Debates of Dec. 12th, 2023

Canada-Ukraine Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, 2023

[Lori Idlout, NDP, Nunavut, NU]

Uqaqtittiji, the other thing I very much appreciate about this trade agreement is the chapter that talks about trade and indigenous peoples. I understand that modernizing the agreement is important, and ensuring that indigenous peoples are allowed economic opportunities through this trade agreement is particularly important.

Will the member make sure that, when his party is creating the bilateral committee, it will include indigenous representation from all indigenous groups?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am confident in knowing that, when we talk about trade agreements, economic development and the social impacts of these agreements, a wide spectrum of things are considered. These include the absolutely critical role, as the Prime Minister himself has indicated, of ensuring that we operate as two governments, making sure that indigenous and Canadian interests are being served well.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety]

Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague spoke about the obsession that the Conservatives have around pricing pollution, which will actually take money out of the pockets of his constituents. He also spoke about the influences from the Trumpist MAGA Republicans in the U.S. Is the member at all concerned that the Conservatives seem to be advocating for the far right in this country, which supports Russia, as well as big oil instead of constituents?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the question, and that is the reason I would reference a pattern. What we have actually seen is that the Conservative Party of today is not the same Conservative Party even of Stephen Harper. Under the current leadership, it continues to move farther to the right.

The MAGA right is very real. It is a movement that is in the United States, and it is coming north. The one who is selling it the most today is the leader of the Conservative Party, and the price on pollution is an excellent example of that.

A bunch of Conservatives travel the country saying that they are going to get rid of the price on pollution and make things more affordable; in fact, it is just not true. A vast majority of Canadians would actually have less disposable income as a direct result of the Conservatives' policy, yet they would not know that from what they are being told by the Conservative movement today. Canadians need to be made aware of it. American-style politics is coming north through the leader of the official opposition.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, of course, different sovereign states disagree from time to time about policy. Last summer, the Canadian ambassador to Ukraine was actually summoned, and the President of Ukraine publicly and repeatedly expressed his extreme displeasure over the fact that this government granted a sanctions waiver for a turbine that was to facilitate the export of Russian gas. This was a very serious issue for the Government of Ukraine. One does not summon an ambassador lightly, but that is what the Ukrainian government did.

The member is sort of on his high horse about how, somehow, we should never disagree with a country that we are friends with. Of course, Canada supports Ukraine; Conservatives support Ukraine. However, this member is now saying that we should do exactly what the government wants.

I want to ask the member: Where was he last summer? Did he make any statements about the sanctions waiver? What, if anything, did he have to say when the Canadian ambassador to Ukraine was summoned by President Zelenskyy to express his displeasure?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am not going to accept the changing of the channel. At the end of the day, whether it is the President of Ukraine, the Ukrainian ambassador to Canada or the Canadian Ukrainian Congress, not to mention millions of Canadians, they can see the behaviour of the Conservative Party today when it comes to the Canada-Ukraine agreement and the line-by-line allotments of support to Ukraine. The Conservative Party has been nothing but a disappointment; the far right has taken over the party on certain policies, and this is one of them.

I say shame on the Conservative Party for not getting behind this and continuing to have that unanimous support. Rather, it caters to the far right. I think that does a disservice to all of Canada.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Madam Speaker, as I rise for this third reading debate, I have to express my deep disappointment at the inflammatory rhetoric that we hear from the Liberal government. Its members are desperately trying to change the channel from the misery that they have brought to Canadians, whether in terms of the millions of Canadians visiting food banks or the 800,000 people in Ontario who have to rely on a food bank now. This would be the same as the fourth-largest city in Ontario being completely dependent on the food bank to survive. That is the result after eight years of the Liberal government.

Liberals try to change the channel about a principled decision by the Conservative Party to vote against this free trade agreement. There are many reasons to do so. Of course, we have talked about the fact that there is a reference to carbon pricing and carbon leakage. There is also, as the Liberals like to call it, the polluter pays principle, with policies that those who pollute the environment should bear the cost of that pollution. Most Liberals say that emitting carbon is pollution. Therefore, as Ukrainians are in the middle of a war and are trying to heat their homes, the Liberal government is saying that they are polluters, because most Ukrainians use carbon-based fuels for heating.

We get to have a principled objection to this free trade agreement on that basis alone. There are many other reasons we would be opposed to it that we have not debated in great detail. Opposition parties get to vote against what they consider to be bad legislation. The Liberals say it is no big deal that there are some references to carbon pricing and carbon leakage. However, what will they do in the next trade agreement they try to sign? This is the first time carbon pricing and carbon leakage have ever been in a trade agreement. Is it in the free trade agreement with the European Union, the CPTPP, our trade agreement with the United States or any other trade agreement that Canada has ever signed? No, it is not.

This is the first time Liberals have put it into a trade agreement. What will it be the next time? Will Liberals mandate a certain carbon tax within a trade agreement? That is what they are trying to do. The Liberals are desperately trying to entrench the carbon tax and their version of carbon pricing into international trade agreements. What will be the next step they take on that?

We get to oppose that on principle. The really despicable thing that has happened as a result of this is that the Liberals suggest that this is the Conservative Party not supporting Ukraine and, in fact, somehow supporting Vladimir Putin and Russia. That kind of toxic rhetoric is actually quite despicable. The Liberals should be ashamed that they are using it on the very principled position that Conservatives have taken on this free trade agreement.

As we know, there are two other parties in the House that have supported this free trade agreement, so this is actually going to pass. Our vote will cause no harm to Ukraine as we voice our principled opposition to the Liberal government's obsession with carbon taxes and carbon pricing.

When we look at—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The hon. parliamentary secretary to the government House leader on a point of order.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, seriously? Wow.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order. I have recognized the hon. parliamentary secretary for a point of order. Let us hear what he has to say.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, the member is, if not directly, then indirectly, talking about how the Conservative Party has voted. It was ruled earlier that we cannot do that.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I rise on the same point of order. These far left, megadisruptive tactics from this member have no place in the House. He should be ashamed of himself.

The member in question was talking about his own decisions, which the other member has done, and he says this should be allowed.

Again, I encourage these far left-importing tactics—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

From what I can see, we are starting to go down that road again that was ruled on earlier this morning based on all the points of order that were being raised. I would recommend that members go back and look at the rules of order we already have in place. If they have a point of order, members should make sure it fits within those rules, one that we can actually take in.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Madam Speaker, the party that complaints that points of order are disruptive makes a ridiculous point of order.

I will go back to my point, which is that my decision as a Conservative to vote against this agreement is a principled decision. I will not stand for trade agreements having carbon pricing or taxes, because who knows what the Liberals are going to do next time. I get to do that. As we know, this legislation is going to pass, so there is no harm being caused by that.

When we look, for instance, at what happened with the waiver of the export permit that the government granted for a gas turbine, that caused significant harm to Ukraine. President Zelenskyy said, “If a terrorist state can squeeze out such an exception to sanctions, what exceptions will it want tomorrow or the day after tomorrow? ...it is dangerous not only for Ukraine, but also for all countries of the democratic world.” President Zelenskyy called on the Liberal government to change its decision.

The Liberals say we should listen to President Zelenskyy on the trade agreement, but Conservatives get to disagree with them on that. We think it is not a good trade deal. It is not good for Ukraine and not good for Canada. However, President Zelenskyy saying that the Liberal government should not grant the export waiver that is aiding Russia is somehow no big deal, there is nothing to see here. Their hypocrisy on this is really astounding.

Then the government turns a principled vote in the House of Commons against including carbon taxes, carbon leakage or carbon pricing in a trade agreement for the first time ever into somehow aiding Russia or Vladimir Putin. Not only is that language despicable, it is completely unhelpful to the debate. Liberals saying Conservatives are supporting Russia is giving Russia some kind of a win.

Conservatives, of course, are not saying that. We are saying it is a terrible decision and the decision helped Russia pump gas, which has helped fuelled its war. President Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian ambassador said that. Those are their words, not ours.

If we look at who is actually causing harm to Ukraine, it is the Liberal government in its decision to grant that export waiver. Many Liberal members stand and claim that Conservatives are doing terrible things to Ukraine as a result of our principled decision. Where were they on this decision? They are not there, which, to me, is deeply hypocritical. Ukrainian Canadians know exactly which party supported the export of that gas turbine. If that was all, I would say that is pretty bad, but not absolutely awful.

However, let us look at what else has happened. There are now media reports that Canadian detonators are in Russian mines. That is a complete lack of export control by the government. We know that Liberals are not very good at doing much, but to allow Canadian detonators to find their way, as the media has reported, into Russian mines is inexcusable. They say our principled vote against the bad things they put in this trade agreement is somehow aiding Russia and Vladimir Putin, but they exported a gas turbine used to pump Russian gas to fund the war and Canadian detonators have found their way into Russian mines that are used during the war. If we compare these things, some things are desperately harmful to Ukraine and other things do not cause any damage whatsoever.

If that was all, Conservatives would say it is terrible, though not absolutely awful, but there is more. Canada is the only G7 country that is not offering wartime insurance to businesses. Liberals say Canada is there to help rebuild Ukraine, but they will not put wartime insurance in place for businesses right now. Therefore, any businesses in Canada that want to help Ukraine during the war do not have wartime insurance. Every other G7 country has it. This causes real damage to Ukraine and they have the audacity to say that our principled vote against the trade agreement is somehow aiding Vladimir Putin. These three decisions the Liberals made are aiding the Russian war effort, so their hypocrisy on this is really stunning.

At committee, we tried to improve the trade agreement. The Ukrainian ambassador said recently that they could use, in the future, co-operation on energy security. As we pointed out at the committee, there is nothing in this trade agreement on energy security. It is shocking.

Ukraine needs energy security. Why would we not include a chapter on energy security? I know the Liberals and all their proxies say that has never been in a trade agreement before, so we cannot put it in. Carbon pricing and carbon leakage were never in a trade agreement before either. Clearly, we can put things into trade agreements that have never been in them before.

They are going to ask why it is not in there. It is because when we negotiate a trade agreement, two sides decide what they are going to put in them. The Liberal government's priority was carbon taxes, carbon pricing and carbon leakage. We know the Ukrainians want energy security. The ambassador just said it recently on the news. Why was there not a chapter on energy security in the trade agreement? We can only conclude it is because the Liberal government did not want to put anything in the trade agreement on energy security. We can come to no other conclusion.

The Conservatives tried to fix that. We brought forward a motion at committee to expand the scope of what could be included in the review of this trade agreement to allow for energy security. Every single Liberal member on that committee voted no, which is the exact opposite of what the Ukrainian ambassador was just asking for.

When we talk about what is causing harm, there is only one wrecking ball going through this and it is the wrecking ball of the Liberals because they exported the gas turbine, they will not grant wartime insurance and Canadian detonators are somehow finding their way into Russian mines. I ascribe all of that to gross incompetence because we see gross incompetence from the Liberals on virtually every single thing they touch right now here in Canada.

If that was all, we could say that it is not such a big deal. However, there were eight amendments at committee that we tried to use to improve the free trade agreement so we could actually find a way to support it. One of the amendments that I put forward would have delayed the coming into force of the agreement until the references to carbon pricing and carbon leakage were removed. If that had been done, I would have found a way to vote in favour of it, but that was voted down like every single amendment was voted down that we put forward to make this trade agreement better.

This included an amendment to strengthen co-operation on matters relating to nuclear technology, including the export of Canadian nuclear equipment, expertise and uranium to Ukraine. Ukraine has lost 50% of its electricity-generating capacity as a result of this war from Russian bombing. Would it not have been great to put in this free trade agreement co-operation on expanding nuclear capacity?

I know, everyone is saying surely the Liberals voted for that. It is what Ukraine needs, it is what the Ukrainian ambassador asked for. No, people would be wrong. Liberals voted against it. They want to include their ideological obsession with carbon pricing and carbon leakage, but they do not want to vote for co-operation in nuclear technology, and co-operation on energy to provide energy security.

The other issue is this: There could have been co-operation on LNG capacity in Ukraine and increasing Canadian LNG exports. As everyone knows, Russia's war machine is primarily funded by the exports of gas.

Ukraine is sitting on the third-largest proven reserves of LNG in all of Europe. Imagine a Europe that is getting its LNG exclusively from Ukraine, as opposed to getting LNG from Russia. Imagine if Ukraine got the revenues from being able to export LNG to Europe and to other parts of the world to help it fight the Russian invasion. This would be a double win. It would cut off the blood money that is going to Russia and it would increase the revenues of Ukraine. It would have more money to fight the war.

Surely, Liberals voted for the trade agreement to include LNG co-operation, right? It would be a win-win for everyone. No, they did not; they voted against it, because the Prime Minister and the Liberal Party have an ideological obsession with carbon taxes, carbon prices and carbon emissions.

Even to the detriment of a country in the middle of war, a country fighting for its very survival, what is the most important thing for the Liberal government? It is carbon tax, carbon price and carbon leakage. Even in this context, Liberals cannot get out of their obsession with the carbon tax, which is something that absolutely would have helped Ukraine.

I will move on to some of the amendments that were put forward. We put forward an amendment on the donation of Canadian military equipment because we have equipment somewhat past its functional life but not completely unusable. This could be exported to Ukraine and refurbished so it could have more Canadian military equipment to help in its war. Again, surely Liberals voted for that because it would be a direct benefit to Ukraine. No, they did not. Then they have the audacity to say to us that if we vote against this free trade agreement somehow it is a win for Russia and Vladimir Putin. The hypocrisy is really unbelievable.

There are more and more amendments that were put forward—

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order, only because I do think it is important we get some sort of a ruling sooner as opposed to later. The member has now, on a couple of occasions, been reflecting on votes, whether they were in committee or here, which is a concern all members should be having.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Madam Speaker, on the same point of order, on what the parliamentary secretary just said, a member is allowed to reflect on their own votes. I do not believe the Standing Orders in the House of Commons directly affect how committees vote. I do not believe it has ever been part of the rules directly.

Votes cannot be referred to in the House that are taken here. Part of the ruling that is made should also include whether we can refer to votes taken at committee, especially a member's own vote, which a member is allowed to reflect on because it is part of the public record. It should be public and they can refer to it when speaking to constituents and speaking in the House on it. That is what the member for Dufferin—Caledon was doing. If not for the interruption by the parliamentary secretary, I am sure he would have finished by now.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Madam Speaker, I rise on the same point of order. I will read very specifically from the standing order I think the member is trying to refer to. This is Standing Order 18, the second half of it, which reads:

No member may reflect upon any vote of the House, except for the purpose of moving that such vote be rescinded.

That makes fairly clear that reflecting on a vote of committee is not covered by the standing order.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

As indicated before, I appreciate the additional information the hon. members have put forward. I will come back to the House, if need be.

I want to remind members that, according to the Standing Orders, they are not to reflect on how other members have voted in votes that have been held in the House.

I will allow the hon. member for Dufferin—Caledon to continue his speech.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is amazing to me that the member who complained about points of order during his speech continues to rise to interrupt me when I am giving my speech about continuing to talk about motions that were brought forward to try to make the trade agreement better.

Again, a motion was brought at committee for expanded munitions productions in Canada to increase munitions exports to Ukraine and to support the development of weapons and ammunitions manufacturing capabilities in Ukraine by Canadian industry. A country in the middle of a war and using thousands of shells a day needs expanded munitions, so, of course, we brought forward the motion to say that we want to directly support Ukraine, because, despite the desperate attempts by the Liberal government and its members to say we do not support Ukraine, we absolutely do. Of course, the motion was defeated, with all Liberal members at the committee voting against it.

We try to talk about actual support for Ukraine, and Conservatives have put forward real motions, real amendments to improve the trade agreement to help Ukraine. We have done that. What the Liberal government has done is export a gas turbine and be so incompetent and negligent as to allow Canadian detonators to end up in Russian mines. It has not provided wartime insurance for Canadian businesses to help rebuild Ukraine. We are the only country in the G7 not to do that. Liberals then have had the audacity to stand here and somehow suggest that we are supporting Vladimir Putin. That is a disgraceful comment to make. They should be ashamed of themselves for making it, but—

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I think it would be really shocking if the Liberals accused the Conservatives of supporting Vladimir Putin, but I think the issue was that they voted against Operation Unifier on three separate occasions.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Again, that is a point of debate.

The hon. member for Dufferin—Caledon.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Madam Speaker, what we find is that the hyperbole coming from the Liberals does not match reality. Their criticism is deeply hypocritical. We all know it. They have done things that have directly harmed and continue to directly harm Ukraine with their decisions. They have become the party of disinformation by suggesting that we do not support Ukraine, disinformation that somehow our opposition to the free trade agreement means not supporting Ukraine. We tried to make the trade agreement better so we could support the agreement and, of course, Ukraine. The Liberal government did everything it could to make sure that was not possible. Why did it? It is because it wants to use the trade agreement in a desperate attempt to score cheap political points here in Canada with an incredibly false narrative.

I move:

That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word “That” and substituting the following:

“Bill C-57, An Act to implement the 2023 Free Trade Agreement between Canada and Ukraine, be not now read a third time, but be referred back to the Standing Committee on International Trade with the view to amend the coming into force provision to allow it to be fixed by order of the Governor in Council after the removal of all references to carbon pricing and carbon leakage.”

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The amendment is in order.

[Marcus Powlowski, Liberal, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Madam Speaker, on a point of order, are we debating the amendment or are we still in the original debate?