Erin O'Toole

[Foreign Affairs, October 15th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative caucus, like many Canadians, is deeply concerned about reports that Saudi Arabia may be directly involved in the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Will the minister inform this House on actions the government will take against Saudi Arabia if the reports of his death in Saudi custody are confirmed?

[Veterans Affairs, September 28th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Veterans Affairs refuses to apologize to a veteran whom he personally attacked. The minister's own department confirms that Sean Bruyea is right about the Liberals' broken promise on pensions. The War Amps has confirmed there is a Liberal broken promise to veterans, and today we learned that the Library of Parliament has confirmed that Mr. Bruyea's assessment was correct. We do not care about how many meetings the minister has had, because he has been misleading veterans. Will he stand today in the House and apologize to Sean Bruyea for the personal attack?

[Aung San Suu Kyi, September 27th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It relates to a convention of the House, and I will cite Beauchesne's sixth edition, page 151, with respect to “Documents Cited”. It is a convention of the House that when a member of the government, a minister or parliamentary secretary, reads a document into the record of the House, that document will then be tabled.

Today, the parliamentary secretary to the minister responsible for Canada-U.S. relations, the member for Orléans, appeared to read into the record the Liberal NAFTA plan, when he said “no deal is better than a bad deal”. We would like him to table the official Liberal NAFTA plan today.

[Veterans Affairs, September 27th, 2018]

What is tragic, Mr. Speaker, and why Mr. Bruyea brought his small claims case is that the Department of Veterans Affairs told the minister that Mr. Bruyea's complaints about broken Liberal promises on pensions and other things were in fact correct. The minister ignored his own department and sent three government lawyers to crush Mr. Bruyea's lawsuit.

I will ask again. The minister, all week, has said he stands by veterans. Will he show respect for Mr. Bruyea, stand today and apologize?

[Veterans Affairs, September 27th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, Sean Bruyea is a veteran and one of the leading advocates for veterans. I did not always agree with Sean when I was minister, but I always showed him respect, unlike the situation now, and I always knew that he knew his stuff. The current minister chose instead to disrespect Sean and to attack him publicly.

Will the minister rise in the House today, show respect and stand by that veteran and apologize for publicly attacking Sean Bruyea?

[Business of Supply, September 25th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her question.

The member served in the Canadian Armed Forces and I have been proud to do some veterans affairs work with the member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue and I appreciate that. It is a good question.

The determination on benefits is a subjective one, so someone at Veterans Affairs made a decision. It was a wrong decision because there are no programs whatsoever for adult non-dependent children.

Mr. Garnier was in his mid to late twenties when he committed a horrific crime. He was not a dependent child. Even if there were a dependent child, most of the programming, either family-based counselling or some programs with the child directly, relate to operational stress, transference injury from the veteran in the home. The mom or dad who has an injury can affect the wellness of the family. I support those programs. This is not a circumstance where those programs would be eligible, because the PTSD, in the words of the killer's father, do not come from his service in uniform; they come from committing a horrific crime as an adult.

The minister should get to know the files in his own department before he embarrasses himself day after day defending a clear error.

[Business of Supply, September 25th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Winnipeg North said we should apologize to veterans. He should apologize to veterans for eroding their trust by putting a murderer ahead of veterans. He also said they value our veterans. He is a veteran. He served as an air traffic controller. I thanked him publicly for his services and I will again today.

All parliamentarians value our veterans, but right now with the Garnier case, only the Conservatives are listening to our veterans. They are outraged by the fact that a mistake was made. Rather than rectify the mistake, we see privacy concerns. We suggest we are not serving veterans by serving someone who never wore a uniform for one day.

I ask that member who has served to go and speak to the Winnipeg police, the volunteer firefighters outside of Winnipeg, and ask them whether we should be respecting a victim like Catherine Campbell by helping her murderer or rectifying the error that was made at Veterans Affairs.

[Business of Supply, September 25th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, this is one occasion when I am actually sad to have to rise in the House to speak on this issue. I normally begin my remarks with what an honour it is for me to rise on behalf of my constituents in Durham, on behalf of my experiences in the private sector and the charitable space and, as many members of the House know, speak to the issues that affect the Canadian Armed Forces, their families and our veterans. I said last week in the House that the Conservatives were going to be back here every day until the Liberals start to take some sense of ownership of their files. This is people's House. This is the House of Commons, where we are representing our constituents and the concerns of Canadians, be they veterans, family members, first responders or their families who are outraged by this situation.

I should say that I will be splitting my time with the member for Brandon—Souris.

Christopher Garnier is not a veteran. He never served a day in uniform and yet he took the life of Catherine Campbell, who wore two uniforms of service for her community and country. She was a police officer and in her spare time, she was also a volunteer firefighter, a young Canadian we should be proud of and should celebrate the fact that she dedicated so much of her life to serving others. Christopher Garnier snuffed out that life and he should be treated accordingly. He should be given no benefits from the federal government, certainly not those that are safeguarded for veterans.

On all sides of the House, and the member for Winnipeg Centre knows this, we have talked about the sacred obligation to our veterans. My first response when I stood in the House was to echo the words of Sir Robert Borden and the profound duty we owe to our veterans. In fact, I have echoed the sentiment of a World War I veteran who died in that conflict, Talbot Papineau, whose famous family now bears the name of the Prime Minister's seat, on the obligations we owe.

From the moment someone joins the Canadian Armed Forces, at 18, 19, 20 or older until the end of his or her life, we owe veterans that obligation. For those seriously injured, that obligation includes supports, benefits and treatment. Mr. Garnier is not one of those people. There have been a number of absolutely false arguments put forward by the government in its stubborn refusal to just do the right thing, acknowledge there was an error and rectify it.

Mr. Garnier, in September 2015, as the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia has confirmed, killed Catherine Campbell and then desecrated her remains. I will not go into the sordid details, but they are horrific. In December 2017, he was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced in August of this year for killing a fine Canadian. What is horrific as well to not only the family but veterans across the country is that sometime ahead of his sentencing, he started receiving benefits from Veterans Affairs Canada.

The government's own documentation show wait times for assessment are getting past the nine-month mark on average. Therefore, in many ways, Mr. Garnier was placed ahead of veterans who are waiting for operational stress injury support, mainly counselling, psychiatric counselling and peer support services. How a convicted murderer, who never served a day in his life, received those benefits is a scandal and the failure to own that scandal by the Minister of Veterans Affairs is shameful. It was suggested that privacy or other reasons are preventing the discussion. I would invite anyone to see the coverage of the case in The Chronicle Herald newspaper or on CBC, where Mr. Garnier's lawyer told the court that his client has PTSD from committing murder, where the father of the killer admits to the court that his son has PTSD from a murder. That PTSD has nothing to do with his father's service in the Canadian Armed Forces.

However, for the minister to suggest that he does not know the file is a joke. Since I joined the Canadian Armed Forces at the age of 18 until this very day, I have either been in uniform or have been working to support those in it. When I was minister, I admitted where we fell short and worked with veterans to make a plan to make it right. I never lied, I never misled and I always read my briefings. I will debate any member on that side of the House any day on any of the issues related to Canadian Armed Forces and veterans. I will tell them, because the minister, we know from the news, does not read reports but shelves them, that there is not a single program within veterans affairs that Mr. Garnier would be eligible for or programs outside of it.

I was happy as a new member of Parliament to visit Can Praxis in Rocky Mountain House, Alberta, which was trail-blazing equine therapy for a veteran, a first responder, and a member of their family who were struggling. There are some programs available for spouses and dependent children. However, we are not talking about any of those circumstances in the Garnier case. This is an adult, non-dependent who murdered someone. I am sure that murder and the horrific circumstances around it have upset his family, but that has nothing to do with the service related to that veteran. That veteran, the father, needs as much support as we can provide. His adult, non-dependent child is not eligible for any programming, and the very fact that he can be accelerated before his judicial proceeding and sentencing is even complete, receiving benefits that some veterans are waiting for, is a travesty.

What I would like to see instead of the minister hiding behind privacy, when all Canadians can see this entire sordid story online or in the newspaper, is for him to take some ownership. A mistake was made where someone said there was eligibility when there was no eligibility. There is no legislative requirement for Mr. Garnier to get support. There are no privacy concerns that the Liberals cannot discuss it. He is ineligible. In fact, if the father had committed this crime while he was in uniform, he would not be eligible for treatment. That is how black and white this issue is. The fact is that once the Liberals craft a talking point, they will not move away from it, when veterans and Canadians are asking them to show some reality here.

We are always going to have cases where we need to do better, where we find a veteran or their family has fallen through the cracks. Let us fix those cases and rebuild trust, and not erode the trust by showing veterans that we are going to allow someone ineligible to access benefits faster than them.

As the minister should know, if he would read up, the permanent impairment allowance many veterans receive under the new veterans charter, and we increased the PIA supplement, was the focus of my attention as minister. A vast majority of veterans receiving the permanent impairment allowance have operational stress injuries. It has been something the Canadian Armed Forces has been struggling with. I talked about it on the 20th anniversary of the Swissair crash, which was the first time I ever heard “operational stress injury”. That is why we were opening operational stress injury clinics and not administrative offices that people still do not use. It is amazing that the Liberals are still talking about those issues. It shows they do not understand.

As I said last week, if the minister had shown some leadership, I would rise in the House and thank him on behalf of my constituents, on behalf of veterans, for showing that if a mistake was made within the department that he will own, acknowledge and rectify that mistake. If they do not, they will hear us every day, because we are listening to Canadians. We are listening to military families and veterans who are discouraged and disappointed.

It is time for them to show ownership and stop this shameless treatment for Christopher Garnier.

[Small Business, September 24th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the finance minister needs to recognize small business owners cannot wait a year for relief from the tariffs their government is imposing on them. The government is collecting $300 million already in tariffs, but studies show most of that will go to large businesses. Small business owners like the Junkins cannot afford armies of lobbyists and lawyers. They need to access tariff support now. Will the government streamline the application process and make support available to small businesses across Canada in the next month, not next year?

[Small Business, September 24th, 2018]

Mr. Speaker, the Junkin family owns a small business in Port Perry, Ontario and sells boats for recreation. Both Brandon and his wife, Martina, work at the small business as do both of Martina's parents. Like most businesses in this sector, they buy their inventory in the winter for sale in the summer. They have to pay the GST up front, and now they have to pay the Canadian tariffs up front. This means they will buy fewer boats and they will lose money this year.

Why is the government failing to listen to these small businesses? Will the Liberals exempt these boats from the Canadian tariffs?