Alain Therrien

[Justice, December 6th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, the interpretation was not working and we did not hear the French version of my NDP colleague's comments.

[Forestry Industry, December 2nd, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, last February, when the Prime Minister met with Joe Biden for the first time to plan a common course of action, they must have spoken about 50 or so files.

However, they did not talk at all about softwood lumber. They obviously did not discuss getting rid of the tariffs, which is a priority, and they definitely did not talk about separate treatment for Quebec.

It was in May, when Washington decided to double the tariffs, that the Prime Minister woke up and remembered that there was a trade dispute.

It is always the same old story with this government. We are always waiting for something to be done. If we do not tell the Liberals what to do, when to do it and how to do it, they do nothing.

When will this government stand up for Quebec's forestry industry?

[Resumption of Debate on Address in Reply, November 30th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, that is quite the question. I must thank my colleague, who is putting me on the spot.

Clearly, the Montreal Canadien players do not skate as well as the Liberals. That is a fact. However, we hope that the Prime Minister will do a somewhat better job as general manager than Marc Bergevin.

Aside from that, Canada and Quebec decided that we would have a minority Parliament. The role that the opposition must play and that the Bloc Québécois will play is to monitor the government, be a constructive opposition, provide advice and act to ensure that this government has policies that will truly serve Quebeckers and Canadians. We have a lot of work to do in that regard.

[Resumption of Debate on Address in Reply, November 30th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, the Bank of Canada has had just one inflation target since 1991.

It is the second bank in the history of the world, after New Zealand, to have such a specific target. In 1991, the Bank of Canada wrote that its only monetary policy goal was to maintain inflation between 1% and 3%, ideally aiming for 2%.

That is the only goal of the Bank of Canada. I hope that the bank will continue the good work it has been doing since 1991. I also hope that the government will respect the fact that the Bank of Canada is responsible for combatting inflation.

This obviously does not mean that the government should spend as it pleases. This means that the government must keep close tabs on its spending.

The Bank of Canada has a role to play, and I hope that it will do so.

[Resumption of Debate on Address in Reply, November 30th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, we can look at all the bills and go over their history. I have no problem with that.

We could talk about Bill C-7 on medical assistance in dying. The Conservative Party blocked that bill, as my colleague said. The Bloc Québécois, meanwhile, decided to support the bill and move it forward.

No, the Conservatives' approach to Bill C-6 was not exemplary. However, an election should not be called simply because one or two bills get stuck, when many bills are going through without a hitch. I know; I was there.

Yes, the Conservatives could take a good hard look at themselves when it comes to this bill. They have not been effective, one could say, but the fact remains that this is a democracy. The Conservatives were against the bill and they showed it.

What I am trying to say is that when there is a strong, robust, intelligent and effective legislative agenda, things go well. That was the problem in the last Parliament. The government did not get the job done.

[Resumption of Debate on Address in Reply, November 30th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I would like to let you know that I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Repentigny.

If I had a title for my speech, it would be “autopsy of a failure”. Before we talk about the throne speech, let us go back in time, to last spring. I would remind my colleagues that we were in a pandemic last spring. There was only one MP on the other side. I say this often, because I cannot believe it. There was just the member for Kingston and the Islands. All the other Liberal Party members were in their basements or some such place. They were afraid of the pandemic. They were shaking under their desks. Once in a while, the Prime Minister would come and visit. I remember that we would give a start of surprise when we saw him coming. We were shocked to see that there were other Liberals in that party. He would arrive from time to time and answer questions.

Then, things improved. Quebec began opening up. We thought the Liberals would eventually see common sense. We talked about it with their leader and their whip. They said that they could not come to the House, that the situation was still terrible and that there was still a pandemic. They continued to hide under their desks in the basement. They said that they could not do it, that they could not handle the light of day and that they needed to adapt.

It made no sense. That was the Liberal approach. They were afraid of the pandemic.

People say a lot of things, but the Prime Minister can be very persuasive. He convinced those folks over there that it was time to call an election. Even though we were in a fourth wave of the pandemic, he convinced them that the time was right. Even though it was only two years after the previous election, it was the right time to meet the public. An election had to be called, the situation was critical, there was an emergency on the home front.

At the end of the day, one by one, Liberal Party members took the bait. They thought they were going to walk around, meet with people and shake their hands. Soon they were making human pyramids. They were happy; they were finally out.

They told people that they were calling an election and that everybody would have to line up to vote. We were in the fourth wave of the pandemic, but no big deal. They said they could not make Parliament work because of their minority situation, that it was not going well and that the opposition was behaving outrageously. They all said that.

I have been the House leader of the Bloc Québécois since 2019, and I remember that everything was going well. The opposition was making its contribution. There were discussions happening, and that was great. Bills were being improved because we were all working together. I would say that the main problem during that time was more the Liberal government's lack of organization in developing its parliamentary strategy and legislative agenda than the opposition from the opposition parties.

There were bills on the table, and the work was getting done. Bill C‑10 got all the way to the Senate. In Quebec, we had been waiting for years for the web giants to contribute to the culture sector. The bill died in the Senate because of the election. Bill C‑216 was meant to ensure that supply management would be protected in future trade agreements. It was on track. Everything was going well. Bill C‑6 on conversion therapy was almost wrapped up. The Liberals are coming back to that now with another bill.

The bill that made pensioners first in line to get paid when a company goes bankrupt was also coming along nicely. The one that made sure that someone with a serious illness was entitled to 50 weeks of EI benefits was moving forward. That is something to be expected, it makes sense, but they decided to throw it all away and call an election, because time was of the essence.

The Prime Minister looked people straight in the eye and told them that it was urgent, that the government needed their opinion because otherwise horrible things lay ahead. The public voted, and almost all members are back, except for a few changes.

The public said to stop fooling around, stop with the elections and get back to work. They said to get back to work because we are in a pandemic. That is what the public said. The public told the government to get its act together and return to Parliament.

Now the Liberals are returning to Parliament. They wanted a majority government, but that turned out to be a flop. Now they are saying that we need to take the bull by the horns, that it is extremely important, that it is urgent.

We sat around for two months. We waited for Parliament to be recalled for two months. Our clothes were out of style by the time we came back here.

They came back, claiming that the throne speech would be as amazing as a kangaroo on a trampoline and that we would have to wait and see. People were saying that the speech would be amazing, that it would be the highlight of the decade.

When we heard the speech, however, there was nothing there. The government should be ashamed of having given birth to a mouse. It is not even a mouse; it is a flea and you would need a microscope just to see what is there. No matter how many times you read it, there is nothing there.

In the end, we did find one thing. We learned that the government does not like its jurisdictions and prefers to interfere in provincial ones. The government asked itself how it could interfere in Quebec's and the provinces' jurisdictions. Someone a little smarter said that the provinces and Quebec would be stunned if the government were to interfere in health care.

The government talks about health but fails to mention that provincial health care systems are underfunded because the federal government has been starving them for more than 20 years. The federal government is saying that it is going to stop giving the provinces the money they deserve and is going to starve them little by little. At some point, however, all hell is going to break loose. That is when the federal government will step in and say that the provinces do not know how to manage health care and that there are all kinds of problems in the sector.

However, the federal government has been starving the provinces' and Quebec's health care systems for 20 years. It is quite simple. The government must be told to increase payments as it should be doing and to increase transfers to 35% of the cost of health care for everyone in Canada and Quebec. Everyone agrees on this amount except for the federal government, which does not understand. The federal government is telling itself that it will say that the provinces are not doing a good job, so that it can go ahead and interfere in their jurisdictions.

The federal government is steadfast, and it does not like its jurisdictions. The rail crisis fell under federal jurisdiction, but it let the provinces deal with it. It says it will let the City of Montreal and Quebec deal with the firearms issue. When an issue falls under its jurisdiction, it does not want to deal with it, but it will meddle in the jurisdictions of Quebec and the provinces. If the Prime Minister wanted to run a provincial government, all he had to do was stand for election in British Columbia. However, he is the Prime Minister of Canada.

The federal government thought it came up with a good idea by announcing that it needs a minister responsible for mental health, an area that falls under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. However, the federal government said that it would be all right and that it would be fun. It went ahead with it.

This morning, despite being comfortably seated, I fell right off my chair when the leader of the official opposition said a minister responsible for mental health was a good idea. The Conservatives have been saying for years that they do not want to interfere in areas under the jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces. Then, this morning, the leader of the official opposition said he was disappointed and ready to fight. The thing is, one cannot respect the provinces' jurisdiction by leaving them alone and support the idea of a minister responsible for mental health at the same time. That does not work, but that is what the Conservatives did, and they thought it was pretty great. Then they said it was because the government was no good. I think the root of the problem is not that the government is not good; it is that it did not do its basic job.

Quebeckers send half their taxes to Ottawa because they want to be taken care of during a pandemic that makes the problem even worse. What Quebec and Quebeckers want is to see the money they send to Ottawa flowing back to where it is needed: health care. The federal government does not have the authority to handle health care. It has never done so. It has never paid a doctor or a nurse, and it has almost never run a hospital, so it must send that money to the people with expertise in this area: my government, the Government of Quebec. That is what the Bloc Québécois wants.

We are also thinking about seniors, who suffered in isolation, who were the most affected by the pandemic in terms of health, who are on a fixed income and who are now being financially strangled by inflation. The only thing the federal government did was divide them into two classes. It said that it would help seniors 75 and up, but seniors 65 to 75 would have to wait.

In the House, three ministers said that if seniors 65 to 75 did not have the means to live comfortably, they would have to go back to work. Seriously? The federal Liberal government wants to send people 65 to 75 back to work? This government is already worn out only two months in. Good thing it spent two months resting, or it would be dead.

With a throne speech like that, I think the opposition will have its work cut out for it.

[The Environment, November 29th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, this is the only government that has increased its greenhouse gas emissions since 2015, so it is in no position to lecture anyone.

If the government's plan were as good as my colleague claims, fossil fuel companies would not be celebrating. The Canadian Association of Energy Contractors was happy to announce last Tuesday that no fewer than 1,363 new wells would be drilled in 2022. That is an increase of 25% over this year. They are literally popping the champagne, and all this comes barely two weeks after COP26.

Can the government at least warn the industry that 1,363 new wells is a very bad idea?

[The Environment, November 29th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, the commissioner of the environment slammed the Liberals' record on climate change.

Since they took office, the commissioner said, and I quote, “Canada...has become the worst performer of all G7 nations”. Nevertheless, the government is still subsidizing oil companies so that they can increase production, but in the hopes that they will do so in a cleaner way.

What a smart bunch. They are still trying to put out the fire with a flame-thrower. Will the government finally figure out that we need to put a cap on fossil energy?

[Health, November 25th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, the government refused to commit to increasing health transfers in the throne speech. Worse yet, the government does not even seem willing to commit to talking about it.

The Bloc Québécois is suggesting that the government hold a summit to have a public discussion on health care funding. That is the least the government could do after what happened during the pandemic. The government has no choice, yet it still cannot commit. It is a world record.

This government is totally disconnected from reality. When will the government organize this summit?

[Health, November 25th, 2021]

Mr. Speaker, we made progress yesterday on Ottawa-Quebec relations.

Yesterday, the Prime Minister explained to us, and I quote, “in Canada, in a federation, we have something called provincial jurisdiction”. Kudos to him, I say. He went on to explain that there are things the federal government can do, but other things that only the provinces can do because they fall under their jurisdiction.

Now that we all finally understand that, and I am hoping the Prime Minister understood his own words, will he transfer the money needed for health care to Quebec?