Brian Jean

[Safe Drinking Water for First Nations Act, June 6th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments from the member. I find them kind of fanciful right now. She did spend considerable time with the previous Liberal government when they were in power. In 13 years, they settled somewhere around 8 treaties.

This government has settled over 80 treaties since 2006. It certainly says something about the focus of our government. Something else that says it clearly is that since 2006, we have built over 30 new schools for aboriginals, renovated over 200 schools, built over 10,000 homes and renovated thousands more. We have invested in safe drinking water. The Liberals left around 300 reserves without safe drinking water when we took over in 2006. We have increased funding for child and family services by 25%. We have delivered on our promise for accountability and transparency in reserves. We have invested in over 700 projects that are linked to aboriginals and spent over $10 billion per year in 34 departments.

Very clearly, the Liberals did absolutely zero during their time in office. They did zip. They did nada. I wonder what excuse she is using to suggest that we need to do more, even though we have done ten times more as far as treaty claims go, and in half the time.

[Cracking Down on Organized Crime and Terrorism Act, June 5th, 2013]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-526, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (sentencing).

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce my private member's bill, an act to amend the Criminal Code, also entitled the “cracking down on organized crime and terrorism act”.

It has been identified by this Parliament, the RCMP and criminal law experts that organized crime is a serious problem in Canada and around the world. Currently, offences connected with organized crime and terrorism are considered aggravating factors during sentencing.

Bill C-526 would protect Canadians further by creating a new subcategory of serious aggravating factors and, secondly, providing greater direction and additional tools to judges to identify and punish gang members, organized criminals and terrorists.

The purpose of the bill is to ensure that those committing a criminal offence in collusion with others, and those committing acts of terrorism, are severely punished.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Natural Resources, June 5th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the oil sands are the economic engine of this country, providing 334,000 jobs in Canada today and $2.1 trillion toward our GDP—yes, that is trillion with a t—and one million jobs by 2035.

The approval of the Keystone XL pipeline would not only create economic stability for all of Canada, it would also provide the United States with $172 billion—that is billion with b—toward the U.S. GDP by 2035, with $99 million in local government revenues, $486 million in state government revenues, and 1.8 million person-years of employment in the next 22 years. Wow. I am no doctor, but Keystone XL sounds like a perfect prescription to begin to cure an ailing U.S. economy.

As usual, the NDP opposes this Canadian pipeline and all Canadian jobs, but I would argue that a strong Canada-U.S. economic partnership could only mean success for all citizens of our great countries.

[Safer Witnesses Act, May 31st, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, we always work with our partners, because there is only one taxpayer, and that taxpayer funds all of the services we provide with their money. That is the difference in philosophy. We bring in these laws because we know that we can make people safer. We do not do it with the chequebook as the only barrier to entry.

To get to the point that member raised, the Attorney General of Saskatchewan said this:

These changes will help strengthen our criminal justice system by providing greater protection for witnesses. We support the proposed improvements to the Witness Protection Program Act as yet another step in making our communities safer.

If members do not believe me, they can believe him. Clearly, this is a situation where the facts speak for themselves.

This is going to be a great piece of legislation to keep witnesses safe, which will ultimately get the information to the courts to convict and send the people to jail who deserve it.

[Safer Witnesses Act, May 31st, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the member is right that it is true leadership. That is why, when the Federation of Canadian Municipalities identified $123 billion in infrastructure investments that were necessary in this country, this federal government responded immediately. We responded with $45 billion of economic investment, along with our partners in the provincial and territorial governments and the municipalities. We doubled the gas tax and made it permanent. Now it increases every few years automatically. The NDP voted against all of those actions, every single one of them, and not just one budget, not just two, but far more. It will continue to vote against all the great measures we bring forward, and it is shameful. I wish New Democrats would stop doing that.

[Safer Witnesses Act, May 31st, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I was segueing, because as I mentioned, I was a defence attorney in Fort McMurray and I was talking about some of the people I worked with while I was a defence attorney and the fact that the NDP would vote against the jobs those people worked in when I was a defence attorney and dealt with cases such as this in the past.

I know they might not want to hear it and they might want to shut down debate on critical issues such as this. I know they do not want their constituents to find out they went down to Washington and joined in with some people down there to, frankly, protest Canadian jobs. I know they do not want us to talk about that.

However, as a result of the oil sands and what we are producing there, in a very environmentally sustainable way, we have accomplished the best banking system in the world. We have the best economy in the G8 and the G20. We are looking great as a country right now, not only because our laws are fantastic. The Conservative government has brought in some great laws that are tough on criminals, that do not stand up for victims, as does the NDP. I was on the justice committee for a long period of time and I saw time and time again that the NDP members would stand up and vote against our legislation to be tough on criminals.

The NDP uses the excuse that there is not enough money, but we have heard differently. I read two quotes today from a very reputable person with the RCMP that it does not need any more money. They talked a bit about and criticized the admissibility part and that there were not enough people being admitted. Well, we dealt with that in the legislation.

The truth is that the NDP members want to change the channel from what is happening: the NDP speaking against the economy and costing Canadians jobs. We are going to keep Canadians safe, as we would with this legislation, and we are going to continue to make sure the economy grows strong and stays strong.

[Safer Witnesses Act, May 30th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to have the opportunity to talk about this legislation. It is an interesting scenario indeed when a person can talk about what is important to people, and that, of course, is their life.

Some people have called this legislation different things but I broke it down. It is about someone seeing something, wanting to tell the truth about what was seen, but worrying about one's life or the life of a family member being taken as a result of the truth being told. Often these people are members of criminal organizations and they do not have the greatest character.

When we looked at the necessary amendments, we realized, as the NDP has said, that the Liberals did not get it right. Hopefully we are going to get it right. We had to make some changes to legislation that was not too bad. It was a good first step, but it obviously would not do the job.

I am glad to hear that the NDP and the Liberals both support this particular piece of legislation, but they cannot support anything without voting against it first. I would be surprised if the NDP actually do vote for it. That party cannot support anything without criticizing and I find that rather negative. It is not constructive, especially with respect to this particular piece of legislation.

I certainly think that protecting witnesses With respect to terrorism offences, we must make sure that we protect witnesses so they can speak without worrying about their safety. This is the time the NDP should come forward and say this is a great piece of legislation, but it might have a suggestion. The Speaker would not stand up and criticize something if he did not have a suggestion, but the NDP did. It is hard to believe that those members criticized today on three different points, but they never suggested one amendment to the legislation. The first time the bill came to the House there was not one suggestion. When it went through committee, there were no suggestions, not one amendment.

The NDP has suggested that there is not enough money. To be clear, I am not an expert on it. I was a criminal attorney for some period of time and I had the opportunity to work with people who were involved in situations such as this, although not in an in-depth nature. Police officers will tell us what is on their minds, and they will tell us the truth.

My colleagues keep repeating the same two bits of testimony from experts who came to committee, the first being “With the changes this bill brings about, the RCMP is comfortable that we have the resources within our existing resources to run an effective witness protection program”. Assistant Commissioner Todd G. Shean said, “It's not a question of resources; it's a question of the assessment that's done”.

The House should not take my word for these statements. These experts said there is enough money. Assistant Commissioner Todd G. Shean, federal and international operations, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, is a respected, well-renowned police officer and an expert in international and federal operations. He would know whether there is enough money involved.

When the NDP members come forward and say things like that, they lose credibility. Those members should maybe think about that in the future when they criticize government legislation without having substantive proof of what they are claiming.

That is probably why the NDP is the best at standing against government legislation. That party is against all of our economic action plan bills. It is against the 950,000 net new jobs we have created since the recession. Believe it or not, those members voted against every single action that we have taken as a government because they want to criticize us. They do not want to work as team players. They do not want to work with us to improve Canada's economic condition.

In fact, I am very proud to represent about 150,000 people, 80,000 of whom are directly or indirectly employed by the oil sands. I have seen the oil sands grow over the last 40 to 44 years from a barrel a day to where it is today at over a million barrels. We are looking at somewhere between 3 million and 5 million barrels a day being produced out of that area. Twenty per cent of Canada's exports right now are oil.

The NDP says we need more money, but what does it come up with for suggestions, recommendations or amendments to our legislation? It comes up with zip, zero, nada. New Democrats do that because all they can do is criticize and vote against things.

Speaking of voting against and criticizing, I want to continue on with my story, and it is a true story. Members might not believe it because it does sound like some sort of a fairy tale. Some of the NDP members went down to the United States and protested against the people working in my riding. They protested against Canadian jobs. It is unbelievable. In a time of economic downturn they voted against the people who I work beside, who I represent.

What shocks me the most is that they voted against the jobs of people from their own ridings. We have seen the oil sands produce a large number of jobs for people who work in the forklift manufacturing industry and for a bus manufacturer that is right in the middle of Quebec, for instance, in an NDP riding. They voted against those jobs.

Why did they do so? They did so because they believed, based upon voodoo magic, in my opinion, that somehow oil sands oil creates more GHGs than other forms of oil. That is not the case. When we look at it from start to finish, it is comparable to any other oil in the world, and frankly, it has lower emissions than Venezuelan crude and Californian crude.

[Safer Witnesses Act, May 30th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to the member's speech. He mentioned one of the changes, which was to move from 90 days to 180 days, and he suggested it was a good change.

Since he is on the committee and heard from these expert witnesses, does he see any other changes that would be beneficial to these people and would be necessary to ensure that they are protected and kept safe in particular instances involving organized crime, et cetera? Would he suggest anything further we could do to keep them safe?

[Incorporation by Reference in Regulations Act, May 23rd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad the member asked that question. What type of material is incorporated by reference? Federal, provincial or foreign legislation. This includes standards developed as part of Canada's national standards system, including those of the Canadian Standards Association, the CSA. There are currently over 400 references to these types of standards in federal regulations.

International standards, such as the standards written by the International Organization for Standardization, ISO, most people see that. Members will see we are taking care of business.

[Incorporation by Reference in Regulations Act, May 23rd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I was here then and I do not remember them voting against that.

I do remember them voting against Canada's economic action plan. I remember them voting against the first $33 billion. I remember them voting against $12 billion in infrastructure stimulus. I remember them voting against just about everything we have put forward.

I judge by results, and I think that is what most Canadians judge by. They judge by whether they have a job or not. We have created over 900,000 new jobs.

We see that the member across the way voted against $241 million to improve on-reserve income assistance programs. He voted against $5 million to expand facilities at Cape Breton University for the Purdy Crawford Chair in Aboriginal Business Studies throughout Canada. He voted against $10 million to inspire and help young aboriginal people all across the country. What he voted against most of all, and every time in the House, is the opportunity to train aboriginal Canadians to have jobs in colleges, universities and trade schools right across the country.

That is what we are doing as a government. We are making sure that we stand up not only for the youth of the country, who have one of the highest unemployment rates of any group and sector in the country, but also for the aboriginal and needy people right across the country.

It is not about a handout; it is about a hand up, so that people can feel good about themselves, take pride in what they do and feel good about being Canadian.