Anne Minh-Thu Quach

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, January 28th, 2019]

With regard to the Minister of Youth, the Prime Minister’s Youth Council, the Youth Secretariat and the Youth Policy for Canada: (a) what is the decision-making flow chart for the Prime Minister’s Youth Council; (b) what is the total amount spent and the total budget for the Youth Council since it was established, broken down by year; (c) what amounts in the Youth Council budget are allocated for salaries, broken down by (i) year, (ii) position, (iii) per diem or any other reimbursement or expense (telecommunications, transportation, office supplies, furniture, etc.) offered or attributed to each of the positions mentioned in (c)(ii); (d) what are the dates, locations and number of participants for each of the meetings held by the Youth Council since June 2017, broken down by (i) in-person meetings, (ii) virtual meetings; (e) how much did the government spend to hold each of the Youth Council meetings mentioned in (d), broken down by (i) costs associated with renting a room, (ii) costs associated with food and drinks, (iii) costs associated with security, (iv) costs associated with transportation and the nature of this transportation, (v) costs associated with telecommunications; (f) what is the decision-making flow chart for the Privy Council’s Youth Secretariat, including each of the positions associated with the Youth Secretariat; (g) what is the total amount spent and the total budget of the Youth Secretariat since it was established, broken down by year; (h) what amounts in the Youth Secretariat budget are allocated for salaries, broken down by (i) year, (ii) position, (iii) per diem or any other reimbursement or expense (telecommunications, transportation, office supplies, furniture, etc.) offered or attributed to each of the positions mentioned in (h)(ii); (i) what is the official mandate of the Youth Secretariat; (j) what is the relationship between the Prime Minister’s Youth Council and the Youth Secretariat (organizational ties, financial ties, logistical support, etc.); (k) is the Youth Secretariat responsible for youth bursaries, services or programs; (l) if the answer to (k) is affirmative, what amounts were allocated to these bursaries, services or programs since they were established, broken down by (i) the nature of the bursary, service or program funded, (ii) the location of the program, (iii) the start and end date of the bursary, service or program; (m) who are all the people who are working or have worked on the Youth Policy for Canada as part of the Office of the Prime Minister or the Office of the Minister of Youth, broken down by role and by start and end date; (n) what consultations were carried out in connection with the youth policy, and what are the dates, locations and number of participants for each consultation held, as well as a description of the topics discussed, broken down by (i) in-person meetings, (ii) virtual meetings; and (o) how much did the government spend to hold each of the consultations mentioned in (n), broken down by (i) costs associated with renting a room, (ii) costs associated with food and drinks, (iii) costs associated with security, (iv) costs associated with transportation and the nature of this transportation, (v) costs associated with telecommunications?

[Elections Modernization Act, December 13th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I am still concerned about one aspect of the bill, despite all the time the government has taken to propose amendments to what they had already proposed in Bill C-33 to protect Canadians' privacy.

Even the Privacy Commissioner said that Bill C-76 adds nothing of substance in terms of privacy protection. For instance, this bill still allows parties to sell Canadians' personal information, so it is not covered by the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act.

Does my colleague not think that we are moving a little too fast with this bill, considering that the government has rejected some significant amendments?

Also, is it not totally ironic that a so-called electoral reform bill is being rushed through the House of Commons—virtually on the last possible day that Parliament gets to debate in this chamber in 2018—and that it is riddled with so many privacy loopholes?

If we move ahead with this bill, it may not even come into effect in time for the next election. Why not take the time to get it right and make absolutely certain that everyone's privacy is protected?

[Criminal Code, December 6th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I am asking the same question again in the hopes that the government will change its mind. I hope it will invest money to give victims of sexual abuse or sexual exploitation access to the legal assistance the government claims to be giving them in this bill. I hope this will result in meaningful action, coupled with real financial assistance for women.

Elizabeth Sheehy, a professor at the University of Ottawa, and Emma Cunliffe, a professor at the Peter A. Allard School of Law, have confirmed that it is an important step for victims of rape to have the right to counsel throughout proceedings, but that this measure will largely be ineffective if the complainants who want to hire a lawyer do not receive financial assistance from provincial legal aid programs.

The minister's response was to offer four hours of legal advice. That is a far cry from ensuring victims can rely on legal counsel throughout the legal proceedings.

Does the member recognize that there is a desperate need for this assistance, that this is a flaw in the bill, and that if the government truly wants to help victims it should invest in a fund for victims who do not have the means to pay for a lawyer to be on their side during legal proceedings?

[Criminal Code, December 6th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, it is really hard for people between the ages of 18 and 24. This has not happened to me, but we hear about it all the time. People who are sexually assaulted become depressed and develop mental health problems.

An Ipsos Reid survey shows that 40% of these people said nothing because they felt ashamed. Others said that it was difficult to go to the police because they do not have faith in the criminal justice system. This will continue to happen if they do not have access to a lawyer, because it is difficult for people to defend themselves.

Victims are already revictimized when they go to court; if they do not have the support of a lawyer or an expert in the field, it is very difficult for them to know what their rights are or how to defend themselves and weather the storm once they are in court. That is why we need funding to strengthen this bill.

[Criminal Code, December 6th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, it is very sad to hear a government member say in a question that more consultation is needed.

For years, feminist advocates have been calling for a broader, clearer definition of consent and for judges to be better trained. The former leader of the Conservative Party even had a motion unanimously adopted by the House of Commons because there is a big problem in Canada.

More and more women are reporting their attackers, but others are afraid to do so because they fear the justice system. If we truly want to protect women and girls who are victims of sexual assault, we must give them the protection they need. This must be part of the definition. Judges must be trained, and victims must be given the means to defend themselves. I asked the Minister of Justice a question, and even she told me that improvements were indeed needed.

Many experts agree that women without the means to pay a lawyer cannot be properly defended and protected. As I was saying, there are 18 times as many sexual assault victims among 18 to 24 year olds as in any other age group, and three times as many among indigenous peoples as among non-indigenous people. These people do not have the means to pay for a lawyer. We need the Minister of Justice to put funding in place to ensure that this bill is not just symbolic and that it truly protects victims.

I urge the government to accept the Senate's amendments.

[Criminal Code, December 6th, 2018]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue.

As we commemorate the École Polytechnique massacre today, I would like to begin by reminding the House that 14 women were killed at a Montreal school exactly 29 years ago today. We all believe in eliminating violence against women and girls, which no moral code or policy can justify.

Today, the focus is on armed violence. The bill introduces major changes to how the justice system handles cases involving sexual assault and violence. In recent years, the NDP has been putting pressure on the government to keep its promises, heed the call of feminist organizations, and take action by funding measures to achieve true gender equality and end discrimination and all forms of violence against women and girls.

Our former colleague and leader of the opposition, Rona Ambrose, cared deeply about this issue. She introduced a bill to ensure that judges are better trained on the issue of sexual assault. The bill passed unanimously in the House and remains in the Senate. I think we all want to improve our society.

The NDP wants to support the Senate's amendments regarding sexual assault, but as parliamentarians, we must also make sure that the government is not just making symbolic gestures. We must ensure that these changes are followed up with meaningful action and funding for our legal system.

A few hours ago, I asked the Minister of Justice whether she intended to set up a fund to help victims pay for lawyers to keep them safe. All she said was that her government had already invested money to give victims access to four hours of legal advice. Four hours of legal advice is not the same thing as being defended by a lawyer with experience in these matters.

I welcome the positive change this bill allows. However, the government's response to Parliament's motion is troubling and disappointing. Senators, my colleague from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford and many witnesses talked about potential problems if we do not clarify consent. By asking two questions, my colleague from Abitibi—Témiscamingue just illustrated how much grey area still surrounds consent. When we talk about consent we mean agreeing to engage in sexual activity. There is also the issue of condom removal without the partner's knowledge, whether that partner is a woman or a man. This should also be included in the definition of consent.

As we know, women are more likely than men to be victims of sexual assault. Sexual assault is the only violent crime in Canada that is not on the decline. Since 1999, the rate of sexual assault has remained relatively stable. That is one of the reasons the risk of violence against women was roughly 20% higher than that of men in 2014, according to the self-reported data from the general social survey on victimization. What concerns me is that the rate of this type of assault is 18 times greater for young Canadians 15 to 24 than it is for people 55 and older. We all know that alcohol is a factor at student parties and far too often complainants cannot get justice because a judge does not recognize their rights since they were passive under the effect of alcohol.

According to Carissima Mathen, associate professor at the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law, from a legal perspective, ambiguous consent cannot be considered an affirmation of agreement. Still according to Ms. Mathen, passivity is not consent and consent must be expressed in a meaningful way and not by silence.

Intoxication with alcohol or any other substance cannot be used as a defence by someone who commits this type of crime. I will say it loud and clear: there is no excuse or justification for a sexual assault. Asking for consent before and during a relationship is key. There is still a great need for education of adolescents and young adults, particularly about consent.

We have heard a lot about this in recent years. We have heard about the #MeToo movement, or #MoiAussi in Quebec. This is still a hot topic. Unfortunately, the concept of consent is often misunderstood. There should be more discussion and debate about this so we have a clear definition of consent, especially when introducing bills that will affect the legal system.

That is why the Senate's amendments are very interesting. They incorporate the principles of the amendments my NDP colleague moved at the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights which, unfortunately, were rejected by both the Liberals and the Conservatives. I find this part of the government's response problematic:

...as they are inconsistent with the bill’s objective of codifying Supreme Court of Canada jurisprudence on a narrow aspect of the law on sexual assault and instead seek to legislate a different, much more complex legal issue, without the benefit of consistent guidance from appellate courts or a broad range of stakeholder perspectives.

On the contrary, the goal reflects the Supreme Court of Canada's 2011 decision in R. v. J.A. The amendments proposed by Senator Kim Pate absolutely and unquestionably reflect the Supreme Court of Canada's decision, so I do not understand why the federal government decided to reject them. There are also several recommendations from experts and women's groups who appeared before the committee. Here is what Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin wrote in the Supreme Court's 2011 ruling in R. v. J.A.:

Parliament requires ongoing, conscious consent to ensure that women and men are not the victims of sexual exploitation, and to ensure that individuals engaging in sexual activity are capable of asking their partners to stop at any point.

I would also like to quote University of Ottawa law professor Elizabeth Sheehy, who commented on the ruling in a CBC article:

The most important message...is that unconscious women are not sexually available. It is a crime to touch a person who is asleep or drunk.

If that is not enough to convince my colleagues, I invite them to read the decision handed down in Alberta a few weeks ago. Senator Kim Pate sent a copy to our offices. The court of appeal in that province overturned a lower court ruling, pointing to the need of once again addressing and clarifying the concept of consent. As we know, there are still too many prejudices and, as the senator put it, too many harmful stereotypes about sexual assault victims.

The courts have taken a stand on this concept and therefore it is up to us, as legislators, to establish a clear definition. We must not wait for another case to go all the way to the Supreme Court before we finally do something. Unfortunately, the government's excuse for not taking action is absurd at best. If court rulings are not enough, I invite my colleagues to refer to organizations that have also taken a stand.

The DisAbled Women's Network of Canada wants the amendments to pass. Student organizations have developed campaigns on the concept of consent with a clear message on the issue of intoxication. Here is what the website withoutayesitsano.ca says about one myth:

Being drunk, intoxicated or unconscious as a result of substance abuse invalidates consent. Alcohol remains the number one rape drug.

In other words, the Senate's amendments are consistent with the amendments brought forward by my colleague from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford at the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. Clear jurisprudence exists on the issue of consent when a person is intoxicated, unconscious or in a passive state.

In conclusion, from a social perspective, more and more organizations are fighting for clearer rules of law on this topic. Parliamentarians, experts and judges agree, and civil society approves. What more do they want? The government's response to the Senate amendments makes no sense politically or legally. We must do more to combat sexual assault, and the Senate's amendments are a step in the right direction.

[Criminal Code, December 6th, 2018]

Madam Speaker, I thank the minister for her bill.

The NDP is heartened by several amendments seeking to enhance the rape shield provisions and to ensure complainants have legal representation during proceedings.

However, the bill does not include any additional funds to help cover legal fees. It is well known that this will create economic disparities between victims who can afford a lawyer and those who cannot.

Does the minister plan to set up a fund to help victims obtain legal services for their own protection?

[International Trade, December 5th, 2018]

Madam Speaker, what the parliamentary secretary is saying today is completely contradictory.

He says the Liberals protect and preserve the supply management system. However, in their three years in power, they have signed three trade deals that have collectively opened up a 10% breach in the supply management system. For farmers, that amounts to a month's salary being given away in the last three trade deals.

How can the parliamentary secretary talk about stability? How can he say the system is working? How can he talk about compensation when no timeframes or programs have even been announced?

Yes, the Liberals are holding consultations, but that is not going to save jobs. The agri-food sector provides one in eight jobs. Dairy farms revitalize our regions, maintain local jobs, keep young people from moving away, and create jobs and SMEs.

The Liberals are slowly hacking away at all that because they have no vision.

[International Trade, December 5th, 2018]

Madam Speaker, I am very proud to rise in the House to stand up for farmers across Canada, especially the people of Salaberry—Suroît, who work tirelessly to feed the people in our region and also just to survive. Unfortunately, that is the reality they must face. They are just surviving and do not earn a decent living from working the land.

The NDP supports farmers and is determined to preserve the integrity of the supply management system and the Canadian dairy system. For years, we have been calling for the full protection of the supply management system. Unlike the Liberals and the Conservatives, we believe that Canada should not have made concessions in the CETA negotiations with the European Union, or in the TPP negotiations, or in the recent negotiations between Canada, the United States and Mexico.

Mr. Trump was expecting Canadians to accept similar concessions because the Conservatives and the Liberals had already made them in the two previous negotiations for the TPP and CETA. Unfortunately, the U.S. got their concessions.

The Liberals made some significant concessions. In total, these three agreements signed over three years account for a 10% breach. This is the equivalent of about one month of a farmer's income. Farmers have said that they are having to forgo 28 days of income because of these three international agreements. I do not think anyone in this House would easily give up a month's worth of work.

Furthermore, in the latest agreement between the United States, Canada and Mexico, access to Canada's dairy market was expanded by 3.6%. The Canadian government abandoned class 7 and is also allowing a new dairy product, diafiltered milk, to enter the Canadian market. Canadians fought to say that we should prioritize Canadian milk. They said that when other classes are allowed to cross the border, it is harder to know where the milk in our products comes from.

As a result of all this, farmers will lose more than $200 million in revenue a year, and the agreements will also limit supply-managed exports to levels lower than they were in 2017.

The government also signed away its sovereignty by giving the Americans oversight of the classification of dairy products. Farmers are strongly opposed to this. They never expected this to come up in the negotiation.

The Liberals claim to defend supply management and say they are going to offer compensation programs, but so far no such program has been offered to farmers following negotiations with the U.S.

As for the meagre compensation offered last summer, it was the middle of July and it was handed out on a first-come, first-serve basis. Farmers fell off their chairs and said that it made no sense, because it did not meet their needs and it really was not fair for all the farmers who were busy working in their fields. Nobody could make head nor tails of it. The Liberals understood and acknowledged that it was ad hoc and that they should not have gone about it like that, but they still have not offered farmers an alternative.

How is this going to help attract young people to farming?

[Aeronautics Act, December 4th, 2018]

Madam Speaker, I am a little taken aback by what I have just heard from my Conservative colleague, but I will focus on the bill that my Bloc Québécois colleague from Repentigny introduced. In the almost 14 years that I have known her, she has always been a defender of the environment and, of course, of Quebec.

Bill C-392 amends eight acts in order to bring the federal government to observe certain rules concerning land use and development, and environmental protection in particular. I will support the bill. My colleague from Repentigny introduced a very interesting bill that could force the government to take into account the assessments of the Bureau d'audiences publiques sur l'environnement, known as BAPE in Quebec.

I agree with the amendments, but I have a few questions about their application and their implications. That is why I will vote in favour of the bill so that we can study it in committee and question expert witnesses to determine the potential negative and positive impacts of the bill.

Since I arrived in the House, I have seen too many bills imposed by the federal government without any real environmental assessment. Under Stephen Harper, the Conservatives eliminated the legal safeguards and the federal administration's ability to monitor enforcement of the few environmental rules they left on the books. The environment and the protection of our forests and waterways have become priority issues, however.

Last Sunday, my office organized a town hall on climate change and the need for a solid federal framework and tools at every level to keep our commitments in the fight against global warming. One hundred twenty Canadians came to hear people such as Lorraine Simard of Comité 21, Julia Posca of IRIS and Patrick Bonin of Greenpeace.

Bonin was clear: there can be no energy development without environmental assessment or estimation of upstream and downstream greenhouse gas emissions. The federal government needs a short-term plan, a medium-term plan and a long-term plan to reduce GHG emissions. The advantage of this bill is that it recognizes that some provinces have effective assessment tools and allows them to use them, for example, BAPE in Quebec.

Consider the energy east pipeline. I do not disagree with the arguments put forward by my Conservative colleague. Conservatives in Quebec and across Canada would like to see the project resurrected. The Liberal Minister of Natural Resources says his government is open to a project like energy east, and yet, under the Conservatives, BAPE published a mini-study, and TransCanada refused to allow its project to be subject to Quebec's environmental legislation. Public opinion prevailed, and the vast majority of municipalities that could proffer an opinion on energy east opposed it for a number of reasons, in particular because there was no environmental assessment. Either the environmental assessments were inadequate, or there was a lack of information about the job creation potential, economic impact and greenhouse gas emissions associated with the project. There was a serious lack of information, and people could see little potential for job creation.

How much GHG will be emitted because of the pipeline? Nobody knows. Will TransCanada pay for the clean-up if there is a spill? Maybe. What we know for sure, though, is that our wetlands, such as those around Sainte-Justine-de-Newton, have to be protected and that a spill in the Ottawa River could contaminate all of metropolitan Montreal's drinking water sources. No big deal, that is only about half of Quebec.

The company never told us how long it would take to contain a spill. What we do know is that it takes an hour and a half to respond to an emergency. That is how long it would take to get to the manual shut-off valve in Sainte-Justine-de-Newton. A lot of people are worried about this. The 23 municipalities in the RCM of Vaudreuil-Soulanges repeatedly asked TransCanada questions about energy east, but they never got any answers.

The region of Vaudreuil-Soulanges has the most pipelines and we need protections. The bill sponsored by my colleague from Repentigny could ensure that a BAPE study be considered if the Conservatives or Liberals decide to do further harm to our planet by approving another pipeline.

The notion of co-operative federalism is important to the NDP. It calls for mutual respect by the different levels of government, promotes co-operation on social and economic policies and guarantees the universality of social programs. To ensure that we have a healthy democracy, it is vital that we respect the jurisdictions of each level of government.

We can all cite examples of the federal government meddling in files in our riding where it has no jurisdiction or disregarding the opinion of the provincial or municipal government. A very telling example in the riding next to mine is a communications tower in Montérégie.

In 2008, Rogers informed Châteauguay that it intended to build its radiocommunication antenna system on municipal land that the company had leased since December 2007. The problem was that the people were dead set against the location. The municipal team proposed another location for the tower. Different problems arose along the way.

In 2016, in a case involving Rogers Communications Inc. and the City of Châteauguay, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the municipality had interfered in an area of federal jurisdiction when it tried to ban the construction of a Rogers telecommunications tower. The municipality had issued a notice of establishment of a reserve to prevent the construction of a radiocommunication antenna system.

The Supreme Court ultimately found that since radiocommunication comes under federal jurisdiction, the City of Châteauguay had interfered in an area of federal jurisdiction. However, the city's campaign sent a clear message about the importance of land use and forced a debate on the issue of proceedings specifically, and the city ultimately won in the Quebec Court of Appeal.

How much money could have been saved if we had a real federal-municipal agreement on land use and the environment? The two levels of government probably could have saved millions of dollars in legal fees.

The NDP therefore believes it is important to respect the concept of co-operative federalism, which aims to counter unilateral actions by the federal government and ensure that multilateral decisions and negotiations take place with a long-term perspective. Bill C-392 is a positive step toward that objective.

I see nothing in this bill that would prevent the federal government from taking action. On the contrary, it promotes the need for agreements among all levels of government and strengthens necessary collaboration. We need strong institutions to deal with the coming climate storm. My constituents, and constituents in all ridings, need to be able to have faith in an environmental assessment process. This is not currently the case. A good federal process would help prevent some of the disputes addressed in Bill C-392.

I was shocked to learn that an RCM in my riding could receive what amounted to an insulting letter from the National Energy Board demanding that the RCM stop causing problems and asking questions. I think it is a problem when the federal government buys a pipeline with our money without consulting indigenous peoples and with no concern for giving $4.5 billion to a Texan company without our consent.

The government needs to step up. We all need to work together to combat climate change and support Canadians. In an open letter, my colleague from Longueuil spoke about creating a non-partisan department of war against climate change. We may disagree on the terminology, but we agree that we need to act quickly and decisively to protect our planet. We need to ensure that our planet will be soundly managed by future generations and also by us, since urgent action involves the next 12 years. Bills like these are therefore welcome.