Andy Fillmore

[An Act to Change the Name of the Electoral District of Châteauguay-Lacolle, February 8th, 2018]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-377, introduced by my colleague, the member for Châteauguay—Lacolle. The bill proposes to change the name of her riding to “Châteauguay—Les Jardins-de-Napierville”.

As members of the House know, the municipality of Lacolle, which is currently included in the name of my colleague's electorate district, is actually located in the neighbouring riding of Saint-Jean. This is confusing for residents in both ridings, and this legislation has received support from the hon. member for Saint-Jean in the neighbouring riding.

Our government in turn supports this bill, because it just makes sense. In fact, at first reading of Bill C-377 on December 6, 2017, we heard from hon. members on both sides of the House who support the objectives that this legislation sets out to accomplish.

In addressing his support for the legislation, the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent stated that:

I appreciated the speech by my colleague from Châteauguay—Lacolle, a riding whose name will change in due time. I want to reassure her straight off that the official opposition fully agrees with the substance of the bill and that we will be supporting the measure.

As my hon. colleague has shown, there is indeed a major anomaly in the name of the riding, which refers to Lacolle, a place that is not even located in the riding of Châteauguay—Lacolle, but rather in that of Saint-Jean.

During the same debate on Bill C-377, the hon. member for Salaberry—Suroît stated:

I fully understand my colleague's need to change the name of the riding to Châteauguay—Les Jardins-de-Napierville. As my other Conservative and NDP colleagues said, we understand and commend the initiative shown by the member in consulting her constituents, doing historical research, and keeping an election promise. That is why we are going to vote in favour of her bill.

Like members of Parliament themselves, constituency offices must be accessible to their constituents, and all members of Parliament are here to represent and voice the concerns of their constituents.

In listening to her constituents, the member for Châteauguay—Lacolle introduced Bill C-377 and told the House that the riding name causes “confusion” for the constituents of both her riding and the neighbouring riding of Saint-Jean. Her proposed new riding name would result in a more exact description by incorporating the important regional county municipality of Les Jardins-de-Napierville.

Once this legislation is passed, my colleague for Châteauguay—Lacolle will be able to return to her riding, knowing she has listened to the concerns of her constituents, and as a result, acted and made change on their behalf. For that reason, she should be very proud of her work.

I would like to share a personal anecdote that demonstrates the importance of riding names.

I am very fortunate to be the member of Parliament for Halifax. It is a short, simple name. It fits really well on any communication product. It is not a mouthful, making it easy for me to introduce myself to constituents without confusing them. It also has the very fun and distinguished history of being one of only four riding names that date all the way back to the beginning of the Canadian Confederation in 1867. I would never want to have it changed, but it does come with some challenges.

The boundaries for the federal riding of Halifax are smaller than the municipal boundaries for Halifax. In fact, the municipality of Halifax includes four federal ridings, mine and three others: Halifax West, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, and Sackville—Preston—Chezzetcook. However, because residents of all these federal ridings are also residents of the municipality of Halifax, many people in these adjacent federal ridings often believe I am their member of Parliament because I am the MP for Halifax.

This means that people often contact my office for help when they are in fact not my constituents. We would, of course, love to help them, and in most cases do get them what they need to know, but as every MP here knows, we already have a substantial number of constituents who we must represent and care for, and in Nova Scotia that number is between 70,000 to 90,000 constituents each. That is to say, we already have our work cut out for us in order to serve our constituents well.

This is an example of how my riding name impacts the day-to-day operations of my office, and I am sure there are stories similar to mine and to that of the member for Châteauguay—Lacolle, which demonstrate the importance of accurate riding names.

Our government believes Canadians deserve access to their member of Parliament, and by extension, our government is also committed to helping and encouraging more Canadians to vote. The Minister of Democratic Institutions has spoken passionately about the need for us to do everything we can to encourage, and not discourage, democratic participation. In fact, we are expanding the voting franchise to more Canadians by reversing elements of the previous government's Fair Elections Act, which actually made voting more difficult and unnecessarily complicated for Canadians.

If passed by Parliament, this act will let more Canadians vote and make it easier for them to do so. It will help enhance the integrity of our electoral system as well as people's confidence in it.

Another issue the Minister of Democratic Institutions is examining is cybersecurity. In accordance with her mandate letter from the Prime Minister, the minister presented a threat assessment from the Communications Security Establishment, or CSE, to analyze the risks to Canada's political and electoral activities from hackers. The fact is political parties have been the victims of cyber-attacks in other countries, and those attacks are attempts to destabilize and undermine—

[Dalhousie University, February 5th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today as a proud alumnus to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Dalhousie University. Dalhousie educates more Nova Scotians than any other Nova Scotian university, yet over half of its students come from elsewhere, with its student body representing over 110 countries.

When Dalhousie was established in Halifax on February 6, 1818, it was the only non-denominational school in Atlantic Canada. These founding values of diversity and inclusion still serve as a guiding force.

Today, Dalhousie is the only Atlantic Canadian member of Canada's U15, our country's most powerful research universities. Dalhousie's faculty members have won Canada's top science prize three out of the last four years.

Further, Dalhousie is a global leader in advancing our understanding of our oceans to better protect them for future generations. In 2016, our government supported this work by awarding Dalhousie $94 million to launch the Ocean Frontier Institute.

The list of distinctions is long. At the dawn of its third century, I invite all Canadians to congratulate Dalhousie University on its remarkable contributions to Canada and the world.

[Canada Elections Act, February 5th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the official opposition members have paradoxically exercised themselves with great vigour to decry the elements of transparency and openness proposed in Bill C-50, while they themselves are practising a closed style and opacity. I wonder if the parliamentary secretary could share any first-hand experience that she has with just how open and transparent our Prime Minister truly is.

[Canada Elections Act, February 2nd, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, picking up where we left off before question period, as I listened to the member's high moral judging, I was reminded of another great work of fiction.

What we have here is really a tale of two leaders, in which what is the best of times for the leader on this side of the House is perhaps the worst of times for the leader on the opposite side. We have one leader, the Leader of the Opposition, attacking the other, the Prime Minister, for holding fundraisers. At the same time, the Leader of the Opposition first denies having secret fundraisers and then, when presented with proof, in a plot twist worthy of Dickens, says that it is okay for him to do those things. Then we have the other leader, the Prime Minister, proposing a bill to increase transparency in fundraising, and who is indeed already voluntarily following the rules proposed in Bill C-50.

Could the member tell the House why, in the winter of the Conservative despair, the antagonist in this tale, his leader, will not take his party's fundraising activities out of the season of darkness and into the season of light?

[Canada Elections Act, February 1st, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I have never owned a mule, and I have never had the opportunity to ride on a mule, but I imagine that if I had a favourite old mule, I would want to ride it as far and as long as I possibly could. Looking at things that way, I can understand why members of the official opposition party are riding this particular mule as far as they have, the mule of pretending to oppose this bill for any reason other than the true reason, which is that they do not want to have transparency in their fundraising regime.

Will the member opposite admit that this mule is tired, unsaddle it, and tell us all that the real reason for the opposition is to avoid full transparency in fundraising, such as modelled by this side of the House?

[Canada Elections Act, February 1st, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the member, along with his colleagues across the way, have a new-found esteem for the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner and have been very interested lately in what she had to say about a number of topics. I wonder if the member would tell me how he feels about what she said about Bill C-50, which is:

I support the direction of this proposed legislation.... The amendments to the Canada Elections Act proposed by Bill C-50 promote transparency with respect to fundraising activities. I think it is a positive measure.... It goes quite a good way, I think, because it puts things in the public domain. It allows me to have access to some information if I'm dealing with some kind of a problem.

Does the member agree with the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner?

[Canada Elections Act, February 1st, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member opposite for his comments and his dedication to this file.

At its heart, Bill C-50 is about ensuring that prime ministers, leadership candidates, ministers, and opposition leaders are accountable to Canadians when they attend fundraisers that cost over $200 to attend. This is fundamentally about openness and transparency.

What we seem to have are two opposition parties whose leaders both attended high-value fundraisers. The leader of the official opposition originally denied that he had attended one and later admitted it, and the new leader of the NDP attended high-value fundraisers during his leadership candidacy but is now refusing to follow the leader of the Liberal Party in openness and transparency.

I am at a loss. Perhaps the member could help me understand why it is that we have one party on this side of the House that has embraced this new era of openness and transparency, and we have two parties opposite that are fighting tooth and nail to prevent the passage of a bill that will create more openness and transparency.

[Canada Elections Act, February 1st, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the member for Perth—Wellington could share with the House why he feels that his party's leader should be entitled to such secretive fundraisers.

[Canada Elections Act, February 1st, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend, the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands, for her ongoing care and attention to democratic institutions in Canada.

I would like to dwell on the section of her remarks regarding conventions. Any fundraiser within a convention for which a person walks through a door and pays over $200 to spend time with the class of folks we already have identified would be captured by the new rules. Therefore, that kind of event is not exempt at a convention. What would be exempt under Bill C-50 is the kind of appreciation event for folks who have already paid a convention fee and will be present there.

To that, our acting chief electoral officer Stéphane Perrault said at PROC committee:

There is also an important exception for party conventions, including leadership conventions, except where a fundraising activity takes place within the convention. The convention itself is exempted, but if there's a fundraiser that meets all the conditions within the convention, then that is caught by the new rules. Again, this reflects a concern to achieve a proper balance and I think it is wise.

Could the member reflect on the CEO's statement that it does actually capture a good balance?

[Canada Elections Act, February 1st, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, members will recall that after the last election in 2015, then Chief Electoral Officer Marc Mayrand produced a report. That report was characterized by a number of recommendations on how we might do better in this place.

One recommendation, A36, of the report said we should “make leadership and nomination financial transactions fully transparent and the political financing regime applicable to contestants more coherent.” That recommendation, A36, is implemented in Bill C-50 in clause 4.

However, in a puzzling motion that the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley put on the floor, the implementation of recommendation A36 would be deleted. What is even more puzzling is that members from all parties of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs unanimously supported the recommendation from CEO Marc Mayrand.

Could the member help us understand why he would like to eliminate from Bill C-50 the implementation of the CEO's recommendation around transparency?