David Graham

[Criminal Code, May 20th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, the member made reference to the notwithstanding clause. I am always a little nervous about telling someone that their rights temporarily do not matter. It is something that I do not find terribly helpful.

The member said that he wants to make sure that anything that happens is safe from future Supreme Court decisions. I wonder why he thinks that matters, if he is willing to use the notwithstanding clause in the first place.

[Income Tax Act, May 19th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the wonderful thing about tax credits is that we only get them if we pay taxes, so they do not necessarily benefit people who need them most. I did not see a huge benefit to that. We could put those investments elsewhere in the budget and the economy. That is what the government has done and will continue to do.

[Income Tax Act, May 19th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, it is helpful to have any investment in our community. Any cuts in taxes, for anyone but the wealthiest, are beneficial to us.

It is part of a larger plan that all members have seen in our platform. It is part of a larger budget. There are several more budgets to come before the next election. Everything we can do to help our community will be appreciated and supported.

[Income Tax Act, May 19th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the riding of Laurentides—Labelle is huge, and it has diverse economic needs. This riding is a rather poor one. Any assistance for a riding like mine is very much appreciated.

My riding has 43 municipalities, and the poverty rate is rather high. For a long time, there was a lack of investment from the federal government. We are trying to fix that situation with infrastructure spending and tax changes. This is part of a comprehensive plan that will help regions like mine and my colleague's. That is very important to our community.

[Income Tax Act, May 19th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I greatly appreciate the correction made by my colleague from Louis-Saint-Laurent.

I want to tell him that it has been a very long time since the Conservatives managed to balance a budget. They had surpluses in 1871, 1912, 2006 and 2007. They left surpluses, but they always inherited them from the Liberals. They have not balanced a budget in about 140 years. When he talks about deficits, he is not being quite honest.

I will stop there, but I am interested in hearing the questions from the member for Louis-Saint-Laurent.

[Income Tax Act, May 19th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Mount Royal, who, like me, spoke in French during Monday's debate on Bill C-10. I wanted to make that correction since the hon. member for Outremont misinformed the House about that on Tuesday. In fact, I speak French more than he does in the House. He would contribute more to the quality of the debates in the House if he checked the facts before making unfounded accusations.

I rise to speak to one of our key election promises: the 7% tax cut for the middle class, whose tax rate will go from 22% to 20.5%; the tax increase for wealthier Canadians from 29% to 33%; and the reduction in the TFSA annual contribution limit from $10,000 to $5,500.

I commend the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance and my riding neighbour, the hon. member for Saint-Maurice—Champlain, on his maiden speech. Our ridings meet along a provincial gravel road, Parent Road, where government signs strongly advise the use of CB radios. This border is located more than 300 kilometres north of Montreal, not far from the community of Parent.

Bill C-2 is important to the growth of the middle class. It includes crucial changes to Canada's tax system. The legislative summary of the bill is quite clear:

This enactment amends the Income Tax Act to reduce the second personal income tax rate from 22% to 20.5% and to introduce a new personal marginal tax rate of 33% for taxable income in excess of $200,000. It also amends other provisions of that Act to reflect the new 33% rate. In addition, it amends that Act to reduce the annual contribution limit for tax-free savings accounts from $10,000 to its previous level with indexation ($5,500 for 2016) starting January 1, 2016.

These changes will benefit Canadians, so naturally, they are looking forward to them.

I also want to congratulate my colleague from Louis-Hébert on his speech. I rose to reply to him a couple of times, but better members were recognized before me. The life of an MP is complicated.

I would like to point out that the member for Louis-Hébert alluded to the fact that budget 2016 provides for a deficit. He also said that his government was responsible for all of the good things that came out of the last term of office. He is very happy to take credit for all of the positive results, while saying that his team had nothing to do with anything that went wrong.

Investments in the middle class and economic growth for ordinary Canadians are very important to me, the government, and the millions of Canadians who will benefit.

The member for Louis-Hébert also said that the Conservatives left the House clean. That is not completely true. The Conservatives sold the house to pay off the mortgage. They waved the cheque from the sale in the air for all to see before giving it back to the bank to pay the mortgage. The house was not really clean. It was gone. There are now deficits in the middle class, in infrastructure, and in all levels of government.

My colleague from Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques is a bit more reasonable. He presented fact-based arguments about our policies. I really enjoyed listening to his speech. I do not agree with him when he says that these tax cuts do not help the middle class. I agree with my colleague from Mount Royal, who asked why the New Democrats did not promise to cut taxes in their platform but did promise to balance the budget.

With the exception of the members of the former government, who still think that they left a massive surplus, even though that is not quite true, I think it is clear to all of us that it would only be possible to balance the budget this year if we used extreme measures, such as austerity, which is a very unpopular policy in any country.

I short, I am not worried about these deficits because they are investments. That is the case with Bill C-2. I would like to give my colleague from Louis-Hébert a little bit of background on deficits. Almost 100 years ago—

[Air Canada Public Participation Act, May 16th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, earlier the member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan talked about how this law would change the rules mid-game. If we never change rules or bring things up to date, we end up with very weird situations. Things become outdated very quickly.

I am wondering if the member could talk about the importance of modernizing the rules around Air Canada, and any other part of the industry in this day and age.

[Air Canada Public Participation Act, May 16th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan talks about this bill as though it were designed to bail out Air Canada. I do not agree. This is absolutely not the case. This bill is designed to modernize the existing act. If, for example, we had not modernized the Parliament of Canada Act, we would still have about 200 seats here.

Does the member think it is important to modernize the Air Canada Public Participation Act, or should we leave it as is forever?

[Science Fiction, May 11th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, 15 years ago today, with Arthur Dent well established in his new life, Ford Prefect returned to this mostly harmless place for Douglas Adams. Marvin the paranoid android was, of course, left behind.

Anyone who has read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is aware that planet Earth is little more than a computer, built on the orders of mice, to determine the answer to life, the universe, and everything.

While I must wrap up this statement, brought to some of us by our resident babelfish, before it is destroyed to make way for a hyper-partisan bypass, it is a great honour to know that all of our colleagues, brought together here today by the infinite improbability drive, will forevermore have our names listed together on a plaque.

The plaque will be here in Centre Block marked, without ever having determined the question, with the answer to life, the universe, and everything, the number of our Parliament, 42.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2016, No. 1, May 10th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague from Calgary Forest Lawn whether he has studied Canada's economic history at all. He talks about history, but he is not familiar with it. He should be, since the Conservative member has been here for a long time.

Conservative governments have a history of deficits, debts, cuts, and negative growth. Not once have the Conservatives managed to leave a balanced budget for their successors. They do not invest. They simply spend. There is a big difference between the two.

Has the member for Calgary Forest Lawn studied the history of previous Conservative governments, or does he simply get his facts from their advertisements?

His government left us with a $150-billion debt, yet that money did not produce anything new. Hypocrisy is a Conservative value.