Erin O'Toole

[Canada Pension Plan, November 28th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour for me to rise today in the House of Commons from my new perch here in the back row. It is my first speech, since taking this spot, to engage with more Canadians. As I said when I was first elected and sat in the corner over there, any seat in this chamber is a true honour to occupy, and I think all members on all sides would agree with that.

I am glad to be speaking again about CPP reform and specifically about Bill C-26, because this, yet again, is an example of a government absolutely disconnected from the reality of the economy.

We have a jobs crisis in Canada right now, and this legislation would lead to fewer jobs. The finance department has confirmed that.

It is a jobs crisis of epic proportions, and the Prime Minister and the finance minister have done nothing. In fact, they have made it more difficult for employers to hire people, and I will spend a few moments talking about that.

Where is the crisis most acute? It is in Alberta, where 200,000 Canadians, families, are without the certainty and the confidence a job provides. If that alone is not a crisis, I do not know what is. I am very proud of my colleagues from Alberta who have been raising this in the House daily for the last year. We have yet to see a plan of any sort from the Liberal government.

The epicentre of our jobs crisis in Canada is in the west, which we have to remember kept Canada moving forward through the great recession of 2008-09, when Canada led the G-7 in economic growth and job creation after the worse recession since the thirties. We relied on family members in Alberta, Saskatchewan, British Columbia, and Manitoba, and now the government is turning a blind eye to that crisis.

In Calgary, the unemployment rate is 9%. People were coming from around the world to work there because of the opportunities in the last generation. The government has no plan. The unemployment rate in Edmonton is roughly 8%, and there is not even an acknowledgement, in a serious way, of that prolonged state of affairs.

Let us look at whether this is just a global commodity cycle, which I have heard members of this government sometimes suggest, instead of their inaction. Let us look at the parliamentary budget officer's recent report on the labour market. Let us look at what the PBO found on job creation in Canada. I will quote from page 1, which really summarizes the PBO's report,

The Canadian economy created 96,000 (net) jobs from Q3 2015 to Q3 2016, which is half the average annual gain of 192,000 over the previous five years.

That is when our party was in charge of the economy, so the Liberals are not even batting half our average. I will continue.

Job gains from Q3 2015 to Q3 2016 were entirely part-time and mostly in the private sector. Full-time and public sector employment contracted.

Does that not underscore the crisis we are experiencing? Is that not a call to action for the Liberal government? When is the government going to come to grips with the economy?

The $30 billion the Prime Minister has spent to put us in deficit has created zero full-time jobs. We will hear the Minister of Innovation and the ACOA minister, who is in Mississauga, I might add, speak about jobs, but they are part-time jobs.

We remember the election, when the Prime Minister, the third-party leader at the time, said that Canada was in a recession. That was false then, and it was proven false afterward. He said he would spend no more than a $10-billion modest deficit. That was another false claim. He spent $30 billion. Why did he say he was going to go into deficit? It was to stimulate job creation. That is false. He has created zero full-time jobs, according to the PBO. This is the job crisis we are in, yet the Prime Minister is going around the world, spending our money elsewhere, and has no plan for job creation at home.

The last time I rose in the House to speak on this very subject, 2,000 jobs at Bombardier were lost, so this is not just a job crisis in western Canada; it is a Liberal job crisis.

What is worse, the unemployment rate for young people has remained fixed at 13%, which is unreasonably high. What was the response of the finance minister? It was that our young Canadians should get accustomed to job churn. That is shameful absence of leadership. In fact, I think it is the modern equivalent of “Let them eat cake”, a comment that is disconnected from the reality our young people are facing. Rather than saying “We're working on innovation jobs, working on clusters, and making sure there are more people going into the STEM fields and coding”, he said, “You'd better get used to unpaid internships and being underemployed”. That is a failure of leadership.

Why are we in this crisis? Taxes are going up on job creators and entrepreneurs, who are highly mobile. Taxes are going up on small and medium-sized businesses that have had their previous tax reduction decreased. We have a carbon tax, which on the weekend the environment minister said would make our economy more competitive, showing the height of her disconnect from reality. Today, we are discussing a payroll tax. In one year, the run up in the deficit and the taxation of people, businesses, and consumption is unparalleled in Canadian history. In fact, it would take multiple Liberal governments of the past to introduce so many different types of tax increases all in one year.

Getting back to Bill C-26, what did Finance Canada's own report say about the CPP reforms? It said that 10,000-plus job losses would result from these reforms in the bill in the coming years. We are in a job crisis. We are creating a carbon tax that would raise the import costs of manufacturers in Ontario, and the costs of farmers in the west and across the country, and of people who are hauling lobster and trying to get it sent over to Europe to be sold, and of the lumber industry. Higher costs on all those people translates into higher costs for families and seniors. Now we are doing a payroll tax that the minister's own department has said will lead to 10,500 job losses in the coming years. His own department has said so. It is staggering.

What have the leading groups that work with employers said? The Canadian Chamber of Commerce and the Canadian Federation of Independent Business have both implored the government not to bring in a payroll tax at a time when we are trying to get corporations, small and large, to use some retained earnings to hire one or two more people. We are putting a payroll tax on them and stopping them from hiring more people, whether by a 1% increase in premiums today or a 4% increase in coming years.

As I have said many times in the House, there is no crisis in retirement savings. In fact, who claimed the media was “fear-mongering” with regard to a retirement crisis? It was the finance minister in his book with his actuary at Morneau Shepell, Fred Vettese, in a book called The Real Retirement. They said it was fear-mongering. Well, the finance minister is now relying on that fear-mongering to bring this bill forward.

Who will it help? Ipsos Reid showed that 70% of Canadians do not realize that retirees and people near retirement will not benefit. In fact, Fred Vettese, the chief actuary at Morneau Shepell, has said it will only help 8.7% of middle-income Canadians boost their retirement income. It will not help people on the low end, those we were trying to help when we were in government, with GST reductions and other things, and not people at the high end. It will only help 8.7% of people in the middle. That translates into 5% of Canadians who in the future might have some modest increase in retirement income, if they do not use RRSPs, if they do not get the value from their home, and if they do not use the TFSA that minister Flaherty brought in. Therefore, potentially 5% would benefit while 95% of Canadians would pay, and employers, whom we are imploring to hire more people, are forced to pay premiums for every new person they hire.

It is shameful, in the midst of a jobs crisis, the government is introducing yet another tax that would lead to more Canadians being unemployed.

We must stop it here. We have to focus on job creation for the future.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2016, No. 2, October 31st, 2016]

Madam Speaker, I would like to seize upon the question just asked by my Liberal friend from Winnipeg, who seems to assess the progress and nature of budgets by how big their deficit is. Certainly, burdening our future with the debts of today is not progressive. I would contrast this, and the hon. member touched on it in his speech, with the fact that in the last election the NDP tried to offer a plan for the future that was not just runaway deficits. Also, a number of the tax provisions the Conservative government provided for low-income families, particularly cutting the GST, which consumed most of the lowest income level earners household income, would be progressive.

In reference to what the member for Winnipeg North just asked, suggesting that the Liberals' budget was the most progressive in history, is that just from their running a deficit? I noticed he mentioned that the Liberals liked to run as the NDP in elections and then govern in an entirely different way. Would the member comment further on that?

[Canada Pension Plan, October 21st, 2016]

Madam Speaker, what concerns me most about the government is that on fiscal and economic policy affecting all Canadians, it says one thing one day and then takes a totally opposite view the next.

The Prime Minister opposed deficits, then it turned into a $10-billion deficit, and now we have a $30-billion deficit. The Minister of Finance is the same. Before he ran, when he was a pension executive in Toronto, he wrote a book called The Real Retirement that said that retirees were much better off than most experts were saying, but today he says that people cannot retire in dignity. In his book, he said that it makes little sense to incent early retirement, yet he then rolled back old age security modernization. Today he talks about this being the right time and says there will actually be job gains. That contradicts what his own department is saying, which is that there will be job losses as a result of these reforms.

On a morning when Bombardier has just announced 2,000 layoffs, amid an economic crisis in Alberta, the flight of capital, and the imposition of a carbon tax that will make manufacturing uncompetitive in Ontario, why is the government implementing yet another barrier to job creation in Canada?

[Standing Orders and Procedure, October 6th, 2016]

Tell your foreign affairs minister.

[Standing Orders and Procedure, October 6th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, since the member is a parliamentary secretary, I have the occasion to talk about section 114 of the Standing Orders. I would like to know his position on the membership of standing committees.

The Prime Minister made much fanfare about parliamentary secretaries not being part of our standing committees, yet many parliamentary secretaries attend and regularly try to disrupt or control the progress of said committees, including the hon. member. Therefore, if it was the Prime Minister's pledge to not have parliamentary secretaries be part of committees under chapter XIII, and particularly section 114, of the Standing Orders, would the hon. member pledge to the House today to no longer attend committee, as per the pledge of his Prime Minister, and today pledge to make the comment of the Prime Minister that parliamentary secretaries will no longer be members of a committee and no longer interfere with the progress of a committee part of the Standing Orders?

[National Seal Products Day Act, October 3rd, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for bringing this issue forward, and for wearing his charming bow tie.

Could the member comment on the troubling issue of people sometimes judging a practice or a cultural element of a society, such as the seal hunt in Newfoundland and Labrador, without having even appreciated, visited or gotten to know the people who engage in that traditional practice, whether that be first nations or Newfoundlanders and Labradorians? We all remember the case of celebrities coming onto ice floes and not being sure what province or part of the country they were in, yet condemning this practice that had been a livelihood for people for generations.

Would the member care to comment on how debates like this in the chamber can allow for a thoughtful discussion of how a diverse country like Canada has these unique traditions and heritages that should not be condemned by people who do not even know the people involved or the practice at issue?

[Highway of Heroes Durham LAV Monument, September 28th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to rise today as the member of Parliament for Durham mere days after our community unveiled the Highway of Heroes Durham LAV Monument, remembering the service and sacrifice of Canadians in Afghanistan.

The passionate volunteers in this project made it possible: Tom Quigley, Stacey Haley, Logan Caswell, Mayor Foster, and the entire Clarington team.

The Afghanistan war was the longest in Canadian Forces history; 40,000 Canadians served their country there, and 158 gave their lives.

As the wounds of this conflict still heal, it is critical for Canada to recognize and commemorate the service and sacrifice of our citizens. That is why I am so proud that in Bowmanville, Ontario, next to the Highway of Heroes, there is now our region giving Canada a way to show that we will remember them.

[National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act, September 27th, 2016]

Madam Speaker, we all have pride in our security agencies but I am a little disappointed in the minister responsible for them today, first for not introducing debate on the bill, and second, for having the gall to reference my letter to him in debate, my letter which was the first of two written in collaboration with the NDP to talk about this. The minister refused all meetings. He also refused meetings with some of the leading experts he quoted in his speech to get this right. My letter said a Privy Council appointment and the oaths ascribed to that should be part of this committee if the committee was going to see real information.

The government has so many exceptions to Bill C-22 that this committee would just be window dressing. We want to see amendments, as does the NDP, so that we can make this work from a political basis and for our practical security needs.

I would remind the minister that when he was involved as House leader in the Milliken decision with respect to Afghan detainee documents, he demanded such disclosure of information to members of Parliament. Now he is denying that same disclosure. Which member is it? Is it the member for Regina—Wascana now or the member for Wascana in 2010 whose words in this place should ring true? I would like the member to square that circle.

I would also like the minister to say why he voted Motion No. 431 for the election of chairs and now refuses to allow a chair to be elected? Why does he now not seem to respect the privilege outlined in the Speaker Milliken decision? He is talking about earning trust, yet he denied the ability to work with the opposition to get this right.

We hope this debate is an opportunity for the minister to listen and make the amendments needed.

[National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act, September 27th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, there are certainly no members in the House of Commons who use their privilege to speak on occasions more than my friend from Winnipeg North. I would note that my colleague and friend from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan is on his heels when it comes to speaking the most in the House, so he had better stand up more often to keep that title.

The member spoke about the charter, which we respect a great deal. He should also respect the privilege of parliamentarians. Since he speaks in the House more than anyone else, he should want to make sure that parliamentarians have unfettered access to holding the government to account. Speaker Milliken, the member's former colleague, said that it was an undisputed right of parliamentarians. This bill would violate that undisputed right.

I could have stood on a point of privilege rather than on debate, but I want to work with the government. I have tried since March. I said that this issue is not just a Liberal or a Conservative issue. I mentioned my friend from Malpeque. Huge Segal, the Conservative senator, had a bill on this issue. Conservatives support the supremacy of Parliament perhaps far more than the Liberals do.

In my preparations for this debate, I talked to Ron Atkey and Chuck Strahl, both distinguished former Conservative parliamentarians who have eminent respect and knowledge about security. It is about time the government listened to them as well.

[National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act, September 27th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, I outlined in my remarks the member for Victoria's extensive background and national renown on security and legal security issues. He has tried to bring a thoughtful and learned approach to debate. He was privy to my March 1 letter, in which, collectively, we tried to engage with the minister in this process to make sure that the committee got off to a start that was not political. The minister was not interested.

Going back to the election of the chair, the credentials of my friend from Victoria are so extensive that he may have wanted to stand for chair of this committee. According to Motion No. 431, he could have justified that to the House, and Parliament could have decided for itself. My friend from Ottawa South could have done the exact same thing, or with a smaller body of MPs on the actual committee. What is ironic, and what I pointed out, is that the minister voted for Motion No. 431, the motion in the last Parliament on the election of chairs, and so did the member for Ottawa South.

Every time we stand in the House to vote on an issue, it is an important decision. If we believe in it at the time, then we should share with Canadians why we no longer believe in it several years later. Since it was also in the Liberal election platform to make committees and chairs of committees accountable and more effective, the Prime Minister and his ministers should justify why they are deviating from that promise and their track record of supporting it in the past.

I quoted the President of the Treasury Board, the member for Kings—Hants, who spoke in favour of Motion No. 431. I hope he is not silent at the cabinet table, much like he must have been when they were taking away an Atlantic Supreme Court justice.