Bob Rae

[Taxation, October 20th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has an opportunity to do something very direct and very simple. I asked a question the other day for which he did not give a direct answer. The tax credits in the budget currently being discussed in committee are not refundable. Some people do not pay taxes because they are too poor. Why not make the tax credits refundable, for example, those for caregivers and volunteer firefighters? These are good examples of what could be done for the least fortunate in—

[Taxation, October 20th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the small business federation has been clear about the fact that taxes on employment kill jobs.

I have a simple question for the Prime Minister: in light of the current difficult economic situation in Europe and in the United States—we are seeing signs of a recession—why not freeze taxes on employment now and ensure that people are not contributing to killing jobs in Canada?

[Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act, October 20th, 2011]

They had no choice.

[Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act, October 20th, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I hope it is not the position of the government of the day that the only people who are allowed to have an opinion with respect to the Wheat Board are the people who agree with the government.

The fact of the matter is when the minister stands in his place and asserts that there is unanimity among western farmers with respect to the future of the Wheat Board, that is a preposterous statement.

I would hope that the minister would at least have the decency to recognize that western farmers themselves had a vote. They had a vote because the government was not willing to have a vote. They had a vote because the government was not willing to follow the law. We then have the Prime Minister of the country saying on October 7 in the Globe and Mail:

It’s time for the wheat board and others who have been standing in the way to realize that this train is barrelling down a prairie track.

What the government of the day is saying is that the Conservatives are going to railroad the western farmers. They are going to railroad anybody who does not agree with them, and they are going to railroad the House of Commons for the fourth time in 25 days.

That is what the government has become all about, a government that simply says, “It is our way or the railroad”, and it is the railroad that it is driving and it is not--

[Official Languages, October 19th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I am addressing my questions regarding official languages and the commissioner's report to the Prime Minister. In his report, the commissioner clearly states, “Five years after amendments were made to the Official Languages Act, the Government of Canada has still not affirmed, loudly and clearly, that full and proactive compliance with part VII of the Act is a priority.”

When will the government clearly affirm that part VII and improving the situation of minority communities are still priorities for the Canadian government?

[Criminal Code, October 19th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister and the government have come up with this completely unrealistic number of $74.6 million as the cost for the changes in the Criminal Code that have been proposed by his government. There is not a person out there in the field who believes any of these numbers. They have absolutely no credibility with anybody.

Just at the moment, when the American conservative movement, to which the Prime Minister has paid such tribute his entire political career, is suddenly giving its head a shake and realizing just how wrong this path is, how expensive it is, how ineffective it is and how it is not, in fact, achieving any of the results it wants, why is the Prime Minister taking this country down exactly that same path?

[Canada-U.S. Relations, October 19th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Prime Minister another question. I am absolutely certain that, after the American ambassador's speech yesterday about the buy American policy, the Prime Minister called President Obama to discuss this issue and all the other cases in which Canada is facing severe discrimination as a result of American protectionism.

Can the Prime Minister tell us what President Obama said when they spoke yesterday?

[Canadian Wheat Board, October 19th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, on the same subject, with a slightly different tone. In his first answer to the Leader of the Opposition, I heard the Prime Minister clearly state that he was confident that he had the full support of the majority of western farmers.

I will ask him a simple question. If the Prime Minister is so confident that he does have that support, why will he not put this question in a plebiscite? We have had a referendum. Why not have a plebiscite and let the prairie farmers themselves decides what is going to them. Let them--

[Canadian Wheat Board, October 18th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister's position with respect to the Wheat Board becomes even less understandable when the American ambassador announced today at lunch that there would be no change in buy America and that buy America would be the policy there.

We have a thickening of the border, a continuing attack on the marine tax and other continuing attacks on the Canadian economy, and the Prime Minister at this moment decides to make the biggest single unilateral trade concession it could make, this by a government that has been trying to get rid of the Wheat Board for 15 years.

The Prime Minister should be ashamed of himself.

[Taxation, October 18th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, one thing is clear and that is that, despite the Prime Minister's confusion, when the Conservative Party has the opportunity to make a change that will make the tax system far more progressive, it does not want to make that change.

I will repeat the same question: why not give tax credits to the poorest people in the country? That is how to make the system more progressive. That is what the government needs to do.