Chris Alexander

[2013 Annual Report on Immigration, October 28th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to subsection 94(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the 2013 annual report on immigration.

[Citizenship and Immigration, October 28th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hard-working member of Parliament for Vancouver South for her excellent work.

As she well knows, the Liberals left us with the legacy of huge backlogs, reduced immigration. When we took office there were 830,000 unprocessed applications. Some prospective newcomers were waiting a decade to come to Canada.

We have taken action. We reduced the waiting time for foreign skilled workers from seven years to one. We have cut that backlog in half. We are taking action to fix the once broken system to make it fast, fair and flexible. I will have more to say on this score in a few minutes.

[Citizenship and Immigration, October 24th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, first I would like to congratulate our colleague on her appointment as critic for the immigration portfolio. I would also like to congratulate her on her marriage news from last summer.

Canada has an extremely generous immigration system. When people try to abuse that system with unjustified refugee claims, we will continue to remove them from Canada. I am very grateful to my colleague for bringing this case to our attention, as others have done. We will be looking at every possible option for waiving costs and fees and showing compassion in this extraordinary case.

[The Economy, October 17th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, first I would like to thank the hard-working and fast-running member of Parliament for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country for his excellent question.

Anyone who read yesterday's Speech from the Throne or who heard it can conclude that this is a government focused on the priorities that matter to Canadians, on creating jobs and opportunities, on supporting and protecting Canadian families and on putting Canada first.

We plan to introduce new legislation to ensure that our streets and communities are safe, to protect Canadian consumers, to ensure a balanced budget and to—

[Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, June 18th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, as you know, childhood is a sacred time for Canadians. It is a time when friendships are forged for life, so imagine our surprise last week when a defiant millionaire Liberal leader sent out his childhood friend from across Sussex Drive, the member for Beauséjour, as the sacrificial lamb to defend his exorbitant speaking fees scammed from charities.

The member for Beauséjour demanded apologies from those who called the Liberal leader out for ripping off charities. For a few short hours, that childhood friend, the member for Beauséjour, was the one person in Canada who did not feel ripped off by the Liberal leader. That all changed when the Liberal leader abandoned his position and hung his childhood friend from Rideau Hall out to dry.

Make no mistake, the Liberal leader will not think twice about scamming the most vulnerable in our society or abandoning his best friend, if he thinks he can make a buck. The Liberal leader's favourite cause is a long way from charities or childhood. It is the Liberal leader.

[Samuel de Champlain, June 14th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, exactly 400 years ago today, there were two canoes travelling up the river behind your chair. They were approaching the Chaudière Falls, which the locals called Asticou, a spiritual place and portage point.

Among those voyageurs was a man from Brouage, in Saintonge. He was a royal representative in Canada and a seasoned adventurer and cartographer who made good use of his astrolabe.

A few days later, on Allumette Island, he met with Tessouat, chief of the Kichesipirini, the people of “the great river”. The chief was a great orator and a keen strategist, who at the time imposed customs duties on navigators. He would later allow the French to travel deeper into the country by opening the route to the Great Lakes, the Upper Country and the west.

However, this French voyageur had already left his mark on our country as a key figure in the history of Acadia, as the founder of Quebec City, by inspiring the settlement of Montreal and by establishing New France.

The day before yesterday, at Westminster, our Prime Minister was right to call the man who helped found our country “our first governor”.

Let us celebrate that man who was travelling up the river behind you 400 years ago. Let us celebrate Samuel de Champlain.

[Prohibiting Cluster Munitions Act, June 11th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Winnipeg Centre did not answer my question earlier, which was this. Does his party support our membership in the alliances that have brought us security since the Second World War, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the North American Aerospace Defence Alliance based in Colorado Springs, part of it based in the member's hometown of Winnipeg?

He has already given us his answer. He spoke about cleaning up after the elephant. That is exactly the NDP's policy on defence and security. The New Democrats do not want an active role for Canada. They do not want us to have armed forces that are capable. They do not want us to be interoperable with our allies, because they just want security to happen. They want others to look after it. They want to wake up in the morning and find out that everything is all right. The world is not like that. The member should know better. He should know we have obligations in the world.

Will he not confirm once and for all in the House that he supports our basic alliances that have kept us safe?

[Prohibiting Cluster Munitions Act, June 11th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, it is extraordinary to be accused of praising a very dangerous munition. As part of a series of speeches on this side, we spoke in support of a convention to ban that munition, which has never been used by the Canadian Forces. Very limited stockpiles within the Canadian Forces are already on the way to being destroyed.

Let me remind the member opposite that this is a measure brought in by this Conservative government. The member opposite spent most of his speech calling for a convention on the total prohibition and ban of cluster musicians. He does not realize that this will lose the NDP members a lot of votes, the few votes they have left in the city of Toronto. The member for Davenport and the member for Timmins—James Bay would be affected. It could be the collapse of the party. We are not here to champion that move tonight. We may champion it later.

The only person he could cite in favour of his position was a former Australian politician. Does the member know that Australia, too, has its version of clause 11? It, too, has an exception because it does combat operations with the United States. It wants to continue to be interoperable with the United States.

Does the member opposite understand that the United States still uses these weapons, much as we may regret that fact? It does not use land mines.

Finally, does the member acknowledge and support the fact that Canada is a member of NATO and Norad? Does he support those alliances?

[Prohibiting Cluster Munitions Act, June 11th, 2013]

That is not true.

[Prohibiting Cluster Munitions Act, June 11th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Davenport says that we on this side do whatever the Americans tell us to do. I have news for him. He clearly has not been following the debate. The Americans are not signing this convention. We signed the convention. We are ratifying it. It is a sovereign decision by a Conservative government, and it is a good decision.

Second, the member says that the United States of America, and I think this one is really one for the record books, is in a different universe. What universe is it the member for Davenport is talking about? Is it the universe that does not include a country across the Niagara River, our closest ally with whom we do $2 billion in business a day, with whom the city he represents is integrated culturally, socially and economically in every possible way? Does he call that a different universe?

What greater measure, what greater indicator of a lack of respect for the United States, its role in the world, its role as an ally, in security and in military affairs could there be than to say that it is in a different universe?

I would like to close by simply reminding the NDP that with its position, opposing the combat mission in Afghanistan, it joined a grand total of zero governments of NATO countries. There were no NATO countries that failed to deploy to Afghanistan. It would have been the only one, and that is why it is not fit to govern. It will not govern. This government will do everything in its power to point out the absolute bankruptcy of the NDP on these issues.