Kevin Sorenson

[Canada Elections Act, June 15th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, it is not the former government that was selling cash for access; it is the current government. It is the current Minister of Finance. It is the current Minister of Justice. It is the current Prime Minister. We can go right down the front row here. It is the very same in Queen's Park with the Liberal Party in Ontario, where Gerry Butts and Katie Telford brought the fundraising machine to Ontario. They have now brought that very same fundraising machine to Ottawa. It is unethical.

Bill C-50 would only be put in place to cover the practices that are common practice in the Liberal Party of Canada. If we go to the website and look at the political parties that receive money, not just publicly funded money but money from fundraising within the membership, we find that the Conservative Party of Canada can fundraise with 50% more membership giving to it. The average amount of money given by the average member in my riding is about $75, and the average amount to our Conservative Party is around $100 or $200. Those are the facts.

The Liberal Party does not have that grassroots. It has the elite groups that say they will give $1,500 at the fundraiser and then a million dollars to the Trudeau Foundation if it gives them the bank, the commissioner, or the position.

The member for South Surrey—White Rock was right. It is immoral. It is unethical. It is a practice the Liberal government has been caught at, and it needs to stop.

[Canada Elections Act, June 15th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise in this place to speak to Bill C-50. When I arrived this morning, I had no intention of speaking to this, but the topic we are discussing is relevant and of major concern to most Canadians. For those who are not certain whether it should be a major concern, I suggest that it should be. I will give a couple of examples as to why.

Before I get into the examples of why it should be, let me say that this has always been a question we have battled with in Canada. I recall, between 2000 and 2004, the Liberal Party got into problems much the same as today, with cash for access and monies rolling in. Out of part of that came the sponsorship scandal and the Gomery inquiry. Much of it was access to Liberal fundraisers, at which huge amounts of money would be raised. Indeed, even after the audits and the Gomery inquiry, there were $40 million left unaccounted for.

I remember LaVar Payne from Medicine Hat asking where the $40 million was. Out of that, Conservatives made some changes to political fundraising. The way the Liberal government responded was not, in the Conservatives' opinion, the right way either. It said there would no longer be an ability to give massive amounts of money to the federal government for lobbying and influence, but it would be done through the public purse. For every vote cast for the Conservative Party, it would receive a certain amount of funding, as well as the Liberal Party, the NDP, and the Green Party. We realize that just going to the public purse is not the way to raise funds for political parties, so Parliament said it is up to political parties to raise their own funds. It is up to political parties to call on their membership and people who want to support them and raise funds. That is exactly what we have seen: fundraising letters to membership, saying there is an election coming and asking the membership to help out. That is certainly what the Conservative Party has done.

The Liberal Party has fallen back into the trap of saying it now has something that it did not have for 10 years. It has influence. There is a Prime Minister who makes decisions of what is coming in legislation and what may come to Canada. There are cabinet ministers in all of the different portfolios who go out and speak to their stakeholders. They are money-making machines to the Liberal Party of Canada. We have seen some of it happen already, and it has been mentioned a number of times.

We have seen it with the justice minister from British Columbia. There are hundreds of openings for appointments to the bench, and she met with a group of lawyers whose goals would be to some day be a judge on the bench, and they were the ones invited to the fundraiser at a law firm in downtown Toronto. These were the ones who paid $1,500 to rub shoulders with, speak with, and get their pictures taken with the justice minister of Canada.

It was brought up about the finance minister, who in budget consultations made the rounds to all the different groups of stakeholders who want to invest in jobs, businesses, or such and such. We saw it with the Prime Minister, which was brought up, who attended a meeting in Vancouver with billionaire Chinese investors, who paid $1,500 to attend the meeting. One wanted to be involved in a financial institution and gave $1,500 to the Liberal Party of Canada. Then one of the attendees at the same meeting, who paid the $1,500 at that Liberal fundraiser, also wanted to give $1 million to the Trudeau Foundation. It is not the Prime Minister's foundation but the Prime Minister's father's foundation. How convenient. It is cash for access to cabinet ministers and prime ministers.

I had the privilege of serving in the government in the last Parliament as a minister. I worked closely with Jim Flaherty, Joe Oliver, and with our former prime minister, in budget consultations, as other cabinet members did. Before we went to events, if there was even any thought of speaking to the membership, we were not even allowed to advertise that we were ministers. I would go out as the member of Parliament for Crowfoot, as it was called at that time. If there was any publication, I would not be able to say that I was a minister, because we wanted to be above reproach.

I appreciated a question that came earlier. The Prime Minister meets with all these people. He meets in my small town. He meets with these individuals. That is exactly what we are expected to do. However, when lobbyists show up and say they are willing to give us $1,000 to be at a meeting, and wink-wink, nudge-nudge—that absolutely did not happen. The government is now trying to put cover on what is its common practice. That is not being accepted by the Canadian public.

I also want to say something that may not exactly illustrate the point of what we need here, but we have two problems. Another problem that we have in this country, and it has been dealt with in Parliaments past, and Elections Canada deals with it, is how we bring young people into this whole idea of becoming involved politically. How do we engage them?

This past week I had a board meeting. I had met young James from Three Hills at an event; he was a grade 11 student, going into grade 12. He asked how he could get involved in politics. He was not sure if he was a Conservative or what. We invited him out to our board meeting. He was involved in the discussion, and he really started to enjoy the discussion.

The way we engage Canadians, and especially our youth, is not by saying, wink-wink, nudge-nudge, “If you want access to the Prime Minister, $1,500 is the going rate.” It is unethical and, as my former colleague says, it is immoral. It is immoral to say, “We will listen and you will have our ear if you provide the $1,500 to the Liberal Party of Canada.”

One member on the other side says it is up to all parties to decide how they fundraise. This is giving the Liberal Party of Canada an avenue of fundraising that no other party in Parliament has. That is why the Liberals are attracted to it. They are attracted to the fact that they have one up on every other political party, because they have ministers making decisions.

When I leave this place, I want to be able to say that in my opinion there has been nothing that I have done that has in any way infringed on the rules of how conduct should be for an honourable member of Parliament. I believe with everything I have that the average Canadian says that this is not honourable behaviour, and that this is the way we expect things to be done in third world countries, or other countries, but not our Canada.

Our democracy is worth protecting. Our democracy tells us that even the smallest, the most uninfluential, whoever that may be, has the same right as the most wealthy. That is what this country stands for. The government is going out and setting a very serious, sad practice of how it is going to conduct and fight the next election.

We have a problem. This bill is to solve the problem. It is really an admission by the Liberal Party that it has a scandal called “cash for access”, or “your cash for access to our cabinet minister or our Prime Minister”. The Liberals promised they would deal with this problem, and Bill C-50 is coming along and that is their response to the problem. The Liberals have already said that there are rules set for themselves, and that is what the description of this bill is all about.

I could go on, but I will say this. The member for Barrie—Innisfil and the member for York—Simcoe gave two speeches that were amazing, with great stories of the history of fundraising problems and scandals the Liberal Party has had. I would encourage people to read those and to call their members of Parliament about what they believe is—

[Main Estimates, 2017-18, June 14th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals are not walking the walk; they are following along. They are caught in the wake behind the Unites States economy. That is a fact.

When we went into the global downturn, the United States and every G7 country had gone into that downturn as well. Canada was the last to go in. Why? It is because we paid down our debt by $40 billion. We lowered our taxes. We lowered the GST, and we lowered taxes for every Canadian. The average family in the time the Conservative party was governing had $6,600 more in their pockets than they have today.

We were the last to go into the recession, and first to come out. Why? It is because international investors understood we were going to get our house in order. Why are those same investors today going to China? Why are they selling off all our goods to China? It is because it is hard to find investors here in Canada who believe the government in the long term has the economy in mind. The government fails. It spends, but it is not concerned with balancing budgets and fiscal management.

[Main Estimates, 2017-18, June 14th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I love the rhetoric coming from the President of the Treasury Board. Make no mistake, when the Conservatives came to power in 2006, he is correct, there was a surplus, almost a $9 billion surplus. They undoubtedly did like former Prime Minister Martin did in overtaxing Canadians. There was no question. There was no recession. Those were in very good times.

In 2007 and 2008, the world went into a recession. Canada was the last to go into the recession. The Liberal Party and the NDP were begging for the government to spend like drunken sailors. We know how drunken sailors spend. We can see how they are doing it today. We paid down $40 billion in debt. Yes, we went into deficit while the whole world was going into deficit to kick-start the economy. When the Conservatives left power, we were not in a recession, we balanced the budget, and we told Canadians that as long as there was growth in the economy, we would balance the budget. We would keep our spending in line.

The other thing that is forgotten is that the Conservatives encouraged Canadians to save through things like a tax free savings account. There are no options like that brought forward in a budget, nothing shown in the estimates. The Liberal government only cares about spending. It does not care about seniors or the average Canadian. It is a shame. The Conservatives will solve it in 2019.

[Main Estimates, 2017-18, June 14th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise in the House again tonight. I will be splitting my time with the member for Sarnia—Lambton.

I appreciated the speech I just heard, and before I get into my remarks, my colleague the vice-chair from public accounts committee expressed very good comments and much confidence in the Senate. We will wait to see what the government does with the budget bill that the Senate will send back with all the amendments. We will see if she is bragging about the members of the Senate then. However, it is good to follow the member from the Liberal Party.

I am pleased to speak during the debate on the main estimates and this government's mismanagement of the Canadian economy. The main estimates are a publication from the federal Government of Canada. They detail the Liberal economic plan, how it has failed, and how Canadians are the ones ending up paying for it. Most disappointing is that we can see item by item, line by line, that the main estimates are telling us that the Liberal government's only solution to the problems it is facing is to try to manage on behalf of Canadians by borrowing more money, spending more money, and putting our children and grandchildren into bigger debt.

The biggest problem with this borrowed money is that in the long term it affects Canadian workers, families, and jobs. Economic forecasts suggest it could be 2055 before the government again has a balanced budget, unless, of course, Canadian voters decide to elect a Conservative government as soon as possible to stop the skyrocketing debt the Government of Canada is piling up.

On May 30 of this year, a few days ago, the parliamentary budget officer released a report entitled “Following the Dollar: Tracking Budget 2016 Spending and Tax Measures”. This document is important because it provides Canadians with an independent analysis of the Liberal government's finances.

In the annual federal budget, the government outlines its fiscal plan, including additional spending for ongoing programs, new spending initiatives, and changes to taxation. I want to highlight some of the findings in the parliamentary budget officer's document. For example, the parliamentary budget officer says, “...many spending measures had more funding or less funding in fiscal year 2016-17 than indicated in the budget (31 per cent)”.

The people of Battle River—Crowfoot, the investors on Bay Street and around the world, the middle class and, as they would say, those trying to join the middle class are disappointed that the Liberals were 30% wrong in their budgetary calculations. Imagine: 31% of the Liberal budget was wrong in its projections. In the private sector, accountants, number crunchers, forecasters, chief financial officers, and other executives would be in serious trouble if one-third of their facts and figures were wrong. They might be fired from their jobs for such a 30% error.

Small businesses around my constituency and across our country cannot survive and stay in business if they are one-third wrong on their budgetary estimates. Obviously they would be poor managers, and those businesses would undoubtedly lose business. However, the Liberals are confident that if things go off the rails, even by 30%, they can simply borrow more money off the backs of taxpayers in the next federal budget.

The parliamentary budget officer also found that 8% of the Liberals' spending measures “were not provided funding through the supplementary estimates.” This is important because it means that 8% of the budget was never funded. These budgetary announcements—“announcement” being the key word—were never paid for. They do not exist. The middle class and those trying to join it have been shortchanged by the Liberals by almost 10%.

Is this another tax, to simply withhold 8% to 10% of what they promised? Is this another way of promising something, then not delivering on it, and hoping no one notices?

The parliamentary budget officer noticed and we noticed. The parliamentary budget officer's report said, “That is, they were not implemented as stated in Budget 2016.” The Liberals promise, and then they break the promise. The current government should get an A for announcement and a D for delivery. It should get an A for making those wonderful promises to municipalities, and wonderful promises to Canadians, but when it comes right down to delivering, the budget officer said it is failing.

I hope the Canadian electorate tires of this talking the talk, but not walking the walk. I hope the voters do something in the very next election. The parliamentary budget officer is so very diplomatic in the way he makes these comments, much like our Auditor General. As chair of the public accounts committee, I have learned that Canada's auditors general, including our current Auditor General, are for the most part very matter of fact when they comment on the government's performances. The parliamentary budget officer, another officer of Parliament, carefully said, “...which suggests that the Government may need to improve its funding processes or its estimation methodology for spending measures included in the budget.”

Therefore, what makes this credibility gap that the Liberals are the architects of even more tough is, and I will again quote the parliamentary budget officer report. He said:

Moreover, there is no clear line of sight from budget announcements to their implementation. The different presentation, wording and accounting methodology makes it challenging to align budget spending measures with items included in the estimates. And it is not possible to track spending on most budget measures beyond the first year or what was actually spent on specific measures. It is thus very difficult for parliamentarians to follow the dollar and hold the government to account for implementing its fiscal plan, as outlined in the budget.

This would be brilliant if it were not so scary or so nefarious. It almost makes one wonder if this is some type of devious plan concocted by our finance minister and President of the Treasury Board, who is here tonight, so we can throw him in there too, both of whom should know better. An alternative explanation would be simple incompetence. Canadians do not want to believe that those in charge of Canadians' fiscal situation are so incompetent, but the facts and the figures they present cannot even be traced or linked to reality. That is according to the parliamentary budget officer, and yet Canadians do not want to believe that the books are cooked.

Even an accountant has a difficult time following the money trail left by the current government. Worst of all, we parliamentarians are supposed to be able to examine what has been done by the Liberal government, and debate these things during main estimates debate, for example, like we are doing here tonight. Canadians rely on us to spend the time going over these books: the budget, the estimates, the supplementary estimates, and even the public accounts of Canada. Canadians should be able to depend on and believe that these expenditures by the Liberal government are what it says they are.

Therefore, what do the Liberals do? They present this House with a budget that reads almost like a plate of spaghetti, and then they challenge the members of Parliament to follow each noodle of their expenditures of taxpayers' dollars, and make political and policy decisions on the success or failure of these expenditures. The Liberals make it as hard as possible to follow the expenditures. The average member of Parliament has very great difficulty following the promised expenditure to the actual expense. Liberal backbenchers do not have to read or study this; they just accept what the finance minister says. They are basically told, “Do not bother about that, we will give you your talking points; you're new, over the years you'll learn how to do this.” However, even the parliamentary budget officer says the methodology of working through this is difficult.

I have concentrated my comments on the work of the parliamentary budget officer. The Liberal government is scrambling the facts and figures we are debating tonight in the budgetary main estimates, and I believe dishonestly.

The budget officer tries to withhold the frustration of that office, and the PBO gently calls for more streamlined reporting in the budget process, a little more transparency and methodology.

I am thankful for the opportunity, on behalf of Battle River—Crowfoot, to bring forward some of the concerns we have with the government, the main estimates, and with its spending.

[Business of Supply, June 12th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I am not one who advocates for higher tariffs and higher taxes, and certainly not for larger government and more bureaucracy. What the member is saying is that we can just hit them with a tariff. I can say, and I believe it wholeheartedly, that when we start applying those types of tariffs, there is reciprocity, and then other countries start applying tariffs in retaliation. I know it may be the goal of the NDP just to have this little island here and not need the world, but as an exporting country, we get it that we do need the world. We want to sell our goods to the world. We are an exporter. Therefore, I do not support that idea.

Also, it is interesting that although we signed on to a Paris accord and although China and some of those countries may, their goals are extended beyond what ours would be, to 2030. Our coal plants were initially set to phase out by 2030; now they are being pushed, so it may be as early as 2025, and some are talking 2020. It is not a level playing field. As Canadians, if we are going to compete anywhere, all we ask for is a level playing field.

[Business of Supply, June 12th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, in regard to the question asked, that member does fit in very well on that side of the House with that party, because when people losing jobs and western Canadians are fighting the winters and the climate, to answer with electric cars as the answer to those problems really does the people of Alberta and the people of this country a disservice. The answer to the issue is not putting electric cars in every driveway across this land.

Certainly there are some places where we can do it, and we fully endorse and support sustainable industries and capital, not just government handouts. We support the promotion of renewable types of energy, including solar, wind, and others. However, no matter where we look, we will not find statistics showing that any more than 20% or 25% of our energy needs could be answered by renewables. Fossil fuel is going to be around, and to be quite frank, China, India, and the world are looking for more. We have it and we should be supplying it.

[Business of Supply, June 12th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak during the Conservative Party opposition day debate on the government's mismanagement of the Canadian economy. When we talk to Canadians, they understand how badly it is being mismanaged.

More specifically, the Conservative motion states, “That the House recognize that the government has mismanaged the economy in a way that is damaging Canadian industries and diminishing Canadians’ economic stability by”. Then it goes on to list three separate industries and areas where it does it.

First of all is “failing to negotiate a deal on softwood lumber and instead offering a compensation package rather than creating sustainable jobs for Canadian forestry workers”. That is the Liberal way, a compensation package. They cannot get the job done, but they will fork over more taxpayers' dollars.

Second is “attempting to phase out Canada’s energy sector by implementing a job killing carbon tax, adding additional taxes to oil and gas companies, removing incentives for small firms to make new energy discoveries and neglecting the current Alberta jobs crisis”. I will speak more about that later.

Third is “refusing to extend the current rail service agreements for farmers in Western Canada which will expire on August 1, 2017, which will result in transportation backlogs that will cost farmers billions of dollars in lost revenue.”

The constituents of Battle River—Crowfoot want the Liberal government to admit to its failures as described in the motion. There is concern throughout the large agricultural community that I represent about railway service and the challenge of getting our products to ports and markets. There is even more concern when they see the Liberals, as I stated in a question earlier, failing to renew Canada's softwood lumber agreement with the United States. When they came into power, they thought it would be a fait accompli and an easy task, and they have failed. Again, their only response is compensation.

Alberta has already seen the Liberal government completely ignore the crisis in the oil industry. There were no hundreds of millions of dollars to help that very important sector of the Canadian economy. The Liberals have nothing to help the oil and gas industry and the workers who are now unemployed. In fact, the government has seemed to only hurt the industry more. There has been what we called back in my football days “piling on”. They have taken one crisis down on the turf and jumped on it all over the place. The Liberals have nothing except handouts and people want more. The unemployed want jobs.

In Battle River—Crowfoot and many other agricultural ridings around the country, people are concerned about the Liberal government's pending mismanagement of our rail system. Liberals are basically saying that what they have done to softwood lumber and the oil patch they want to now take to the railway transportation system. What we are about to receive from the Liberal government as an answer to many of these problems, by the way, is a carbon tax on everything and everyone, and there is no reason for it. That is the good news. Conservatives are here to proclaim loud and clear that there is no reason for a carbon tax at this time or any time, and no reason to call it a solution to the problem.

The Liberals are using the same emissions targets that were calculated by the previous government. The Conservative government set very achievable targets that would not require a carbon tax system for Canada to meet them, and we were committed. Conservatives know that Liberals are using their carbon tax as a cash grab and Canadians should not take it. Canadians should not just accept that a carbon tax is a way to reach the Paris accord or any other environmental goal that the government may want to reach. It is not required. That is what my constituents tell me when I am home.

Battle River—Crowfoot is a large agricultural riding, approximately 54,000 square kilometres. It is mainly agricultural and individuals who work in the oil and gas industry. The people I meet in groceries stores, on the streets, and at various community events are all being hit hard by the drop in oil prices. In fact, many skilled workers who worked in the oil patch are not employed any longer. Many people have come home and there is little or no work. The Liberal government has not come to the aid of this sector of Canada's economy. In fact, it has added to it. It has ignored the job crisis.

The Conservative members of Parliament from Alberta went through the province and created an Alberta jobs task force. We listened to Albertans and to Canadians about the government's role in helping to create jobs. It is not just hiring more bureaucrats and just hiring more public servants. We wanted to know what it was going to take to create a climate in which the private sector, the small and medium-sized businesses, could create jobs. We did this before the last recent budget, but the Liberals ignored what the people of Alberta said.

In my constituency through most of the time I have served, we have had an unemployment rate of around 3%. It would go down a little and it would just go up marginally, but it was typically around 3%. Even during the recession, it was relatively low compared to what we are seeing now. In the month of March, it was 9.9%. In the month of April, it was 9.7%.

I mentioned some of this in my speech last week. These are the issues facing Alberta and my constituency. Now, as we come into the summer, when there are typically more jobs, the Liberals say there has been a bump in some jobs, including in Alberta, but it is a small marginal jump that happens in the construction season, and it is there again this year.

However, the Liberals are going down the road of a carbon tax, believing that this is going to solve the problems that they want to focus on. It is a shame.

The way the Liberals want to implement the agreement they have would mean speeding up the closure of coal-fired generation plants. The Liberals have gone ahead and seriously limited Canada's softwood lumber industry, but on the coal issue, I have two in my riding. One is Sheerness Mine down by Hanna, on Highway 36. Most of the workers employed there live in and around Hanna. There is also the Battle River generating station, just out of Forestburg, These workers are being told that their jobs are going to end and that it may be sooner rather than later.

That is not what we see going on everywhere else around the world. China is allowed to continue to use coal. They continue building new coal-fired electrical plants while Alberta shuts theirs down. In fact, some say we are shutting ours down so they can open them in China. China uses their coal-fired electricity to operate manufacturing facilities to make goods that will then be sold back to Canada, and we are purchasing them in record numbers.

The question is, is the carbon footprint being lowered? It was asked earlier in questions. It was asked earlier in this debate. Are we sending money to China to help them fire up their coal furnaces to generate electricity and then send products back to us? Are we actually supporting that? Perhaps we are. All I know is that precious little is offered to communities like Hanna and Forestburg to replace the jobs that are going to be lost there.

I want to talk about the Conservative motion in regard to the mismanagement of the economy around the softwood lumber deal. In the softwood lumber agreement, a rookie government got caught in the promises it made. It said it could do this. Now the average family involved in that industry pays the price, the father who is unemployed or the mother who is unemployed. They used to work in the sector. The child is off at school, but now mom and dad are not working. That is the problem. It did not need to be this way.

What did the Liberals do when the oil industry needed help? Nothing. What did it do when the softwood lumber industry needed help? It came up with an agreement and compensation. Then what did it do when Bombardier needed help? It spent hundreds of millions of dollars, and we know that some of that money went to pay executive bonuses. It is shameful.

The Conservative motion today is about the future of the Liberal government in protecting Canadians' jobs and economic growth. That is what the Liberals are going to fail to do, through the Paris Agreement and others.

[Business of Supply, June 12th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for correcting the record. The facts of the matter of the last softwood deal were that the Liberals did not get it done in 2005. We became government in January 2006, and we got the softwood deal in September. Out of that deal the Americans then had to give $5 billion back to Canadian companies. We then negotiated a seven-year contract, and the hon. member is right that the contract ran out in 2015. There was an extension period there. It ran out in the midst of the election, but we also had a one-year extension where no duties and no countervail would be brought against our companies during that time. That then gave whichever government won the election time to finish the deal.

We heard the Liberals say, “We can do a better deal than they can. This will be easy. We know President Obama. We will have a great deal.” However, they did not get it done.

Would the member also make some comments as to that, how the $5 billion came from America back to the Canadian companies in 2006?

[Government Appointments, June 9th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, the lesson learned here hopefully is that the Prime Minister should not try again to appoint another partisan Liberal commissioner. No one believes that the government House leader or anyone else over there will actually consider Canadians who apply for these appointments online.

How can Canadians believe that the new appointment process that the government House leader brags about is not just the Liberals' newfangled attempt to ensure that they get to appoint the partisan Liberal stalwart that they have always wanted?