Mr. Speaker, I want to be clear about who I stand with. I stand with the health care workers. I am compassionate toward the people who have given so much to us. I denounce the fact that they have been made afraid to walk down the streets. I am compassionate toward the families in Ottawa that want to send their kids to school but have been kept awake all night by people who want to overthrow the government. I am compassionate toward workers in the downtown core who get harassed and intimidated by members of the convoy. I am compassionate toward young people who have been harassed and verbally assaulted. I am compassionate toward racialized people who see symbols of hate. I am compassionate toward Jewish people who saw swastikas and Nazi flags flying. I am compassionate toward racialized people and Black people who saw Confederate flags. I ask how this is happening in our country.
That is who we are standing with. We are standing with the people and saying this is not Canada. This is not what we represent, this hate, with the desecration of war memorials and the vandalizing of the Terry Fox memorial. This is not Canada. This is not who we stand for. I want to stand with people who are saying this is wrong. I want to stand with the truckers who are saying this convoy does not represent them. They are worried about their wages being lost, wage theft and work conditions. Some 90% of them are vaccinated and they do not care about what the convoy is talking about. It does not represent their concerns.
I am standing with those people. I am standing with the workers. I am standing with families. I am standing with health care workers. I am standing with people who have been terrorized by the convoy. I am saying to them that I am going to fight for them; I am going to stand up for them. I understand that people in Canada are frustrated, but we have to respond to that frustration with a real plan to get us through the pandemic and with real hope to deal with the problems that people are faced with, and we can do it.