Jennifer O'Connell

[Carbon Pricing, March 22nd, 2024]

Madam Speaker, I find it incredibly interesting that, while Conservatives pretend to care about Canadians, we are actually working to implement legislation and procedures to bring down prices, such as grocery prices and Internet fees.

While we are working hard for Canadians, do people know what Conservative lobbyists are doing? They are creating fake, secret lobbying companies to lobby the government while hiding from Canadians that they are the same chief advisers. They are lobbying for higher Internet costs. The Conservatives should come clean about whom they are standing up to.

[Peter Rodrigues, March 22nd, 2024]

Madam Speaker, I am sad to rise today to reflect on the recent passing of former Pickering regional councillor Peter Rodrigues.

Peter was a colleague but, more than that, he was a true friend. I am devastated thinking about the fact that our last time together was, in fact, the final time I would see my friend.

We had some memorable council meetings together, and we knew we were in for an interesting debate when Peter started his intervention with “to make a short story long”. Peter was never at a loss for words and he may have been the catalyst for the implementation of speaking time limits for councillors.

I was lucky to know Peter outside of politics and what I always remember most about him is his unmatched kindness and generosity. He was always helping someone out or volunteering in his beloved Whitevale community.

Peter lived every moment with such joy. I know he would not want anyone to be sad about his passing, but we have lost a fearless advocate for our community and a dear friend to so many.

[Business of Supply, March 21st, 2024]

Madam Speaker, I find it interesting that the member opposite spoke about public safety, crime and the regulations in place regarding prison transfers. He made reference to specific language in the regulations that is used in prisoner reclassification.

He might be interested to know that it was actually a Conservative government, under the late Brian Mulroney, that introduced the language that is used today. In fact, Conservatives had the highest years on record for transfers of prisoners from maximum- to medium-security prisons. Therefore, when the member opposite talks tough, I am curious how he looks in the mirror at night and tells Canadians that things are going to be different, when in fact the same language was created under a Conservative government, and there were in fact more transfers from maximum to medium that happened.

Does the member believe his own words, or is this all in the speaking notes from his leader's office?

[Questions on the Order Paper, March 20th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, in response to parts (b) and (d)(i) of the question, information with regard to particular events is not tracked in CSC’s offender management system. As such, CSC is not able to provide the requested information.

The RCMP is limited in its ability to respond to this question, given that it does not have the mandate to offer responses on behalf of other police services or correctional services of jurisdiction.

In response to part (a), as the RCMP is not the police of jurisdiction in the national capital region, where the Ottawa Police Service had the responsibility for investigations and possible charges under the Criminal Code, it is not able to provide a response to this part of the question.

For areas where the RCMP was the police of jurisdiction, the RCMP is able to provide a response. In Coutts, Alberta, on February 14, 2022, the RCMP arrested 11 individuals following the execution of search warrants and the seizure of weapons.

In response to part (c), while the Emergencies Act was invoked, the RCMP acted as a conduit to disclose information to financial institutions on behalf of law enforcement, as outlined by the emergency economic measures order. Police services only disclosed information on owners and operators of vehicles that were active participants in the events related to the invocation of the act. This information enabled financial institutions to decide to freeze or unfreeze financial accounts, solely at their discretion. The RCMP never disclosed any information on individuals who donated or purchased merchandise tied to the events related to the invocation of the act.

As of February 23, 2022, RCMP action had culminated in the disclosure of 57 entities to financial institutions, which included individuals and owners or drivers of vehicles included in the events related to the invocation of the act.

In response to part (d)(ii), the RCMP is not in a position to answer this part of the question.

[Questions on the Order Paper, March 18th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, CSC is committed to upholding its legal obligations. The federal administrative segregation class actions challenged the previous use of administrative segregation in federal correctional institutions, which was abolished in 2019. The superior courts of Ontario and Quebec awarded class members aggregate damages and the ability to seek individual additional compensation.

The court-appointed claims administrator, EPIQ Canada Inc., is responsible for managing and tracking the distribution of the net aggregate damages award payments to eligible claimants. The $28-million aggregate damages award was divided equally among 5,311 eligible class members. The equal share has been calculated at $5,469.85. Payment distribution by the claims administrator is ongoing.

With regard to information about the status of the offender as well as the institutional breakdown, CSC undertook an extensive preliminary search in order to determine the amount of information that would fall within the scope of the question and the amount of time that would be required to prepare a comprehensive response. The level of detail of the information requested is not systematically tracked in a centralized database. CSC concluded that producing and validating a comprehensive response to this question would require a manual collection of information that is not possible in the time allotted and could lead to the disclosure of incomplete and misleading information.

[Questions on the Order Paper, March 18th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, there are 36 self-administered police service agreements supported by the first nations and Inuit policing program. These agreements vary in duration, given that each self-administered police service has the discretion to negotiate the term of the agreement.

Since November 4, 2015, of the 36 signed agreements, all agreements have been renewed or extended. Notably, three of the 36 agreements were amended in 2023 in the context of an ongoing Canadian Human Rights Tribunal complaint brought forward by the United Chiefs and Councils of Manitoulin Anishnaabe Police, the Anishinabek Police Service, and the Treaty Three Police Service. These services chose not to renew their respective funding agreements for 2023-24 and each agreement will expire on March 31, 2024.

[Questions on the Order Paper, March 18th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, in response to part (a), there are no plans to issue additional reimbursements to the City of Windsor beyond the eligible expenses totalling $6,094,915 provided via an ex gratia payment issued in 2023.

With respect to part (b), the Government of Canada does not have a view regarding financial issues between the province and Ontario municipalities in this regard.

With regard to part (c), Public Safety Canada officials reviewed the City of Windsor’s claimed expenses against the nation's capital extraordinary policing costs program terms and conditions, the details of which can be found on the website at https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/rsrcs/fndng-prgrms/ntns-cptl-xtrrdnry-plcng-csts/trms-cndtns-en.aspx, and concluded that most would be eligible for reimbursement. This program’s terms and conditions were applied equally to municipalities to determine eligible expenses. In the case of Windsor, all expenses were deemed eligible save for the lost Windsor Transit revenues, which were ineligible.

The only exception pertained to $1,780,983.00 in legal fees and legal support incurred by Windsor for Ambassador Bridge blockage-related injunctions and for obtaining legal support in preparation for the Emergencies Act commission of inquiry. Legal expenses are out of the program’s terms and conditions scope. However and exceptionally, partial reimbursement, in other words, a fifty-fifty split between the municipality and the federal government, was made due to their extraordinary and unforeseen nature. This formula was applied to other municipalities as well.

[Business of Supply, February 27th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, on a point of order, I ask for unanimous consent to table the Conservative contracts as well as—

[Business of Supply, February 27th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, I am really curious how this could happen. The Conservatives awarded millions of dollars of contracts to the very same company that the member just called “infamous GC Strategies”, and said that it “does not even do any work”. Would their opposition day motion be more complete and get to the bottom of this issue if it included the millions of dollars that the Conservative Party awarded to this very company, which apparently did not do any IT work? By the way, they were sole-sourced contracts for IT, and the Leader of the Opposition was the parliamentary secretary to the minister of transport when a majority of these contracts were issued to Transport Canada. How did this happen?

[Business of Supply, February 27th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague spoke about the Conservatives' speeches and behaviour in the House today. I found it interesting because the government has acknowledged that there was a problem, that procurement practices need to be improved and that we need to get to the bottom of this. We have even already implemented solutions to prevent this from happening again. However, the Conservatives do not offer any solutions.

In his speech, my hon. colleague spoke about a stunt. I found it interesting that when I went to Conservative Twitter accounts that spoke about this issue, they were linked to the Conservative Party page to donate.

Should Canadians be concerned about the fact that Conservatives are trying to use this to fundraise instead of protecting transparency for Canadians' dollars?