House of Commons photoLost her last election, in 2015, with 26% of the vote.
CANADA-PANAMA ECONOMIC GROWTH AND PROSPERITY ACT June 19th, 2012
Madam Speaker, the Canada-Panama agreement is a bilateral agreement between two countries. When we look at the resources and trading power that Canada has compared to Panama at this stage, does she not feel that is an unbalanced relationship, that it actually opens the door for transnational corporations to exploit the people of Panama and does not lead to sustainable development, which is what Panama needs?
Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act June 18th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, I find it a bit strange listening to all of this, especially when the Parliamentary Budget Office said that there was no financial or budgetary reason to make changes to the OAS, and past ministers, including Conservatives, are saying that attacks on the environmental assessment is just wrong and stop.
Then I heard my colleague say that hitting the delete button on close to 300,000 skilled workers would actually make improvements in bringing more skilled workers into this country.
How does my colleague think hitting the delete button on 287,000 skilled workers who have waited in line and have played by the rules made by the government would help provinces like Alberta and B.C. get the skilled workers they need right now.
Citizenship and Immigration June 18th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, the minister's attitude is shameful. Sitting here, I am wondering if we should believe the minister or the doctors? I will take the doctors any day.
On this side of the House we believe that no one in Canada should have to choose between food and health care. No one should have to wonder if their sick child will be denied treatment because of the balance of their bank account. Canadians expect leadership to improve access to health care, not senseless cuts to limit it.
Today we stand with doctors and refugees across the country and ask when the minister will reverse these cuts.
Refugee Health Care June 18th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, our country has been built on the idea that we all have a responsibility to take care of one another, especially the vulnerable. However, the Conservative government is targeting this basic Canadian value with its mean-spirited cuts to refugee health care.
These cuts will effectively deny health care to refugee applicants who need to see a doctor and who have limited or no financial means to do so. Most egregiously, some legitimate refugees will be cut off from even basic medical coverage. That means a refugee undergoing emergency surgery for a heart attack at a Canadian hospital would have to pay for it out of pocket or be denied care.
Is this our Canada?
Today, doctors and other health care professionals across the country are taking action against these cuts. I call on the Conservative government to have a heart and reverse this decision before it comes into effect at the end of June.
Bill C-38 June 15th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, the minister cannot simply hit the delete button on this problem as he tried to do with the backlog. The people who have waited patiently in the backlog have followed the rules. They have done everything correctly and are being punished because the Conservatives are looking for an easy way out of a problem they and the former Liberal government created.
Will the Conservatives do the right thing, apply the court decision to the outstanding applications and play by the rules themselves?
Bill C-38 June 15th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, it has to sting the Conservatives to be rebuked by the court before they were even able to force their Trojan Horse bill through the House. It must be some kind of record.
The court's decision highlights the recklessness of the Conservative bill. The Minister of Immigration has no plan. He is making it up as he goes, and it is Canadians who will pay the price.
Will the government comply with Justice Rennie's decision? Will it process the outstanding applicants?
Citizenship and Immigration June 13th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, hidden in the Conservatives' outrageous budget bill is the rejection of foreign skilled workers who have played by the rules and waited in line. Conservative mismanagement, on top of Liberal mismanagement, has left a huge backlog of applicants. How many of them are doctors? How many are skilled tradespeople? Now, we will never know, because the Conservative budget bill simply rejects them all, sight unseen.
Will the minister reverse this reckless and unfair decision?
Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act June 12th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, there are different ways people get into the country. The skilled workers class is an independent class. People have to qualify based on their education and profession, that type of criteria. The people whose files are being deleted qualified before 2008. The backlog, as it is being referred to, is not really a backlog because the minister himself gets to decide how many people from each category are going to be allowed into the country.
Over the last number of years we have seen a huge growth in the number of temporary foreign workers. Also, a lot of the skilled workers who applied before 2008 have been left out. Their hopes, dreams and aspirations have been based on the idea that they are going to come to Canada. These are the professionals we want. There was an article in the news the day before yesterday that people in Alberta are asking why the government is doing this, because these are the people that are needed.
Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act June 12th, 2012
Mr. Speaker, my colleague and I went to Taiwan together and got to know each other really well. I have a great deal of respect for my colleague across the aisle.
What we are debating today is the budget implementation bill and the process that is being used, and what is being thrown into the budget bill that goes way beyond what should be in a normal budget implementation bill.
According to the OECD's “Best Practices for Budget Transparency”, the government's draft budgets should be submitted to Parliament no less than three months prior to the start of the fiscal year. It also noted that the budget should include a detailed commentary on each revenue and expenditure program, and that comparative information on actual revenue and expenditure during the past year and an updated forecast for the current year should be provided for each program.
None of these practices are currently followed in Canada. It is very hard for us to support a budget that is smoke and mirrors.
Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act June 12th, 2012
Madam Speaker, I was saying that what we are facing here is not simply a budget bill. What we are facing here is a double-sided telephone directory of items and issues that go way beyond the budget. Not only that, but as a parliamentarian, I and many of my colleagues feel that we have been denied the opportunity to debate this so-called telephone directory of a bill, Bill C-38, in any meaningful way.
Members on all sides of the House were elected to come here. We run to be MPs because we believe in parliamentary democracy. The role of government in a parliamentary democracy is to propose, and the role of the opposition is to hold the government accountable, as it is for some of the MPs sitting on the other side, as well. There is nothing stopping them from getting up to ask questions if they need clarification.
In a parliamentary democracy, we do not have a dictatorship, we do not have a republic, we do not have the power to veto. Therefore, it behooves even majority governments to allow the parliamentary process to play out, because only then can the people of Canada have full confidence in the workings of this House.
The Conservatives are not used to having a majority. I have been hoping they would learn that they do not have to use time allocation, that they do not always have to smack the opposition on the side of the head and say that we are not going to be given time to debate. I was hoping that after they had used time allocation a few times it would have occurred to them that they do not have to do that. They have a majority. They could let the debate take place and let the Canadian public see what they are trying to do.
They say they have so much pride in what is in the bill. If they have so much pride in this thick document, they should be willing for us to have those discussions right here in this Parliament.
I heard a colleague say that we have had three months. There has not been three months of debate on this bill in this House. If there has been, it must have happened in a different reality in which only the government lives, because it certainly has not happened on this side of the House.
As a result of, I could call it arrogance or the fumes of power which have invaded certain heads, it absolutely boggles my mind that over and over the Conservatives keep using time allocation. We had a vote earlier today once again to limit the debate on this bill which is thicker than many of our communities' phone books. It is a great concern and we really have to pay attention to that.
Let us take a look at what is buried in the bill. There is a whole lot buried in the bill that will have a huge impact upon the world we leave for our children.
I hear a lot of rhetoric about protecting our environment, but when I see the kinds of attacks in this bill on environmental assessments and environmental protections, it causes me a great deal of concern.
Some will say who cares if I am concerned. I am an elected MP. A riding of constituents voted for me and sent me here in good faith.
However, I am not the only one who is raising concerns. People in the larger community are talking about environment issues.
For example, Jessica Clogg, executive director and senior counsel at West Coast Environmental Law states:
By gutting Canada’s long-standing environmental laws, the budget bill gives big oil and gas companies what they've been asking for--fewer environmental safeguards so they can push through resource megaprojects with little regard to environmental damage. It is Canadians and our children who will pay the cost.
I do not want my children, my grandchildren, my great-grandchildren or myself to have to pay the cost, nor do I want the rest of our youth to have to pay the cost.
Ten minutes goes by very quickly, especially when there is an interruption, but I will move on to another area. The changes to OAS are totally unnecessary, as all kinds have experts have said.
I will focus for a couple of minutes on the changes to immigration. Some people will wonder why changes to immigration are buried in the budget bill. The government is planning to hit the delete button for thousands of skilled workers who have been waiting very patiently to come to Canada. Out of the blue the government arbitrarily decided that anybody who applied for the skilled workers program before 2008 is gone. It will hit the delete button and their applications will no longer be valid. I know the government is saying that it will send the processing fee back to them, but the government made a commitment. These people played by the rules made by the Canadian government. Not only did they play by the rules, but they waited patiently. They did not do anything illegal to try to circumvent the system. As they were waiting patiently, they saw a new face of Canada that the Conservative government is showing to the world, that is, that Canada lacks compassion and has no respect for people who play by the rules.
The government will give them their money back, but who will give them back their hopes and aspirations? Who will give back to the family in China who, based on a promise made to them by the Canadian government because they were in a lineup to come here, sold their property. They gave their child an education so that the child would do better here. Now they cannot afford to buy back their house because the cost of living has gone up so much. I have hundreds of stories like that one.
People are demonstrating against us, against the Canadian government, in Beijing, in Manilla, in New Delhi, in Chandigarh and in Hong Kong. Why? Because we as Canadians broke our promise. What are we going to do to give these people back their hopes, aspirations and dreams? Why is the government determined to damage Canada's reputation worldwide?