Debates of Dec. 3rd, 2024

International Trade

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, Humber River—Black Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to present, in both official languages, the 22nd report of the Standing Committee on International Trade, entitled “Selected United States and European Union Trade-Related Measures: Some Impacts on Canada’s Fishing Sector”.

This report is timely, given the very issues that we are contemplating and discussing today, and so I am pleased to be able to present the report.

National Defence

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 16th report of the Standing Committee on National Defence, entitled “Supplementary Estimates (B), 2024-25: Vote 1b under Communications Security Establishment and Votes 1b, 5b and 10b under Department of National Defence”.

Environment and Sustainable Development

[Branden Leslie, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Madam Speaker, I move that the 10th report of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development, presented on Monday, October 30, 2023, be concurred in.

It is always an honour to rise in this place, and today's matter is about transparency and common-sense ideas. This report contains a few common-sense recommendations that, unfortunately, the Liberal government and its radical Minister of Environment have simply chosen to ignore. Members should make no mistake: There has never been a more ideologically driven Minister of Environment than the one we have today.

Even if we set aside the previous arrests and the utter disdain for Canada's energy sector, I truly believe that, at some point in the not too distant future, we will all come to realize that we have never had such an incompetent and ineffective Minister of Environment for Canada. Not only have Canada's climate outcomes failed to improve, but Canada's performance is also the worst in the G7, despite claims that the government may make all the time. The minister has imposed a crippling carbon tax that punishes seniors trying to heat their homes during our cold winters. I can tell members that the rumours are true: It does get cold in Manitoba. Seniors deserve to have heat and quality of life. The minister targets moms and dads who are struggling to fill their tanks to take their kids to school, to hockey practice, to soccer practice, to music lessons or anything else, if they can still afford to put their kids in such important programs.

The minister has done more damage to Canada's economy than almost any other minister of the Crown in our nation's history. He has forced us to pay for his carbon tax, and for what? The Liberals may not want to admit it, at least publicly, but they are nowhere near meeting their emissions targets. Simply put, they are failing because their climate plan was never about the climate; it was always about taxes. Their carbon tax is a major contributor to the inflation that is driving up the cost of everything. This is causing millions of Canadians to visit food banks every year just to put something in their stomachs; they do not know where their next meal is going to come from. In Canada, we now have a resurgence of scurvy because people cannot afford enough fruits and vegetables. This is insane and embarrassing. The fact that the Prime Minister's legacy will be a country where people cannot buy enough nutritious food to keep them healthy is something that I imagine he will be very ashamed of when his tenure comes to an end.

While Canadians are being forced to pay for the Liberal carbon tax, most people I talk to recognize that, sadly, we are in a cost of living crisis. We are threatened by tariffs from our largest trading partner; our GDP per capita is declining steadily. Millions of Canadians are just $200 away from insolvency, and household debt has reached new record highs. The vast majority of young people that I talk to cannot afford to buy a home; frankly, they have lost all hope and given up the idea of even trying to ever have that happen in their lives. Meanwhile, the minister is on a mission, for some strange reason, to continue down this path of quadrupling the carbon tax and, if given the chance, probably more. He gave a very unclear answer at our environment committee just last week, and he still thinks everything is fine. It is not fine for millions of people in this country.

I have never met anyone more out of touch, more disconnected from the realities faced by Canadian families, students, seniors and everybody else. The minister has no understanding of the pain and suffering that he is causing right now, and it certainly does not appear that he even cares about it. He thinks we should all just shut up and pay his carbon tax because he knows what is best for people. He has lost the plot. He has climbed so far up his ivory tower that he has lost all sense of reality.

I will also mention that I will be splitting my time with the member for Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa.

This brings me to the second recommendation within the report, one that the minister and the Prime Minister surely did not read. This recommendation is that the government must direct its incentives to technologies that actually reduce emissions, and what a reasonable idea that is. Thank goodness for the commissioner of the environment, who has put a glaring spotlight on the Liberals' net-zero accelerator initiative. It is as though the Liberal ministers are playing poker: “I see the green slush fund, and I raise a net-zero accelerator fund.” It is an $8-billion Liberal boondoggle in the making. Eight billion dollars is handed over to large multinational corporations while the Minister of Environment taxes seniors, students, families and anybody else whose pockets he can get his hands into.

The findings of the environment commissioner's report regarding the $8-billion initiative are terrifying, to say the least. This program, touted as one of the cornerstones of the Liberal government's climate efforts, has been nothing but a complete failure. The Liberals have mismanaged this fund to the point of negligence, as they have done with many other things they have gotten their hands on. The department failed to track whether the initiative was delivering real value for money and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Using value-for-money audits is a reasonable idea. The Liberal government has failed to do that. Simply put, taxpayers have no idea whether their hard-earned tax dollars are going to reduce emissions, as the government claims they are.

Let us talk numbers. The report shows that five corporations made a commitment to reduce emissions in their contracts, and the cost to taxpayers to reduce just one tonne of greenhouse gases was $143. That might sound like a lot, but it gets much worse. For the other 12 projects, funded with that same $8 billion, there are no signed commitments to reduce emissions whatsoever; the commissioner's audit found that, because these projects did not have any signed commitments, the overall cost is $523 per tonne of emissions reduced under this program.

The Liberals, as they always do, promised results; once again, they failed to deliver on yet another promise. They have just simply delivered another wasteful program. It is not one that can measure results. That is not how to develop a program for anything. They have squandered billions of dollars with no real targets, no clear outcomes and no clear plans on how to achieve anything. This is not a climate action plan; it is a taxpayer-funded boondoggle.

The environment committee did the responsible thing and passed a motion demanding full access to the contracts the Liberals signed with these massive corporations. The common-sense Conservative team led the charge because we believe taxpayers should know where their money is being spent and whether it is being spent in a useful manner. However, here is the kicker: The Liberals completely disregarded the committee's motion, stonewalling us for months. Once they did hand over the documents, kind of, they pulled out hundreds that we simply could not see and redacted so much that it made them largely irrelevant.

They simply do not want members of Parliament or Canadians to know where the $8 billion is going. They do not want us to know how many jobs may or may not be maintained or ever created. They do not want us to know by how much emissions will be reduced through spending on any of these programs. It is ridiculous, to say the least. It is insane how far the Prime Minister and his radical Minister of Environment will go to hide the truth. Exhibit A is the ongoing green slush fund debate in the House of Commons.

They do not care about outcomes. They care about announcements, press releases and press conferences. They care about being seen to be doing something but not about actually doing anything. It is virtue signalling on the taxpayer's dime. It is lazy environmental policy, and it is simply no way to run a government. They are failing miserably.

Members of Parliament simply need to see how these tax dollars are being spent. We deserve to know whether the net-zero accelerator is accomplishing its stated goals. While the Liberal MPs on the committee gave every lame excuse they could not to learn the truth, it was the Conservatives that got them to vote in favour of the motion we passed at committee. The motion partly reads:

Given that the government has failed to provide the committee with the following documents and information relating to their 8-billion-dollar Net Zero Accelerator fund:

all complete contributions agreements signed, to date, for the Net Zero Accelerator;

the government's complete tracker tool used to measure the Net Zero Accelerator's progress and results; and

all internal Net Zero Accelerator targets set by the government, including the government's Net Zero Accelerator emission reduction target.

...

It was a reasonable motion passed at committee, but can we guess what? The Liberals are doing what they always do and trying to defy Parliament once again. They refuse to abide by this motion, and today is just the beginning of the Conservatives' mission to discover how rotten this net-zero accelerator fund truly is. We deserve to know results because Canadians deserve to know results. We represent the people who pay their taxes to fund these sorts of programs, and it is ridiculous that the Liberals are continuing to try to hide the truth. The environment committee has much more work to do in order to get to the bottom of this boondoggle and find solutions that can actually deliver results for taxpayers; Canadians deserve nothing less.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and to the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources]

Madam Speaker, I found the speech to be a fascinating exposition in avoiding actual facts. Right now, emissions in Canada are at the lowest they have been in almost three decades, and that is actually verified by independent reports. When the member opposite keeps talking about everything he believes we should do to stop fighting climate change, I am fascinated, because what we are doing is actually working.

Economists across Canada have said that the most efficient way to fight climate change is the price on carbon pollution. If the Conservatives want to remove it, what is their plan?

[Branden Leslie, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Madam Speaker, I wish my hon. colleague had listened to my speech, because what I was talking about was how the Liberals need to stop wasting money without achieving any results. In fact, thanks to the work of the environment commissioner highlighting that the Liberal government is not on track in any way to meet its stated emissions reduction goals, we know that the government is failing in its objectives.

There is also a report showing that Canada is in 62nd place of 67 in the world. We are last in the G7. If this is achieving something, I do not know what Liberals think they are trying to accomplish. They are failing. In terms of the carbon tax, I would invite the member to come to my riding, talk to my constituents and see whether they think they are better off under the carbon tax.

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

Madam Speaker, recommendation 2 of the report we are currently studying requires the government to demonstrate the effectiveness of technologies before implementing them. The first example that comes to mind is carbon storage. The Conservatives talk about it all the time. However, we know it has been tested elsewhere, and it does not work.

I would like to hear my colleague's comments on this. Does he not think we should first get proof that it works elsewhere before investing colossal sums in it, so that it does not blow up in our faces in 15 years?

[Branden Leslie, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate that the member understands the need to actually focus on results for taxpayer dollars. In terms of carbon capture and storage, yes, it seems like a promising lead and a way to actually reduce emissions. The good news is that the private sector is leading the way in this; it is the one trying to make investments and reduce its emissions.

While the technology is promising, I think there is so much more, because we are innovative. If we had a government that stopped stifling, through regulation and legislation, the innovators and entrepreneurs in this country, we would more rapidly, through technology, not taxes, achieve the emissions reduction goals this country has aimed for. Under a Conservative government, we will.

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, the member did not completely answer my colleague's question, which was about whether the Conservatives are going to hand over public money to private companies for an unproven technology that is being used in other areas to produce more oil and to raise emissions. Carbon capture and storage, as the IPCC has said, is one of the most expensive and least proven at scale technologies to meet our net-zero goals.

The government has given over $5.8 billion to profitable oil and gas companies, when the private sector could be doing the investing. Will the member commit to pushing for private investment into carbon capture and storage, if private investors so choose, but to no longer putting public money into unproven technology?

[Branden Leslie, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Madam Speaker, CCUS is one example. What I am focused on, which will be the first principle when the new common-sense Conservative government steps in, is to review programs like it to see where money has been wasted and where it has been successful. Thanks to the work of the environment commissioner, we now know that it is a failed project.

Once again, I am more than proud to say that we are going to unleash Canada's energy potential, stop the strangulation of our energy sector and let it do the investing both in terms of emissions reduction and, yes, creating wealth for Canadians once again in this country.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Madam Speaker, as a member of the standing committee on environment, I am honoured to speak about the work of our committee. I was fortunate to work on the committee's 10th report on clean technologies. The report proved that technology, not taxes, should be the foundation of an environment policy. Unfortunately the Liberal government is hell-bent on plowing ahead with its failed carbon tax without getting any environmental results.

There is an old saying that “only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked.” With multiple reports published recently, it is clear that the Liberals have been swimming naked in the waters of environmentalism for years. Last month, Canada's independent, non-partisan environment commissioner released a damning audit that revealed that the Liberals will not meet their own emissions reduction targets, despite plowing ahead with their plan to quadruple the carbon tax.

The commissioner revealed that under the Prime Minister, Canada has the worst record for emissions reductions in the entire G7. In fact according to the 2025 climate change performance index, which was just released, Canada now ranks 62nd out of 67 countries in environmental performance under the environment minister.

The ranking is four places lower than it was two years ago, despite multiple carbon tax hikes on Canadians. With such an embarrassing ranking, it is no wonder the environment minister is trying to discredit the report by saying it is some random international assessment that does not reflect Canada's policies and reality. No, it is a report that does not reflect his imaginary fantasy that he wants it to.

Unsurprisingly, dozens of countries around the world that do not punish their people with a carbon tax are significantly outperforming Canada on the environmental index. This is why I asked the independent environment commissioner whether Canada could achieve its targets without a carbon tax. He said yes. For nine years, the Liberals falsely claimed that the carbon tax was the only way to meet their environmental targets. They were once again proven wrong.

It is for these reasons that Canadians are rejecting the failed so-called environmental policies of the government. Canadians understand that the Prime Minister and his radical environment minister are inflicting a lot of economic pain with no environmental gain.

It is not just the carbon tax that the environment committee has exposed; it seems as though at every committee meeting a new Liberal scandal or cover-up is exposed. The Liberal government's $8-billion net zero accelerator fund may win the top prize for the government's most expensive environmental scam yet.

Most Canadians tuning in have probably never heard of the government's $8-billion net zero accelerator fund. I find this surprising for three reasons. First, Canadian taxpayers are literally being charged $8 billion for the program. Second, the government usually brags about how much money it is spending. Third, the Liberals claim the $8-billion net zero accelerator would significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Instead the Liberals have gone incognito on their $8-billion net zero accelerator fund. I wonder why that is.

When I asked the commissioner how many emissions have been reduced by the $8-billion program, he stated, “I can't say”. It gets better. At the public accounts committee, I asked the environment minister's top official, the deputy minister, how many emissions were reduced; he stated that he did not know. It was such an outrageous misuse of taxpayer's funds that all parties except for the Liberals called an emergency meeting of the environment committee. When the Bloc Québécois MP for Longueuil—Saint-Hubert found out about the $8-billion fund, he stated:

This whole thing is kind of uncomfortable....

I would remind everyone that the net zero accelerator has $8 billion in funding. Everyone here represents constituents who expect us to do our job, which is to hold the government to account for the money it spends.

I agree with the Bloc member. It is more than embarrassing, though; it is corrupt. I can guarantee that Canadians want to know why they are paying $8 billion for the failed and fraudulent slush fund. Conservatives on the environment committee called on Liberals to release the funding details of their $8-billion net zero accelerator fund to the public, but the government refused. This is why the environment committee ordered the government to hand over all contracts to the committee so we could find out the truth.

Instead of handing over the contract to parliamentarians, the Liberals locked the contracts in a room and put a gag order on every MP who viewed them. Any MP who read the eight billion dollars' worth of contracts was forced to lock up their phone and not take any notes, and was prevented from discussing what they saw. I was one of those MPs, and I understand why the Liberals have gagged me. I was absolutely shocked by what I saw.

As I said, the government has placed me and all the members of the environment committee under a gag order to prevent us from disclosing the truth. Over 65 pages of net zero accelerator contracts were redacted and over 360 pages were completely ripped out of the contracts. Someone in the Liberal government ordered over 360 pages of the net zero accelerator contracts to be ripped out to prevent parliamentarians from seeing what $8 billion was spent on. This sounds borderline criminal.

Did the Minister of Environment order it to be done? Did the Prime Minister order it to be done? Who ripped out the pages of the net zero accelerator contracts to hide the truth? Who poured black ink on the contracts to cover up the lines? Who will be accountable for the $8-billion scam?

The Liberal government defied the will of Parliament by failing to hand over the contracts of its $8-billion net zero accelerator funds. It is very clear it is hiding something. The environment commissioner caught the Liberals giving away billions of tax dollars to large multinational companies without any commitment to reduce emissions. This could very well be the government's most expensive scandal yet.

If the NDP were truly opposed to corporate handouts, its members would be outraged. If the Bloc truly cared about the environment, its members would be outraged. If any member of Parliament cared about accountability, they would be outraged. I can promise that Canadians are outraged. Canadians deserve answers on the Liberal government's fake, failed and fraudulent $8-billion net zero accelerator fund. They deserve to know what companies received eight billion dollars' worth of taxpayers' money and what the money was spent on.

I therefore move the following amendment, seconded by my colleague from Langley—Aldergrove, on behalf of Canadians paying for the $8-billion scam: That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the word “That” and substituting the following: “the tenth report of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development, presented on Monday, October 30, 2023, be not now concurred in but that it be recommitted to the committee for further consideration, with a view to studying the implementation of the net zero accelerator initiative, and, to support the committee with this study, an order of the House do issue for: (a) copies of all signed contribution agreements and term sheets, including schedules of work for each contract, for the net zero Accelerator initiative; (b) a copy of the government’s tracker tool used to measure the net zero accelerator initiative’s progress and results; and (c) copies of documents which describe all internal net zero accelerator initiative targets set by the government, including the government’s net zero accelerator initiative emissions reduction target, provided that these documents shall be laid upon the table, in both official languages and in a complete and unredacted form, within two weeks of the adoption of this order, following which they shall stand referred to the committee.”

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

I thank the hon. member for introducing the amendment. We will take it under advisement and return to the House.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Kings—Hants.

[Kody Blois, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Madam Speaker, I find it interesting that the Conservative Party is moving a concurrence report on the environment. I listened to the member for Portage—Lisgar and, to some extent, the member for Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa as well. I did not hear a whole lot about what the Conservative Party actually stands for in relation to environmental plans.

This government is the first in Canadian history to actually reduce GHG emissions and grow the economy at the same time. It is very interesting to have the Conservatives throw darts. They have very little actual, tangible plans. However, I do have a very precise question for the hon. member.

When he was working for the Grain Growers of Canada, the member for Portage—Lisgar used to lobby me about the importance of the clean fuel standards. The hon. member has a lot of grain farmers in his neck of the woods. The clean fuel standard is helping to drive demand in their sector and helping drive down emissions.

Would that member stand and support the clean fuel standards if he were in government and support that for the Conservative Party, or would they scrap that and hurt grain farmers too?

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Madam Speaker, I just gave a speech on an $8-billion fraud that was run by the government. Over 70% of the contracts gave no commitment to reduce emissions. The whole idea behind the $8 billion was to reduce emissions. That member cannot be taken seriously and neither can the government.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for bringing this matter to the House today. There is something interesting about the fact that the Conservatives are focusing on sustainable development issues. That being said, I am nonetheless concerned about happens in the future. I want to highlight recommendation 10:

That the Government of Canada integrate its support for clean technology within all existing federal strategies, such as the Critical Minerals Strategy, the National Housing Strategy and the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership, prioritizing the objectives of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and fostering the development of sustainable jobs.

I want to talk about strategic critical minerals, because I think they are the key to successful transportation electrification, and I am very concerned about the Canadian strategy. We see what is happening with the U.S. There is one active lithium mine in Canada, and it is in my riding. How are we supposed to develop our products and potentially sell them to the U.S. unless we speed up the creation of lithium mines or mines to extract other clean technology minerals?

Most importantly, we must encourage local processing, close to the mines, in order to help our resource regions. To me, that is part of a real strategy. Do the Conservatives support that?

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Madam Speaker, I will bring this back to reducing emissions and what this accelerator fund was all about. The commissioner testified at committee on this scandal, and he stated:

We also found that the department did not always know to what extent GHG emissions had been reduced by those companies that took part in the [net zero accelerator] initiative, or whether the funding provided would lead to reduced emissions.

There were $8 billion, and our environment commissioner could not find a shred of evidence on over 70% of those contracts of whether they were reducing emissions. It is absolutely absurd.

[Laurel Collins, NDP, Victoria, BC]

Madam Speaker, I would hope that all members can agree that the environment commissioner's report on the net zero accelerator fund is deeply concerning. As members of Parliament, as we look at the documents that we have been provided, it is hard to get a sense of what is going on because of the redactions and the missing pages. However, we do have the environment commissioner's report, which really outlines, clearly, that something is amiss when a government hands out billions of dollars and does not link that to emissions reductions.

The member is correct in presenting this, but what he needs to answer is that Canadians right now are looking at this and wondering how the Conservatives cannot even agree if climate change is real. In the past, when Harper was in power, they handed out billions of dollars to profitable oil and gas companies in the form of fossil fuel subsidies.

Would the member commit to stopping the handouts to profitable oil and gas companies and pushing the government to do the same?

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Madam Speaker, I understand what my NDP colleagues are up against. They have been basically duped by the Liberal government. All of this time, for the last nine years, it has been telling us that it is going to reduce emissions, with $8 billion of taxpayer dollars going to the heaviest emitters and, I might add, to oil and gas companies as well. The NDP should be outraged about this finding, and it should be supporting us on getting this back to committee.

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

Madam Speaker, what a pleasure it is to rise to speak to yet another concurrence report. Interestingly enough, the Conservatives are, in fact, continuing with the game they began a number of weeks ago, and that is the reason we have a concurrence report.

Before I get into a number of my concerns, let me amplify why all members, all parliamentarians in the House of Commons, should be concerned with what we consistently seeing from the Conservative Party. When the Conservatives bring in a concurrence report, they also bring in amendments to it. The amendments are instructions. What they are doing is sending the reports back to standing committees. In some cases, they are asking us to call other individuals to come before committee to answer questions.

I would argue that the leader of the Conservative Party, in his drive to control every aspect of members of Parliament, is trying to say that the Conservative caucus wants to dictate what standing committees should be studying and who we should be calling before them, which is far more than any other government has seen in recent history. We all should be concerned about that, because yet again, we have another concurrence report where we are telling a standing committee what to do. We are telling it that the report it sent us is not good enough, that we are sending it back and we want X, Y and Z.

That is consistent with the leader of the Conservative Party. It is borderline contempt, whether it is on the floor of the House of Commons through a multi-million dollar, self-serving filibuster, or what we are witnessing now, which is his desire to fill the space of standing committees. We should not be surprised, because the Conservative leader took his training from Stephen Harper. When Stephen Harper was held in contempt of Parliament for not producing documents along with other things, his parliamentary secretary, his point person on the issue, was the current leader of the Conservative Party.

We have yet another concurrence report today. This time the Conservatives have chosen to deal with the environment.

[An hon. member]

Wow, how dare us.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Many would say, “How dare you.”

Madam Speaker, the Conservatives do not really recognize climate change, yet they want to talk about the environment. The reason they want to talk about the environment is to downplay the role the government can play in protecting the environment.

I will get into that shortly, but not before I amplify how abusive the leader of the Conservative Party is toward democracy and the functionality of the House of Commons. This is a very serious issue of which all Canadians need to be aware. This is only a hint of the type of grab for power and his thrive. It shows the degree to which he is prepared to sacrifice the interests of Canadians because of his own personal self-interest.

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

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I rise specifically in relation to the fact that you have taken the amendment to the motion moved by my colleague, the member for Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, under advisement. I would like to add a little context as to it being within the scope of the discussion. The report does, in fact, talk about the net zero accelerator and therefore makes this amendment relevant.

Concurrence motions and amendments to them have been used time and again to structure a committee's follow-up study, including, and I would list a number of examples, deadlines for reports, topics to study, new recommendations to be made and witnesses to hear from, and that includes witnesses being ordered to appear. Therefore, it follows that the House can support a committee by ordering documents to be reviewed as part of that study.

Therefore, I would suggest, Madam Speaker, that the amendment my colleague moved is not only relevant but pertinent and follows the precedent that has been set in this place. I would further note, and I know the parliamentary secretary is not very happy about having to debate these sorts of things, it appears that Conservatives have a better grasp and control of the House than the governing party does.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

I thank the hon. member for the clarification.

The hon. parliamentary secretary.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, that is somewhat humorous. If I were given a dozen grade 12 students from Sisler high, Maples, St. John's, R. B. Russell and Children of the Earth, I could cause the same sort of commotion that the Conservatives have day in, day out for the last number of weeks. In fact, I suspect I could even get half of them to go without written speech material.

At the end of the day, I was highlighting how we have a leader of the Conservative Party who is abusive in terms of the procedures and what takes place on the floor of the House or in our standing committees. His history does not reflect well on how he would handle the House of Commons or the institution of Parliament, if he were ever given the power of being in government. We should be concerned about that.

As an example, for many weeks now we have been in a filibuster on a Conservative motion that says that an issue should be transferred to a standing committee. The Conservatives have now put up well over 200 speakers on that, at a great and substantial cost to the House not being able to deal with a wide variety of issue. A majority of the members in the chamber would like the Conservatives to stop the filibustering and allow the Conservative motion to be voted on and sent to committee.

On the environment—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Alexandra Mendes]

I must interrupt the hon. member again.

Earlier today, the member for Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa presented an amendment to the motion to concur in the 10th report of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development. The Chair took it under advisement. After consideration, the Chair finds that the amendment introduces a new concept that should be presented as a separate substantive motion.

As mentioned in House of Commons Procedure and Practice, third edition, at page 541:

...it is irrelevant to the main motion (i.e., it deals with a matter foreign to the main motion, exceeds its scope, or introduces a new proposition which should properly be the subject of a separate substantive motion with notice);

As a result, I rule the amendment out of order.

The hon. parliamentary secretary.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, what is really difficult, when the Conservatives want to talk about the environment, is that we have now had two speakers stand up to try to play down the importance of the price on pollution.

It is really quite unfortunate because it is not only on the floor of the House of Commons that they spread misinformation, but also, sadly, through social media, in particular, and emails. In all likelihood, they send out literally millions of emails. I am one of the recipients of their emails, and they are so misleading.

Let us talk about the price on pollution. There are two components: the rebate portion and the tax portion. It has been well established that over 80% of Canadians receive more money back than they pay for a price on pollution.

Canada is not the only jurisdiction in the world that uses a price on pollution. There are even some American states that use a price on pollution. The arguments that the Conservatives use, depending on the day, do not hold water. They are like a strainer. At the end of the day, what we are seeing is a Conservative Party that is more concerned with trying to give a false impression than truly caring about our environment, and ultimately, taxation and supporting Canadians by increasing their disposable income. I will expand on that.

First and foremost, every member of the Conservative caucus, with the exception of those who were elected in a by-election, campaigned on a price on pollution, including the leader of the Conservative Party. Then they changed their position, and it is not the first or the second time that they have changed their position. They changed their position with the current leader, who made the initial flip-flop, so they now oppose it.

When the Conservatives say that they oppose it, they are trying to give the impression that the rebate is less than the tax, which is not true for over 80% of the people who receive the backstop. If we take a look at it, we will find that it is having a positive impact in our communities. That is why we even have some provincial jurisdictions that have their own programs. They realize that putting a price on pollution is an effective way of dealing with emissions, amongst other things.

I would suggest that it is not unique to see the Conservatives flip-flopping and completely disregarding their election platform. Members can remember that last week, we had a vote on an actual tax break, a GST holiday for Canadians. Every one of the Conservatives voted against it, yet every one of them campaigned in favour of a GST holiday break in the last federal election.

What does that say about the Conservative platform, those major policy announcements that come out during an election, such as the Conservatives saying that they were in support of a price on pollution and giving a tax break with a GST holiday, when it comes down to voting, that they actually vote against them? They voted against a price on pollution, and they voted against a GST tax break for the holiday season.

The irony of it all is that we have Conservatives going across the country saying they are going to axe the tax. Let us look at what they are telling Canadians and what they are doing. In Winnipeg North, the Conservatives would get rid of the carbon rebate. That would mean a whole lot of money would be coming out of the pockets of at least 80% of the constituents I represent. Plus, when we factor in the rebate compared to the tax the Conservatives say they would be axing, it means the disposable income based on the election commitment under that leader would see less disposable income because of their so-called axe the tax. That is not a net gain for 80% of the constituents I represent.

The Conservatives do not have a problem with misleading Canadians. They are telling people that they are going to be better off because of their proposal, when they know for a fact that is not the case. They know that, and then, when it comes time to do something to provide tax relief for Canadians, again, the Conservatives are doubling down. They are voting against one other issue that they said that they would give to Canadians, a GST holiday during the season.

It makes no sense unless, of course, we listen to the leader of the Conservative Party and think of his ambitions. That is why there was a very interesting article that made the national news last week. It talked about a lot of the Conservatives on the inside. Members of Parliament were concerned about the leadership of the Conservative Party, and I can appreciate why. They went to the doors and said, “We are going to give a tax holiday during the holiday season”, and now they are being forced to vote against the tax holiday for the Christmas season. The Conservatives went to the doors in the last election and said, “I support a price on pollution”, and now they are voting against the price on pollution.

It is not like Conservative members were given a choice. They were told to bring this forward. It is interesting that it was two Manitoba members of Parliament who brought forward this motion. In the last budget, or I think it was the previous one, we saw a major commitment to the province of Manitoba. Canada's national Water Agency will be located in Manitoba's capital city of Winnipeg. The premier, the mayor and many different stakeholders are very happy to see a national government that recognizes the importance of having a water strategy, and that the national office will be located in the city of Winnipeg.

When I talk about the environment, and the many things that are taking place, I could provide a list of things I have noted, whether they are the banning of single-use plastics, making zero-emission vehicles more affordable, the serious cut on emissions or the expansion of 44 national wildlife areas and three national parks. Canada's emissions are tracking downward, which is so encouraging to see. There are so many things, such as the greener homes program.

I figure the national story that we heard last week about how the leader of the Conservative Party has absolute and total control of his caucus members is something Canadians should be very much aware of. I would like to quote from the story, which reads:

After two years of [the leader of the Conservative Party] as their leader, many Conservative MPs say they are much less free now than they were before his arrival.

The man who promised during his leadership run to make Canada the “freest country in the world” maintains tight control over the actions of his caucus members....

Conservative MPs' words and actions are closely scrutinized by the leader's office. Partisanship is encouraged. Fraternizing with elected officials from other parties is a no-no.

This means they cannot come over to talk to me. The article continues, “Those who follow these rules are rewarded. Those who don't often have to suffer consequences.” We can talk to the member for Abbotsford to get a sense of the consequences.