House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2011, with 41% of the vote.
Ethics October 17th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, the official agent mentioned by the Prime Minister was just appointed to an important federal government board. Those are the kinds of standards they have. That is the issue. This is not about a few dollars. We are talking about $20,000 that was illegally spent in excess of the limit established by Elections Canada. It is obvious that the election in Labrador was bought. What is the Prime Minister going to do?
Ethics October 17th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the Prime Minister could now tell us exactly what his standards are with respect to the conduct of ministers.
There is substantial evidence now that there was overspending in the last election by the member for Labrador, the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, by over $20,000 in a campaign that had a limit of $80,000.
This is not simply a question about Elections Canada. This is a question about the standards of the Prime Minister of Canada with respect to the conduct of his candidates.
Instead of buying elections, why not a byelection?
Canadian Food Inspection Agency October 17th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, if the Prime Minister is so confident, as he says is, that Canada has the best food inspection system in the world, I wonder why his government would not accept the very simple amendment that is now being considered in the Senate that would allow a third party, namely, the Auditor General, to do the review with respect to the activities of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the whole system, instead of asking the minister to do the review, because the minister has already said that everything is working fine, everything is just great.
Why not let the Auditor General do that job?
Business of Supply October 16th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, we have reached the point now where, if the government continues in the way it is going, at the beginning of a session, it may introduce one bill, one law, one big fat bill on every conceivable subject and tell members to go ahead and discuss it.
One of the great members of the House, Stanley Knowles, the member for Winnipeg North Centre when I was first elected to the House, pointed this out to the government 20 years ago. He said that we had to understand the implication of what was taking place.
Now we are seeing it go from a 20-page omnibus bill to a 500 to 600-page omnibus bill. Surely at some point the thread is lost and what we have is something that we can all recognize and identify when we see it: the abuse of power. That is what we are seeing.
Business of Supply October 16th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, first, I must say that we now have the opportunity to change the Standing Orders of this House.
We are suggesting changes because, as I said earlier, there is a difference. When there is a theme or a single objective that affects many laws, then an omnibus bill can be introduced. Is that not different from the situation that occurred in the spring? I would like to make it clear to the hon. member that, in my opinion, there is a difference.
We should have continued to discuss the issue, but the government turned down any opportunity to hold this candid and clear discussion. In committee, the hon. member for Westmount—Ville-Marie proposed amendments and studies in order to discuss ways of accomplishing this goal. Unfortunately, since the Conservatives have a majority, they were not prepared to agree to that.
The second problem is that this gives the government the opportunity to attack members who vote against a measure because it is part of the legislation introduced by the government. However, the bill cannot be divided to show how different our opinions are.
Interestingly enough, the hon. member for Calgary Southwest said exactly the same thing when he was a member of the opposition. He said that it was not fair to insist that members take a position on a comprehensive measure, an omnibus bill, without having the opportunity to voice their opinions on the aspects of the bill with which they agreed.
What the hon. member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville clearly stated was that we want to vote in favour of the measures proposed by the government some but not all of the time. However, the government puts us in a difficult position. The Conservatives do this for political, partisan and propaganda reasons.
Business of Supply October 16th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my very distinguished colleague, the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville.
I could not help but listen to the comments of the member for Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, giving us advice as to which motions we should actually be drafting for discussion in opposition day motions and which other ones would be better than the one we are putting forward. He believes this is such a trivial technical subject that no one could possibly be interested in it.
In fact, the Canadian public is very interested in it. It is interested when a majority government systematically abuses its power and takes a decision of 20 years ago to use as justification for having a 450 page piece of legislation that we have to swallow whole, forcing the House to vote on amendment after amendment, moving closure after closure and making a farce of ministerial accountability. It put pensions in with environmental legislation, with all kinds of other measures that were added into the bill, then it realized in its own administration that it had to amend the law because it had made mistakes because the bill was so mammoth in terms of what it represented.
Therefore, the notion that this is somehow a technical question, a tiny issue with respect to how Parliament operates, is completely false.
Also is the Conservatives' adulation of various Speakers' decisions of the past. The House is master of its own regulations, of its own rules and every Speaker has an obligation to be the defender of the rules of Parliament. However, it is up to Parliament to change its rules when it sees the way the rules are abused by the government of the day. The House needs to change its Standing Orders so members are able to do their jobs, so we are able to hold the government accountable and so we are able, as a Parliament, to do what our constituents expect us to do.
This government loves to tell us that we voted against the measures in Bill S-3, against employment measures and against important government investments.
When the Prime Minister was in the opposition, he said the same things and asked why that was the case and why it was difficult. When so many elements are included in a single measure, the opposition has no choice but to vote against it.
That is why the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville clearly said that we were prepared for changes to the MP pension plan. We have no problem with that. However, we must insist that, as members of Parliament, we have the right to vote on a measure that changes legislation. But the government's mindset and actions do not allow for that.
The government has taken a tiny exceptional provision, in which governments for purposes of consolidating a discussion on issues that came together but which in fact affected different legislation, which is one thing, to justify wholesale changes to every piece of legislation in the name of saying that it is all part of its economic action plan.
This is the triumph of propaganda over truth. This is the triumph of twisting words and interpretations to justify the unjustifiable. That is why Parliament has no choice but to debate this question. Yes, of course we are going to debate it in a way that demonstrates how two-faced the government is being. When it was in opposition it recognized the impossible position that these kinds of bills could put members of the opposition into. We were asked to consider not one piece of legislation that dealt with one particular matter, but an entire book of laws and amendments and changes that flowed from the overall economic plan of the government. It in fact demolished environmental regulation, changed entirely rules with respect to how many aspects of government legislation would work and brought it all together in the name of one simple, single matter.
This is what happens when governments abuse their power. When the Prime Minister was in opposition, he spoke up against what he saw as an abuse. Since he has become Prime Minister, he has taken zero action to limit the power of the executive in the ways in which he wanted to do. His government has attacked the Parliamentary Budget Officer. The Conservatives failed to listen to the Auditor General of Canada when he criticized their behaviour. The Prime Minister has shown a singular lack of respect for the rule of law outside the purview of executive diktat. He forced the House last session to vote in favour of one bill which should have taken many different bills and the House to have serious discussion on all the matters that were put before us.
Now we know the son of omnibus is about to come before us. We wanted the House to have one opportunity to say to the government, “enough is enough”. When the editorial writers of every major national newspaper and other commentators independent of Parliament say that parliamentary rights and privileges are being abused and that these are terrible practices in which to carry out accountability and transparency, we in this party are going to continue to push this point. If it means embarrassing the government by forcing Conservatives to swallow the words of their leader whole, fine, let them swallow the words and let them understand how two-faced their standards have become as they moved from opposition to government.
Omnibus Legislation October 16th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, everyone can clearly see the difficulty facing this government, which has ministers who will not accept responsibility. It has a Prime Minister who refuses to tell his ministers that they have a duty to tell Canadians the truth in the House of Commons. These ministers blame everyone else and refuse to take responsibility for what they said when they were in opposition. How hypocritical.
Omnibus Legislation October 16th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is unable to enforce the most basic principles of ministerial accountability. Let us see how he does with respect to his own words and his own statements.
When the House was debating the question of omnibus bills in the past, the member for Calgary Southwest said, “the subject matter of the bill is so diverse that a single vote on the content would put members in conflict with their own principles”. He then went on to say, “We can agree with some of the measures but oppose others. How do we express our views and the views of our constituents when the matters are so diverse?”
Why does the Prime Minister not agree with those words today?
Food Safety October 16th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister just told the House that the Minister of Agriculture was not responsible for inspecting food. Presumably, the Minister of Agriculture is responsible for telling the truth to the House of Commons. He told the House three weeks ago that there was no tainted meat on store shelves. He has been completely discredited with respect to that statement.
I have a simple question for the Prime Minister. Why will he not enforce ministerial responsibility, the principle that ministers are responsible to the House and to the people of Canada for the jobs they have? The Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of Health are responsible for protecting the health of Canadians. When are they going to take that—
Food Safety October 5th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, the facts and the science are the same in the United States. There is no difference between American science and Canadian science when it comes to the protection and safety of consumers.
It is incomprehensible that the Minister of Agriculture closed the border so that these products would not be made available to Americans, but then allowed the same products to be made available to Canadians for two more weeks. It makes no sense. The minister was seriously negligent in this regard.
How can he explain these inadequacies?