Andrew Scheer

[An Act Respecting Additional COVID-19 Measures, June 10th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, I have two unanimous consent motions for which I hope you will find support. The Conservatives, of course, believe that Parliament should be sitting and had we been sitting normally, we could have debated this bill. We could have facilitated the government House leader's request, but the government has refused to allow the House to do its work as it normally would.

Indeed, the proposal that the government has as it relates to people with disabilities was announced several days ago and the House could have been entertaining this legislation as early as Monday.

I ask for the unanimous consent of the House for the following motion in order to allow the House to debate the legislation that the minister introduced today: that notwithstanding any standing order, or special order or usual practice of the House, when the House adjourns, it shall next meet at 3 p.m. later this day.

[Ethics, May 26th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, this is so typical of the Liberals. When it comes to things like this, they only apologize when they get caught. When we put this in light of their whole approach to China, foreign affairs experts are saying that the government's approach is to speak softly and carry no stick.

Yesterday, I gave the Prime Minister four opportunities to condemn the attack on the freedom of the people of Hong Kong by the Government of China. He refused. We have seen a pattern of appeasement toward the PRC, but this is much worse. By helping an arm of the Chinese government suppress media critical of the PRC here in Canada, the Prime Minister is actually doing its dirty work.

Why are the Prime Minister's cabinet ministers helping the dictators in the PRC?

[Ethics, May 26th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, the media is also reporting today that the Minister of Digital Government has been promoting a fundraising campaign to sue Global News for its story that criticized the Chinese Communist Party. WeChat is a Chinese state-sanctioned social media platform that is monitored by the communist state security and, worse yet, the minister has admitted that her taxpayer-funded political aide is the one who manages her WeChat account and who allowed the fundraising campaign to be promoted. Clearly, this is inappropriate.

What action has the Prime Minister taken in light of these revelations?

[Health, May 26th, 2020]

The Prime Minister has laid out that kind of timeline, Mr. Speaker.

I have a simple question. Who had the report from May 14 until last Thursday?

[Health, May 26th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, the fact remains that the report was written on May 14, so it took almost two weeks for it to be made public.

Our seniors deserve better than this. They deserve better than a government that waits almost two weeks before reading an absolutely appalling report on the situation in seniors' homes. We hear that the army is working on a second report, which will describe the situation in long-term care homes in Quebec.

Can the Prime Minister assure us that he will not wait two weeks before reading it?

[Health, May 26th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, we are learning today that on May 14, members of the Canadian Armed Forces wrote a report detailing dreadful conditions at long-term care homes in Ontario. Soldiers have witnessed cockroaches, rotting food, seniors left in soiled diapers, and cries for help ignored for lengthy periods. I am sure all Canadians are horrified to hear these details. However, the Liberals only provided this report to the Province of Ontario on Sunday. In other words, the government sat on this report for almost two weeks.

Why did it take a leak to make these details public? Why was the Prime Minister not transparent with this horrific information?

[Proceedings of the House and Committees, May 25th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, I know it drives the hon. member crazy when Conservatives quote Margaret Thatcher, Winston Churchill and Adam Smith. I have no doubt he is harkening back to decades-old arguments.

The fact is that, in these decades-old arguments, he would have been arguing on the side of the Soviets. It is his economic policies that create the bread lines. Every country that has instituted the policies this member advocates for creates untold misery on its population. Those people who can, flee the countries that this member idolizes.

As for yesterday's man, it is true. Our party will select a new leader soon, and we will support that new leader.

I will say this. This member used to be a lot closer to the Speaker's chair. However, after the last election, because of the policies the New Democrats were advocating for, they are now the fourth party in this chamber.

[Proceedings of the House and Committees, May 25th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very pertinent question.

Quite simply, what we have been using this chamber for in virtual sittings over the past few weeks is not Parliament; it is a special committee. It is a special committee with very specific constraints.

You yourself, Mr. Speaker, ruled a question out of order because it was not related to the subject matter of that special order. We respect your decision, but the problem is in the constraints that the special committee puts on you, Mr. Speaker, and on other members here, including the inability of the opposition to raise important issues using our opposition day motions to identify the gaps in the Liberals' programs.

We have told the government that a very small technicality in its wage subsidy program prevents companies that have acquired another company from accessing the wage subsidy. I have an example in my riding. We have been calling on the Liberals for weeks to fix this. There are multiple similar cases around the country.

Opposition parties in the past have used their opposition days to force government to take action. We have a Canada-China committee because of an opposition day motion. The Auditor General is going to audit the government's infrastructure programs because of an opposition day motion.

Questions on the Order Paper would provide us with vital information to understand the blunders that the government made in the early days of this pandemic. Canadian people have a right to know all that.

Again, if we can meet here, if 50 of us can come into this chamber and participate in a committee of the whole, why can 50 of us not come here and participate in a way that respects public health guidelines and fully brings back the powers that Parliament should have during this pandemic?

[Proceedings of the House and Committees, May 25th, 2020]

Mr. Speaker, I will take no lessons from a party that fought to keep the subsidy for every vote received in an election. The Bloc Québécois fought very hard to keep that.

As for the wage subsidy, we identified ways the government could eliminate barriers for other businesses. Many business owners cannot access that program because of useless criteria. We proposed specific measures to ensure that more businesses and workers could access jobs. We will continue to improve government programs.

[Proceedings of the House and Committees, May 25th, 2020]

We have not been doing that. What the member forgets is that the government drew a line in the sand the last time we were trying to get parliamentary sittings. It found complicit parties in the Bloc and the NDP, and was able to sideline Parliament so that it did not need to tackle these types of issues.

There are a number of options we could look at to satisfy that, but we do not believe the solution should be no parliamentary sittings.