House of Commons Hansard #89 of the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was pension.

Topics

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Portage—Lisgar Manitoba

Conservative

Candice Bergen ConservativeLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, the inquiry and the committee's investigative work are finding that there is less and less evidence for the government to have used the Emergencies Act, and the evidence points to the only reason it was used was to cover up the problems the Prime Minister was finding himself in. Unfortunately, because the minister has been misleading, the work of the committee is being disrupted and corrupted.

It is very interesting to see that, when strong women stand up and speak truth to the Prime Minister, he has no problem firing them. However, when a minister of the Crown misleads Canadians, that is completely fine and he overlooks it. Why does the Prime Minister get rid of people who have integrity and speak the truth, but defend—

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Anthony Rota

The hon. Prime Minister.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, wow. We can see very clearly how desperately the Conservatives are trying to change the channel from the important work being done in the follow-up to the Emergencies Act to highlight the challenges that these illegal blockaders posed to our economy, to our municipalities and to Canadians.

Police asked us for more tools because they said they could not deal with the situation with the existing tools. We delivered the Emergencies Act in a responsible, proportional way, which ended the crisis. At the same time, Conservative politicians kept supporting these blockades—

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Anthony Rota

The hon. Leader of the Opposition.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Portage—Lisgar Manitoba

Conservative

Candice Bergen ConservativeLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, this is not the first time the Prime Minister has kept a disgraced minister in his cabinet. He defended the former defence minister, who covered up sexual harassment in the military.

The Prime Minister calls Canadians he disagrees with names. He divides and stigmatizes for political gain, and he demotes female MPs who stand up to him.

Is it not true that the only reason he will not fire the Minister of Public Safety is because that minister is doing and saying exactly what the Prime Minister wants him to?

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, once again, we see the lengths to which the Conservatives will go to try to distract and deflect from the fact that they stood on the wrong side of this issue. They stood against hard-working Canadians who were disrupted in their daily lives: people who lost their jobs. Factories and supply chains were interrupted, all because of illegal blockades. The Conservatives continue to stand with those at the illegal blockades while we worked hard to make sure the police had the tools necessary to put an end to them.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Bloc

Yves-François Blanchet Bloc Beloeil—Chambly, QC

Mr. Speaker, at the beginning of the year, the Prime Minister invoked the Emergencies Act during the civil, yet obviously illegal, occupation of Parliament Hill.

The Minister of Public Safety said he did that at the request of police forces, but there was no such request from law enforcement, the RCMP, the Ontario Provincial Police, or the Ottawa police.

Does the minister acknowledge that for the second time in two days, his government has misled Quebeckers and Canadians?

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:25 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, I want to be very clear with Canadians that police do not grant themselves extraordinary powers. It is the government that must do it.

Parliament subsequently debated the bill and passed it. As RCMP Commissioner Lucki stated, the Emergencies Act gave the police the powers they needed to get the job done.

Municipalities, provincial leaders and police told us that they needed more tools to dismantle these blockades. That is exactly what we did.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Bloc

Yves-François Blanchet Bloc Beloeil—Chambly, QC

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the joint committee that is required under the act received the Deputy Prime Minister and the former public safety minister, who is now the Minister of Emergency Preparedness. They testified that it was a purely political decision and was not made at the request of police.

Who is not telling the truth? Which minister is not telling the truth? What is the Prime Minister saying?

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, our government and our ministers have always been extremely clear that police do not grant themselves new powers. It is up to politicians and the government to make that decision. That is exactly what we did.

When law enforcement and provincial and municipal authorities asked us for more tools, we delivered them. Then we saw that they needed even more. We realized that the only way to give them what they needed was to invoke the Emergencies Act—

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Anthony Rota

I am going to interrupt the right hon. Prime Minister.

We have a problem with the screen in the House and there are members who want to see everything the Prime Minister is saying in person.

We will make sure the screen is working and then the Prime Minister can start his answer again from the beginning.

The right hon. Prime Minister.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Liberal

Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC

Mr. Speaker, the government and all our ministers have always been very clear that police do not grant themselves new powers. It is up to politicians and the government to make that decision.

When law enforcement and provincial authorities asked us for more tools, we invoked the Emergencies Act in a reasonable and proportional way. That is exactly what people expected of us, and that is how we were finally able to resolve the situation.

Child CareOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

NDP

Jagmeet Singh NDP Burnaby South, BC

Mr. Speaker, one in four Canadians will lose their home if interest rates continue to rise. One in four Canadians is going hungry because they cannot afford their groceries. The Minister of Finance is going to give a speech tomorrow that was supposed to respond to their needs. Instead, it is going to be a reannouncement of previous measures, none of which will help people right now.

People need immediate support so they can make ends meet. Why does the current Prime Minister continue to ignore the plight of people and refuse to deliver financial support directly to families who need it most?

Child CareOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, I recommend that my hon. colleague, and indeed all colleagues in the House, take advantage of the opportunities coming up to speak with Canadians who have seen their child care expenses cut in half in different parts of this country as more parts of this country, like Ontario and others, do that in the coming weeks and months.

That is because of federal investments made over the past many months that are landing right now in people's bank accounts and pocket books. At the same time, in the coming weeks, we will be increasing the Canada child benefit alongside the cost of living. Those are concrete helps delivered now—

Child CareOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Liberal

The Speaker Liberal Anthony Rota

The hon. member for Burnaby South.

Child CareOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

NDP

Jagmeet Singh NDP Burnaby South, BC

Mr. Speaker, that would not happen until next year, and people need help today.

People need help right now to pay the bills, to make ends meet, to put food on the table.

Will the Prime Minister support our proposal to increase the GST rebate and the Canada child benefit so we can get help now to the families who need it?

Child CareOral Questions

2:30 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, the Canada child benefit will be increasing in the coming weeks because we indexed it to the cost of living, and this increase will provide direct, immediate assistance to families.

Families across the country are benefiting from reduced fees for early childhood centres and day cares because we have invested money with the provinces in recent months to lower these costs. People in Ontario and in other provinces will see these changes in the weeks and months to come.

We are here to support families, and we will continue to be there for them with immediate help.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Mr. Speaker, now the truth is starting to come out. Today, the Prime Minister said that “police do not grant themselves new powers”. He was admitting that the police did not ask for the Emergencies Act.

That is the exact opposite of what the Minister of Public Safety has repeatedly said. Ministerial responsibility means nothing to this Liberal government anymore.

Is the Prime Minister also going to mislead the House and repeat what the Minister of Public Safety said, or will he ask him to resign?

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, during this crisis, law enforcement and provincial and municipal authorities continually asked us for more tools to deal with these illegal blockades and demonstrations, and that is exactly what we delivered. That includes invoking the Emergencies Act in a responsible and limited way to deal with these blockades.

That is exactly what happened, while Conservative politicians stood with the protesters and blockaders.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Conservative

Luc Berthold Conservative Mégantic—L'Érable, QC

Mr. Speaker, who asked, when did they ask and what exactly did they ask for? The Prime Minister just said that police officers asked the government to implement extraordinary measures by invoking the Emergencies Act.

The Prime Minister is repeating what the Minister of Public Safety said. This is scandalous. The Prime Minister is misleading the House too. He has a choice today. He can do the honourable thing: apologize and ask his minister to resign. Will he do so, yes or no?

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives are clearly willing to do anything to make people forget about how they sided with the blockaders. What I said was that, yes, police forces asked for more tools, and we gave them those tools. We sent in members of the RCMP and additional resources.

When they needed even more resources and tools, we ended up invoking the Emergencies Act. It is not up to the police to invoke that kind of act. It is up to the government, and that is exactly what we did.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Conservative

Stephanie Kusie Conservative Calgary Midnapore, AB

Mr. Speaker, in April, the Minister for Public Safety said that at the recommendation of police, we invoked the Emergencies Act, but his colleagues are saying that there was never a recommendation from law enforcement. When he was appointed as the Minister, he swore an oath to be true and faithful, but we know he has not lived up to that pledge.

Will the Prime Minister hold the minister accountable and fire him for misleading Canadians?

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, I can understand if perhaps Conservative politicians' recollections of what happened in April are a little bit fuzzy. They were out celebrating and supporting the people barricading our streets here in Ottawa and preventing goods from flowing across the border.

What we were doing was talking to police who continually were asking for more support and more tools, whether it was more resources, more money or more RCMP officers. We were there to respond to their need for more tools and we finally did that with the invocation of the Emergencies Act, which was the government's decision and not police officers' decision.

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Conservative

Stephanie Kusie Conservative Calgary Midnapore, AB

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Public Safety told Canadians over and over again that the authorities were the ones who had asked for the Emergencies Act, yet the Minister of Emergency Preparedness testified, “I'm not aware of any recommendation of law enforcement. Quite frankly, this is a decision of government.”

The Minister of Public Safety has not lived up to his oath of office, so when will the Prime Minister take immediate action and fire the Minister of Public Safety?

Public SafetyOral Questions

2:35 p.m.

Papineau Québec

Liberal

Justin Trudeau LiberalPrime Minister

Mr. Speaker, while Conservative politicians were busy supporting and celebrating with barricaders along Wellington Street and across the country, we were working with police who continually asked for more help and more support to be able to deal with this public order emergency. That is exactly what we continued to do throughout the three weeks, until and up to the moment in which we chose to bring in the Emergencies Act to restore order to this country and to the situation. We did it in a proportional and reasonable way, and it brought an end to these illegal actions.