Colin Carrie

[Italian Heritage Month, November 18th, 2016]

Buongiorno, signor Presidente.

It is a pleasure to rise in the House to discuss Motion No. 64, Italian heritage month.

Italian Canadians have contributed immensely to Canadian society, and that is something that our party has always acknowledged. By recognizing the month of June as Italian heritage month, we are acknowledging the importance of educating and reflecting upon Italian heritage for future generations, because Italian history is also Canadian history.

Many people do not realize that the second European to discover North America is generally agreed to be an Italian explorer by the name Giovanni Caboto, or as many kids learn, John Cabot. We now believe his first landing was in Nova Scotia, and so we could argue that the first European to set food in Canada was an Italian.

Many people do not know that Canada boasts the sixth-largest Italian population outside of Italy, which is 1.3 million Canadians. We cannot talk about Canadian culture and heritage without talking about the richness and warmth of Italian culture and heritage.

I would like to take this opportunity to talk about the Italian community in my riding of Oshawa.

Earlier this month, I had the pleasure of celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Oshawa Italian Recreation Club. I would like to take a moment to share a little bit about who the members are and what they do, because they are such an important part of my community.

Today, the president, Tony Rizzuto, oversees a vibrant organization. As a matter of fact, I start off many of my mornings with a friendly cappuccino, usually made by Michelle, who since last week has been on maternity leave so Gianni has taken over now. I will drop by for lunch, and they have even named a sandwich after me. They call it “The Colin”. They are always welcoming at social events.

We have a vibrant bocce club, and Nick and Frances take charge of that with all of their members. They actually took a park in Oshawa, Radio Park, which is by the Oshawa Centre, and beautified it. I do not know if members have ever played bocce, but if they have the opportunity, they should come by, because our bocce club is so vibrant and friendly.

At our annual barbeques, for example, Nick, Frances, and all their members come out and share their hospitality. They also share their homemade soppressata, which is always a great hit. I really enjoy it.

However, it was not always like this. We had to start somewhere and they had to start somewhere.

In 1954, a group of newly arrived young Italians created the Oshawa inter-football league. It was an amateur soccer team to remind them of Italy. The team was extremely successful, and the enthusiasm from their accomplishment was the beginning of the Oshawa Italian Recreation Club, which promoted not only sports activities, but social and cultural events as well.

The club is a part of my community today, and it is one of the reasons why I feel that Italian Canadians deserve this recognition we are talking about today. Their warmth and hospitality makes everyone feel welcome.

The Oshawa Italian Recreation Club is the product of two Italian clubs: the Oshawa Italia Club and the Italian Social and Recreation Club of Oshawa. They came together in times of need and ultimately decided to amalgamate, and I will elaborate a little bit.

In 1966, the city of Florence was devastated by a flood that destroyed numerous historical buildings and works of art. In order to help, the two clubs came together and started a fundraising campaign, which raised tens of thousands of dollars for Florence. Unfortunately, a year later, a massive earthquake hit Sicily, leaving thousands homeless and hundreds dead. The two clubs again came together and set up a joint fundraiser committee where Colonel Sam McLaughlin, the founder of General Motors Canada, was the honorary chairman. The success of these two fundraising campaigns and the fact that these two clubs clearly worked together well was a great reason for them to join together into one, and they were named the Oshawa Italian Recreation Club, or OIRC.

This club began as a way for Italian immigrants to feel more at home by doing such things as opening a social agency to help Italian immigrants better integrate into Canadian society, helping with Italian passports, pensions, etc. However, its sole objective was not to only help Italian immigrants. The club has also organized many successful activities and fundraisers throughout our community, such as for the Oshawa General Hospital. It established an after-school program for elementary school-aged kids, and sponsors local minor hockey and soccer teams. It continues to fundraise and donate to local, national, and international charities.

What I am trying to get to is that Italian Canadians have made a tremendous contribution to Canadian society through local communities and internationally. OIRC was established as a meeting place for Italian immigrants. It was a place where they could feel at home. I have to say that, today, they make everyone who walks through their doors feel at home. The Italian community is so well integrated and well established in Oshawa and the club continues to promote Italian culture and recreational activities.

Every year, in June, Oshawa celebrates a great festival called Fiesta Week. It is one of the oldest multicultural festivals in Canada. Every single year, our Italian community opens up its doors to share its culture through dance, dining, and very good cheer. Everyone is welcome.

If members come to my community and it is not during Fiesta Week, they do not need to worry about it. Within walking distance from my office, they can drop into one of our many fine Italian restaurants, two of them owned by the Fazio family, called Fazio's and Tutto's. They will see Tino, Nicholas, Rosaleen, and Martin. They always welcome people with their great hospitality. They work hard and they contribute to our community. Around the corner, Avanti's is run by the Albis family. Tony, Ida, Domenic will always make their customers feel at home, and they serve a great meal as well. Their wood-burning oven makes awesome pizza within a couple of minutes, and I would recommend it to anyone. We have a great Italian community in Oshawa.

This is one of the reasons we support the motion, which suggests that the government recognize the contributions that Italians have made to Canada by sharing their culture and language through education programs and community clubs, such as the Oshawa Italian Recreation Club.

I would like to take a moment to make a brief aside. On my 10th wedding anniversary, I had to think of something really special. Any woman who could spend 10 years with me deserves something special. I thought of one of the greatest surprises that I could do. She loves cooking, and I wondered where I could take her to allow us to enjoy a week together away from the kids. There is a famous Canadian cooking school in Tuscany. A gentleman named Umberto Menghi has great restaurants throughout the Vancouver area. He also has a culinary retreat in Tuscany. I kept everything secret. I packed her bags, and I picked her up on time, and we took off for our 10th wedding anniversary. It was one of the best holidays we ever had. We would wake up every morning to a lovely breakfast. We would then go to the cooking class. These guys did the impossible. They did something they thought could not be done. They taught me to cook. I learned how a bit of sale e pepe makes a difference. Everything we cooked up was bene, molto bene.

[Committees of the House, November 18th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague, the hon. member for Oakville, and all health committee members for their hard work on this emergency study on the opioid crisis currently being faced by our country. I think I speak for all my colleagues when I say we got through it with very few hiccups.

I would, however, like to make a quick mention of the rushed process in putting the report together. It was a challenge but, again, we got through it.

My Conservative colleagues and I feel the report does not effectively address the severity of the ongoing crisis. Nor does it acknowledge the main sources of these illicit drugs, which is China. We feel the report only highlights band-aid solutions to manage the crisis and does not actually look at ways to facilitate prevention. Really important is the quick integration of patients into treatment programs, which we think is essential.

The report also neglects to protect Canadians communities which, ultimately, should be the primary responsibility of the government. Therefore, my colleagues and I strongly believe that removing consultations and safeguards is an abdication from this responsibility. I am happy we were able to get our dissenting opinions in with the committee's report, even with the one-day timeline.

Again, I want to thank the member and all my colleagues on committee.

[Health, November 18th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the health minister refused any organizations, such as CPMs, centres for pain management, attending her opioids summit. The Liberals have stated that doctors who prescribe opioids are a primary cause of this crisis, yet they are not invited to help find a solution that works for their patients. That is because these organizations have a different view and perspective than the government.

How can the health minister claim to be consulting on the opioids crisis when she will not even talk to pain management doctors on the ground, who she blames for being a source of the problem?

[Health, November 18th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, hundreds of Canadians are dying every single month from illicit opioids flooding our borders. These drugs are so powerful that a small amount, the size of a grain of salt, can kill a person. Last month, a nine-month-old was hospitalized after being exposed to carfentanil, an illegal opioid 100 times stronger than fentanyl, yet the health minister is only consulting now.

When will the minister acknowledge that China is the primary source of the problem and start cracking down on these illicit drug shipments?

[Health, November 14th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the health minister has announced that she is going to repeal the right of Canadians to have a say in the location of heroin injection sites. This means law enforcement, families, and different levels of government would no longer be consulted before sites are approved in their very own communities. We are beginning to see a trend. Liberals only consult when they know they are going to get the answers they want.

If the minister is so sure that communities want these sites in their backyards, why will she not guarantee them the right to say no?

[Health, November 2nd, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals have slashed HIV/AIDS funding without giving a single organization advance notice. These organizations play an important role in reducing the transmission of HIV/AIDS, and they provide support to the literally thousands of Canadians living with this illness.

Our previous Conservative government invested in Canadian programs. The current Liberal government is cutting them out.

Why are Canadian tax dollars not going to Canadian AIDS organizations before going to other countries?

[Budget Implementation Act, 2016, No. 2, November 1st, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, as for the first part of his question about the shell game, I hope the House recognizes what the member actually said, because at the end of the fiscal year, he may be eating some of those words. We know that the Liberals have a bit of an opportunity; I think it is $6 billion they may be playing with.

As for the second part of his question on whether manufacturing has really excelled in Canada over the last few years, it certainly has not in Ontario. Some 300,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost because of the policies of the provincial government in Ontario, the exact same policies the Liberals want to establish federally. The proof is there. Why would it replicate these job-killing policies from Ontario for the entire country?

[Budget Implementation Act, 2016, No. 2, November 1st, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent question because this is really the important part of this debate. He noticed that it is not even a topic in the United States. This is what frustrates me about the Liberal government selling out Canada's advantage. We all know that Mr. Obama goes to the climate conferences and signs on. However, at the end of the day, he also knows that the U.S. will not put federal or state carbon taxes in place. The states we compete against, Michigan, New York, Ohio, and Tennessee, will not be putting a state carbon tax in place. Therefore, when looking at competitiveness, the Liberal government is tying the hands of our industry not only today but into the future. It is also basically putting a halt to any new investment into our communities with respect to anything that utilizes carbon.

My colleague is absolutely correct that this is decreasing our competitiveness. It is foolish that the Liberals would move ahead without being in lockstep with the United States, our biggest trading partner. It is something we have to push back on, because it will kill our economy and our jobs.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2016, No. 2, November 1st, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I absolutely do not object. I think innovation is the way to move forward. What I was talking about is the message the Liberal government is sending industry. I talked about the language, the ideology, and how the Liberals have changed even the way Canadians talk. I said that 20,000 manufacturing jobs are gone, and it is 39,000 in the oil, gas, and mining sector, an industry that creates jobs. A record number are now gone within a year.

I get upset when I hear colleagues talk about innovation. There will be nothing left to innovate if we do not start concentrating on Canada's strengths. It was our strength in our manufacturing and natural resources sectors that brought our country to the forefront in the world, yet the current government seems determined to shut it all down. In other words, there will be no industry left if the Liberals continue forward with the way they are addressing this issue.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2016, No. 2, November 1st, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I want to take this opportunity on behalf of my constituents of Oshawa to express deep concerns when it comes to the frivolous spending of the Liberal government and, more importantly, the lack of results for hard-working Canadians.

We had an election last year, and a lot of promises were made in that election. Let us take a look at some of those promises.

Just a year ago, the Liberals promised that they could spend their way to prosperity. Hard-working Canadians trusted them to borrow just a modest sum so that they could create more jobs and put more money into the pockets of Canadians. What was that promise all about? Let us take a look at what modest means to the Liberals, because only the Liberals could say a $10 billion deficit is modest. Let us see.

The Liberals ran on the promise of a modest $10 billion deficit, but by March 2016, only three months into the year, the deficit was over $30 billion. On top of that, just last month the Prime Minister admitted that he did not know how big the deficit would be this year. How can the Prime Minister create jobs and promise economic growth when he does not even know how much money he is spending? If the PM does not know, how much confidence can Canadians have in regard to the Liberal record and the Liberal stewardship of our economy?

This is what we do know. Despite all of the money borrowed, the economy is stagnant and there is no economic prosperity for Canadians. The Bank of Canada, the IMF, and the OECD have all downgraded their forecast for Canada this year and the next. However, that did not have to be the case. The parliamentary budget officer has confirmed that Canada would have experienced a $2.9 billion surplus in 2015-16 if the Liberals had stayed on the path to prosperity created by our previous Conservative government. Basically, the proof is in the pudding. Despite all their expensive policies, unemployment remains at 7%, which is exactly the same as when they took office a year ago.

Let us contrast that with how our government approached the economy. Members who were here at that time know we were faced with an unprecedented downturn in the global economy. We were faced with a global meltdown. Over that period of time, our Conservative government created 1.2 million net new jobs. Now let us look at the Liberal record. In a very short period of time the Liberals killed 20,000 manufacturing jobs and 39,000 mining, oil, and gas jobs. I am going to address this a bit later in my speech. We are now seeing the results of the foolish decisions the Liberals made. Full-time employment has been non-existent under the Liberal government. The only jobs it did manage to create were entirely part-time jobs, meaning no benefits and very little security.

It seems that the government is entirely out of touch with the concept of competitiveness. We know that Canada plays on the world stage. Nobody playing in the world today lives in a little box, like the Liberals pretend we are in. On the weekend even Brian Mulroney mentioned how foolish it is to create policies that decrease the competitiveness of our country. We can debate the policies, and some of these policies might be good ideas, but if we are the first to jump off a cliff, it does not make any sense. Let us take a look at these ideas.

The Liberals put in a carbon tax. The Prime Minister has demanded a carbon tax across this country, which is going to cost about $1,200 per person in Canada. It is also going to cost business billions of dollars. How does that contribute to our lack of competitiveness? In Ontario and in my community, it will contribute hugely.

The Liberals have put in a new payroll tax, which is going to result in 2% less per paycheque for my constituents. Also, businesses will now have to add that extra 2%.

Ontario is stuck with the highest electrical rates in North America based on, again, irresponsible Liberal energy policies, but that is a whole other story.

We know that Oshawa, in Ontario, is an industry town, but what did the Liberals do? One of the first things they did was eliminate the minister of industry. I do not think there was a time in Canadian history that the Government of Canada did not have a minister of industry. What kind of message does that give to industry? I would say it is that they do not want industry. This is the message they are giving out.

What is really concerning to my constituents is, despite the depreciation of the Canadian dollar—and many people think it is going to depreciate even further under the current Liberal government—normally manufacturing employment increases in Canada, because we trade mostly with the United States. As the dollar goes down, we become much more competitive and jobs increase, but this is the first time in history that manufacturing employment has fallen by 20,000 jobs.

The PBO noted that this is a marked reversal from the gains that averaged 1,000 each year between 2011 and 2015. This is the difference between what happens when government works with manufacturers and what happens when, like the current Liberal government, it works against them.

In my community, we rely on manufacturing to provide well-paying middle-class jobs. Unfortunately, the Liberals have seemingly abandoned the entire sector. Members will remember that the Prime Minister, during the election campaign, went so far as to say that we should shift away from manufacturing. What message is he giving companies that want to invest in our communities? The reality is that to shift away from manufacturing is not possible in Oshawa.

I have been meeting with manufacturers and businesses throughout my riding to discuss how the House can help support them, and I hear continuously that the planned increase in CPP premiums is going to be hurting businesses. I think we hear that across the country.

However, here is the sad part. During the election—and members heard it—the Liberals said that they were going to increase CPP for seniors. They were telling seniors that it would happen right away. Well, guess what? The increase in CPP will take 40 years to be fully implemented, and so none of these new benefits will go to seniors in Oshawa who need it today.

As members know, some seniors did not work in the past, and they will not be working. Therefore, even increasing CPP is not going to help those Canadians who are really needy, who are looking at their retirement and wondering how they are going to make it by.

This policy does not even make sense. The Liberals did not even consult properly with business on it, but they put it in and decreased our competitiveness.

According to the CFIB, a full 70% of small business owners disagree with the notion that the proposed CPP increase is modest and that it would have a limited impact on their businesses. That is what they were saying, and the current government ignored them. Piling on a combined $2,200 per year on average Canadians and their employers is not going to result in more money staying in my constituents' pockets.

Dan Kelly of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business said that two-thirds of small firms say they will have to freeze or cut salaries by over one-third, and they will have to reduce hours or jobs in their businesses in response to the CPP hike. Yet, the Liberals are recklessly moving forward with this increase, despite the fact that 70% of employed Canadians oppose a CPP expansion if it means a wage freeze.

The math simply does not add up. We have businesses across the country telling the Liberals not to do this, please, and at the same time Canadians are telling them that they do not support it if it means a freeze on their wages. Do the Liberals not realize that Canadians understand that this is just a shell game?

Another significant concern for businesses and constituents in my riding is the job-killing carbon tax. It is widely recognized by my Conservative colleagues and all Canadians that Canada must do its part in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but that should not be at the expense of our economy.

Based on numbers from the British Columbia and Alberta governments, the Liberal carbon tax will add 11¢ per litre at the pump. The Canadian Tax Journal determined that it will add at least 15% to our natural gas bills and almost 10% to our hydro bills. In total, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation said that the Liberal carbon tax will cost the average family more than $2,500 each and every year, and it is only going to go up.

We have seen the Liberals develop these new terminologies as far as carbon pricing is concerned. One of them is decarbonizing our economy. What does that mean? It means shutting down any business, or anybody, that burns any type of fossil fuel. They have talked about carbon pollution. What does that mean? It is just about breathing, which causes a little bit more carbon pollution. Why did they change this terminology? It is because they want to tax it. How long will it be before the Liberals tax breathing, for heaven's sake? The challenge with these taxes is that there is no proof that they will have any benefit in lowering carbon emissions.

There is so much more I could talk about, but let us take some questions and see what we can do to help further this debate.