Don Davies

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 20th, 2022]

With regard to disability benefits provided by Veterans Affairs Canada (VAC) since November 2015, broken down by year: (a) what is the median time to process (i) an initial application, (ii) a reassessment application; (b) of the applications in (a), how many were processed after 16 weeks of receiving all the information needed for processing; (c) of the applications in (a), what is the percentage of cases that VAC met its service standard target; (d) how many of the decisions on initial applications submitted for mental health conditions were made in more than 16 weeks, as a (i) percentage, (ii) raw number; (e) of the timeframes in (a), what are the application processing times broken down by recipient groups (i) male, (ii) female, (iii) anglophones, (iv) francophones; (f) what is the total number of applications; (g) how many officers process applications broken down by (i) temporary officers, (ii) permanent officers; (h) what is the volume of backlog of applications; and (i) were the number of total applications processed below the fiscal year target, and, if so, what is the target and what is the number of total applications processed?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 20th, 2022]

With regard to the Canadian Coal Transition Initiative (CCTI) and the CCTI Infrastructure Fund, since their inception, broken down by fiscal year and by initiative: (a) what is the total amount of funding provided under each program to date; (b) how many projects have been funded; (c) in which communities have the projects been funded; (d) what is the timeframe for assessment, review, and approval or rejection of an application, broken down by (i) average timeframe, (ii) median timeframe; and (e) what accountability metrics are in place to ensure that (i) emission reduction targets are met, (ii) workers in the sector find employment in other industries?

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, September 20th, 2022]

With regard to Canada’s pledge at the UN Women Generation Equality Forum in 2021 to commit $100 million in new funding for standalone programming addressing unpaid and paid care work in low-and middle-income countries: (a) how much international assistance funding dedicated to care programming has been dispersed by Canada since July 2021, broken down by month; (b) how much of that funding has been (i) channeled to multilateral institutions and processes, (ii) earmarked for standalone projects; and (c) what steps is the government taking to ensure that this funding supports and can be accessed by women’s rights organizations and feminist in-country partners in the Global South?

[Questions on the Order Paper, September 20th, 2022]

With regard to the Canada Revenue Agency's criminal investigation of KPMG's offshore tax scheme: (a) what is the job title of the person who decided (i) to initiate the investigation, (ii) when to initiate the investigation, (iii) the mandate of the investigation, (iv) the date of completion of the investigation, (v) the drafting of the full investigation report, (vi) determination of the findings of the investigation; (b) for items in (a), was the minister or her exempt staff involved in these decisions, and, if so, to what extent; (c) when did the investigation begin; (d) what are the titles and numbers of the documents used in the investigation; (e) how many hours were spent on the investigation; (f) how many full-time equivalent employees were involved in the implementation of the investigation; (g) when did the investigation end; (h) what are the detailed findings of the investigation; (i) was the minister involved in the investigation, and, if so, to what extent; (j) were the exempt staff of the minister's office involved in the investigation, and, if so, to what extent; (k) when was the minister informed of the findings of the investigation; (l) was the minister or her exempt staff involved in (i) the drafting of the full investigation report, (ii) the review of the full investigation report; (m) are there different versions of the full investigation report, and, if so, why, and what are the titles and numbers of those versions; and (n) was the full investigation report sent to the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, if not, why not, and, if so, did the Public Prosecution Service of Canada make a decision to prosecute, if not, why not?

[Health, June 23rd, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, health experts are raising the alarm. According to the Canadian Medical Association, our health care system is collapsing around us. Health care workers are dealing with severe burnout and leaving the profession. Patients are being treated in cars. They wait months for diagnosis and are suffering without care. Despite this, the Liberals are missing in action.

Will the government call an immediate meeting with provinces and territories to address the health care staffing crisis and provide significant, stable and long-term federal funding for health care to Canadians?

[Criminal Code, June 14th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, one of the, I think, good things about the bill is that it removes mandatory minimums for drug sentences, but it leads to a larger question of consistency with the government. The member and the government voted against the NDP Bill C-216, which would have treated addiction as a health issue and decriminalized it for everybody. The government continues to say that it does believe that it should treat substance use as a health issue, yet it continues to criminalize substance use through the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act.

If it is right to remove mandatory sentences from people suffering from addiction in the bill, why is it not right to treat all drug addicts across the country with the same empathy and ensure they are treated as patients, not as criminals?

[Criminal Code, June 14th, 2022]

Mr. Speaker, I guess what I am struggling with is there seems to be a relatively straightforward connection and a couple of principles that underpin this bill. One of them is that we have a very high percentage of people locked up in our country who are suffering from mental health or addiction problems. In fact, when I was the public safety critic for the official opposition and toured Canada's correctional institutions, that number was 70%. The second thing is that mandatory minimums operate on the principle that if we just lock people up for a longer time, the problem will be solved.

I would like my hon. colleague to comment on that. Does he believe that locking up people who are suffering from addiction or mental health issues will actually help integrate them into society or reduce recidivism, or does he agree with me that we need a better approach to actually help these people deal with their fundamental problems so that when they come out, they do not reoffend?

[Criminal Code, June 9th, 2022]

Madam Speaker, absolutely, we need to start addressing in a more meaningful way the social determinants of crime. That is part of it. Also, I think the bottom line is that we need to give our courts and judges the tools they need to make proper individualized assessments to find out what the root causes of the person and the circumstances are before them. Punishment is an aspect of our penal system, so that is part of it, but it has to have its proper perspective. We have to understand what the real cause of the crime before them is, and we have to address that. That is the only way we can keep Canadians safe.

[Criminal Code, June 9th, 2022]

Madam Speaker, I would answer that by approaching the latter part first.

I had both the privilege and the trauma of suffering through the Harper government the whole time. I have been in this House for 14 years, and it was a major political issue the entire time of the Harper Conservatives to adopt this tough-on-crime approach, where they did bring in mandatory minimums. In fact, those are the mandatory minimums that are being struck down by the courts as being unconstitutional, because the Conservatives did not care about the law and they did not care about the Constitution; they cared about trying to look like they were tough on crime to the public.

By the way, if those methods worked and were effective, I might support them, but they do not.

[Criminal Code, June 9th, 2022]

Madam Speaker, of course, I guess this is a matter of perspective. If one believes that punishing people more harshly and putting addicts and people with mental illness in jail cells for longer will keep communities safe, then I suppose one will critique this bill, as the official opposition is doing.

However, we actually believe it is important to make an individualized assessment of what has happened, get to the root cause of the crime and address that as a better approach for that person, who has transgressed our laws. I do not want in any way to be taken to say that I am countenancing the violation of our laws. That is wrong, and we as parliamentarians need to do everything we can to stop that. The question is whether we adopt effective measures to do so. Between spreading misinformation or using crime as a political wedge issue and adopting evidence-based policy that works, I certainly prefer the latter approach, and I urge all of my colleagues to do the same.