Debates of Dec. 10th, 2024

Public Accounts

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, my comments were very much reflective of the individuals who introduced the concurrence report. Their emphasis was on what was taking place between Canada and the United States, specifically in regard to the border and some of the issues related to it. This is what I was talking about and amplifying with respect to the misinformation that the Conservative Party continuously puts on the record, both inside and outside the House, through things such as social media.

Obviously, the government is very concerned, whether it is the situation that the member described of someone attempting to cross the Canadian border, or a death that occurs in my home province of Manitoba, an individual who had frozen to death. The sad reality is that smugglers caused a great deal of harm to the individuals in question—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Members need to look at me so they know when they are being prompted to wrap it up to allow for more questions.

The hon. member for Timmins—James Bay.

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

Madam Speaker, when Putin launched his horrific invasion of Ukraine, I took it for a given that everyone in the Canadian Parliament would stand up and defend Ukraine. However, time and again, the member who lives in Stornoway sent all his members in to vote against military support and trade for Ukraine. We were very shocked. We thought that perhaps it was because of the Putin disinformation out there. However, I never thought we would see Conservatives standing in the House to undermine Canada to benefit Donald Trump, a convicted predator who has lied about our nation time and time again. At stake is a 25% tariff that will hit our nation while Americans amplify this disinformation.

I have been in the House 20 years and I have never seen any party, other than the Bloc, openly undermine our nation's interest. I am very concerned at this time that they are playing into Trump's hand, because they are acting like his happy little sock puppets.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, it is a fair assessment to say “Puppets for Trump.”

What many of the Conservatives are echoing as a narrative both inside and outside the chamber is just not true. It is grossly exaggerated and ultimately feeds into what President-elect Trump is raising concerns about. I do not think that is good for our Canadian negotiators who are going to be sitting at the table.

The Conservatives have been cautioned on that. I would like to see them behave in a more responsible fashion on this issue. Their behaviour in voting against the Ukraine trade agreement, and I wish I had more time to expand on that, was a disgrace.

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

Madam Speaker, on the heckling that the hon. parliamentary secretary to the government House leader was responding to, “Name one”, I would like to name the hon. member for Elgin—Middlesex—London. It was widely reported that she was removed as chair of a committee because she got along too well with members of other parties.

I would also like to mention that this business of tracking how MPs behave is repeated on the Liberal benches. I was very disturbed to read in Jody Wilson-Raybould's book that PMO now extends its reach into saying that members of cabinet cannot meet with each other without people who report to PMO, such as a meeting when the former member of this place, Ralph Goodale, was a minister and he wanted to meet with Jane Philpott when she was a minister. They were scolded for meeting without spies in the room.

We have to stand up for the rights of individual MPs to be friends with whomever they want to be friends with and to meet with whomever they want to meet with.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I have never experienced any form of constraints. As I have indicated, my speeches are not necessarily written. I am not told what to say or anything of that nature. I like to think that I have more freedom, in terms of expression and in the sharing of my thoughts with members, than virtually every member of the Conservative caucus, with the exception of the leader of the Conservative Party, possibly.

There is a great deal of freedom within the Liberal national caucus. That is what my first-hand experience has been through my years.

[Bardish Chagger, Liberal, Waterloo, ON]

Madam Speaker, I know we are supposed to be speaking to an opposition day motion, but the con party has decided to speak to this concurrence motion.

I was appreciative of the member's speech. There is one reason why I ran for office, and it was to ensure that the voices of constituents of the riding of Waterloo were represented in this chamber. Oftentimes I hear many perspectives that I personally might not agree with, but my role as an MP is to have them represented.

My question for the member is this. What are his thoughts on the fact that today the Conservative Party is more concerned about the incoming president of the United States? However, when it comes to 18 con members representing their municipalities, asking for housing accelerator funding, they are told that they cannot not do that. When it comes to representing voices within those Conservative benches that support a woman's right to choose, they are not allowed to do that. What are the member's thoughts about democracy and representation in the House of Commons, because they remind us—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

We are running out of time.

The hon. parliamentary secretary.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the question.

The member for Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman made reference to state-owned television. However, whether it is CBC or CTV, the Conservatives have boycotted it. The Conservative Party is very dependent on social media for spreading misinformation, and it discredits mainstream media.

Having said that, I would encourage every Canadian to read the article from CBC News that was posted on November 20, 2024. If they do that, they will get a very good sense of who the leader of the Conservative Party really is, and if they know, then it is a lot of trouble for the Conservative Party.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak today about the eighth report of the Auditor General that we studied in the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. This report was tabled nearly three years ago, but a great many of its observations remain very problematic. Border management is still a serious problem, and that is what I would like to address today in the House.

As we learn in grade 10 at age 15 or 16, Canada was founded on the basis of certain broad principles. One of them is the separation of powers, established at the Charlottetown Conference of 1864. It was decided at the time that there would be a separation of powers, with a view to forming a confederation. Powers over services often delivered by the clergy or women, such as education and health, were left to the provinces, while it was incumbent on the federal government to deliver some of the most important public services, especially at the time, including border control and defence.

During my three and a half years as a member, I have had to rise in the House to criticize the work of the Canada Border Services Agency too many times, work that comes under federal jurisdiction. I feel it behooves us, therefore, to discuss some of these failures today. Let us begin by considering the report at hand, entitled “Report 8: Pandemic Preparedness, Surveillance, and Border Control Measures”. According to this report, border management was rather chaotic, and quarantine management perhaps even more so.

Here is an example. The rollout of border management measures was very slow. The federal government is so out of touch, that the City of Montreal had to dispatch its own personnel to manage the Montréal-Trudeau airport. This is an outrage. I recall watching television and wondering what the government was doing. It was doing absolutely nothing, so the cities had to send their own personnel to handle passengers. If passengers exhibited symptoms, staff tried to ensure they at least had masks to protect themselves and the people around them.

Here is another example. At that point, Quebec Premier Legault had repeatedly called on the federal government to restrict the entry of non-essential travellers. It is not known what happened, but once again Ottawa was slow off the mark, failing to grasp what was going on. The border was not closed to non-essential travel in time. When, at long last, thanks to pressure from the opposition parties and the public, the government woke up and began imposing border restrictions, it was not a pretty sight. My colleagues remember it as well as I do, no doubt. It is as though the government wanted to showcase its mismanagement.

The Auditor General has released a number of reports on the government's management during the pandemic, and the most recent one addresses how the Canada Emergency Business Account was administered. I will come back to this later, but in her first report, released in 2021, the Auditor General stated that in 37% of cases, Ottawa was unable to tell whether people had complied with their quarantine orders or not. Still, this failure is an improvement over the 66% of cases in the 2020 report. This means that the government put a quarantine management system in place to avoid a situation where travellers arriving from other countries would bring the virus with them and spread it upon their arrival. In 66% of cases, no one knew whether people had followed quarantine orders in 2020. By 2021, some progress had been made: No one knew whether people had followed quarantine orders in nearly 40% of cases.

According to the 2021 report, 30% of border screening test results were either missing or could not be matched to a case file. Ottawa had no automated registry to track those who had to quarantine in a hotel, and it was unknown whether they had done so. The records that the agency had to verify hotel stays covered only 25% of travellers arriving by air. Once again, I say bravo. Priority follow-ups received no response for 59% of the people who needed them, despite the referrals to law enforcement. In addition, 14% of people who had tested positive for COVID-19 were not contacted by the Public Health Agency of Canada. Even people who showed a positive result upon arrival were not contacted by the Public Health Agency of Canada. Once again, these are only a few examples of the government's mismanagement.

There were also problems related to our official languages. Every time there is a problem concerning the official languages, that means that there are no services available in French. Several of the companies charged with screening did not offer services in French. It is amazing: Once again it is obvious that our official languages are very low on the list of priorities. French comes after absolutely everything else. That is how committed the government really is.

We could also talk about the ArriveCAN app, which was the subject of a hefty Auditor General's report. Let us start with how it worked. The ArriveCAN app erroneously told people they needed to follow quarantine orders when that was not the case. There was unequal access for people who did not have a cell phone or a cell data plan. There was an endless number of bugs that prevented people from accessing the app. Also, as we all know, this app cost far too much, some $60 million, instead of the $800,000 it should have cost—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I must interrupt the hon. member to ask her to put her phone away, since we can hear it vibrate and that can cause difficulties.

The hon. member for Terrebonne.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, I put my phone away, but I do not know whether that will change anything.

As I was saying, the ArriveCAN case was a blatant failure from beginning to end. When the Auditor General released her report on that fiasco almost a year ago, the first thing we asked was that it place the Canada Border Services Agency under administrative supervision. In fact, we were tired of seeing that nothing had been working right at the Canada Border Services Agency for years. My colleague from Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot made the same request yesterday for another program, the CBSA assessment and revenue management system, or CARM, which is supposed to provide a service. However, we know that, despite the more than $500 million this program cost, it is almost completely inoperative at this stage. How can we put half a billion dollars into a system managed by an agency and not see any positive results? It is scandalous. This leads to huge losses for companies trying to get access through the portal. It is another fiasco. Is it a future Phoenix? Only time will tell. I hope not, however, since I hope that by then the government will have listened to us to finally impose some order in the Canada Border Services Agency.

I will continue, because there is still a lot to be said.

The Auditor General tabled numerous reports on the government's management during the pandemic, and the last one is pretty interesting. To help businesses, the government created the Canada emergency business account. The aim of the program was to help 900,000 businesses by giving them funding, some of it in the form of loans and some in the form of grants. A lot of businesses benefited from the program with some being kept on life support. We know that the program failed on a number of levels.

The most interesting thing is once again how the government managed the program. Someone in cabinet decided to implement the program, which we were fine with, since we supported it. Then, the Department of Finance, which appeared before the committee yesterday, was mandated to manage it, but it instead decided to delegate it to a Crown corporation. We all know that Crown corporations do not have to follow the same rules and are not subject to the same accountability requirements as government departments. In this case, the Department of Finance washed its hands of the program. The Crown corporation in question was Export Development Canada, or EDC, which told the Department of Finance that it did not have the ability to manage the program. The Department of Finance said not to worry and to go ahead anyway. Then, in a non-competitive process, EDC subcontracted the management of the program to a company in exchange for $300 million. In the end, all of the businesses that benefited from the program were served, often very poorly, by Accenture.

There is one small detail that is nonetheless important. My colleague from Trois-Rivières told me about it, because I was a little young at the time. In 2000, during the infamous Enron scandal, Andersen, which was both performing and transforming the audits, was to advise the company. It had therefore hidden certain information, because it was acting unethically. We now know that that is fortunately no longer the case, because regulations were put in place. When the company split from its audit branch, Andersen Consulting became Accenture. Yes, it is the same company. Obviously, some of the people who were there at the time have since left, but it is the same company that simply changed its name to change its brand and its image. Accenture managed the program.

The Auditor General's report once again showed extremely poor management of public funds. This is not only poor management during a pandemic, because a lot of people were left in limbo. I will give an example. A lot of companies that were deemed eligible at first received a loan and a subsidy, then almost a year later, a few weeks before they were to repay the loan, they were told that, in fact, they were not eligible. They had to pay everything back, including the subsidy, which the vast majority of these companies had already spent because they needed the money. That was the first failure.

The second failure was the call centre created by Accenture. In some cases, Accenture invoiced 14 hours per agent, despite the fact that the call centre was only open for nine hours. It was overbilling. We also know that the call centre was created much too late and that 19,000 calls were answered by the banks, and even by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, even though that is definitely not their role. Evidently, there was a bit of a problem with the call centre, which cost almost $30 million.

They are proud of their call centre, but many businesses never actually received a response to their messages. Either they got an automated message telling them to call back because there were 900 other businesses in line ahead of them, or they finally got through to an agent after calling for days, only for the agent to say sorry, but they did not have the answer. What fantastic service $30 million buys.

Since EDC could not handle things, it left everything in the hands of the consulting firm, Accenture. We know that EDC even asked Accenture to manage a call for tenders. On the pretext of being more competitive, it asked Accenture to manage this call for tenders. Accenture accepted and proceeded to award itself the $36‑million contract. That is what Accenture did. It awarded itself a public contract worth $36 million. Is that acceptable? Absolutely not. It is totally unacceptable. When questions were asked, EDC and the Department of Finance said they had no intention of asking Accenture for any money back, even though we know that it was overbilling and that taxpayers paid far too much.

Actually, I have my doubts about whether it was malicious because, having been a consultant myself, I know that when people invoice things, they pay close attention to the amount being invoiced. Usually, clients look at what is in the invoice. People are very careful about invoicing the fewest things possible. In cases of overbilling, questions arise as to whether this was done intentionally to make more money. Here again, the responsibility does not lie with Accenture. It lies with the government, to whom we entrust part of our salary. That is what it comes down to. Someone who works does not even have access to their full pay because they trust the government to manage that portion of it and of their hours worked and to provide them with appropriate services. This is not what we are seeing and it is not what we saw during the pandemic.

The Auditor General's many reports on the government's pandemic management left no doubt: There was catastrophic mismanagement. This is not the case either when it comes to the management of public funds. The Liberal government's management of public funds is a catastrophe. I cannot wait for Monday, when we will likely hear the bad news that the deficit is even higher than expected. That is what we get from the Liberal government: gifts and goodies that no one wants, and meanwhile the deficit keeps ballooning. This is hardly sound management of public funds.

I could go on and on about this, but what I am basically trying to say is that, looking at the pandemic management as a whole, there are certain recurring themes. I named two: the Canada Border Services Agency's mismanagement of our borders, and inventory mismanagement. How many times have we heard the Liberal government say that it was a pandemic, that no one knew quite what to do and that it was unprecedented? All right, but as the Auditor General said numerous times when the question was put to her, there is no justification, during the crisis, for all the systems and all the protections put in place to prevent abuse to disappear all of a sudden. Suddenly, sound management of public funds went out the window. Suddenly, sound management of the various policies, either for public health or border management, went out the window. How is it that everything got tainted? Why did that happen? It is as though the government was caught like a wide-eyed deer in the headlights, with no response for weeks in certain cases, including border management.

Let us face it, this is truly shameful.

What I find very surprising about the Canada emergency business account, or CEBA, is that the federal government, the finance department, disagreed with one recommendation. It was the recommendation inviting it to reflect on what had happened, to share in the responsibility and to establish an accountability process for CEBA. However, the finance department said that it was washing its hands of it and that it was up to the Crown corporation to take responsibility. That is odd, because the Crown corporation says that it is the departments that are directly accountable, along with the company. That is because departmental accountability also means the minister is accountable for the Crown corporations that the minister has mandated. This case is very clear. The Department of Finance and Global Affairs Canada mandated Export Development Canada to manage CEBA.

Why is the government still unwilling to take responsibility? Last week, Quebec's auditor general tabled a report showing that a government corporation had been badly mismanaged. What happened that very day? The CEO was fired. That is how a government with a modicum of responsibility toward its taxpayers operates. In this case, the government took action.

Does anyone know how many people were fired after the infamous ArriveCAN saga? Two people are on leave as of now, and an investigation is under way. That is all. We know full well, however, that the chain of command extends far beyond that. Why has no one taken responsibility? Why was the former CBSA president, who appeared before the committee, able to then bill the CBSA for the time he spent testifying? Yes, taxpayers paid for questions to be put to the government and to the former CBSA president. This CBSA president is now employed by PricewaterhouseCoopers, so he is receiving a full salary from that company, and on top of that, he is billing the CBSA for the time he spent preparing for his appearance before the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. That is how the former president of the CBSA, who was there during the ArriveCAN saga, shows his respect and sense of responsibility toward taxpayers, who paid far too much for an app that we know was defective.

I would like to conclude by addressing something important. If the Liberal government wants to take responsibility, it will have to do something. We know that it is a government on its last legs, but that does not mean that it does not have to take responsibility, at least when it comes to the Auditor General's report. We are seeing things now that we have never seen before. Departments are rejecting the Auditor General's recommendations.

The government should at least do something about the Canada Border Services Agency. Everyone knows that there is a cultural problem with the CBSA bureaucrats. The CBSA really needs some attention and really needs the government to take it in hand. We will continue to try to hammer that message home. We will continue to ask questions until the problem is resolved. We firmly believe that the Canada Border Services Agency should be put under administrative supervision.

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

Madam Speaker, the government spent billions and billions of dollars during the worldwide pandemic that was having an effect on Canadians in every region. There were going to be some problem areas; there is no doubt about that, but there were also many more success stories. The member made reference to gifts, saying that we gave gifts. Supports to seniors and Canadian workers during the pandemic were not gifts. That is something we did because it was the right thing to do. I am wondering if the member would at least acknowledge that those were not gifts; that, in fact, it was important that the government step up and support Canadians.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, of course my Liberal colleague can quote me entirely out of context, but I will give him an example of a gift: his GST holiday. Tens of thousands of businesses are still wondering how they are going to implement this so-called gift.

Some gift. It will cost businesses more to adjust their cash registers to accommodate the GST holiday than they will make in additional sales. According to a CFIB survey, only 4% of business owners think they will have stronger sales as a result. Meanwhile, it will cost them $4,000 to $6,000 to reprogram their cash registers.

Is this really a gift? No one wanted the Liberals' GST holiday.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Madam Speaker, my colleague is a well-versed member of the public accounts committee and has done great work there on behalf of many Canadians, and I thank her for that.

One of the issues we dealt with in the public accounts committee was hearing from companies, particularly from pharmaceutical companies during the time of COVID. We have seen that these pharmaceutical companies were malicious not only to Canadians, but they were malicious right across the globe. They sought to withhold consent to release documents and contracts. We saw that operators of these companies were hedging their bets. They were taking advantage of people because they had control over critical vaccine supply and critical vaccine patents and they used that to abuse countries right across the globe. In that public accounts committee, we reviewed those contracts, in the very first instance of that across the globe. Can the member please speak to the importance of transparency for these companies that would take advantage of a crisis?

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his question, since it is always a pleasure for me to address this issue.

I originated the motion asking that the government provide us with the contracts for purchasing COVID-19 vaccines during the pandemic. As a matter of fact, I would like to thank my colleague for his support, because it certainly was not easy. The government was extremely reluctant to give us the contracts. It even called the pharmaceutical companies.

The Standing Committee on Public Accounts had quite a meeting. We heard Pfizer, Medicago, Sanofi and Moderna explain why it would not be a good idea for parliamentarians to see the vaccine contracts, even though that is our role.

What we did see was in camera, so we cannot share the details. I can only corroborate what my colleague just said. Certain pharmaceutical companies took advantage of Canada's vulnerability and severely overbilled us so they could increase their profit margins, all while people were dying because they did not have access to vaccines yet.

That is contemptible.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Madam Speaker, I want to say that, of all the speeches I have had the opportunity to listen to in the House, this one has been remarkable. I see the member's depth of understanding and appreciation for what she sees happening with the government, which is something I share her frustration with. Even more importantly, the vast majority of Canadians and Quebeckers are also frustrated to extreme limits.

We are talking about the border and the issues around drugs coming into our country. The member knows that the government decided to remove mandatory minimum penalties for drug dealers. I would like to know what her perspective is on whether this was appropriate in any way; I really think we give the Liberals more benefit of the doubt than we should. Is it appropriate that they signalled more leniency for drug dealers who, even right now, with premeditation, are benefiting from the addictions and deaths of Canadians because of what the government has done?

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question and comments, which are much appreciated.

Of course, anyone who has served for several years on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts and has seen how hard it is to get the government to do anything will be feeling frustrated. I hope I will be forgiven. As for the message the government is sending, I would have to go back and speak with my colleagues who are more familiar with legal matters.

However, the fundamental problem here is border management. My colleague is absolutely right. The border has become a real sieve. People come and go as they please, sometimes even with firearms. We also know that a cartel is stealing vehicles. We know that there are huge problems at the border and that the Canada Border Services Agency is not fulfilling its responsibilities. That is why we are calling for the agency to be put under administrative supervision.

[Yves Perron, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, once again, my colleague delivered a very clear speech.

As she just mentioned, our borders are porous. The government is not taking this seriously or responding appropriately. I would like my colleague to comment on the fact that the Quebec government has deployed resources at the border, even though the border is a federal responsibility. I would also like her to talk about what that might mean for the future.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, this gives me a wonderful opportunity to say that I think the Sûreté du Québec may often be more competent at managing our borders than the Government of Canada, together with the RCMP or the CBSA.

This also gives me a wonderful opportunity to say how much better Quebec would be if we could control our borders ourselves.

Vive le Québec libre.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Madam Speaker, during the pandemic, we saw not only an instance of a very large national crisis but also an instance of a global crisis. During these kinds of global crises, there is a tendency for polarization and distrust to grow in relation to the crisis. This particularly happens in democratic nations. Of course, there was a lot of distrust in the government predating the pandemic. Going into the pandemic, there was even more distrust.

There are two kinds of Canadians now, those who were united before the pandemic and those who were divided after it. It is a difficult and sad thing to realize. Does the member think that distrust has played a role in the lack of civility or decorum across our country, especially during that time? Would the member please comment on the level of distrust and how it has eroded our democracy?

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, that is an excellent question. That is why I really enjoyed sitting on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts with this member. We see the government's mistakes. We also see the good things, at times, but mostly we see the government's mistakes.

What is eroding the public's trust in the government is its lack of accountability, its lack of responsibility. I gave an example from Quebec. When Quebec's auditor general tabled a report on a poorly managed public corporation, the government fired the CEO that same day.

That is how the government can show that it takes the Auditor General of Canada seriously, that it takes public money and its management seriously. Even more fundamentally, as my colleague rightly said, this is how the government should show that it takes the public's trust in our institutions seriously. This trust is being eroded all over the world, and Canada is no exception. This can largely be blamed on the Liberal government.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, there are ample examples of the government often taking necessary actions in order to show transparency and accountability. We saw that during the pandemic. Because of inappropriate behaviour by companies or individuals, there were attempts to recover finances and allow the RCMP to do the work that needed to be done when there was criminal involvement. Would the member not see that as a positive thing?

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Madam Speaker, I agree.

The RCMP finally decided to open an investigation into ArriveCAN long after parliamentarians started asking for and demanding one. As we know, the RCMP is independent. Nonetheless, I would like to see the results of that investigation. I would like to know more, because we have seen many cases of mismanaged funds.

Just look at the misappropriation of funds at Sustainable Development Technology Canada, or SDTC. It is another example of the government's bad management. Obviously, that is not what we are talking about today, but I want to take this opportunity to talk about the CEO of SDTC who gave $5 million in funding to a company owned by her friend when that company did not meet any of the program's eligibility criteria. Again, we have not seen anyone pay for the mismanagement at SDTC. It is just a routine matter for the government. No one pays; there is no accountability.

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

Mr. Speaker, at the beginning, I want to say that I will be sharing my time with the member for Edmonton Griesbach.

It is really important to make clear what is happening today for those who are watching. I do not normally get into all the procedural rigmarole. It is in-house fighting. However, the Conservatives had a day to bring forward any opposition motion to fight the government, which is one of the fundamental principles we have. They decided to upend their own opportunity to speak to something that they had previously committed to in order to use the House of Commons to amplify the distortions that are coming out of Mar-a-Lago from Donald Trump, primarily his falsehood that Canada is this fentanyl trafficking system causing deaths in the United States. What he has put on the table is the threat of a 25% tariff that would cause economic havoc for families, workers and businesses across Canada. There was a time when parliamentarians would have stood up for Canada and responded to these falsehoods, but that is not how Canada's Parliament operates under the member who lives in the 19-room mansion at Stornoway. It is to burn the House to the ground at all costs. That is a dangerous position for democracy to be in.

I would like to start just by talking about how we have the world's longest undefended border. Other than in 1812, when they attacked us and tried to take us over, we have maintained that border and we have maintained good-natured relations. However, we have not gone along with the Americans when they have tried to bully us. We have not embraced their wide open and dangerous death-cult gun culture, even though many Canadians are registered gun owners. We accept the principle of having responsible gun ownership as opposed to the reckless guns that are killing people across the United States. We have not supported their belief that health care should belong to those who have money. We took a different tack, even when we were being undermined as being communists and socialists at the time. When the United States insisted that young Canadian men go and die in the rice paddies of Vietnam, we said no, we would not send our young men to Vietnam. It was a wrong war. We opened our borders to many great young Americans who were not going to go die needlessly in Vietnam.

When the United States tried to pressure us to go into the false attack on Iraq, we said no; we were under enormous pressure then. In the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan was launching horrific violence in Latin America, in El Salvador and Guatemala, and then the United States was deporting thousands of people who were trying to escape the genocide that was happening in the hills of Guatemala, they put enormous pressure on us to close our border. People who could not go back to the death squads in El Salvador and Guatemala were trying to cross the border at Buffalo to get into Canada and be safe. At that time, Brian Mulroney said we had to have the same border principles as the United States, but Canadians stood up and said no, those were not our values. We pushed back because we could not send people back to the death squads.

Yes, the United States is our neighbour, but we have stood up to it. We are in a different situation with Donald Trump, a convicted predator who is seriously undermining the democratic process in the United States. He thinks he can just push us around. He insults us. The Conservatives seem to like it because he is insulting our Prime Minister, but he is not really insulting the Prime Minister. He is insulting Canadians, calling us the 51st state.

Once there was a Canada that had a flag that did not need to be waved, a flag that represented who we are. We did not boast about it. It was not until our flag was appropriated by conspiracy haters that it was stuck on pickup trucks, promoting all kinds of disinformation. Our flag was something that just said it was about values. It was something we all understood. We did not have to brag about that when we were a country of 11 million people and the Americans were saying they did not want to go to war. When Hitler invaded Poland, on the very first day, 11 million Canadians stood up and created the fourth-largest air force in the world, the fourth-largest navy in the world. We sent our young people all across the world to defend the notion of freedom and parliamentary democracy. We paid an enormous price. When we came back, we did not wave the flag; we just came back and did what we did because we were Canadians.

Now here we are with this falsehood being perpetrated by the member who lives in Stornoway, and whatever Donald Trump says, he will use it to burn the House down to get to the Prime Minister. He is using this falsehood on fentanyl, which is an absolute falsehood. I have the Drug Enforcement Administration's unclassified reports on fentanyl. It writes about China, India, Mexico, but there is just one very tiny thing about a small amount coming from Canada, so that is not the issue. Fentanyl is not the issue, but the Conservatives will use that falsehood, threatening a 25% tariff.

We can bet these dumbed-down speeches claiming Canada has a broken border and is a fentanyl-trafficking area are going to be used on every right-wing blogcast and on Fox News to further undermine our country. The Conservatives would do that. They would burn our House to the ground because they do not care about truth. They would would not know what truth was if Lady Truth came down naked, painted purple, and danced all over Stornoway for weeks. The member would not notice.

I say that jokingly, but it is not a joke, because what Trump is really after is our water. He has made it clear. He said there is a “giant faucet” in Canada and one can just turn it on. There was a time we would have defended those resources, but one can bet that if Donald Trump says, “I want Canada's water,” the Conservatives will use the House of Commons to promote his attack on our resources, to take what he can take, because the Americans do not take us seriously. They think they can push us around, but they can only push us around if we have fifth columnists, which is what they called Franco's people who undermined the defence of democracy in Spain, people who would undermine their own country to score a point. Another term is “quislings”.

We need to stand up to Donald Trump, and not to be boasting like he boasts, not to be threatening like he threatens, but to stand for Canadian values: that we will counter falsehood with truth, be a good neighbour, protect our border. We will not be pushed around. The member who lives in Stornoway will amplify falsehoods and misuse the House of Commons, knowing it is putting Canadian jobs and families directly at risk, because the Conservatives do not care. They do not care, because it is about burning the House to the ground to get to the Prime Minister.

I am not going to go down into the gutter with the Conservatives where they make these falsehoods about the Prime Minister, who I do not agree with on hardly anything, but that he somehow created the fentanyl crisis that caused thousands of deaths is an ugly falsehood. It is just a straight-up lie, but they use that all the time.

The Conservatives come into the House of Commons and talk about defending the border when, under Stephen Harper, they trashed border security. Members will remember when Tony Clement took $50 million out of border security and spent it on bogus projects in his riding, like the gazebos, the sunken boats and the fake lakes. They took money that would have protected our borders and used it so shamelessly. They cut 1,100 jobs from the Canada Border Services Agency, and they were told about the threats that would follow. They got rid of the dog sniffer teams. Maybe Stephen Harper did not know what a dog sniffer team is; a dog sniffer team is what we use to sniff out drugs, and it was the Harper government that got rid of that. They got rid of the intelligence agency at the border. They got rid of the teams who went undercover to take on the smuggling gangs. That is the record of Stephen Harper.

So, when Conservatives come in the House and pretend they stand for Canada, we know they do not stand for Canada. When they come in the House and say they will stand up on the world stage, we know they supported Putin in undermining the votes for Ukraine. When they say they will defend the border, they are only defending the interests of Donald Trump and they would sell us down the river, but not on my watch, not on our watch, not ever. We will stand up for Canada.