François Choquette

[Business of Supply, June 13th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his question and comments.

He has shown the whole scandal, all the problems that were disclosed week after week, for six weeks running. Nearly every other day, there was something new showing that Ms. Meilleur’s appointment was not made by the book or impartially, and that she had special rights and privileged access to the most senior officials in the Liberal government and around the Prime Minister. I am talking about Gerald Butts and Katie Telford. There was no final interview with the Minister of Canadian Heritage, who herself, here in the House, stated that Ms. Meilleur had never had any special contact with Katie Telford and Gerald Butts. However, Ms. Meilleur herself confirmed that fact to the Standing Committee on Official Languages and to the Senate committee.

In fact, there have been problems since the beginning. That is why the process must be reviewed, and we are proposing one today.

[Business of Supply, June 13th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, the process put in place by the Liberals seemed to be working very well. However, the government threw a spanner in the works when some people were given privileges and were able to meet with the most senior officials in the Liberal government, the people closest to the Prime Minister.

In addition, the members of the firm they retained to do the screening did not even know that a commissioner had been selected. They learned that from the media, although they were supposed to call the candidates who had not been selected. Even the finalists learned about Ms. Meilleur’s appointment from the media. The process was therefore compromised.

We also know that the final evaluation was done by the heritage minister, although two of her employees formerly worked for Madeleine Meilleur. The process became more and more compromised as it moved along.

That is what we are telling our colleague. The process is not entirely flawed, but it has to be reviewed.

[Business of Supply, June 13th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I am both happy and sad at being required to stand in the House today regarding this motion, and that the NDP was required to table it. Contrary to what my colleague has just stated, the appointment process for senior parliamentary officials is flawed. It does not work. It has been damaged and has lost a lot of credibility.

I would like to inform the House that I will be sharing my time with the excellent member for Sherbrooke, the champion of mandatory labelling of GMOs. That is another fight that we are leading together to ensure that one day there will be transparency and all Canadians will know what they are eating.

That is the transparency that we also want to see in the appointment process for the highest offices in government. Officers of Parliament are hired by Parliament, not by the Liberal government. It is important for the Liberals to understand that. Officers of Parliament are not only accountable to the government, they are also accountable to Parliament.

Those officers of Parliament are our watchdogs. They ensure that the government follows the rules and the laws. It is very important to have these impartial people. That is the entire problem with the last appointment.

I will come back to that, as it is a matter that I followed with much interest. It took up almost six weeks of my time and the time of official language communities, including FCFA and QCGN members. They all lost precious time because of the partisan appointment of Madeleine Meilleur, instead of working on extremely important official languages issues, such as immigration in official language communities. We are facing a major problem, as we are not meeting our immigration targets.

Early childhood is another important issue. If we want to ensure that younger generations are committed to our official language communities, children must be able to attend day care in French, or in English in Quebec.

These are issues that we must address. In the meantime, we must ensure that the appointment process is not tainted by Liberal partisanship.

The new process was used to appoint Ms. Meilleur. We are not calling into question everything about the new process. The problem is that the process was undermined internally because Madeleine Meilleur had privileged access to the Prime Minister's senior officials, people in charge of the Liberal machine. I am talking about Katie Telford and Gerry Butts.

Ms. Meilleur had coffee with these people, which is something that the other candidates did not have the opportunity to do. Then, after enjoying that privileged access, she got a call from a public servant at the Department of Justice, which is quite an impressive thing.

On Thursday, May 18, 2017, when Madeleine Meilleur appeared before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Official Languages, she was asked who had told her that she was the candidate who had been selected.

She said, “I got a telephone call that my name was going to be put forward to the Prime Minister.”

She was then asked who had called her, and she responded, “It was staff from the Minister of Justice.”

She was asked on what date that had occurred and she answered, “It was late April, I think.”

We all know what happened next.

In April, an employee of the Department of Justice called Madeleine Meilleur to tell her that she was the successful candidate. In May, the opposition leaders received a letter telling them that Ms. Meilleur had been selected. There was no consultation.

How can we talk about consultation when Ms. Meilleur was already told last April that she had the job?

If there had been consultation, the leaders of the opposition parties would have been consulted, and Ms. Meilleur would then have been advised that her appointment had also been approved by the leaders of the opposition. The process in this case was completely backwards. That does not work.

This whole affair so undermined the credibility of the process that the FCFA said that it absolutely had to have a meeting, because the process was not working and there were outcries on all sides. The FCFA and the QCGN stated that they absolutely had to meet with the highest office holder in official languages, the Prime Minister of the country, who is responsible for official languages. They requested a meeting with the Prime Minister of Canada. Numerous newspaper articles mentioned that the FCFA and the QCGN wanted to meet with the Prime Minister because this was a serious situation. It is unprecedented for an appointment to be questioned that way, during six weeks of total unending controversy.

It did not end there. People filed complaints with the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages because the Liberal government, the Prime Minister’s Office, did not comply with the Official Languages Act. Subsection 49(1) was breached. I myself filed a complaint, along with other Canadians. Why? Because that section is very important. It clearly states that “[t]he Governor in Council shall…appoint a Commissioner of Official Languages for Canada after consultation with the leader of every recognized party in the Senate and House of Commons…”, which was not done.

That is the second time that I file a complaint against the Prime Minister. The other time was when he wanted to speak only in English in Ontario, while on a cross-country consultation, a consultation of all Canadians. There are official language communities that speak only French in Ontario. After that, he went to the Sherbrooke area, the riding of my colleague and champion of GMO labelling. He spoke only in French, saying that he would not answer questions in English. That is a failure to recognize the reality of Canada. There are two official languages.

When you are Prime Minister of Canada and you embark on a cross-Canada consultation, you must respect both official languages, hence my question:

Does anyone think that I or any other Canadian citizen would have been able to file a complaint against the Prime Minister if the commissioner had been a personal friend of the Prime Minister's, a personal friend of the highest-ranking people in government and the Liberal Party? I am talking about Katie Telford and Gerald Butts.

Does anyone think I would have been comfortable with that?

According to subsection 58(4), the commissioner has the right to refuse to investigate. The Act says:

The Commissioner may refuse to investigate or cease to investigate any complaint if in the opinion of the Commissioner (a) the subject-matter of the complaint is trivial; (b) the complaint is frivolous or vexatious...; or (c) the subject-matter of the complaint does not involve a contravention...of this Act....

Ms. Meilleur could have rejected the complaint. How would I have known if it had to do with a different assessment of the situation or a desire to protect her Liberal friends?

To say that what has happened up to now was legitimate is false. The process was completely undermined. It needs to be revised and revamped. The vision set out in my colleague's motion is a good one. It outlines a process that includes opposition parties and relevant communities and guards against bad decisions like the one to appoint Madeleine Meilleur.

My colleague said that she was a very good candidate. Despite having all the skills, however, her one flaw is that she is too close to the government. She lacks impartiality, which is critical to serving in a watchdog position such as official languages commissioner. Commissioners are the highest-ranking officers in Parliament.

In conclusion, I hope that the Liberal government will implement a better process for the very important appointments that it will soon be making.

[Business of Supply, June 13th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I had time to hear a few snippets of my colleague's speech, as I just came from the Standing Committee on Official Languages, which I am a member of.

On the topic of appointing commissioners, specifically the official languages commissioner, subsection 49(1) of the Official Languages Act compels the government to consult the leaders of the official opposition before appointing a commissioner.

I would like to hear my hon. colleague's thoughts on the fact that Madeleine Meilleur, the government's choice for the position, said that she was told back in April that she would be the next commissioner, in a call from the Deputy Minister of Justice. The opposition leaders were not informed until sometime in May.

Does my colleague think the current process is working? It appears to be breaking the law.

[Government Appointments, June 8th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, after the debacle with Madeleine Meilleur's appointment, I hope that the government understands that there cannot be any partisanship in the appointment of officers of Parliament.

The position of official languages commissioner is a vital one because the person who holds that position ensures respect for both official languages and the law. The commissioner works for Parliament, not for the Prime Minister.

Does the government commit today to follow the process established in the Official Languages Act and truly consult the opposition leaders?

[Paris Agreement, June 6th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to repeat what I said in the brief minute I had earlier and to talk about the fight against climate change.

I am truly disappointed that we are bringing back a motion to say that we will continue to support the Paris agreement. We support the Paris agreement. Why do we need a motion? What we need is action. We are being told that a price has been put on carbon. That is all fine and good, but what are we waiting for to eliminate, for example, all direct and indirect subsidies to the fossil fuel industries?

We are giving $1.3 billion to $1.5 billion per year to the fossil fuel industry instead of investing it in renewable energy and helping northern communities to make an energy transition, so that they need not draw electricity from diesel fuel. Those are the kinds of new measures we are waiting for.

In 2016, we were expecting $1 billion along with the Minister of the Environment's climate action plan. Funding has been postponed not to 2017 or 2018, but to 2019. We are short $3 billion. Yes, we would have preferred a motion that brought about action, not a motion just to say once again that we agree on the Paris agreement. Everyone knows that.

[Carbon Pricing, June 6th, 2017]

How very generous of you, Mr. Speaker. I have a minute; I am not sure where to start.

This motion comes from the Conservative Party, that withdrew from the Kyoto protocol in 2012. Let us not forget those were very difficult times. They were certainly difficult for me and for many of my colleagues in the House of Commons.

Let us also recall that same party eliminated the national round table on the environment and the economy, the only institution that linked the economy with the environment. The Conservative Party did that. It was very disappointing.

The study conducted by the national round table on the environment and the economy showed that not fighting climate change comes at a cost.

[Carbon Pricing, June 6th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for raising the climate change issue again. This is an important issue that we talk about regularly in the House, fortunately. Still, the Liberals' measures are disappointing. They put a price on carbon, but that is the only good thing they have done.

My Conservative colleague keeps calling it a carbon tax, but what he is referring to is a carbon pricing system. For example, in Quebec and Ontario, there will be a carbon exchange, a cap-and-trade market that prices emissions allowances. This is not just about a price on carbon.

As for the economic disaster that carbon pricing could trigger, here is what Équiterre has to say:

To those who fear the economy will fall apart, I would like to point out that, when Quebec put a price on carbon, it was able to create jobs, boost the GDP, and reduce GHG emissions.

Seventy university researchers from across Canada have said that we must put a price on carbon and that it will help grow our economy and fight climate change. That is what science has to say about it.

[June 5th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech on the budget implementation bill.

As we have mentioned many times, it is a mammoth bill. The Liberals swore that they would never proceed in such a way. They also said that they would not bring in time allocation at every turn. They are on track to beating the previous government's sad record. It is truly pitiful.

I want to talk to my colleague about something I am sure we will agree on: the infrastructure privatization bank.

Does my hon. colleague not agree that time allocation should not have been brought in and that we should have taken the time to properly study this infrastructure privatization bank? Our smaller and rural communities will not have access to this funding, which they desperately need for infrastructure investments. This bank will actually be harmful to Canadians, because they will take on all the risk while large private corporations rake in the profits.

Does the member not agree that this infrastructure privatization scheme does not pass the smell test and that it is a very bad idea?

[Paris Agreement, June 5th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, indeed, the government should also have invested in affordable housing. I know that my hon. colleague from Hochelaga does a tremendous amount of work on supporting and promoting affordable housing. In future investments, we must ensure that the National Building Code is improved and updated to include energy efficiency in every construction project, not just for homes, but also for buildings, industries, businesses, and other structures.

This is a tangible measure that the Liberal government should have put in place two years ago already. It could have introduced an energy efficiency program that is good not only for fighting climate change, but also for creating jobs and allowing low-income Canadians to save money on heating and their home energy needs.

It is a very important measure that could have been included in the plan to fight climate change. Unfortunately, the Liberal government has yet to do that.