Chris Charlton

[Democratic Reform, March 31st, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, when pushed on his very selective interpretation of the report, the minister eventually admitted he disagreed with Neufeld's recommendations, yet he continues to rely on the very same report he disagrees with.

When will he stop using misleading evidence to justify unfair changes that could disenfranchise seniors, aboriginals, and young Canadians?

[Democratic Reform, March 31st, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, it is almost as though the minister thinks that if he keeps misquoting Mr. Neufeld, somebody will start to believe him, but nobody is fooled. When pushed on his—

[Democratic Reform, March 31st, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the former head of B.C. Elections has been delivering stark warnings about the minister's unfair election act changes and his constant misquoting of Mr. Neufeld's report. Harry Neufeld says the bill either needs to be amended or it needs to be killed altogether.

This is about people's basic right to vote, yet that minister simply will not listen, and he continues, like a broken record, to misquote statistics and mislead Canadians.

How does he expect Canadians to trust this bill when they cannot even trust his facts?

[Industry, March 26th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, in 2011, the Conservatives abandoned their case against U.S. Steel. They claimed they had forced the company to invest an additional $50 million in its Canadian facilities. It is now 2014, and there is no sign of these promised investments. There are signs that U.S. Steel is planning to shut things down.

Why has the government repeatedly failed to hold the company accountable? How many times will Conservatives ignore Hamilton's economy, ignore workers, ignore retirees, and let U.S. Steel off the hook?

[Natural Resources, March 25th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the minister's predecessor listened very closely to industry lobbyists but smeared concerned Canadians as foreign-funded radicals. Conservative failures on natural resources have hurt our economy, damaged our international reputation, and will leave a massive financial and ecological debt for future generations.

Will the new minister back away from the slurs of his predecessor and commit to working with all Canadians to achieve sustainable development?

[Natural Resources, March 25th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to welcome the Minister of Natural Resources to his new portfolio. The minister will be making decisions that significantly impact the energy sector. He will be responsible for regulations governing some of Canada's largest publicly traded companies. However, it turns out that the minister holds personal investments in an energy sector hedge fund, investments that would be impacted by the decisions he makes. Has the minister put these investments in a blind trust?

[Energy Safety and Security Act, March 25th, 2014]

That is all right, Mr. Speaker. I do not need very much time, because clearly the minister is confusing us with the Liberals. It was the Liberal leader who said that budgets balance themselves. I do not think I will be taking any lessons from him on that.

With respect to his suggestion that we are standing up for workers, I make no apologies for that either. In fact, the one thing the bill would do would be to say to the industry that this government will always be there to protect the interests of the Canadian nuclear industry at the expense of Canadian taxpayers.

We will stand up for hard-working families. We will stand up for taxpayers and make sure that they are not on the hook for accidents caused by an industry whose behaviour may put Canadians on the hook to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars.

[Energy Safety and Security Act, March 25th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, some would suggest, though, that the experience of Ontario with respect to the gas plants the member mentioned was hardly an accident. Rather, it was a very calculated, politically motivated cancellation of those plants. However, I certainly take his point.

Yes, he is absolutely right. Taxpayers are again on the hook, quite substantially, because of an action the Liberal government in Ontario took simply in an effort to try to save some seats. That, of course, will be an issue that will be at the forefront of the upcoming provincial election in Ontario, and I suspect that there will be a huge political price to pay by the Liberal government.

[Energy Safety and Security Act, March 25th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, first, let me say that I look forward to working with the parliamentary secretary on the natural resources committee. I am sure that we are going to have many lively debates in the House.

I have been a member in this House since 2006. One of the things I learned, probably within the first week of being in this House, was that the most foolish thing any MP could do is actually speak on behalf of his or her leader.

I suspect that there will be many opportunities when the parliamentary secretary could put that question directly to the member for Outremont. I look forward to hearing that exchange.

[Energy Safety and Security Act, March 25th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I really appreciate my colleague's question and his passion for this issue. He is absolutely right: we ought to be debating in the House measures to enhance sustainable development in this country. One of the things that is woefully lacking in the bill is any language about the things that we need to do to prevent nuclear accidents and offshore oil accidents from happening in the first place. We are not talking about that in the House—not now, frankly, and never. We are simply talking about how much liability companies will have in the case of accidents. That is not a conversation that is in the best interests of Canadians if we do not put it into the fuller context of how we stop those accidents in the first place.

I want to commend my colleague for bringing that to the floor of the House and I look forward to his intervention on the bill, where I am sure he will elaborate further.