Martin Shields

[Taxation, September 22nd, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, Rick, in my riding of Bow River, owns a three-generation farm. He works it with his children and his grandchildren.

The Minister of Finance has designed a system by which Rick will pay significantly higher taxes, putting his family's livelihood at risk. Meanwhile, the family fortune of the Prime Minister and the finance minister's family business will not be touched.

Is that really fair?

[Export and Import Permits Act, September 21st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has been very good at delivering questions, and I appreciate that. When the list includes large artillery pieces of equipment, tanks, as well as hand guns and small weapons, that is a little concerning.

When the United Nations would not exempt legal, lawful gun owners of those small guns in this country, that is the problem. It would not exempt it, and that is why we did not sign it before. It is in the list, and that is our problem.

[Export and Import Permits Act, September 21st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, it is always troubling in the sense of when broad policy documents are passed as laws, and the regulations are written later without that unknown.

That is one of the biggest challenges that lawful, legal gun owners have with this particular piece of legislation. It is the unknown in the sense of those regulations, the requiring of documentation, and privacy. It would be great if we were able to see some of that information as we go forward, rather than it being done afterward.

[Export and Import Permits Act, September 21st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, it is always something we would want to do, as I said in my statement. We are absolutely opposed to weapons used by terrorists in areas of the world where destruction is happening.

In this country, we have a tremendous number of people who use them appropriately and very lawfully. Those are the rights we are looking to protect, of those people who are lawful, legal gun owners in this country. Those are the rights we want to protect.

[Export and Import Permits Act, September 21st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with my colleague from Peace River, who will be speaking after me.

It is an honour to rise in this place to speak on Bill C-47, an act to amend the Export and Import Permits Act and the Criminal Code. As the government has signed the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty, this bill takes steps to meet its obligations.

The Arms Trade Treaty is very broad in scope. It governs the trade in everything from small arms to main battle tanks, as well as combat aircraft. In fact, article 5 of the treaty explicitly requests that the treaty be applied to “the broadest range of conventional arms.” Why illegal hunting rifles should be regulated by the same treaty as an attack helicopter is still a little unclear to me, but perhaps the hon. members opposite have figured it out.

Given the treaty's unfortunately broad scope, the process of meeting Canada's obligations under this treaty deserves close scrutiny. We need to ensure that law-abiding firearms owners are not negatively impacted.

To its credit, the Arms Trade Treaty is a treaty with laudable objectives. Preventing and eradicating the illicit trade in conventional arms is undoubtedly an admirable goal. Canada must not stand idly by as weapons flow to conflict zones, where they may be used to inflict horrific abuses on civilian populations and fuel terrorist organizations.

Conservatives have always been supportive of measures to establish international arms control standards. However, the government's own former minister, the hon. member for Saint-Laurent at the time, stated in June 2016 that “Canada already meets the vast majority of Arms Trade Treaty obligations." He also said, “In fact, the Arms Trade Treaty was designed to bring other countries up to the type of high standard that Canada already applies through its robust export control regime”.

These remarks do make me wonder at the wisdom of subjecting the arms industry to regulatory upheaval by signing the Arms Trade Treaty and introducing this bill. Apparently Canada was already more than compliant. It is important to remember that major arms exporters such as Pakistan, Russia, and China are not party to the treaty, which will limit its effectiveness in actually controlling the global arms trade.

It is also notable that contrary to the Liberals' talking points, Canada was not the only holdout on the bill in G7. Our closest trading partner and ally, the United States, has not ratified it, so we are far from alone in abstaining.

It is also troubling that the treaty's scope is extremely broad. It does not acknowledge the legitimate, lawful ownership of firearms for personal and recreational use. What is in the preamble is not in the treaty.

Nevertheless, I respect that the government at least has good intentions in contributing to the treaty's stated purposes of international peace, stability, and reducing human suffering.

With that said, I am the representative of a riding with a large rural population. I must question how lawful firearms could be affected by amendments this bill makes to the Export and Import Permits Act. Legal firearms in Canada are subject to an extensive, strict regulatory regime. The Firearms Act regulates the transportation, storage, and display of legal firearms by individuals. It also mandates the possession and acquisition licence. Further, firearms are currently listed in the Export and Import Permits Act as a controlled import.

Despite the government's assurance that the proposed changes will not impact the legitimate and lawful use of sporting firearms, the implementation of brokering controls and permits is yet another addition to the substantial regulatory system already in place. The new brokering permits seem to cover everything related to firearms, including accessories such as optics.

The first question that this bill raises is this: what additional bureaucratic burden might the brokering permit application place on the Canadian firearms industry?

It remains unclear what specific documentation will be required to apply for the permit. As a first step, the government should provide assurances to firms that are compliant with the existing regulations. They need to know that the new brokering permit requirement will not render them unable to continue their businesses.

Also notable is the government's commitment to establishing a brokering control list that exceeds the Arms Trade Treaty requirements by covering more goods and technology.

I assume this promise is an indication of the government's earnest desire to contribute to the Arms Trade Treaty objectives. However, the government should be aware that this promise raises yet more questions for lawful Canadian firearms owners and organizations who are unclear on what the ultimate result of a more expansive list might be.

Bill C-47 would also require that all documentation pertaining to the application for a brokering permit be retained for six years, yet again the bill leaves the question unanswered as to what documentation will be required.

We only recently removed the wasteful debacle that was the long-gun registry. I am sure the government can understand that the lawful firearms community is wary of any provision that mandates data collection without giving any indication of what data will actually be collected.

For example, will any consumer data form part of the documentation required to obtain a permit? Here, too, there is an opportunity for the government to provide some assurance to the lawful firearms community. The government should give us some sense of how the bill meets the Arms Trade Treaty obligations while still respecting legitimate trade and use of legal hunting and sporting firearms.

As the bill stands, we do not know what documentation will be required to obtain a brokering permit under the new system. We do not know what goods or technology might be added to the brokering control list at the minister's discretion. We do not know what documentation will need to be retained for the mandated six year period. This makes it difficult to appraise its potential impact on the lawful firearms community.

The government's former minister of foreign affairs stated that brokering controls would be a new regulatory area for Canada, and a good example of where we are adding rigour to the existing system. The rigorous new regulatory area being added to the existing program needs far more explanation.

With all of these questions up in the air, it is incredible the Liberals conducted little or no consultation with the lawful Canadian firearms community before introducing this legislation.

Beyond the unanswered questions I have already asked, does the government know the cost to the firearms industry of adapting to the new brokering control permits? There is a serious potential for the loss of jobs as manufacturers and importers transition to the new regulations.

If the government had consulted with lawful firearms community stakeholders, it would know that the questions I pose in my remarks are important to that community. It is a large Canadian demographic already subject to a strict regulatory environment.

Our former Conservative government declined to sign the Arms Trade Treaty specifically because there were concerns about how it might affect lawful and responsible firearms owners. The United Nations refused to exempt civilian firearms from the treaty. The government's own assessment found that Canada was already meeting the vast majority of Arms Trade Treaty obligations, but still the Liberals have opted to sign on.

The government likes to say the treaty will have no impact on law-abiding civilian firearms usage. Why then are civilian firearms even included in the treaty? Why was the United Nations against exempting them? It makes one wonder.

As a result of the Arms Trade Treaty not explicitly protecting the rights of law-abiding firearms owners, it is the responsibility of the government to provide assurance it will meet its obligations without overly impinging on the lawful Canadian firearms community. I look forward to the government doing the right thing, and demonstrating some openness to working with lawful firearms community stakeholders.

This legislation is designed to meet the obligations of a treaty that has lumped in hunting rifles with large calibre artillery systems. The government needs to listen to lawful firearm owners to mitigate the potential damage the bill might do.

[Export and Import Permits Act, September 21st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things we heard in previous speeches was who was all in and who had ratified or signed this agreement. If I remember Woodrow Wilson, one of the great U.S. presidents, he signed an agreement, the League of Nations, but it was never ratified. Perhaps the member could clarify the difference between a U.S. president signing a document and ratifying it.

[Infrastructure, September 18th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments my colleague has made and I would agree in principle. He is absolutely right. I have a list of all the projects that were approved. However, as a former vice-president of the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association, I understand clearly how the communities were offered to apply and get their projects in, but then the provincial government, after it promised to give them this money, diverted hundreds of millions of dollars and spent it in general revenue. This cannot continue. If we have a plan and we want to see it done, and I agree with the member, we should make a bilateral agreement so it cannot do this.

[Infrastructure, September 18th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I previously asked if steps would be taken to allow for funding for infrastructure to flow directly to municipalities. It is extremely important that these steps be taken, as approximately 60% of infrastructure in Canada is under municipal jurisdiction. Funding infrastructure in our country, therefore, means getting it to the municipalities.

The government's budget 2017 states that because rural and northern communities of under 100,000 have unique infrastructure needs that require a more targeted approach, the government will invest $2 billion over 11 years to support a broad range of infrastructure projects. It is to be allocated to provinces and territories on a basis of per capita allocation. This is a bit self-contradicting, in the sense that the government will distribute it on allocation to municipalities, but the province gets the option of how it distributes it and whether it needs to go directly to municipalities. A targeted approach would target the rural municipalities themselves, not allocate the funds to a provincial government. If anything, this method of allocation has missed the target, as is apparent in the experience of many Alberta municipalities.

Small municipalities pass budgets that allocate funds to getting projects shovel ready, but they are wasting considerable time and money doing so. Getting projects ready when they are informed to get on that list is a very expensive project, especially for small communities. Engineering costs a lot of money, so when getting those projects ready, it costs money to apply to get some of the money. Their time and money are wasted because their applications became stale-dated, unlike large municipalities that have shovel-ready projects they can pull off the shelf. Smaller ones cannot do that.

Engineered projects are important to small communities, but the province allocates the funds to these shovel-ready projects instead of supporting the smaller ones, because they can pull them off the shelf immediately.

Budget 2017 also states that bilateral agreements with provinces and territories will have flexible terms, so that funds can be directed to the areas with the greatest need. This seems well intentioned, but the implementation is clearly lacking. Small or rural municipalities under 100,000 that may be in great need of infrastructure investment in many cases simply cannot compete with larger cities with shovel-ready projects. Cities of 100,000 are different from those of 1,000, 5,000, or 10,000.

Infrastructure dollars should be disseminated to municipalities in a similar manner to the gas tax refund. This way, municipalities could use the funds to engineer the projects, get them shovel ready, and implement them. This is what an approach that hits its target looks like.

The government's bilateral agreements with provincial and territorial governments need to be re-evaluated for phase two to ensure that infrastructure dollars actually get to the municipalities for which they were intended. The agreement should explicitly state that the money goes to municipalities so that we do not have a repeat of the hundreds of millions of dollars of new Building Canada fund money that ended up being spent as Alberta government general revenue. It should contain provisions that accommodate the needs of municipalities that are in the process of engineering shovel-ready projects.

Will the government now commit to ensuring that funding flows directly to the municipalities? It can be flow-through, as with the gas tax, but if it is a bilateral that allows them to use it for their own purposes—

[Cannabis Act, June 1st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague bringing up the zoning issue. Companies may have initially been looking to locate in larger municipalities, but we are now hearing that they may want to locate in more rural settings, which affects more of us outside the 22 major cities. That is a challenge that we need to be prepared for, but we need to know and understand what the implications are and how it would work. This is not a simple process of planning and zoning. It will take time. If companies locate outside major urban centres, it is going to take time, and we need more lead time than the timeline we have.

[Cannabis Act, June 1st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his kind words.

Part of the challenge of going ahead with this is the short timeline we have. I understand how consultation works, and it takes a long time. I understand the relationship between the federal government and the provinces. The disconnect is with ensuring the funding gets to the municipalities. The government really has to get that done. Whether it can get that done and provide a clear commitment that the municipalities can understand in black and white, and it flows to them, is the challenge. If the government can do that, it will make a difference. They need to know it and plan for it.