Debates of Dec. 4th, 2024

Reference to Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs

[Jake Stewart, Conservative, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Madam Speaker, I did not say anything about the Governor General or anything that you mentioned, so I am confused.

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

The last sentence of Standing Order 18 states, “No member may reflect upon any vote of the House, except for the purpose of moving that such vote be rescinded.” Therefore, I would ask the hon. member to apologize and retract.

[Jake Stewart, Conservative, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Madam Speaker, let me get this straight. You want me to withdraw the fact that he kept Paul Bernardo and he did not want him to go to maximum security—

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

The hon. member will not be allowed to continue speaking if the hon. member does not want to apologize and retract what the hon. member said.

[Jake Stewart, Conservative, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Madam Speaker, I withdraw and apologize, but I do not apologize for what he did though.

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

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. We have seen systematic violations of the Standing Orders by Conservative members. We saw this last Thursday, of course, with the absolutely deplorable spectacle of Conservative MPs showing up, some of whom had been drinking. It was absolutely disgusting.

In this situation, if the member has refused to withdraw and apologize, he cannot be recognized in the House. He did not do what you asked him to do, Madam Speaker.

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

The hon. member knows that he did apologize and retract. That is exactly what the hon. member for Miramichi—Grand Lake did, which is why I am continuing with the questions and comments.

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

Madam Speaker, I will agree with your ruling and ability.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

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

Again, it seems like some Conservatives have been in the sauce. Is that why they are acting this way tonight?

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

The member will refrain from making such comments please, because it does cause disruption in the House and it is totally out of the scope of the debate that we are having this evening.

[Frank Caputo, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Madam Speaker, on the point of order on bringing disruption to the House, what the member said was patently false, and not only that, he abuses the heckling standing order against women, men, children, anybody he can heckle, and he does it inappropriately.

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

That is definitely not a point of order.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby may ask a question of the hon. member for Miramichi—Grand Lake.

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

Madam Speaker, I can categorically say that I have never heckled a child in the House of Commons, unless some Conservatives are self-identifying as children.

My question is very simple. The member referenced memory, and yet the NDP has been fighting to get to the bottom of the SDTC scandal, the $400 million, which I would agree is a lot of money, like we did with the WE Charity and the SNC-Lavalin scandal.

However, under the Conservative regime, the nightmare of the Harper government, we saw not just $400 million with the ETS scandal covered up by the Harper regime, but $1 billion in the G8 scandal covered up by the Harper regime and $2.2 billion in the Phoenix pay scandal covered up by the Harper regime.

If Conservatives really care about memory, will the member apologize for the appalling scandals of the Harper regime, all of them, every single one covered up by Conservatives refusing to allow committees to get to the bottom of them to do their work, and for Canadians to know the honest truth behind the myriad of Conservative spending scandals?

[Jake Stewart, Conservative, Miramichi—Grand Lake, NB]

Madam Speaker, clearly there are a lot of triggered people in the House this week. I saw NDP members swarming one of my colleague's desks the other night as I left here, making people very uncomfortable; it was very aggressive.

The truth is, I feel bad that I mentioned the way somebody voted. I did not know that was a big deal. I can gladly apologize for something like that, of course. However, my point here is that NDP members are so triggered because they are basically propping up the most inept, scandalous government in the history of this country. They are the reason there is no election. They are the reason that the hurt continues for Canadians. It is always them propping up the government.

Members would not believe the things that the members over there call us members over here. I would not even repeat those words. I have big shoulders, and we have big shoulders over here. Do members know why? It is because we are making decisions that matter for Canadians, and they are over there crying and whining in the corner like a bunch of little babies.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, we can talk about déjà vu all over again. It is another day here in Ottawa; most Canadians would expect to see the NDP-Liberal government working to put out the many fires it has lit that are raging across the country: an economic recession, the housing and affordability crisis, disorder at the border, trade relations with the United States and seniors who have had to take a second job just to pay for essentials. It is crisis after crisis. Instead, we are again debating a privilege motion related to the green slush fund because the Liberals would rather cover up their role in the affair than deal with the problems, even if that means Canadians suffer.

We are here again because the Liberal government has failed to turn over documents to the RCMP regarding a $400-million scandal that saw the Liberal-appointed executives funnel money to their own companies, implicating them in 186 conflicts of interest. Not so long ago, it would have made national headlines to have a scandal of such epic proportions. It would have been plastered on every newspaper from coast to coast to coast. However, after nine years of the NDP-Liberal government, it is just another Wednesday.

What is another scandal or another cover-up when there seems to be a new one every month? After all, we have seen this many times before in the last nine years. The green slush fund is just the latest. We have seen the Aga Khan scandal, cash for access, the SNC-Lavalin affair, the WE Charity controversy, clam scam, ArriveCAN and the two Randys. It goes on and on.

When I look at the state of our country and the leadership of the Prime Minister, I am reminded of what I saw during the big Netflix fight, the Tyson versus Paul fight. When most of us were looking to watch the fight, our screen suddenly froze. There was this spinning circle that we were all staring at, stuck in place, going nowhere. We had hopes and expectations of moving forward; instead, we saw buffering, buffering, buffering. In many ways, that is also why we are here today as a country: We are not moving forward. We are buffering.

People feel stuck in place as their savings dwindle and their paycheques stop covering everyday expenses. Not so long ago, they had hopes, dreams and plans for the future; they do not anymore. When we look at the NDP-Liberal government, it is also stuck in place with no plan, no idea of how to fix the budget and address the economic disaster it has inflicted on Canadians. It has no plan to secure our borders. Therefore, it is forced to cover up its wrongdoing, and it would rather have the House remain in a standstill than face the consequences of its actions. It is buffering. We need strong leadership to restore the promise of Canada. Common-sense Conservatives will provide that leadership to this country.

I should also mention that the real winner the night of the great Netflix boxing event was Pefferlaw's own Melinda Watpool. Melinda made everyone so proud that night in York—Simcoe as she continued to earn the World Boxing Organization's women's super middleweight title.

Returning to the matter at hand, this shameful cover-up, sadly, is just another in a long list of scandals and failures from the weak, inept NDP-Liberal government.

In her damning report, the Auditor General called out the former Sustainable Development Technology Canada agency for “significant lapses” in its oversight and management of taxpayers' dollars. Does this sound familiar? The Auditor General said almost the exact same thing this past Monday in her report on the CEBA loan program, which saw $3.5 billion in taxpayer money paid to 77,160 recipients who were not eligible to receive it. It is unbelievable.

It was not always like this. Not so long ago, the Liberal government used to brag about its supposed ambition to grow the middle class. We can recall that the first chapter in the 2015 Liberal platform was entitled “Growth for the Middle Class”. As well, the front of the 2019 platform read, “Forward: A Real Plan for the Middle Class”. Now, instead of looking to grow the middle class, the Liberals have admitted that because of them, a middle-class lifestyle is now out of reach for far too many. It used to be an attainable expectation of most Canadians.

The contrast could not be any starker when we look at what the Liberals are focused on today. Considering the lengths they will go to, to cover up the green slush fund affair, we can imagine the buzzwords on the cover of their 2025 platform: corruption, waste, mismanagement, absolute failure. That is their focus now, not the middle class, not improving our country. Their focus is on themselves.

It is no wonder Canadians are suffering. Despite the suffering that can be seen on every street corner, in every checkout line and at every fuel pump, members opposite continue to gaslight Canadians. When Conservatives bring up the affordability crisis, the Liberals just fall back on their big-ticket measures. They pat themselves on the back. They point at the GST tax trick, carbon tax rebates, $10-a-day day care, school lunches or the fake pharmacare plan and say, “Look what we have done.” In reality, each of these measures is proof of the economic devastation the NDP-Liberal government has wrought on Canadians.

It was not that long ago that Canadians did not need to look to the federal government for assistance to such a degree. People had good-paying jobs. Kids going hungry at school was absolutely unthinkable. In civil society, charitable groups stepped up to ensure the less fortunate were looked after. The Liberals, with their great ambition of transforming the country into their own image, have forced far too many Canadians into impoverishment, where even the most basic essentials have become unaffordable. It is a problem of the government's own making.

With Canadians suffering, the government comes up with poorly implemented programs to paper over the cracks and cover up the impacts of its disastrous economic policies. Canadians see right through this. They know what the Liberals have actually done. It is right there in black and white. People see it every day when they look at their gas and home heating bills, and when they compare them to their carbon tax rebate. They see how meaningless this 60-day GST tax trick rebate will be on their grocery bill when every item on it has skyrocketed in price despite shrinking in size.

The same applies to each of the headline programs the Liberals implemented, which only made things worse. They were supposed to help, but they came at a significant cost to taxpayers. Similarly, Canadians see right through the antics of the government in shutting down the business of the House to cover up their scandals. They see the lengths the Liberals will go to avoid accountability, and they recognize the serious nature of the revelations of this scandal.

This week, the Deputy Prime Minister was asked why she had still not released the public accounts and why there was still not an economic fall statement. She refused to say why the public accounts had not been released, and on the fall economic statement, she said, “I don't have an announcement to make.... The reality is business of the House is being filibustered. That has...consequences [for] the work we need to do for Canadians.”

However, the only people responsible for stopping the work of the House and dealing with government business are those in the NDP-Liberal government. They could choose to release the unredacted slush fund documents, but they refuse to. The Leader of the Opposition has already told the government that our party is willing to stand down on this order to get the economic statement tabled, but the government will not. It is because the Liberals do not want Canadians to know the dismal fiscal state the country is in as we head into the Christmas holiday. It is very likely because things are far worse than they have let on.

Last year, the Deputy Prime Minister made a commitment that the deficit would be no greater than $40.1 billion. This was the red line. All evidence would now suggest that this is yet another cover-up. She has broken this promise yet again, which will have devastating impacts on interest rates, investor confidence and economic outlook in the coming month. On this side of the House, we have watched 20 or 30 questions asked of the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister: “What is the deficit number? Does anyone have it on the other side of the House?” After asking the Finance Minister 20 times, I wish there was one Liberal-NDP member in the House who would give the number. It is getting painful to watch.

By refusing to turn over the documents related to the SDTC, the Liberals have shown their contempt for the will of the House of Commons, and by extension, democracy itself. Democracy has become a very inconvenient concept for the NDP-Liberal government that, may I remind everyone, was only elected with 32% of the popular vote. The Liberal government has held on to record low polling this whole past year. Liberals do not want to go to Canadians and account for their record in an election. They do not want to justify their terrible policies, such as the carbon tax. We just saw today the provincial leader of the Ontario Liberals, Bonnie Crombie herself, say the carbon tax is bad.

The Liberals do not want to listen to us, as members of Parliament, when we point out the issues our constituents face. They do not want to be accountable when they are found out for their incompetence and wrongdoing, which is why they refuse to hand over these documents. Instead, they want to run this country into the ground for as long as they possibly can and turn it into a place where Liberal grifters and insiders are the only ones who will become better off.

The actions the NDP-Liberal government has taken in covering up its scandals and prioritizing its interests over our citizens has fundamentally undermined the public interest. The Prime Minister and his caucus are more interested in protecting the tattered remains of their image instead of addressing the problems at hand. They care more about hiding their mistakes than fixing them. The implication of their utter failure to put people over partisanship is the most damning aspect of this whole thing.

At a time when our country is facing skyrocketing crime, immigration fraud and misuse of taxpayer funds by governments and organizations, it is especially concerning to see the cover-up taking place here. The message being sent from the very top, from the NDP-Liberal government, is that accountability, transparency and ethical vigour can be ignored. With this sort of example coming from the very top, it is no wonder we are seeing so much disorder and chaos in our communities. This is not what Canadians want. This is not why they elected us and sent us here; they want competence from their government, strength, a sense of duty and a commitment to our country and our shared values. All too often, it looks like the Liberal-NDP government has lost sight of that. More so, it looks like it has forgotten the values that are supposed to unite us and draw us together.

Common-sense Conservatives have not forgotten. We have a vision for this country that would see a restoration of the formula that used to work here, a formula that has become broken. This formula, the promise of Canada, was that a good job and hard work would lead to good pay. That pay would go toward the essentials of life, like a good home and good food, and the rest would allow someone to save, plan and invest in a future. That was the promise of Canada that must be restored.

At the same time, Conservatives want to bring home accountability to Ottawa, to put an end to the Prime Minister's corruption and put an end to bad practices, red tape and high-priced consultants that have led to so many of these scandals and ethical breaches by the Liberals. This may come as a shock to some people here in the Ottawa bubble, but normal Canadians do not pay a lot of attention to what goes on here. Most probably do not even know that the House is seized with this issue. Some do not even know that MPs go to Ottawa. They probably think that caucus is a dirty word.

This has always been the case. Members of Parliament are elected to represent people and do the job of governance on their behalf, but every so often, good, honest, hard-working folks, who are usually preoccupied with providing for their families, building their businesses or contributing to their community start to pay more attention. They are paying attention now because the party that formed government, the Liberal Party of Canada, whose members were elected to look out for the best interests of the country, is failing them. Canadians are tuning in to see what their leaders are doing to address the problems Canadians are facing every day.

Common-sense Conservatives will be focused on axing the tax, fixing the budget, building the homes and stopping the crime. Conservatives have solutions for those problems and the leadership and convictions to bring it home.

In closing, I want to wish everyone across Canada and in York—Simcoe a very merry Christmas.

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

Madam Speaker, I have respect for that member. Like some of his colleagues, he is very respectful of the House and I appreciate that, but yet again, we have Conservatives not taking responsibility for their scandals.

The NDP fought to get to the bottom of the SNC-Lavalin scandal. With the WE Charity scandal, of course, we played the pivotal role. With SDTC, we are now part of the majority in the House that has said very clearly the documents need to be provided.

Conservatives are responsible for scandals that were even bigger than the Liberal scandals. We look at the $400 million of the ETS scandal, which the Harper government shut down so Canadians could never find the real links and the corruption of the Harper government. There was the $1 billion for the G8 scandal; of course, we remember the gazebos. Again, the Harper regime shut it down so Canadians could not find out the truth of what happened with that billion dollars. There was the $2.2 billion for the Phoenix pay scandal and the $3.1 billion that somehow just disappeared. There was no paper trail around anti-terrorism funding.

All of these scandals: that is the Conservative record, the most corrupt government in Canadian history.

Will one Conservative MP, just one, stand up and say they are sorry to Canadians, they are sorry that billions of dollars were misspent, that they covered everything up, that they refused to allow Parliament to play its role? Will that—

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

We have to give space to other questions.

The hon. member for York—Simcoe.

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, the most important scandal the member left out is the scandal the NDP-Liberal government is actually putting on Canadians. That is the scandal of affordability. When we look at the GST trick and the $250 giveaway, we remember that the leader of the NDP ripped up that agreement and said he was done with the Liberals. The fact is that he actually wrote that bill in conjunction with the Liberals.

Do members know what happened? They came in and said that they left out seniors and people with disabilities. Canadians just do not trust the NDP-Liberal government. It is a weak, inept government.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Madam Speaker, the Conservatives are starting to sound like a broken record. The Conservatives say they no longer have confidence in the Liberal Party, but they have been blocking the work of the House for five weeks now and preventing a non-confidence vote. Now we learn that the Conservatives are feeling generous right before Christmas, so they are going to allow the Liberal Party to present their economic update. What an act of kindness.

I would like my colleague to explain why the Conservatives have been supporting this government for five weeks, even though they say they do not have confidence in it. Why did they not move their non-confidence motion, as they are going to do next Monday, and why did they wait for the government to give them an opposition day? Why are they saying one thing and doing the complete opposite?

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, as I said, this is about affordability. This is about transparency for taxpayers. This is what is so frustrating for Canadians. We are talking about $400 million.

We have someone on a phone over here. They are on the phone now, trying to call me in. It is unbelievable.

We are talking about $400 million. I have not seen one NDP or Liberal member of Parliament stand up and ask if anyone has even attempted to get the taxpayer money back. This goes on, time and time again.

When is the government going to show respect to the taxpayers of Canada?

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

Madam Speaker, I want to ask this member about the rural top-up. I think it is a subject he is familiar with.

In all seriousness, it is a great tribute to a member when as soon as we see that member, we know what issue he is going to mention. He has been such a dogged, effective advocate for his riding on the issue of the rural top-up.

For those who have maybe been living under a rock for the last few years and have never heard him mention it before, could the member tell us about the rural top-up issue?

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, quite frankly, I wish I did not have to talk about this. I wish the government promise that they put in the budget last year had addressed this problem. The government loves to divide Canadians, and it has divided them based on geography. My riding is the soup and salad bowl of Canada. I cannot even see the CN Tower from my riding. However, the government has classified us as Toronto. Why does that matter? It is because we do not get the rural top-up for the carbon tax.

The Prime Minister gets up every day and says that Canadians get back more than they pay in the carbon tax. That is absolutely absurd for people in my riding. They know they do not get the rural top-up, and they know that, as I have said before, Liberals are like atoms: They make up everything.

[Jamie Schmale, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Madam Speaker, my geographical neighbour and I share a bit of Lake Simcoe. He obviously has a bigger part of that magnificent piece of water than I do, and Brock township is mine.

There was a Lake Simcoe cleanup fund that the Liberals cancelled and said they were going to bring back. How many years ago was that cancelled, and how many years have we been waiting for that promise to be implemented?

[Scot Davidson, Conservative, York—Simcoe, ON]

Madam Speaker, that is quite true. Actually, the promise was made on the shores of Lake Simcoe. The Deputy Prime Minister promised $40 million for Lake Simcoe because the Liberals cancelled the cleanup fund. What happened was promises, promises, promises. Circling back to how important the environment is, I want to point out that this was from a government that did not support my bill, Bill C-204, on stopping plastic waste from going to developing countries. I also want to ask the Liberal government this: Where are the six billion trees? People in York—Simcoe at my Canada Day barbecue have planted more trees than the Liberal government has, and I am proud of everyone in my riding.