Françoise Boivin

[Privilege, March 4th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate hearing from the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice. How interesting that they are never quite as forgiving when it comes to justice issues, what with the government imposing pretty harsh minimum sentences.

I am trying to understand the logic behind his rhetoric this afternoon. He seems to be saying that an apology should suffice and that because the person stood up and apologized in the House, the matter should be considered closed.

Does my hon. colleague opposite think this means that when one misleads the House, a simple apology to the House suffices? Is rising and voluntarily apologizing sufficient in all cases? Are there any cases that he feels should go to the committee?

I have so many questions. I know the member apologized, but why did he swear to such clear and precise facts? Sometimes the media accuse members of the House of being vague and imprecise. In this case, it was the opposite. A member persuaded us to believe something by telling us what he saw and observed.

Naturally, when we heard his claims, we had to sit back and think about reconsidering our stance on the bill, but he knew, and this is no excuse, that he was trying to get us to change our minds by telling us things that were not true.

Does my hon. colleague think this means that even if the Speaker finds that the House was misled, a simple apology is always enough? Is that what people on the government benches are claiming?

[The Budget, February 26th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the questions are so short. They could be the topic of an entire dissertation.

As for the 1990s cuts to health and education—what are called social transfers—if we talk to the Canadian provinces, they will say that they never recovered from them.

In the 1990s, the Liberals, under their minister of finance at the time, balanced their budget because lower interest rates helped them and because they slashed transfers to the provinces. Once again, this was done at the expense of Canadians, and it involved the most crucial services, like health and education.

Now I am being told by a Liberal MP that health and education are important issues to the Liberals, when they blithely made cuts to them in the 1990s. I always find that a bit disingenuous, but we are used to it and we live with it.

Do we need a serious agreement to fix the situation? There must be no going through the motions or band-aid solutions, as in the 10-year agreement, which did not necessarily address wait times, contrary to expectations at the time. This is urgent. Health is the priority for Canadians.

[The Budget, February 26th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I will start by talking about transfers.

In my opinion, claiming that there has not been a reduction in transfers to the provinces is also part of the Conservatives' dream. Freezing transfers while health care costs continue to rise obviously puts pressure on provincial budgets. However, the Conservative government brags that it has not reduced the transfer amounts. These repercussions are very real.

As for infrastructure spending, my colleague from Toronto, who is sitting to my right, is doing a fantastic job of making the government aware of the overwhelming infrastructure needs.

Furthermore, the day after the budget was tabled, the mayor of the City of Gatineau said that, for his city, the budget was disappointing on a number of counts, including in terms of infrastructure. The mayors of major cities had high expectations. If you walk around Gatineau, it is obvious that the infrastructure needs are enormous.

I do not believe that the government is doing enough. I think that it can do much better and that the government's funding for infrastructure will not solve the problems and address the enormous infrastructure deficit.

[The Budget, February 26th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by saying that I will be sharing my time with the member for Nickel Belt.

I am pleased to rise in the House to speak on behalf of the people of Gatineau. I had the pleasure of spending the entire week last week consulting people in my riding in order to determine if the government's budget addressed their concerns.

My remarks will touch on three key points. I will begin with some general observations. I will then talk more specifically about the economic situation in my riding, Gatineau. Then, if I have time—10 minutes is not very long—I will talk about the Department of Justice, since I am the justice critic for the official opposition, the NDP.

I want to make a general observation. When I was a little girl, my mother and father taught us how to budget. However, we did not do things the same way they are done here. My father asked us what was important to us, what we liked and how much money we had saved up. Then, he told us how we could spend that money. It was not a piecemeal approach, as it always seems to be here. I am always shocked to see that.

We start with a real brick, what I call the government's sentimental picture, which allows the Conservatives to go around and give the impression that they are taking care of the things that the real world is concerned about.

The government runs advertising that is sometimes empty but nice to look at. On television, during the Olympics, it looked good and gave the impression that the government was doing something.

First there is the budget. Then there is the budget bill, which people have more difficulty understanding and which I often call the pièce de résistance. It comes from the Conservative government, which as usual introduces an omnibus bill that changes tons of legislation.

There are also the main estimates, which will be tabled at a given time. Technically, they should more or less fit with the budget speech and flesh it out. The Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights will study them next week.

I think the supplementary estimates are like getting to the end of the year and realizing there is not enough money because of poor budgeting. Adjustments are made, which takes more money.

What fascinates me about the parliamentary process in this magnificent Canadian building is how everything is done piecemeal. It is sometimes very difficult to link it all together. That is what I tried to do.

I will now speak briefly about the economic situation in the riding of Gatineau and the greater national capital region.

I was absolutely flabbergasted this morning to read an article by James Bagnall in The Ottawa Citizen that basically confirmed what I was saying. Some said I was a prophet of doom, since the cuts in the region were now done.

I will read a few excerpts from the article I read this morning.

The National Capital Region will trail nearly all of Canada’s largest cities in economic growth this year...according to a forecast published Wednesday [not by the NDP but] by the Conference Board of Canada.

The Ottawa independent think tank said the region continues to suffer from the unexpectedly deep pruning of public servants—a sector that accounts for 30 per cent of its economic activity.

I say this because it is important. People in the region are often almost embarrassed to talk about the economic driver of the national capital region. It goes without saying, because the Parliament of Canada is located in the national capital region. It is our own public service, the service to the public, all the departments that help and serve the public.

The number of jobs in public administration fell nearly nine per cent in 2013

That is huge.

The number of jobs in public administration fell nearly nine per cent in 2013—the “fastest rate on record”—and the Conference Board expects a further, albeit small drop this year.

I have said many times that we must not think that there will be an end to the pain in the greater national capital region this year. Today, I read some Twitter posts, including those of the brilliant President of the Treasury Board, where he threatened the Federal Superannuates National Association by saying that the association should negotiate and resolve any differences or else the government would impose new conditions on the organization by passing legislation. This ties in a bit with the trend of hitting the heart of the greater national capital region's economy.

The government is not content to merely go after our public service and the people who put their hearts and souls into providing services with far fewer staff members than before, particularly since the public service has still not completely recovered from the cuts the Liberals made in the 1990s. The government is going after the people it let go after they provided years of good and faithful services to Canadians and the federal government. It is telling them that the conditions it agreed upon with them no longer apply because it wants to change the rules.

That is like calling someone up to tell them that you are changing the contract you signed with them because you changed your mind. That is not usually done. It is completely indecent. I have a feeling that the Federal Superannuates National Association will have something to say to the minister about this.

These are things that I heard when I was in my riding last week. I met with hundreds of people—I am not just pulling that figure out of the air—and they shared with me their vision for the economy and their opinion of the federal budget that was tabled the previous week. When I listen to my Conservative colleagues speak about the budget in the House, I get the impression that they are living on a different planet from the one inhabited by our hard-working constituents who do not often get a break. The ministers and Conservative backbenchers talk about 165 budget cuts, but no one in my riding told me that they feel richer since the Conservatives took office, and they certainly do not feel richer after having seen this budget.

According to the Conference Board of Canada, if the cuts are not too serious, there may be some economic growth, but this is not a very rosy picture of my region. That is a point I wanted to make since, ironically, the article was published this morning.

I looked carefully at the budget, and some sections interested me much more than others, because they affected Canadians in their everyday lives. For example, the budget talks about investing in families. In my riding, a group called Logement'Occupe is working very hard to ensure affordable housing. This group went through a near-crisis because it did not know whether it was going to be eligible for the HPS program.

Many community organizations provide incredible services that we could not even afford as a society. Without them, the country would be bankrupt big time. We already have a deficit. Imagine If we had to pay for what all those community organizations do for our people. It would be overwhelming.

The Conservatives may be able to live well knowing that children go hungry and people have no roof over their heads, but I think this is a deplorable failure for a society. There are various needs.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that I will be sharing my time with the member for Chicoutimi—Le Fjord.

There is not much in the budget for justice. The government added a few extra judges here and there—way to go—but some existing positions have not been filled yet. I wonder how serious the government is. When it fleshes out the budget plan, the government should think about the basic needs for home care and caregivers. It must address these needs.

I will elaborate on that some other time. Those were some of my thoughts on the 400 or so pages of nothing that I read last week.

[Business of Supply, February 24th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the exercise of our democracy is one of my concerns.

Clearly, I am very concerned about the percentages, the voter turnout for our elections. The fact that the Conservatives decided to blame Elections Canada for these low turnouts suggests to me that they already have all the answers to the questions they are asking, or else they refuse to see other possible answers. In fact, perhaps it is the way things get done in the House and the way the government acts sometimes that turn people away from politics.

[Business of Supply, February 24th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, once again, the only thing the Conservatives have managed to do today is avoid saying anything about the content of the motion.

The motion is not Bill C-23. The minister prevented us from spending more time debating that bill. Then he had the nerve to rise while we were talking about a motion to let the committee do its work properly after preventing us from engaging in further debate in the House. Maybe if he had been there when I expressed my opinion, or if others had had more time to say what they think about this issue, he would have the answer to his question.

I would advise him to read the motion, since he likes to tell us to read his bill. Our motion is a little shorter than his bill. He should read those ten lines and then tell us that what the motion proposes is anti-democratic.

[Business of Supply, February 24th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what I have been saying for the last 10 minutes.

It is important to go to the people. Otherwise, we will not see them in Ottawa. These people cannot necessarily travel. This is critical to the democratic system here in Canada, our electoral system, which I agree has some big problems. I think that all members of the House agree on that. We have to look at ways to solve the problem. People need to realize that the bill was introduced two years later. One of my colleagues moved a motion in the House. Everyone supported it. Even so, now we have a bill that changes many sections. We have a serious problem here. I do not know why the Conservatives are so afraid to listen to people and go to them. They do not seem to have a problem travelling all around the world.

[Business of Supply, February 24th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am quite pleased to have the opportunity to speak to our opposition motion. First, I would like to mention that I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for York South—Weston.

I am pleased to rise to speak to the motion because I have already had the opportunity to speak to Bill C-23. I believe that it is important to point out that this motion is being brought forward on an opposition day.

It is an opposition motion, as the previous speaker, the member for Lanark—Frontenac—Lennox and Addington, pointed out, and it concerns some very specific points in the very specific context of Bill C-23. Time allocation has been imposed to prevent discussions from continuing and to shut down debate. A time limit has been imposed in order to send the bill to committee as quickly as possible, which will prevent many of our colleagues from expressing their views on this matter.

Based on what I have heard today in the House, what is about to happen in the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs may not be what I would call a great example of democracy.

When I arrived in Parliament for the first time, in 2004, I had the great pleasure, as a new MP, of sitting on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. I recognize that there was a minority government, but that was another reason for us to work together.

I heard the member, who is the vice-chair of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, tell us that the committee members usually work together quite well. I think it is important to explain why to the people in the House.

The Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs belongs to all of us. This committee is responsible for ensuring that our democracy is healthy and is working well. The Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs deals with questions of privilege or the various issues that the chair is sometimes called upon to consider. In general, the members who sit on this committee realize that they have the very important job of ensuring that ours is a true democracy and that this democracy and our ability to speak in the House are not undermined. Our rules and procedures already do enough to enable the government to play hardball when introducing its bills.

We need to put this bill in perspective. It is not a matter of repeating speeches similar to the ones we heard on Bill C-23. I am sure everyone here had the pleasure of reading that brick of a bill.

I agree with the member who spoke before me. He said that the bill contained a lot of technical aspects. However, there are also a lot of substantive elements in this bill. I was shocked to hear them say with a straight face that the bill was all technicalities. I certainly do not think that figuring out how we can get people to exercise their right to vote is a technicality. Figuring out who will oversee how Canadians exercise their right to vote, how our elections are carried out and so on, is not a technicality. I think it is important to point that out.

Now we have a motion that was moved by my colleague from Hamilton Centre. As I was reading the motion, which starts with, “That it be an instruction to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs that...”, I could not believe that we were forced to move a motion in the House to obtain a right that I think should have been a sine qua non in Bill C-23.

I read the motion and saw what it was about. Sometimes, during discussions that take place in the committee I sit on, I have concerns about the daily exercise of a real democracy. When I hear speeches like the ones I have heard today and there is such a lack of discussion, I am extremely worried that this will extend to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

We all know how important consultations are. I realize that I can use Skype and my computer to consult people. However, absolutely nothing beats meeting people in person. It is not true that anyone who wants to voice their opinion of certain decisions that are about to be made can come to Ottawa and speak their mind.

Earlier, I heard my colleague talk about a trip taken by the members of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. I was probably the only member of the committee who refused to go along. Is it right to travel to Australia, New Zealand, England or Ireland to study the changes in the electoral system, when we could read about them in a book by the wonderful Law Reform Commission of Canada?

It seems to me that, instead, we should go see what impact Bill C-23 will have on certain communities in Canada and certain groups that are targeted by some of the measures. We should talk with different groups, not just about the issue of vote suppression, which is extremely important and a major concern of the NDP, but also about the fact that this Conservative government thinks low voter turnout is a result of Elections Canada failing to do its job to promote the elections.

Last week, I went to my riding and talked with some people, including some young people from Nicolas-Gatineau composite school. There was a fundraising activity organized by Alexandre Guindon, a bright young guy in his final year of high school. We talked about the current state of Canadian democracy and how young people are not interested in voting.

If youth are disinterested, it is not because Elections Canada is not doing its job. It is because this kind of issue has been treated with such a cavalier attitude. We are faced with a government that does not pay much attention to the existing rules and then changes other rules. That raises some questions. The public is becoming somewhat cynical, and I am seeing that not just among young people, but among seniors as well. They are saying that voting is becoming increasingly complicated, that they no longer know what is required and that they have no desire to go vote. We need to meet with these people in their communities and reach out to them.

It is impossible to be against the idea and possibility of meeting with groups if none of them have made that request to the committee. It concerns me to see that the Conservative majority on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs is standing in the way of openness and the full and appropriate exercise of democratic rights.

I am gravely concerned to see that this has spread all the way to this committee, because this is the committee that protects our privileges. If it is unable to protect Canadians, I wonder how capable it will be of protecting those who represent Canadians in the House.

Everyone should reflect on that for a minute. We were told to read the bill and we read it. Now, the Conservatives need to read the motion and realize that it will not bite. It simply says that Canada, a democratic role model for other countries on how to exercise the right to vote, should start by looking in the mirror.

[The Budget, February 13th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague from Montcalm, first of all for her speech, but also for the work she is doing in her riding and on behalf of persons with disabilities. She is a source of inspiration.

I very much appreciated what she said in her speech. In my district, we sense the same discouragement among people who have been talking about the budget since it was announced. For example, the mayor of Gatineau told us that the budget was disappointing in several respects, particularly on social housing and infrastructure. He had great expectations for social housing subsidies, which are desperately needed in every Canadian city, but there is nothing for that. The same is true for infrastructure. People working for community agencies had a great deal of hope for social housing, and they too are discouraged. There are many retirees in the riding of Gatineau who are discouraged because of the frequent unilateral changes made to their conditions and agreements. It is shameful.

My colleague spoke about it, but I wonder if the need is as critical in Montcalm as it is in Gatineau.

[Northwest Territories Devolution Act, February 11th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, it saddens me greatly to be getting lessons from people from that side of the House.

Where were they when they had a majority? Where were they when they could have made all those changes? Why wait for a minority government, when it is impossible to reach an agreement? Why wait for a Conservative government that does not believe in nation to nation negotiations with the first nations?

In my opinion, neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals have any lessons to teach anyone. Yes, we are pleased that they are taking a step in the right direction. They just have to actively listen and hold meaningful consultations instead of waiting for problems to arise.