House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2021, with 48% of the vote.
Questions Passed as Orders for Returns December 6th, 2024
With regard to government funding provided to Conavi Medical, since November 4, 2015, and broken down by department or agency: what are the details of all such funding, including, for each instance, the (i) date, (ii) amount, (iii) type of funding (grant, loan, contract for goods, etc.), (iv) purpose of the funding, (v) program under which the funding came?
Questions Passed as Orders for Returns December 6th, 2024
With regard to government funding provided to Thornhill Medical, since November 4, 2015, and broken down by department or agency: what are the details of all such funding, including, for each instance, the (i) date, (ii) amount, (iii) type of funding (grant, loan, contract for goods, etc.), (iv) purpose of the funding, (v) program under which the funding came?
Privilege November 21st, 2024
Yes, it is a lot of scandal, and it is way too much scandal, because it involves billions of dollars of taxpayer money that has been recklessly spent and has been defrauded from taxpayers.
Mr. Speaker, we as a country can do so much better. We as a Parliament can do so much better.
When the Prime Minister was elected, he issued mandate letters to each of his ministers, in which he demanded that they be transparent and accountable to Parliament. Now this very Prime Minister is violating the very mandates that he had purported to impose on his ministers.
It should not surprise anyone that minister after minister becomes embroiled in their own scandal, like the other Randy scandal that we have been dealing with in the House, where a minister of the Crown got involved in a shady company, pretended that he was indigenous when he is not, and then got government contracts by pretending his company was indigenous when it is not.
It has been said that a fish rots from the head down, and that is an apt description of the government. When the head of a government, the prime minister himself, is not willing to comply with ethical standards imposed by the law and is convicted on two occasions of conflicts of interest, we can expect that all those on his team will follow suit, and here we are today. We have this scandal, one of dozens of scandals.
We as a country can do better, and surely we as a Parliament can do better.
Privilege November 21st, 2024
Mr. Speaker, it is interesting to hear these interruptions, because obviously my words have touched a nerve on that side. It is very clear that the NDP-Liberal coalition is really worried about where this scandal is taking it and the government.
What was the Prime Minister's response? There was a request that came from the House of Commons that the government deliver to the House of Commons, to parliamentarians, all the documents having to do with this green slush fund scandal, a Liberal scandal. The Speaker specifically directed the government to deliver those documents. Of course, what the Prime Minister did not want to do was deliver any of those documents, so he did what his government has done so regularly. He engaged in something called “redaction”. That is just a fancy word for censoring documents. They took all those documents and they blacked them out, pages and pages of just black. There is nothing, no information of value, to glean from those documents. The Prime Minister then delivered those documents. The Speaker had expressly instructed that those documents be delivered in unredacted form.
What did the Prime Minister do? He thumbed his nose at the Speaker, at the Speaker's chair. The Speaker understands. He is the highest authority in Parliament. There is no appeal from his decision. When he orders the government to deliver documents, there is no appeal from that decision and it must be complied with. The Prime Minister thumbed his nose at parliamentarians and at the law. He thumbed his nose at Canadians. That is why we are in the House and why the business of the House has ground to a halt.
It has nothing to do with obstruction. It has to do with our intent to get to the bottom of this rottenness that has infected the Liberal government. The Prime Minister has presided over the most corrupt government in Canadian history. In fact, one of my colleagues on the Conservative side recently cited statistics that showed that one-third of all major scandals in Canada's complete history, from 1867 until now, had taken place under the Liberal government. It is unbelievable that this should happen in today's day and age.
Privilege November 21st, 2024
Mr. Speaker, I do not relish the opportunity to return to this debate, but it is important because it is about a thoroughly corrupt government hiding documents that would shed light and transparency on one of the biggest spending scandals in Canada's history. In fact, this green slush fund scandal, which has been laid at the feet of the Liberal government, is far bigger than the sponsorship scandal that cratered the Chrétien government.
This is important because it is about accountability. As my colleague from Toronto—St. Paul's said, it is about accountability, transparency and the responsible use of Canadians' hard-earned dollars, all of which have been wasted by the government and Liberal insiders, who are involved in graft and corruption.
Now, before I delve more deeply into this green slush fund scandal, I did want to chat very briefly and direct some comments to the residents of Abbotsford. This is a community that has supported me for 19 years. By the time I leave this chamber, it will be probably closer to 20 years. They have been very loyal to me. I have been able to win six elections. Each time they have trusted me to represent them with integrity in this House.
I have had the opportunity during that period of time to help shape Canada's trade policy with trade agreements like the European free trade agreement with Canada, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, our trade agreement with South Korea. By the way, that also included negotiating Canada's free trade agreement with Ukraine. It is not a Liberal accomplishment. The original free trade agreement with Ukraine was negotiated under Stephen Harper.
Over those years, I was also able to deliver on a number of infrastructure priorities for my community, for example, the McCallum Road overpass, the Clearbrook Road overpass and the Mill Lake spray park. I was able to deliver on some social priorities, like the youth and gang crime prevention funding that keeps youth out of gangs and violent crime.
However, the biggest ask I have made of the government, and I ask members to take note of this, was that the government step up to the plate and help Abbotsford avoid future natural disasters. As members may recall, back in 2021, Abbotsford suffered through the worst natural disaster in British Columbia's history. The damage was in the billions of dollars. International trade was brought to a halt because goods could not come to and from the Vancouver port, because railways could not get their products to the port. Highway 1 one was completely severed. All this was because of a massive flood in the Abbotsford area on Sumas Prairie. Thousands of livestock drowned.
With billions of dollars of economic activity at stake and with lives at stake, one would think that the government would have stepped up and helped Abbotsford. In fact, what happened is the Prime Minister, as he is wont to do, showed up in Abbotsford. It was time for a photo op. He met with all the business leaders and the political leaders in Abbotsford, and said, “I have got your back.”
In fact, let me quote exactly what he said.
We'll be there for the clean up and the rebuilding after the impacts of these extreme weather events. It's really going to be important that Canadians continue to do what we do, which is being there for each other in this difficult situation and we will continue to be.
That is what the Prime Minister said to the residents of Abbotsford and some of the other flood-affected communities in British Columbia. He made a promise to deliver the help residents need to mitigate against future events like these.
More recently, the cities of Abbotsford and Merritt and the Town of Princeton all put in applications for the government to step up to the plate and do what the Prime Minister had promised he would do and deliver the kind of funding required to be able to build diking and pumping infrastructure that would prevent these kinds of events from happening again. The government said no. For anyone watching in Canada, especially the residents of Abbotsford, they must understand that the City of Abbotsford made an application to the federal government for funding to replace and enhance the Barrowtown Pump Station, provide additional diking and strengthen existing dikes so that a massive flood event would not happen again. The Prime Minister said no.
In case any of my Liberal colleagues over there suggest that this promise was never made, more recently, one of the members of the government approached me in a moment of candidness and said, “Ed, we really failed Abbotsford. I am so sorry. We promised to deliver support and we did not.” That is at the feet of the Liberal government. It is only one in a host of scandals that have surrounded the Prime Minister and his corrupt, unethical government.
That is only the tip of the iceberg. Today we are talking about the green slush fund scandal. I want to explain a bit about what that scandal entails. There is an organization called Sustainable Development Technology Canada, which was created to support small and medium-sized businesses that had innovations in the green technology space that would help Canadians become more technologically advanced and environmentally sustainable. There is merit in that. We all want to do our part for the environment. The Prime Minister asked this organization to create a new fund, let us call it the billion-dollar fund, to help young entrepreneurs and small and medium-sized businesses to perhaps expand markets, do further research, develop their products, market their products in a way that Canada could find a way of leveraging our strengths and educational expertise to deliver value for Canadians and at the same time respond to the emergent environmental challenges that our world faces.
Instead of doing what was right, which was to evaluate each application to the green slush fund on its merits, something quite different happened. The Prime Minister appointed a board to administer, evaluate and assess these applications. The directors of the board, who have a fiduciary duty, not only to SDTC, but to the taxpayers of Canada, instead of evaluating these projects on their merits and declaring conflicts of interest when they arose, enriched themselves by awarding these monies to themselves through their own companies.
Remember, this is a government organization that is supposed to administer taxpayer money. It is basically holding this money in trust for taxpayers to make sure that Canadians get value for that money.
Instead of the directors doing their job and discharging their fiduciary duty, they said that they had companies and that they would love to skim millions of dollars off the top to give to their own companies, which would benefit because that would increase profits in the companies. The directors would get dividends and become rich as a result. That is exactly what those directors did. They stole money from taxpayers and funnelled it to their own companies. By any account or standard, that is a scandal. It is corruption and graft of the highest order.
As I said when I spoke earlier, I fully expect that people are going to go to jail as a result of this scandal. Will it be members of this House of Commons who go to jail as a result, or members of the cabinet? We do not know. Will Liberal insiders go to jail as a result of this? We do not know.
Privilege November 5th, 2024
Madam Speaker, I did not hear a question but I thank the member for Kingston and the Islands for his very kind words. I have loved being a part of this parliamentary family in the House of Commons. I love my colleagues across the aisle as well. We often disagree, sometimes vehemently. Occasionally we heckle each other but hopefully it is always in a good natured way. I always appreciate a witty comment or two.
However, as we move forward, we need to restore Canadians' trust in the institution of Parliament. That is something I see declining rapidly. We cannot afford this as a country, and I hope that whoever follows me and whoever follows the current government after the carbon tax election will be able to restore that trust in government that Canadians expect.
Privilege November 5th, 2024
Madam Speaker, let me just say something about integrity. I am a great believer in something called servant leadership. It is about serving others, putting the interests of others ahead of our own. That requires character.
That is the one thing I have found missing in the government, the character to lead this country with distinction and honour and to admit when it is wrong, to admit when it has screwed up. That is at the heart of what it means to be a servant leader, acknowledging, in complete humility, that we do not always get it right. I do not always get it right. Nobody in the House gets it right all the time. We should be open enough and humble enough to admit that. That is one thing I have found missing, and it is so desperately needed in government nowadays, to restore the integrity Canadians expect of their elected leaders here in Ottawa.
Privilege November 5th, 2024
Madam Speaker, any investigation starts with the proper information and that proper information has not been provided by the government. This Parliament and this Speaker have determined that there are documents within the possession of the current government that are salient and relevant to an investigation of the green slush fund scandal. Until we receive that documentation, Parliament's hands are bound and our police authorities' hands are bound.
We are looking for documents to be delivered, as instructed by the Speaker. I have confidence that he has made the right decision and it is the majority of the members of this House who have supported him in that decision. We will not rest until we get those documents, unredacted.
Privilege November 5th, 2024
Madam Speaker, over the last 20 years, I do not think we have experienced the kind of affordability crisis that Canada sees today, and I thank the member for mentioning the affordability crisis. However, the best thing she and her NDP colleagues could do is force a carbon tax election so that Canadians can judge the failed Liberal government and install a Conservative government that would axe the tax and would build the homes and would stop the crime and would fix the budget.
Privilege November 5th, 2024
Madam Speaker, I would be glad to respond to the question.
I noticed that the member for Saint John—Rothesay qualified the letter by including “where privacy interests exists”. Of course, privacy interests are sacrosanct in Canada. There is a reason why we have privacy interests in Canada, and we protect them at all costs. There is nothing that prevents this Parliament from receiving the documentation that we have asked for and protecting the privacy interests of those who may be implicated. Therefore, there is no reason for the Prime Minister to defy the Speaker.
Imagine if the Speaker ordered documents, knowing full well that privacy interests are impaired. However, they are not. This is not an issue of charter rights being impaired. This is an issue of the integrity of this House and the transparency of the government.