Mike Sullivan

[The Budget, February 12th, 2014]

And they voted against it, Mr. Speaker. Working people trying to find a place to live in Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal face real challenges. Prices go up and up, while the Conservatives just stand by and do nothing. As Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi said, there is nothing in this budget for people who live in cities across Canada.

Can the minister please explain why this budget did nothing to address the housing crisis?

[The Budget, February 12th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, some of that money referred to by the minister was actually from Jack Layton, not from the minister.

Working people trying to find a place to live in Vancouver—

[Fair Elections Act, February 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments of the member opposite, but I heard him suggest to the House that the Chief Electoral Officer bullied him. As was the case in Toronto with the mayor when he was threatened with removal from office, the law is a clumsy and sometimes forceful animal, so if the law says the mandatory minimum for a particular breach is a letter to the Speaker saying a person cannot sit, then the Chief Electoral Officer was merely acting according to the law. That is not bullying.

I regret that the government seems to have taken the same position as a hockey team would when it does not agree with the decision of a referee and does not like the referee, but most hockey teams do not have the authority to remove the referee and fire him. However, that seems to be what the government is doing in response to this activity.

[Petitions, February 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of residents of New Brunswick, I present this petition to implore the Government of Canada to undertake all measures to reinstate daily round-trip VIA Rail passenger service between Montreal and Halifax through the cities of Campbellton, Bathurst, and Miramichi, New Brunswick. I note that this petition is presented in both official languages.

[Rail Transportation, February 7th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians in my riding of York South—Weston and across the country are increasingly worried about rail safety. As it turns out, they are right to be concerned. Instead of putting safety first, the minister has let big rail companies cut corners, skip safety inspections, and be exempt from some brake tests. In one case, they went six months without a complete brake test.

Why were these exemptions allowed, and why is the minister refusing to come clean with Canadians?

[Fair Elections Act, February 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I want to come back to the notion of proof of identity and vouching. The minister is suggesting that there is rampant fraud, when in fact with something like 25% of the people who had to have their identity proven, Elections Canada officials failed to fill in the paperwork properly. There was no fraud, according to the court.

In fact, the report the minister is using to justify these massive changes recommends widening the use of the voter information card as a valid piece of identification for all voters. Instead, the government is eliminating it. There is no recommendation in here whatsoever concerning eliminating vouching. It actually suggests that the use of vouching be reduced. It is a necessary part of elections, but the report suggests that it be reduced by an improvement to the voters list, and there is nothing in this bill to improve the voters list.

[Fair Elections Act, February 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, the reason for the rainbow tie and pocket kerchief is to add solidarity to our friends in the LGBT community, particularly in Russia as the Olympics begin.

The minister has on several occasions suggested that 25% of the people who are vouching are not eligible to be vouched for, and that is not the case. That is not what the court said. The court said very clearly that there was no evidence of fraud whatsoever. The clerks in the polling stations were not sufficiently trained to do the paperwork properly. That is what happened.

Instead of urging Elections Canada to fix that problem, to better train and supervise the clerks, the government is throwing out one of two ways for people to get on the election list. It is both that are the problem. There is only a small percentage of people who are being vouched for, but there are almost one million people who go to the polls without being properly on the list and who have to prove their identity some other way. They have to be allowed to vote based on information not on the list and information having to be done.

Would the member like to comment on these inaccurate comments made by the minister?

[Privilege, February 6th, 2014]

--in English that is, Mr. Speaker, because there were problems with the interpretation.

I did raise with the officials the problems with the interpretation. I did ask the officials if another briefing session would be held. The officials told me there would be no more briefing sessions. The officials were well aware of the problems with the interpretation.

The government has on a number of occasions said to parliamentarians that, if we wish to ask questions or to enter into a debate, we should attend the technical briefing sessions, which I did in good faith. However, portions of that technical briefing session were not available to me in my mother tongue, and it is a parliamentary right of mine that it should be provided.

[Privilege, February 6th, 2014]

I do, Mr. Speaker.

As an anglophone, I too did not receive simultaneous translation of the technical briefing session; so it was not a matter merely of francophone members who have now put the issue squarely before you that they could not understand in their language, but as an anglophone, portions of the technical briefing session were not in my language—

[Grain Transport, February 5th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I was at the transportation committee when Bill C-52 was discussed, and it was clear that the grain shippers were not happy that they were not going to be able to negotiate certain aspects, which they are feeling now. The aspects of that bill they cannot negotiate are what they are being hit with: these big expenses.

In addition was the demise of the Wheat Board. While it was cheered wildly on the other side of the House, there was one thing the Wheat Board was able to do that is not possible now without it. That was to pay farmers and subsidize the transportation of grain eastward through Thunder Bay and Churchill in order to go westward. The Wheat Board did that as a regular part of its business, because it knew full well that the port of Vancouver could not handle a bumper crop. The port of Vancouver cannot transport all the grain that comes off the prairies to China. It just cannot do it. It is physically impossible, and here we are.

We knew it was going to happen, but the Conservatives are discovering it for the first time. We are having what is called an emergency debate, because there is an emergency. Farmers are not going to have money this year. They are not going to be able to plant crops next year if they do not have money this year.

The government has indicated that it wishes to use its legislative authority against Canadian National Railway. Will it do so, not just for the workers? Will it use its legislative authority—