Charlie Angus

[Federal Sustainable Development Act, October 18th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I listened with great interest to my hon. colleague.

A five-minute walk from my house is the most beautiful place I know on earth, Cross Lake. People cannot swim in that lake. People will probably not be able to swim in that lake for another 100 years, because it used to be considered completely acceptable to take the toxins from the mine and just dump it in lakes because they were there.

The environment is recovering, but it is only recovering because of legislation. No one did this or made this happen voluntarily; it was legislation. Could my my hon. colleague comment on the necessity of having strong legislation to protect not just our water, but our air as well?

[Ethics, October 18th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, the boss at Morneau Shepell told investors in 2013 that legislation was required to go after defined pension benefits and, voila, he introduced Bill C-27. Morneau Shepell told investors this legislation would be a game-changer.

The Prime Minister is talking about a gold standard of ethics. Gold for whom, for the finance minister, who is now making $150,000 a month? A blind trust will not cut it. Will the Prime Minister withdraw Bill C-27, and his finance minister's blatant attack on the pension benefits of Canadian workers?

[Gord Downie, October 18th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, the boy, Canada's boy, has gone home to Fiddler's Green. We are devastated by the loss of Gord Downie.

The Tragically Hip have been the soundtrack of our nation, that cranked up, rowdy arena rock band that was both profoundly intimate and profoundly Canadian.

I had the honour of knowing Gord a bit from my days as a musician. He was not just an incredible artist; he was a decent, loving human being who believed the world could be a better place.

In the face of his own mortality, he took his suffering and brought our nation on a journey of reconciliation and justice. Gord wanted the nation to know that there were thousands of Chanie Wenjacks out there today, trying to find their way home from a system that had robbed them of their families, of their identity, and of their culture.

Go to the angels Gord and rock that choir. We will watch those constellations and Gord reveal themselves one star at time.

[Business of Supply, October 17th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I would like to follow up with my hon. colleague, because this fundamental question about who we represent is, to me, at the heart of what parliamentary democracy should be. If we call this the House of Commons it should be the house of the common people. However, we are being told by the Liberals that we are somehow being mean to people who forget they own French villas, that we are supposed to be in solidarity with them because of our paycheques, that this is somehow the rich boys' club, whereas I would say that the people of Canada pay us very well to represent their interests, not to represent the interests of people who cannot remember the fact that they own French villas.

My hon. colleague and I have not agreed on very much over the years. I have known him since 2004. We disagree on a lot of things, but we do agree about defending our regions. I know my hon. colleague defended his region. I will defend my region. The people I represent are hard-working. They play by the rules, and they get none of the benefits that Morneau Shepell gets on a daily basis.

[Business of Supply, October 17th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. If I did refer to myself as the little guy, I would like to retract that comment. I am not a little guy. In fact, I have put on a lot of weight on the leadership bid. However, on standing up for average people, and if we call them the average Joe, then yes, I will do that every single day of my life.

[Business of Supply, October 17th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, that is a tough question. I have to choose between Paul Martin and Morneau Shepell. It is the same party.

The problem is the lack of integrity in the Liberal Party, a party that does not believe that it has to defend the interests of the middle class and the working class. The Liberal Party has always preferred to defend the interests of the wealthy and multinationals. For example, the Minister of Finance says that the precarious employment situation is normal. It is not normal. It is the result of policies that favour multinationals and friends of the Liberal Party.

[Business of Supply, October 17th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, if the member for Kingston and the Islands is not here to represent “Joe Public”, then he should get the heck out the door.

If the Liberals are here to look after their friends, their insiders, all the rich and the wealthy in this country then we have had 150 years of that and it is enough.

I am here to represent people who have been written off the political and economic map of this nation and they are being written off by the Liberal finance minister and his attack on the pensions of seniors and hard-working Canadians. If there are no Liberals willing to stand up and defend them, then they should just step out.

[Business of Supply, October 17th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, it is going to be really hard to answer that question in a very short space of time.

I remember when the Prime Minister said not only is it a ministerial code but the Liberals are going to elevate it and as soon as they elevate it they are going to make sure that it is standard operating procedure. They ditched it immediately.

We are not talking about a finance minister who wrote a letter on behalf of one of his companies, which he is not allowed to do. We are not talking about a parliamentary secretary who writes a letter on behalf of a company in an area where it may have some work through Parliament, even if that individual was just trying to help a local business as any other member of Parliament is allowed to do, because we need to have rules for parliamentary secretaries. We are talking about a minister who has not bothered to tell anybody that he is making $150,000 a month directly from Morneau Shepell in the area of moving toward privatized pensions, who told his investors that we needed to change the legislation, and then stood for office and brought that legislation into Parliament, and is now trying to push it through while still being involved directly with Morneau Shepell.

The level of abuse of public trust is so much more elevated and it is incredibly elevated because we are dealing with the pensions of Canadians. People who do hard work year in and year out should be able to retire in dignity without having to worry about the Liberal government and its pals on Bay Street undermining them.

[Business of Supply, October 17th, 2017]

If we are going to have a finance minister bringing legislation that has to do with pensions, then Bill C-27 will have to be withdrawn, because it is so obviously tarnished with the self-interest of him and his company and his offshore villa that it has no credibility. For anyone on the government side now to stand with that finance minister and say that they are going to continue to push this attack on defined pension benefits, when this man laid out the plan for his shareholders in 2013 and has followed through, it falls to the government to say that it will reject him and his bill.

[Business of Supply, October 17th, 2017]

I would like to thank the Speaker. I do not have a private corporation I can refer to myself as. I am just Joe Average.

Madam Speaker, the Liberals told me it was different. He forgot to mention it was a private corporation. There was silly me, thinking that all the people I know own houses with their families, not through private offshore corporations, but this man does.

Now, on October 17, he is saying that he is willing to look at the issue of a blind trust for the money he is making from Morneau Shepell. I do not think that cuts it, because we are looking at a man who said in 2013 that legislation was needed to attack defined pension benefits, which many workers and many seniors across this country depend on. Then he came into this House, and he was given the position as finance minister, and the first major piece of legislation he brought in was Bill C-27, which was the direct form of legislation his company required to undermine pension benefits for Canadian workers. All through that time, he was able to participate in directing his company, because it was not in a blind trust. Even if it were in a blind trust, how would anyone think that a man whose name is the company, Morneau Shepell, which makes its money getting rid of defined pension benefits, and brags about it, would bring in the legislation?

I am sorry, but putting it in a blind trust on October 17 and asking for advice from the Ethics Commissioner does not cut it. This is about a fundamental, shocking breach.

I have seen a lot of breaches in Parliament over the years, and I have seen a lot of dubious and bogus behaviour, but to have the Liberal government come in and tell us that this is somehow high-minded integrity and just a bit of absent-mindedness does not cut it.

When I talk to Canadians across this country, they talk to me about their disappearing pensions. I want to talk about Lisa Okill, 100 years old, the first woman to run a Sears store, who is losing her pension benefits right now. We will never see anyone from Morneau Shepell or anyone in that government stand up to fight for that senior citizen.

It falls to us as parliamentarians to say that this kind of misuse of public office to look after the pals and friends of the Liberal Party is not acceptable. We have to hold this House to a higher standard, because Canadians have absolutely no reason to believe in a Prime Minister who had his $1,500 cash for access meetings with Chinese billionaires, and when he was caught out and asked why he was doing it, answered that they were worried about the middle class, that they were meeting about the middle class. I guess we little people are supposed to say, “Wow, that is amazing. These Chinese billionaires paid $1,500 to get the ear of the Prime Minister to talk about the middle class.” Yes, I bet. How about, probably not?