Debates of Oct. 28th, 2024

Reference to Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The hon. member knows not to mention the name of the Prime Minister or any other names of members who sit in the House.

The hon. member for Calgary Signal Hill.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, I will withdraw the name of the individual, but the label is the individual's name and it is called “Grope Gate”.

We then went on to the SNC-Lavalin affair, and we all know what that was about. We had a situation where the Prime Minister was trying to get the attorney general of Canada at the time to break the law so that his buddies with a firm in Canada could continue activities that were probably a little suspect. It was another situation where there was no respect for the institution and no respect that the attorney general had a job to do and could not have done that job if the Prime Minister had had his way. We all know how that ended.

We then went to something called the blackface scandal. Of course, who is it attributed to? There is that name again.

We then got to sole-source contracts. That is not him; that is the Minister of International Trade.

We then got to the WE Charity controversy. That was the same individual and another guy named “Bill no more”. He is no more.

We then have a big one. This takes up the whole page. It is called arrive scam. That one is not even finished yet. That one is still well under way.

Then there is the sister-in-law ethics commissioner. We all know who that was. We then have Chinese government interference. Wikipedia names the Government of China, CSIS, the Liberal Party, the guy again and another member, who is an independent now. Then we see the Hunka scandal. While I cannot say the name again, the last scandal happens to be the Leader of the Opposition's “wacko” comment. Wikipedia calls that a scandal.

When we read all of the scandals that Wikipedia lists, the only one that is attributed to the Conservatives is the comment that our leader made about the Prime Minister, which I do not consider a scandal. I consider it an accurate assessment. That highlights where we are at and why we are in this debate today.

I will leave the scandal-plagued government to figure out its next move. I want to talk a bit about the last nine years in this country and what has happened to our economy and the standard of living.

Much of it is because the government has been totally inept. We have a government led by a leader who is quoted as saying that he has an admiration for the Chinese dictatorship. That in itself should cause a lot of concern. If we look at what has happened over the last nine years in the country, it so much reflects China, Cuba or other dictatorships. This is what we have had running this country.

Canadians cannot wait. Canadians have said loud and clear that they are sick and tired of this guy and it is time for him to go. His members, some of whom are afraid they are not going to win the next election, are starting to rebel. We will see where that goes, but as has been the case when it comes to certain situations, this individual seems pretty set in his ways. I happen to have a bet on it. I will not say which way I have gone, but right now it looks like I am losing.

As the Conservative Party, nothing would make us happier than to run in the next election against the Liberal leader, the guy who is referred to as “little potato”. I did not make that up. That is a fair assessment. We would dearly love to have the opportunity to run against the little potato and go into an election. I am afraid the results would not be pretty fr all the fellows and ladies over there. In fact, I am looking at a couple of their ridings and the polls do not look good. I would be polishing up my résumé, especially if I were the member for Waterloo. It is going to be tough for the Liberal MPs to sell this.

We started off with sunny ways, and Canadians bought into it. Politics changes in cycles and clearly in 2015 Canadians decided they wanted a change. They changed to sunny ways, but it was not sunny for very long before the clouds started to set in.

This particular Liberal government has done more to harm the Alberta economy than any government in this country's history. Even today there are announcements coming out. Look at the most recent immigration announcement, and look at it deeply to see how it is going to impact Alberta negatively.

It is about time the government put its record on the line and called an election to see what Canadians really think. The Liberals seem to feel like pollsters have it all wrong, that Canadians still see sunny ways out there, but I am afraid we are well beyond that.

I would like to wrap up by saying that this particular scandal—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order. I just want to remind members that there will be plenty of time for questions and comments, 10 minutes, and that making comments interrupts members who are speaking.

The hon. member for Calgary Signal Hill has the floor.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is the same member that a point of order was called on earlier. I heard the same thing the member for Kelowna—Lake Country heard, which was about calling the member who spoke two members earlier a name. I will not say what the word was—

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

What was the word?

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

"Stupid" is the word you said.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order. I indicated during the point of order that we would be listening to what was said and would come back to the House if need be. I would ask the hon member to stick to his speech, and I would ask the hon. member for Hamilton Centre to please wait if he has questions and comments.

I ask members to please be respectful. When someone else has the floor, please do not interrupt them.

The hon. member for Calgary Signal Hill has the floor.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, maybe while I am on my feet and while the NDP wants to get into the conversation, let us talk a bit about what the NDP has done over the last three years. The first six years were not so bad, but the last three years are why we have the government we have today, why bad decisions have happened and the reason for our cost of living.

Today we heard the March food bank statistics. The member, I am sure, has plenty of people in Hamilton Centre lining up at the food bank, mainly because of policies of the Liberal government that the New Democrats have supported. Every NDP member is on the bubble when it comes to the next election. Members had better believe it. All they have to do is look at the polls. I bet they have looked at the polls—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order. Again, I want to remind members to please hold on to their questions, comments or thoughts until it is the appropriate time.

The hon. member for Calgary Signal Hill has six and a half minutes left.

[Some hon. members]

More, more.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, there will be other speakers, and there may even be amendments we can speak to again, so they may get their wish if they want more.

Let us get back to the scandal before us. If we did not have the NDP consistently supporting the Liberals at committee, we might have a little confidence that something would happen there. However, I am afraid that when this goes to committee, as the speaker before me said, it will be swept it under the rug and the Liberals will filibuster. It is about time the Liberals stood up, respected the ruling of their own Speaker, tabled the documents with no black lines in them and let the RCMP do its investigation. If they do not, we could be here for many more days, or maybe weeks or months. It is hard to say.

I feel sorry for the poor member for Hamilton Centre, who will have to sit and listen to this for what could be days, weeks or months, but I can assure him that it is going to happen unless the documents are tabled. That is an easy way to finish this.

With those comments, I will wrap up and say that I look forward to answering any questions the members for Hamilton Centre and Waterloo might have.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, the member started off by talking about the lack of respect for the institution. What we are witnessing from the Conservative Party of Canada every day is just that. I would ultimately argue that it is a form of contempt of Parliament, every day, from the Conservative Party. Canadians should not be surprised because the only prime minister in the history of the British Commonwealth found to be in contempt of Parliament was Stephen Harper. The parliamentary secretary to Stephen Harper at the time was none other than the leader of the Conservative Party today.

Why does the leader of the Conservative Party believe he can have so much disrespect for the Parliament of Canada? Why does he refuse to get the security clearance to deal with the important issue of foreign interference? When will the Conservative Party, and the leader of the Conservative Party, specifically, start putting the interests of the nation ahead of his own personal interests and the interests of the Conservative Party?

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, the leader of our party has been travelling this country for the last two years and meeting with Canadians of all walks of life on their home turf. All we have seen, since that time, is that the popularity of our leader continues to increase because he is talking with Canadians about things that they care about.

This particular member, who says he goes to McDonald's in Winnipeg on Saturday mornings to check out what his constituents have to say, should maybe pick a few other McDonald's locations and check out what they have to say. Canadians are telling us that they are fed up with the government, they are sick and tired of the Prime Minister, and they want an election now.

[Matthew Green, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I was eagerly waiting to hear what the hon. member had to say today because, quite frankly, I have not heard from him in quite some time. If there is one positive outcome for him here, perhaps it is that he has finally had a chance to speak. As a proponent of freedom of speech, I am glad he has that ability here today.

I do have to ask the hon. member a question because I know he is from Calgary, but it appears the signal is not quite getting to the hill. Did he not watch committee? Does he not understand that I was actually the one who uncovered this in the first place? There is this whole nonsense about this being about us, but why does he not just come clean with his base, stop misleading them, stop banking on the stupidity of the base and come clean with the fact it is them holding us up in the House? It can go to committee. It can be dealt with.

Does he have the integrity and the courage to at least be honest with his base?

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, the facts speak for themselves. How many committees have we had filibustered? Stuff gets swept under the rug because the NDP votes with the Liberals every time. Why would we send this to the committee?

The Speaker has made a ruling, and if we have any desire to uphold this institution, we should be doing what the Speaker says and they should provide the documents, unredacted, now.

[Pat Kelly, Conservative, Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB]

Madam Speaker, I would like to ask the member for Calgary Signal Hill to maybe elaborate a bit. Some have said that this place is now in a state of paralysis over the Liberals' refusal to comply with the order the House that was already voted on, but, of course, there is a remedy. The remedy is an election.

If there is urgent business we cannot attend to because the members cannot agree to get past this issue, why will they not just call an election?

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, the member is one hundred per cent correct. We have been saying that now for three and a half weeks. There are many options that can happen. Number one, obviously, is to table the documents and the House goes back to regular consideration of business, or, if the Liberals are that afraid to table the documentation, there is another option. Actually, there is enough time yet. There are 58 days between now and Christmas, when we could actually have an election. I would challenge the deputy House leader to make that recommendation to his leader at caucus on Wednesday.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thought the hon. member for Hamilton Centre made a very good point. I know that a number of members have worked on exposing what went on at Sustainable Development Technology Canada, and it is not really a partisan issue. There was a breakdown of basic functionality in a committee that had worked well before.

In addition to the work of Conservative members, would the member for Calgary Signal Hill like to acknowledge the work of the member for Hamilton Centre?

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, I have no faith in the Liberal-NDP government or anything going to committee. Neither one of those two parties want to go to an election right now, so whatever it takes to filibuster a committee, they are going to do it. I have no faith in the committee system in the House under the current Liberal-NDP government, and that is why we need the documents tabled, as ordered by the Speaker. There is an easy way out.

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Waterloo, ON]

Madam Speaker, I just want to say to my colleague across the way that I was really enthused by his speech and I could not contain myself. I do apologize for getting a bit loud, but I do appreciate hearing his voice. It is a voice we do not hear often in this chamber, and it is quite refreshing to see him. I will refrain from digressing too far.

The member talks about an election and this issue. I think it is a very important issue. I would like to ask the member if there is any member of Parliament or any political party that does not agree with the advancement of this question of privilege?

The second comment I would like to make is that the member refers to the Speaker as the government's Speaker. That is not the way this place works. The member has been around for a long time. The Speaker is elected to represent all the good people and to play a very important role. Does the member believe, as per the Speaker's ruling, that this work should go to committee?

The Conservatives have been kind of misrepresenting what the Speaker said. The Speaker said we should be able to call the question and let the committee do its important work. I believe we should have confidence in the RCMP to do its work.

[Ron Liepert, Conservative, Calgary Signal Hill, AB]

Madam Speaker, if I gave the impression that somehow the Speaker was biased, that was not my intention. What I said was that the Speaker was elected as a Liberal MP. Yes, he was elected by the House as the Speaker, but he is a Liberal MP. The Liberals are not even supporting one of their own colleagues when he makes a ruling that is unbiased.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I just want to remind the member to be very careful. He knows that every MP who is elected in the House has an opportunity to elect the Speaker, who is then impartial. I just want to leave it there. If the hon. member can finish answering the question, there will be time for another question after that.