Debates of June 18th, 2024

Information Commissioner

[The Speaker, Liberal, Greg Fergus]

It is my duty to lay upon the table, pursuant to subsection 40(1) of the Access to Information Act, the report of the Information Commissioner for the fiscal year ended May 31, 2024.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(h), this report is deemed to have been permanently referred to the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics.

Law Commission of Canada

[James Maloney, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 32(2), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the 2023-24 departmental plan for the Law Commission of Canada.

Federal Ombudsperson for Victims of Crime

[James Maloney, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 32(2), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the 2021-22 annual report from the Office of the Federal Ombudsperson for Victims of Crime.

In addition, pursuant to Standing Order 32(2), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the 2022-23 annual report from the Office of the Federal Ombudsperson for Victims of Crime.

Women, Peace and Security

[Rob Oliphant, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 32(2), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the combined 2021-22 and 2022-23 progress report on Canada's national action plan for the implementation of the United Nations Security Council resolutions on women, peace and security.

Government Response to Petitions

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

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36(8)(a), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the government's response to 10 petitions. These returns will be tabled in an electronic format.

While I am on my feet, I move:

That the House do now proceed to orders of the day.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Greg Fergus]

If a member participating in person wishes that the motion be carried or carried on division, or if a member of a recognized party participating in person wishes to request a recorded division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I request a recorded division.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Greg Fergus]

Call in the members.

(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)

Vote #830

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I declare the motion carried.

The House resumed from June 17 consideration of the motion that Bill C-65, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act, be read the second time and referred to a committee, and of the amendment.

Electoral Participation Act

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

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to speak to Bill C-65. Before I do that, if members would indulge me, I want to send congratulations to a member of my staff, Ali Shahsamand, who is receiving his master's degree today. Based on his excellent work in my office, he could be teaching many of the classes, but he is nonetheless learning a lot through his master's degree. I am going to do my best to pop over there if there are not too many shenanigans from the other side that keep me here throughout the day. Members are pointing out that I might be the cause of some shenanigans later as well. We will see. I think that is tough, but fair.

We are debating Bill C-65 and, in particular, an amendment put forward at second reading by my colleague from St. Albert—Edmonton. I do not know that there has been much discussion of the amendment in particular, so I do want to review. The amendment proposes that the House decline to give second reading to Bill C-65, an act to amend the Elections Canada Act, as the bill would delay the next federal election so that more departing members of Parliament could collect taxpayer-funded pensions, which is a measure that is particularly offensive at a time when Canadians are struggling due to the NDP-Liberal government's inflation, carbon tax and housing costs. It is a wise and thoughtful amendment from my colleague from St. Albert—Edmonton, which I am pleased to support, and I am looking forward to discussing it.

By way of context about the state of the country right now, after nine years of the NDP-Liberal government, two of my children, Gianna and Phineas, are in Ottawa as well, and it is great to have them here. I was reflecting on some conversations I sometimes have with my children when I ask them to do a task. My children are very responsible 99% of the time, but sometimes, it comes to pass that a part of the house needs to be cleaned, and I tell them to put the toys away and to clean up an area of the house. Maybe I have a phone call from someone or have some work I have to do, and when I come back an hour later, nothing has changed; all the toys are exactly where they were, or maybe it is even worse. Then, I ask them what is going on and explain that they have to clean it up. They say that they have been working at it for an hour, but nothing has changed.

As parents, we want to look at not just the amount of time spent on an activity, but also the results of the activity and whether things have changed as a result of the efforts that have been put in. It is a good lesson for children that their activities will be judged not just by the effort they put in, but also by the results they achieve. If people do not learn that they will be judged by the results they produce and not by the efforts they put in, they might grow up to become Liberals.

The Liberals would like us to judge their activities over the last nine years not by the results but by the amount of money they have spent and the amount of energy they have purportedly exerted on behalf of certain outcomes. However, Canadians are judging them on the results. After nine years of the NDP-Liberal government, it is undeniable that the results are much worse.

I think back to 2015 when I was first elected as a member of Parliament for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan. It was the same year that we had a change in government. We had the Conservative government of Stephen Harper prior to 2015, and the current Prime Minister came in 2015, promising real change. That was the slogan. In 2015, the Liberals' slogan was “real change”, and in 2024, their slogan is “boo hoo, get over it”. It is quite a real change that this country has experienced in nine years.

In 2015, the Prime Minister said that real change was coming and, indeed, real change is here. Rents have doubled. The violent crime rate, which was going down, has now gone back up and is continuing to be on the way back up. The national debt has more than doubled. I recall debates previously where people had concerns about the size of our national debt. The national debt has more than doubled since 2015. We are now spending more on servicing the national debt than is transferred to the provinces in health care. As this debt was escalating, the message we heard from the government was not to worry because interest rates were low. However, interest rates have not remained low, and as a result, we are paying more and more in debt servicing costs.

Debt is up. Costs are up. Inflation is up. Crime is up. Canadians are now looking at these results, and they are judging the government, not by its flashy slogans, by its professions of concern or by its promises to spend even more. Canadians are judging the government based on the results that are being achieved. It is amazing to hear the Liberals talk as if they just have to talk in a different way and explain what they are doing in a different way.

After nine years, Canadians have seen what the Liberals have done and have seen the results. What are they doing in response to that? After nine years of failures, costs and crime being up, what are Liberals interested in talking about in the House? What are they trying to focus our attention on? They have this new bill, Bill C-65, and in response to all these challenges and the public anger at the failures of the government, they are proposing to delay the election even further. It is unbelievable.

If the public is upset and it is demanding change and new direction, the Liberals had better delay the election a little longer so that they can stay in power for as long as they can and collect their pensions. That is the approach we are seeing from the Liberal government. I look around the world, and there are a number of cases where governments that are struggling for various reasons have at least the willingness to put their programs to the people and to make their cases to the voters.

We have challenged the government. Rather than a delay to the election, most people I talk to in all parts of this country actually want an election sooner, not later. They want an opportunity to pronounce on the government's failures and to replace it as soon as possible. In the context of the level of fierce criticism and of the challenges the country is facing, the responsible thing to do would be for the government members to say that they were ready to make their case, to put their case before the Canadian people and to let the Canadian people decide on that trajectory in a carbon tax election.

However, the Liberals are trying to move in the other direction. They want to delay the election further. They want to stay in power for as long as they possibly can and avoid the inevitable judgment of the Canadian people on their nine years of terrible failures and the results that it has produced for this country.

Naturally, Conservatives are opposed to the proposed bill. We believe that instead of having a later election, it is time for an earlier election. Canadians want to have a chance to rule on the many failures of the government, and we will, of course, be opposing the bill.

In addition to its evident desire to delay the election and to cling to power as long as it possibly can, the Liberal government has coincidentally put forward a date change to the election that just so happens to allow many additional members of Parliament across the way to be eligible for a pension, and that is certainly suspicious. The members across the way are putting their own pensions ahead of the desire of Canadians for an election that would allow us to replace this costly, corrupt coalition NDP-Liberal government.

The wise amendment from my colleague from St. Albert—Edmonton points out that this focus on protecting their own position and protecting their own pensions is particularly galling to Canadians at a time when so many Canadians are indeed struggling. The struggles Canadians are facing, by the way, are things that the Liberal government loves to try to blame on other people. How can we explain that after the government has pursued inflationary policies, things cost more? The government has chosen to pursue policies that make things more expensive, and on this point, the amendment mentions the carbon tax, and I want to spend a couple of minutes on the carbon tax.

The funny thing about the carbon tax is that New Democrats and Liberals refuse to acknowledge the basic logic of how a carbon tax is supposed to work, even as advocated by its proponents. Proponents of the carbon tax—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I have a point of order from the hon. member for Humber River—Black Creek.

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

Madam Speaker, on a point of order, I have recognized a half a dozen times where my hon. colleague keeps talking about everything else but the amendment and the bill before us. As a reminder, this bill is about electoral reform and not about carbon tax, and not about the umpteen other things that he has mentioned.

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I want to remind hon. members that there is some flexibility when members are debating. However, I would ask members when they are debating to bring it back to the legislation that is before the House.

The hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

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

Madam Speaker, I will just reacquaint my friend across the way, and the one person who applauded her intervention, with the fact that we are debating an amendment from the member for St. Albert—Edmonton, which says the following:

the House decline to give second reading to Bill C-65, An Act to amend the Canada Elections Act, as the bill delays the next federal election so that more departing members of Parliament can collect taxpayer-funded pensions, a measure that is particularly offensive at a time when Canadians are struggling due to the NDP-Liberal government’s inflation, carbon tax and housing costs.

I am, of course, speaking, as I said, about the amendment. That would be not only related to the topic, but definitively the most germane thing that one could possibly talk about: that is, the amendment that is presently before the House. The amendment highlights how the efforts by the Liberals to cling to power by their fingernails, by passing a bill to delay the election, are particularly offensive to Canadians, who would like to see the carbon tax end as soon as possible.

Canadians know that the next election will be a carbon tax election. It will provide an opportunity for the Canadian people to make a decision about whether they approve of the NDP-Liberal plan to massively hike the carbon tax in the years ahead or the Conservative plan to scrap the tax, to axe the tax in every region of the country, and for good. That is the choice that Canadians will have in the next election. A confident government would say they are ready for that choice. It would say, let us have that debate. The member for Winnipeg North says he welcomes that debate. It seems that he has more courage than the leader of his party, because the leader of his party and the minister responsible for this bill have put forward a bill to delay that great clash of ideas that will occur in the next election. Whenever the member for Winnipeg North is ready for this conversation and is ready to allow his constituents to rule on this vital question, then I suggest he tell his Prime Minister to scrap Bill C-65 as they are ready for an election.

I can tell colleagues that, on this side of the House, we are ready. We want to let Canadians decide: Do they prefer the radical NDP-Liberal plan to hike the carbon tax, to quadruple the carbon tax, or do they prefer the common-sense Conservative plan to axe the tax everywhere, and for good? I think Canadians will choose to axe the tax, but in any event, we are ready for that debate. We are ready to submit ourselves to the judgment of the Canadian people. Instead, the government, rather than being prepared to submit itself to the common-sense judgment of the common people, wants to be able to delay the election so the Liberals can hang on to their pensions for as long as possible, hang on to power as long as possible, rather than letting the Canadian people decide.

The government will not be able to delay this inevitable carbon tax election forever. When the inevitable carbon tax election comes, Liberals and New Democrats will have to explain the following to the Canadian people: that the very purpose of a carbon tax is to increase costs. That is what even proponents of the carbon tax say it exists to do. The carbon tax exists to make driving one's car more expensive and to make taking that family road trip more expensive, the family road trip that the Minister of Health thinks is going to burn the planet. I think it was notable after that how various people on social media were able to find posts from the Prime Minister about family road trips he has taken. The Prime Minister does not just take family road trips. He travels much greater distances, using more carbon-emitting options than the simple family van. It is another example of “do as I say, not as I do”. Apparently, when everyday Canadians want to spend a few days seeing beautiful parts of our country, putting their kids in the car and travelling places, the Minister of Health thinks that is going to burn the planet. This is the kind of “do as I say, not as I do” radical extremism that we have come to expect from the radical NDP-Liberal coalition government.

Let us be clear. The purpose of a carbon tax, what it is designed to do, is to increase the price of goods so that people will consume those goods less. That is the theory behind the carbon—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

The hon. member for Longueuil—Saint‑Hubert on a point of order.

[Denis Trudel, Bloc, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, QC]

Madam Speaker, we have had approximately 150,000 opposition days on the carbon tax. Today, we are studying a different bill, and yet my colleague is talking only about the carbon tax, which—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

That is a point of debate. As I mentioned before, there is some latitude. The hon. member is talking about an amendment that mentions the carbon tax. I will let the member continue his speech. He has four minutes and 43 seconds.

The hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

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

Madam Speaker, at the risk of being accused of repetition, I will clarify the point for my Bloc colleagues again, as I did earlier. We are, at present, debating an amendment put forward by my colleague from St. Albert—Edmonton, which is about declining to give second reading to Bill C-65, because the bill reveals the priorities of the government, priorities that are dead wrong. Conservatives would like to focus on providing economic relief to Canadians. We are ready for a carbon tax election, in which the choice will be clear, between a Conservative common-sense plan and the plan of the NDP-Liberals and the Bloc to impose additional costs on Canadians, punishing new costs that would further undermine opportunity for everyday Canadians.

Here is where we are. It is clear and unmistakable that we are at a time when Canadians are overwhelmingly disapproving of the direction of the NDP-Liberal government, when Canadians' disapproval of the government reflects their own frustration and the fact that they can see how policies of the government have made their lives materially worse, how there is more poverty in this country, more division and more crime as a result of policies that have been pursued by the NDP-Liberal government. In that context, where Canadians are upset with the government, see how the government has made their lives worse and are, therefore, looking for an alternative to the current approach, the Liberal government, rather than recognizing its failures, changing course in its policies and putting its programs to the Canadian people, is focused on pushing forward legislation to try to delay when that ultimate judgment will come down from the Canadian people. That is what we are debating. That is what Bill C-65 is about.

Bill C-65 is before this House because, rather than calling an election or putting forward bills that would actually make Canadians' lives better, Liberals are focused on delaying when that election will come. Conservatives are ready to put our plan before the Canadian people, our plan to axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime, our plan to focus on the common sense of Canadians.

I want to remind the New Democrats that the plan is to axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime. I think we are winning converts. I think—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

I would remind members that they will have an opportunity to ask questions and make comments, so I would ask them to please wait until the appropriate time.

The hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

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

Madam Speaker, I think we are finally getting through. I think New Democrats are finally hearing us. I think they may be reflecting. The House leader—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker, NDP, Carol Hughes]

Order. I want to remind hon. members again that they will have an opportunity to ask questions and make comments, so I would ask them to please wait.

The hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.