Alex Nuttall

[Canada Business Corporations Act, October 26th, 2016]

Certainly, Madam Speaker. I try not to say his name as much as possible, so I certainly apologize to the member on the other side of the House.

The Liberals have said that they have a plan, but unfortunately, all they have is a plan to have a plan. It is so good, so big, and so fantastic, it is imaginary and does not exist.

A plan to have a plan does not create a single job. A plan to have a plan does not put food on a single Canadian table, except the minister's, of course, and a plan to have a plan does not pay extremely high Ontario Hydro bills. A plan to have a plan does not help unemployed oil and gas workers get back to work. A plan to have a plan does not spur confidence or hope in the opportunities that exist in this country.

I am sure the minister wants to know why. It is because while he is taking two years to come up with a plan, people are actually hurting. People are wondering how they will pay for food this week, their mortgage next week, their rent the month after, their kids' sports, their parents' medical bills, their anniversary dinner, and their gas to get to work.

Canadians do not have two years to wait. Some do not have two weeks to wait, yet the only response to the downgraded economic outlook by the Bank of Canada and the International Monetary Fund is silence. “Wait,” the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development would say, “we have a plan and a committee of innovation leaders to prove it. We appointed 10 innovation leaders to ask people out there and to teach us how to make Canada more competitive”.

For the record, if the government wants to know how to innovate, then ask the most innovative leaders in Canada and maybe start with the Canadian Council of Innovators, 50 of the country's top tech and advanced manufacturing CEOs in Canada. In fact, we do not even have to go out to find them. They actually came here last week, the same day the Prime Minister was meeting with their top competitors from outside of Canada.

I decided to meet with them and listen to their ideas. They told me that the committee of successful bureaucrats, university and college professors, and venture capitalists from the innovation leaders committee had not interviewed a single one of the top 50 tech CEOs in the country. The committee whose sole purpose is to discover how to harness the power of innovation has not consulted the top innovators in Canada.

These government folks love the photo ops, love committees, and love talking, especially about plans, but when it comes to delivering real results, identifying real opportunities, with real innovators, real change went to Amazon.

I can see it now. My Liberal colleagues will say that they do not need to move bills in the House of Commons to be effective in government. They can spend money, or as governments always say, invest.

First, I would ask why we do not spend money on a plan that would help Canadian employers become more competitive. That is only half the problem. The real problem is that governments of all stripes can just spend our money and then pat themselves on the back for doing it.

Government members will stand up in this House bragging that they have given tax dollars to this company and that company. It is wrong. I do not want the government to measure its success by the amount of money it is spending recklessly to race to the bottom of the well known as the Canadian taxpayer. We want the government to measure its success by how successful it is, not by how much money it can spend and how fast it can do it.

I want to focus on the practical plans the government should engage in. Number one, do no harm. Keep taxes low and red tape minimal and allow entrepreneurs to do what is best for their businesses and their workers.

Be responsive. When 50 of the country's best and brightest come all the way to Ottawa, show up.

Streamline programs, making it easier for companies to respond to and be successful in their applications, as it has become so onerous and slow that companies do not bother to respond and miss opportunities to create jobs.

Recognize why these problems exist and reform them as necessary. Too often, programming is designed to make it easier for the government to do the business of government rather than for business to do business.

Be proactive. Pick up the phone. Mandate ministry-wide quotas on client outreach to find ways to support entrepreneurs creating jobs.

Set measurable targets, as it has with the bill. Whether it is the level of technology, the number of successful companies, market share, or productivity, replace the platitudes of politicians and spending with measurable targets.

Reform the CanExport program so that companies can effectively enter and expand in target marketplaces instead of penalizing companies that have fostered a footprint in a marketplace already.

Recognize that there is a brain drain to the United States and focus resources on creating conditions that keep our talent at home in Canada, and target international talent to make Canada their home.

Ensure that our technical standards are adopted, especially where we are industry leaders and where it will benefit our industries to maintain excellence and a competitive edge for our entrepreneurs.

Finally, follow-through on a commitment to give employers who hire young people, both male and female, a 12-month break on employment insurance premiums.

Instead of enacting these types of practical approaches to maintain jobs, or help the private sector create jobs, the government is treading water.

I support the use of good data to support good decision-making. I know that the bill would encourage the collection of data, and outline the participation level of different demographics on boards of directors, but this measure by itself is not going to deliver a single job to a single person, male or female.

It is also ironic that the government is finding the knowledge and capacity to project measurable standards on the private sector corporations, but has not outlined a single, measurable economic target for itself in its full year in office.

I guess my expectations from our government is this: that it would bring forward practical solutions to help people dealing with a slumping economy; that it would prioritize the citizens of our country who are hurting as job losses mount month after month, with the only exception being the public sector.

I do not want the government to focus on new ways to get information from businesses and accountants, and call it a strategy to grow the number of jobs for women in this country. I want the government to present a plan that would create conditions for Canadian workers, regardless of gender to do what they do best, provide for their families and build their future.

Is it a noble cause to require big corporations to be transparent with the make-up of their board? Yes, it is. But as I have said, this does not put a single person to work, put food on a single table, or help a single Canadian who is struggling to make ends meet.

Canadians expect more out of their government, more than photo ops and selfies, more than non-stop spending, more than new lines on tax forms, and more than more taxes and fewer jobs. Canadians demand the vision to plan and the gumption to act.

We know the government can see what is happening. It gets the same information we do from the Bank of Canada, Statistics Canada, and the International Monetary Fund, yet it is failing to act.

In the words of Helen Keller, the most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight but no vision.

Today, I will finish with my favourite proverb from the Book of Proverbs, “Where there is no vision, the people perish...”

The government has no vision for our economy, and Canadian jobs are perishing daily in the private sector.

[Canada Business Corporations Act, October 26th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-25.

I do not believe that there is a person in this room who can effectively argue that this bill, in any way, hurts our country. I am the father of two, a three-year-old son and a one-year-old daughter. I want an even playing field for my children so that they know that if they work hard, if they make sensible choices, and if they take calculated risks, they can succeed without concerns about gender, without concerns about race, and without concerns about ethnicity.

What I fail to understand, though, is why Bill C-25 does not propose more. Why is it on one subject with all that is going on around us? It is difficult to understand why there is no original work coming out of the office of the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development.

I do not think the minister understands the gravity of the jobs market Canadian families are fighting in to make ends meet. If he did, we would not be discussing changes on disclosure today without widespread reforms to make Canadian employers more competitive and to create jobs for Canadians looking for new or better jobs. This affects all women, all men, and all children who will soon be in the workforce.

Now I know that the minister will argue that another accountant filling out another line on another tax form so that another bureaucrat in Ottawa can create another spreadsheet is an intensely important issue that needs to be prioritized above all else, but I am sorry, I cannot.

We are a year into the mandate of the government, and so far, the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development has failed to introduce one piece of legislation regarding innovation. So far he has tabled two bills, the first regarding copyrighted works and the second regarding the disclosure of the makeup of boards. I do not believe that these bills are unworthy of presentation in any way. That is not what I am saying.

After all, it was work done by the former Conservative government that created these bills in the first place. What Liberal insider in what ivory tower decided that the most pressing issue to deal with right now is not the estimated 52,000 oil and gas workers laid off since last year and unable to pay their bills? What Liberal insider decided that the priority is not finding a way to support the more than 40,000 manufacturing jobs lost in the last year? What Liberal insider decided that the priority is to go to a roomful of work by the previous government, change the colour of the binder it was written in, and put this on the floor of Parliament, without a single mention of the struggling families at home? That is if they can get a home, after the government instituted new borrowing rules that make it even more difficult for first-time home buyers to purchase a coveted first home.

I get it. When the Prime Minister is reducing the average Canadian worker's take-home pay with new payroll taxes, when the Prime Minister is eliminating tax credits for children for sports and culture, when the Prime Minister is removing opportunities for Canadians to save money tax-free through tax-free savings accounts, and when the Prime Minister is introducing a carbon tax that will take $2,500 out of every single Canadian's pocket, the finance minister needed to change the qualifications for mortgages to higher thresholds.

Why? It is because Canadians have less take-home money in their pockets to afford their mortgages. The government is setting up a permanent tax office in the pockets of Canadians. Please tell me how this helps Canadian men or women break the cycle of poverty. It is another government-created solution to another government-created problem.

Canadians only have take-home pay if they have jobs. That seems to be a pretty big issue right now, and I think people at home would agree.

We have fewer jobs in two of the largest sectors of our economy and an affordability problem in housing at the same time. As if it is some comedy of failures we would see in a Shakespearean play, the government does not stop with taking money people are earning now; they run up Goliath-sized deficits so they can take more of their money tomorrow. Yet we are discussing changes to corporate disclosure laws and rules without any mention of the Canadian economy and how it is failing women and men of all ages.

Not only has the number of manufacturing jobs been reduced by over 40,000, the number of jobs available for youth aged 15-24 is down by a whopping 48,000 year over year, according to Statistics Canada. These results are blinding when compared with the Liberal promises that outlined an increase in youth jobs by 40,000 this year alone. “We will invest to create more jobs and better opportunities for young Canadians” is literally a portion of the Liberal platform.

How is it that the current government can contribute only two bills in 12 months, from the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, and with those bills fail to consider the daily fight to make ends meet for Canadian workers? Perhaps I am not effectively communicating the state of the economy for Canadian workers. Maybe the government is inclined to listen only to international elites on the state of the economy the Liberal government presides over. That is just fine.

In October, the International Monetary Fund downgraded Canada's real GDP growth to 1.1% from 1.3%. It makes total sense. Fewer Canadians working plus fewer Canadians buying houses and services equals less Canadian wealth and less Canadian GDP. The problem is that the IMF, the International Monetary Fund, has also downgraded economic growth for 2017. Instead of growth at 2.2%, the International Monetary Fund has reduced the outlook to 2% flat. Following this downgrade, the Bank of Canada has followed suit and has reduced our current year's outlook for economic growth from 1.4% to 1.2% and 2017's economic outlook from 2.1% to 1.9%.

Yet the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development is silent, some would say MIA, missing in action, and without a single competent piece of legislation to support our struggling economy, unless changing the rules of disclosure and copyright will spur the economic growth we have been looking for in this country. Again, I am not against the bills that were tabled. I am merely highlighting how ineffective and lacking the government's approach to our current economic woes has been and continues to be.

I believe that governments are elected to institute a plan, one that will hopefully improve the lives of Canadians. After our government determines what that plan is and the best way to achieve it, each and every piece of legislation should work toward achieving that goal. Maybe these two pieces of legislation that have been tabled and moved by the federal government this year will do that and help the government achieve these goals. Unfortunately, there has been no plan communicated or brought forward before this House to validate them against.

After a full year in office, the Liberals have failed to provide a copy of their plan to underpin the Canadian economy, to spur innovation and reform in struggling sectors, or to tell our hard-working Canadian families what it is they are trying to achieve on our behalf. If Canadians believe these folks in government, and if they believe the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, they will believe that the Liberal Party has a plan that is really good, really big, really fantastic.

On February 1, the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development told the House that the government had a plan. On February 3,18, 23, and 25, the minister said that the government had a plan. On March 7 and 8, he said that they had a plan. The only problem is that his government's budget just three weeks later, in March, said that the Liberals would get a plan together at some point in the next two years.

I have said before in this House, and I will say again today, that the government does not have a plan. Prime Minister Trudeau does not have a plan for Canada to succeed, and the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development does not have a plan to spur innovation or job growth or to create an environment in which Canadian businesses and Canadian workers can succeed. They have a plan—

[Canada Business Corporations Act, October 26th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the production of the bill and for placing it on the floor of the House.

I think it is important to recognize that a large majority of the work for the bill was conducted under the previous government, along with the other bill that is being moved by the ministries that fall under the Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, so we have had two bills in one year.

When can the House expect a bill that will address the needs of the oil and gas, manufacturing, and other sectors across the country that have been losing jobs all year long?

[Canada Pension Plan, October 25th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, to follow up on the member's question a minute ago, it is interesting to hear talk about the 17% that happened to come from the lowest 5% in terms of income in society. Does the member agree with the member across the floor that taking more money out of the paycheques of the lowest 17% somehow makes them more successful?

[Finance, October 19th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, speaking of their children, the Liberals have done nothing but hurt hard-working Canadians since taking office. Their spending is out of control, they have raised taxes on everything, and they have made it harder for Canadians to save. Now they are changing the mortgage rules, which will make it harder for first-time home buyers to get their first home.

How can average Canadians believe that the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance, who have inherited millions, understand the challenges young Canadians face when buying their first home?

[Paris Agreement, October 3rd, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, winners and losers were just mentioned. Being a member of Parliament from Ontario, I have been under a government that has chosen winners and losers under the Green Energy Act. As a result of that Ontario act, a lot of the Liberals' friends are winners and all Ontarians are losers. There have been huge increases in hydro rates. It is somewhat ironic that the member, whose brother was premier at the time, asked the question. It is also ironic that the Prime Minister's principal secretary, who was the chief of staff at the time in Ontario, has been so integral in that process.

With the introduction of carbon taxes and a price on carbon, could you outline who we believe the losers will be going forward?

[Ethics, September 29th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, Canadian history is littered with Liberals doing whatever they can to help out Liberal lobbyists, and they always have the same excuses. They will say they followed the rules. They will say this is just us listening and consulting with people. They will say I was just doing this as an MP, not a minister. However, every time it is friends of the Liberal Party who get access, favours and closed-door meetings.

I will ask this one more time. Where is this member's judgment?

[Family, September 27th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, each of us have at least one of those special people in our ridings who encouraged us, fostered our ambitions in public service and invested in us to help us become not just members of Parliament, but the people we are today.

This person for me is the person from whom I inherited my political interests, a person who has struggled in overcoming incredible adversity in her life. This person was a single mother of three living in government housing when she was struck by a car crossing Eccles on Wellington Street in Barrie and has lived since beating the effects of that head injury.

She took me to my first political rally in 1999 and has always challenged me to fight for my beliefs, my family, my country no matter what the odds are, no matter what pressures are mounting.

I would not break the rules of this great place and recognize anyone who has joined us in the gallery today, but to my mother, Judith Mary Elizabeth Nuttall, I say thanks.

[Government Expenditures, September 21st, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the people of Barrie—Springwater—Oro-Medonte voted for transparency. In my riding, the average salary is $40,000. These are people who actually pay taxes, so when the Minister of Innovation spends 113,000 tax dollars to move a single member of staff to Ottawa, I am speechless.

If the minister cannot admit that this is wrong, will he at least tell us who got the money?

[Government Expenditures, September 21st, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister's silence speaks volumes. Over $150,000 for Liberal staffers to move to Ottawa and take plush jobs is just not fair.

I would like the Minister of Innovation to think about the 39,000 self-employed people who went out of business, last month alone, when he answers this question. Will the minister admit that this payment is wrong, yes or no?