Debates of Nov. 27th, 2023

Climate Change

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we have been waiting months for these rules and we have heard nothing but silence. That is why the commissioner of the environment and sustainable development gave the Minister of Environment a failing grade on the climate crisis. The Conservatives do not even believe there is a climate crisis, and the Liberals are just dragging their feet.

When will the minister stop this nonsense and announce a cap on greenhouse gas emissions for oil and gas companies?

[Steven Guilbeault, Liberal, Minister of Environment and Climate Change]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind my hon. colleague that we are the only G20 country to have eliminated fossil fuel subsidies two years ahead of schedule. Not only has no one else done this, but we did it two years ahead of schedule. We have already introduced regulations to reduce methane emissions from the oil and gas sector by at least 40% by 2025. We have implemented carbon pricing and, as I mentioned to his colleague earlier, by the end of the year we will be announcing the framework for a cap on greenhouse gas emissions for the oil and gas sector.

Gender-Based Violence

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, gender-based violence is unacceptable and has no place in the country, including in my home town, Brampton South. November 25 marked the start of 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. This is a global campaign to raise awareness about ending violence against women and girls.

This month, the federal government stepped up by investing in and supporting the implementation of the national action plan to end gender-based violence in Ontario.

Could the hon. Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Youth share the details of the national action plan with the House?

[Marci Ien, Liberal, Minister for Women and Gender Equality and Youth]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Brampton South for her unwavering advocacy in supporting women and girls.

Gender-based violence has no place in Canada or anywhere else. It is why the national plan to end it is crucial, a plan in every province and every territory.

Recently, the member for Brampton South and I announced $162 million to support Ontario through the national action plan. This creates a safe pathway for those who need it most. We now have nine provinces and territories with agreements. I look forward to others in the coming weeks.

Carbon Pricing

[Damien Kurek, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, after eight years of Liberal-NDP policies being forced on Canadians, we see that the Prime Minister is simply not worth the cost. Recent reports show that food banks saw nearly two million visits in the last month. The tragedy is that this is a feature, not a flaw, of the Prime Minister's plan to quadruple the carbon tax on gas, groceries and home heating.

How high does the number of Canadians starving have to get before the Prime Minister gets out of the way and allows his appointed senators to pass a common-sense Conservative bill, Bill C-234 and help farmers and ranchers lower the cost of food for all Canadians?

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Minister of Families]

Mr. Speaker, as I have said before, we continue to look at policies and programs like the Canada child benefit, like early learning and child care, opportunities to support Canadian families when they need it. At every turn, the Leader of the Opposition continues to oppose the hard work that we are doing. His common sense is just nonsense.

We will continue to do the hard work to ensure that we are there to support Canadian families.

[Damien Kurek, Conservative, Battle River—Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it sounds like that high-priced communications consultant certainly is not worth the cost. The real nonsense is the rhetoric coming from the Liberals.

There is a real opportunity to lower the cost of food for Canadians. It is in the name of a common-sense Conservative bill, Bill C-234. It is a simple and pragmatic way to reduce the cost of food production on our farms.

Will the Prime Minister put his ego aside and do what is best for Canadians and stop the pressure he is applying to his appointed senators, which is keeping them from passing a common-sense bill, Bill C-234?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the nonsense needs to stop coming from the other side.

When it comes to this bill in the Senate, it has been the Conservative senators who have been bullying and harassing independent senators, limiting their ability to participate and exercise their democratic rights. The RCMP is involved.

It is the Conservative Party of Canada that needs to stop directing senators and let the Senate do its work, as it was supposed to do. We do not interfere in the Senate, but clearly the Conservatives do.

[Richard Bragdon, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Mr. Speaker, after eight long years of the NDP-Liberal government, everything is up. Taxes are up, fuel is up, food is up and Canadians are fed up, but they are still hungry. Now, in the midst of this affordability crisis, the Prime Minister has doubled down on his plan to quadruple the carbon tax. We, as common-sense Conservatives, have brought forward Bill C-234, which would create another carbon carve-out for our farmers. We understand that when one taxes the farmer who grows the food, one taxes the trucker who ships the food and one taxes everyone who buys the food.

Will the Prime Minister finally back off, prioritize food security and let his appointed senators pass this bill?

[Steven Guilbeault, Liberal, Minister of Environment and Climate Change]

Mr. Speaker, with your permission, I would like to read a few extracts from a CBC article from last week that reads: “Three independent senators say they were bullied by Conservative Leader [in the Senate] Don Plett”. It says, “Police and the Senate security team are also now investigating outside threats directed at [Senator] Clement”.

It continues: “threatening phone calls and online harassment directed at Clement after her confrontation with Plett on Nov. 9 ‘got so out of control’ that she feared for her physical safety ‘and was forced to leave her private residence and spend her weekend elsewhere in a secure location.’”

That is what they are doing.

[Anna Roberts, Conservative, King—Vaughan, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if the 800,000 people who used Ontario's food banks last year were their own city, it would be the third-largest city in Ontario. It is clear after eight years that the NDP-Liberal government is just not worth the cost.

Conservative Bill C-234 would remove the carbon tax for farmers, making food prices cheaper. The Liberal environment minister has promised to resign. I hope he sticks to that.

Will the Prime Minister tell the senators to put Canadians first and pass Bill C-234, so Canadians can feed themselves?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the premise of her question is false, first of all. We know that this is a pattern of behaviour that we are seeing from these Conservatives where they are not putting forward the actual facts and telling the truth to Canadians about how these things work.

Let us be clear: In the Liberal Party, we have no senators in our caucus. The same cannot be true about the Conservative Party of Canada. What we have heard is that not only are they directing senators, interfering with their independence, but their senators are also threatening independent senators. This is a clear pattern of behaviour, their obstruction of democracy.

Official Languages

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

Mr. Speaker, $2 billion is the total amount that the federal government has invested in strengthening English in Quebec since 1995. It spent $2 billion to support the language of the 360 million anglophones that surround us, and enrich groups that are advocating for Quebec's anglicization. We will say it over and over again until the federal government finally gets the message: French is in decline, not English. English does not need help or money.

When will this government realize that it has to stop funding the anglicization of Quebec?

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Minister of Tourism and Minister responsible for the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec]

Mr. Speaker, our government was the one that said it first: French is in decline and it has to be promoted and supported.

We passed a new Official Languages Act that the Bloc Québécois supported. It is very misleading to calculate spending at roughly $70 million over 27 years when in fact we have been giving Quebec $500 million to $700 million a year for the past 30 years to support francization. We assist Radio-Canada and Telefilm Canada because, on this side of the House, we support not only French, but francophone content as well.

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

Mr. Speaker, Ottawa is spending $2 billion to anglicize Quebec, and it does not stop there. In its action plan for official languages, Ottawa has earmarked $800 million for English in Quebec over the next five years, and let the chips fall where they may. This is typical of our Liberals. They say there is a difference between the situations facing francophones and anglophones. They claim to care about the future of French, but they do not walk the talk. Once again, English is being favoured, with $800 million in federal assistance.

Why not redirect that money to French instead of anglicizing Quebec?

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, as Quebeckers, we must always defend and promote French. That is what we are doing, for example, with record investments in official languages. That is what we are doing for language of work and language of service initiatives in Quebec.

The Bloc Québécois is clearly trying to pick a fight. It is trying to divide Quebeckers.

Will the Bloc Québécois ever understand and accept that a Quebecker is a Quebecker, regardless of their mother tongue?

Automotive Industry

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians are spending billions on taxpayer-funded foreign replacement workers on the new EV battery plant in Windsor.

Windsor officials report that there will be up to 1,600 foreign replacement workers. One Liberal minister said there was only going to be one. Another minister said there would just be a few. A third said of course there will be foreign workers. The company said there would be 1,600, then 900 and then 1,600.

The Liberals cannot get their story straight. Will they come clean, tell the truth and release the contract, so all Canadians can tell what is going on here?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, Minister of Labour and Seniors]

Mr. Speaker, let us set the story straight.

Let us listen to Dave Cassidy, the president of Unifor Local 444 in Windsor, Ontario:

We have 900 skilled trades working on the site today — 900. We're gonna go up to about 2,000 trades, they tell me it's going to go up to about 2,000 trades. There's also on top of that going to be 2,500 unionized Local 444 members inside that facility.

We should listen to workers.

[Rick Perkins, Conservative, South Shore—St. Margarets, NS]

Mr. Speaker, we noticed he did not say “Canadian” workers.

On top of that, the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry said that he is going to hold a meeting with the company to find out from the company what its plans are for the contract he negotiated and signed. I cannot make this stuff up. He has to ask the company what is in the contract he negotiated. A $15-billion subsidy is going to cost every Canadian family $1,000 in taxes and leave Canadian union workers in the cold.

If they have nothing to hide, will the Liberals come clean and release the contract?

[François-Philippe Champagne, Liberal, Minister of Innovation]

Mr. Speaker, we will take no lessons from the Conservatives, especially from a party whose leader, when he was minister of employment, oversaw the loss of not 3,000, not 30,000 but 300,000 manufacturing jobs. Can we imagine? It is shameful.

With an investment of $3.4 billion by Stellantis, we will be creating 2,500 jobs at the plant. We are going to continue to invest in Windsor. We will invest in our workers. We will invest in our industries.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister gave billions of tax dollars to subsidize a single battery plant. Now we learn that hundreds of the jobs linked to the plant will not be filled by qualified, local, unionized Canadian workers but by taxpayer-funded foreign replacement workers.

If that is not bad enough, now the Liberals are desperately fighting to keep the details of the contract hidden. Why are they doing so? If it is such a good deal, what does the government have to worry about? Did Liberals actually sign off on giving billions of tax dollars without securing guarantees that Canadians would get the jobs?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, Minister of Labour and Seniors]

Mr. Speaker, I am fairly certain that Dave Cassidy, the president of Unifor Local 444, speaks for his membership, which are Canadian workers.

He said, “This is nothing new”, that they go through launches like this all the time. He said that this “is nothing more than political hay.” He cannot believe our politicians are playing this game and riling up thousands of people; this is the circus around politics. If Pierre had his way, these factories would not even be built.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Speaker, Liberal, Greg Fergus]

I would like to remind all members that, even if they are reading a quotation, they cannot refer to a member of the actual House aside from their riding name.

The hon. minister.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I will end the same way I ended before: We should listen to workers.