam Chair, I hope the Prime Minister will look at the situation that I have raised and address it, because hundreds of employees across the country will be able to continue to work if Brandt Tractor, specifically, is able to enrol in the program.

When the government talks about making changes to programs that have already been announced, I would like to draw the Prime Minister's attention to the disincentive that is built into the emergency response benefit. By bringing in the ceiling at 10 hours a week, there are many examples where people have a barrier to taking available work. We believe that the CERB should be designed in such a way that there is a gradual elimination of the benefit as people work more and more, so that Canadians are always better off taking available jobs.

Now that the program has been designed and help has gotten out the door, will the Prime Minister look at making this program more flexible, so that Canadians can work more hours while receiving this benefit?

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4:30 p.m.

Liberal

Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC

Madam Chair, yes, we will. Indeed, we already expanded from the proposed 10 hours a week, which was about $500 a month, to $1,000 a month that would be eligible for someone to receive from work while still collecting the CERB. This was because we recognized that many jobs were in situations of reduced hours. Many people work in a gig economy, where they want to be able to continue to work a bit, but they need the reliability of the CERB because so much else has shut down.

That is an example where we did hear the concerns that people have. Now they can earn up to $1,000 a month and still collect the CERB, because I entirely agree that the more we keep people connected to the workforce and connected to their professional obligations and responsibilities, the quicker and the better we will come back after this challenge.

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4:30 p.m.

Conservative

Andrew Scheer Conservative Regina—Qu'Appelle, SK

Madam Chair, this afternoon I asked the Prime Minister whether or not he could confirm that three planes that were sent to China to pick up medical equipment were forced to return empty last night. He seemed to indicate that was the case.

I would like to find out if he could explicitly confirm that, and if he could inform the House as to whether the reason the planes were forced to return to Canada empty was because of the actions of the Chinese government, or if he could provide the House with any other explanation as to why Canada was not able to procure the equipment that the planes were sent to obtain.

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4:30 p.m.

Liberal

Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC

Madam Chair, over the past many weeks there have been significant challenges with disrupted supply chains around the world. We remember the 3M issue with the United States. There have been other issues in procuring the necessary equipment from China, such as delays and shipments that got detoured. We know that there are going to continue to be challenges. At the same time, we have been able to procure enough PPE for the provinces up until this time, and we are now seeing Canadian companies go online.

Yes, there have been disruptions in the supply chain because of global competition, because of actions of different people and countries. At the same time, we are ensuring that we are doing everything we can to get the necessary equipment to our front-line workers, and so far we have been able to manage it.

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4:35 p.m.

Bloc

Yves-François Blanchet Bloc Beloeil—Chambly, QC

Madam Chair, we all know that leaders in certain areas have the habit of telling their people not to come to them with a problem but rather with a solution to the problem. I am going to try to do just that.

I raised the issue of seniors many times. So far, they have gotten disproportionately little attention from the government. We estimate our request will cost about $1 billion, while the government has committed to spending over $250 billion in a way that seems acceptable to us overall. We helped determine how that money would be spent.

Today there is new interest in an initiative that was launched in Denmark and that has supposedly been adopted by Poland and the United Kingdom in a way that fits their own taxation and legal systems. It involves making businesses that are registered abroad ineligible for various forms of government assistance. Such an initiative would make it possible to save a lot of money that could be used to fund the assistance we want to give seniors. That seems to be an option to consider.

The number is so big that no one can agree on how much it would be. We are talking about billions of dollars, money that legally does not come back to Canada. The fact that this tax avoidance is legal does not make it right.

As he prepares to spend tens of billions of dollars of Quebeckers' and Canadians' money, did the Prime Minister consider this course of action?

Will he say that none of our measures are accessible to businesses that are registered abroad and consequently engaging in tax avoidance?

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4:35 p.m.

Liberal

Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC

Madam Chair, at every stage of our reflection, we have remained focused on Canadians, on the workers and families who might be affected by a loss of revenue because of COVID-19.

We did not ask whether people work for small businesses or large corporations, for local businesses or multinationals. We did not judge Canadians on whether they work for a company considered morally acceptable or for a firm that sells tobacco or cigarettes. We are not passing any moral judgements on workers. We are simply saying that if they have lost their jobs because of COVID-19, we will help them.

That approach is what allowed us to bring in the Canada emergency response benefit and the wage subsidy across the country to provide Canadians with the assurance that they can stay home, get their groceries and support their families. That has been our priority from the very beginning.

Yes, tax avoidance is a serious problem. That is why we have invested billions of dollars in the Canada Revenue Agency. We are working to introduce enhanced measures to tackle those issues.

At every stage of the fight against COVID-19, we have tried to prioritize help for workers, regardless of what kind of work they do.

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4:35 p.m.

Bloc

Yves-François Blanchet Bloc Beloeil—Chambly, QC

Madam Chair, I have given the Prime Minister ample opportunity to do the right thing. I have made it as easy as possible for him. All he had to do was take that opportunity. The solution was right in front of him. I am therefore astounded to hear him say that the government will do nothing to ensure that the businesses it is helping act morally or ethically.

For the most part, we all agree that some of the money should go to businesses, but there are “businesses”, and then there are “businesses”. Some businesses, some small local businesses, fight for survival every day and are having a lot of trouble. Other businesses have no trouble at all. They pay little or no tax in Canada but pay tax elsewhere because it is cheaper. Can those businesses be excluded because they do not need help?

We are going to have to get out of this at some point, but we cannot ask taxpayers to pay more because some businesses are not paying. That seems like a basic ethical issue to me. The scandalous part is that it is legal. Our tax system makes tax avoidance legal, but over the course of the crisis, we will be billions of dollars short, and that money will make its way to tax havens.

Does the Prime Minister agree that it is irresponsible not to go get legitimate cash from those places?

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4:40 p.m.

Liberal

Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC

Madam Chair, the reality is that we have chosen first and foremost to look after the workers who have lost their jobs, no matter the company they work for. I have been very clear: If people abuse the system, if they take advantage of the system to obtain money we are offering but that they are not entitled to, there will be very serious consequences.

I do not believe that the member for Beloeil—Chambly is suggesting that we not help workers if they have the misfortune of working for an unethical company, albeit it a legal one. We do not want to punish workers based on the company they work for. They have families and communities that depend on them. We will replace that work. We are focusing on the workers and not the company.

Naturally, there are concerns about companies that do not do the right thing and we have measures to address this. However, in such critical times, our priority is to help all Canadians who have lost a pay cheque because of COVID-19, no matter the nature of the company they work for. That is our priority.

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4:40 p.m.

NDP

Jagmeet Singh NDP Burnaby South, BC

Madam Chair, New Democrats have been calling on the Liberal government to help families that are struggling to pay their rent, as well as small businesses unable to pay their rent. It is encouraging to hear that the government is working with the province to deliver some relief for rent for commercial companies. We will wait to see the details.

However, will the Prime Minister commit today to including residential rent in additional to commercial rent, because so many people are struggling, whether with their businesses or their families, with paying their rent?

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4:40 p.m.

Liberal

Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC

Madam Chair, we recognize the challenges that far too many Canadians are going through right now. That is why we put in place historic measures around a wage subsidy and around the Canada emergency response benefit that gives $2,000 a month to people who have lost their pay cheques due to COVID-19. We recognize there is more to do. We recognize there are challenges that people are facing.

We are also a government that respects provincial jurisdiction. We see that in certain areas of jurisdiction, including the relationships between renters and landlords, the province has far more tools and far more responsibility directly over what we are doing. We have made a proposal to the provinces to work with them on helping with commercial rent, because we recognize the impact on the economy and that it is a significant and uneven weight for the provinces. Many provinces are directly stepping up on support for renters in a way that is appropriate for their jurisdiction. The federal government is there to support in a broad range of ways, but I can also highlight with tremendous pride that the provincial governments are doing their part as well.

We look forward to continuing to work with a historic level of co-operation and collegiality with all provincial governments across the country, as we look to plug gaps and meet the challenges faced by Canadians through this unprecedented crisis. We will continue to work with the provinces in order to make sure that we get through this right and come back roaring strong.

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4:40 p.m.

NDP

Jagmeet Singh NDP Burnaby South, BC

Madam Chair, I am going to keep this question short, so I would respectfully ask that the Prime Minister also keep the response short.

Because they are struggling as a result of COVID-19, 81% of Canadians believe that banks should be forced to lower their interest rates. There are powers that we have at the federal level that have express jurisdiction over banks. Is the Prime Minister prepared to use those powers to waive interest rates on credit cards and personal loans, put a pause on mortgage payments and negotiate for a pause on rent as well?