Nathan Cullen

[Member for Langley—Aldergrove, May 7th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, it is a distinct honour for me to rise today to address my friend, the member for Langley—Aldergrove, and Diane, his wife, to say a few words.

First of all, I want to wish my friend a happy birthday.

The humour, strength and courage with which he came to the House today is remarkable, for those who do not know him. However, for those who have been blessed to have had time with him, it is no surprise and only confirms my feelings and thoughts toward him.

I am not sure I have ever liked someone so much whom I have agreed with so little over the issues of the day and what we have grappled with. We first came to know each other when he was the parliamentary secretary to the minister of environment under Stephen Harper and I was the NDP's environment critic. We agreed on little, and our relationship of respect and mutual admiration was based on our ability to disagree without being disagreeable toward one another.

We are the class of '04. We have spent some time traversing this country, from British Columbia to Ottawa and back again. In some of those moments, we have been able to share the costs, not to us but to our families, of being away and being apart. I have taken my friend's counsel over the years on this.

Although I am not sure he will remember it, I will reflect on a time when a constituent of mine, Mark Penninga, who was running ARPA at the time, invited me to an ARPA meeting on the Hill. It was here in West Block. We had been here a long time, and we knew West Block before this.

I recall that the meeting was at the end of a long hallway. I bumped into my friend at the very beginning of the hallway, and we exchanged pleasantries as we were on our way to the ARPA meeting. ARPA is a Christian group that represents Christian values. There were many meeting rooms along the way, and I felt that my friend expected me to peel off at some point and go to some other meeting. I knew where he was going, and I was going to the same place. He said, “Well, have a nice evening” and I said, “You too. Let's go in.” Seeing the shock on some of the faces of colleagues from various parties in the House that I had entered that room for that conversation was quite pleasurable, actually. I quite enjoyed the conversation and the shock.

We come from opposite sides on many debates and many issues, but he has always approached those conversations with deep honesty and respect. I have taken exception to some of his ideas on things, and I will take exception to his assessment regarding the good looks of the member for Abbotsford. I worry about him and his ability to see clearly. However, I understand that emotions take over at certain points, so I will allow him that clear mistake in judgment regarding the good looks of our friend.

It has been said that politics at its best is a vocation, a true calling. Those who enter politics merely for ego, personal ambition or power often do it badly. Those of us who seek office as a calling have a better shot at doing well by the people we seek to speak on behalf of.

We all know that the member squeaked by in his five elections, with only, I believe, the support of 53% of his constituents, which is incredible. I think he represented them well. I think he represented them with integrity.

To Diane, his five children and 10 grandchildren, who he refuses to ever shut up about, constantly telling us what is going on in their lives, we owe a great debt for the time we have had with Mark.

I hope my friend understands that the shortness of my words here is in direct contrast to the depth and length of my admiration and love for him.

Thank you, Mark.

[Business of Supply, May 7th, 2019]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question. I am a little surprised to hear him say that an NDP candidate was in favour of pipelines and energy east. Maybe he was talking about the leader of the Liberal Party or the leader of the Conservative Party. The Conservatives are decidedly in that camp. One need only look at their plan, which is not really a plan at all.

If we want a stable economy that does not solely benefit Alberta, Canada or Quebec, building another pipeline is not the solution. We do not export enough crude oil, not to mention the labour shortage and tariffs. If we want to improve the overall economy, we need to focus on all of our natural resources, and not just build another pipeline to China or the U.S. That is not the solution.

It is said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. It does not work, but that is the Liberal Party's approach.

[Business of Supply, May 7th, 2019]

Madam Speaker, we can see how the member does this. He said that I have a number of facts wrong but will not tell me what they are.

I talked about the IPCC report, the Auditor General of Canada, and the commissioner of the environment, which has audited the Liberal performance on climate and found it disastrous. I was able to say that the Stephen Harper target in the Paris Agreement is the same one that the Liberals are maintaining but cannot meet. I have laid out some facts, which he says are wrong or disputable but does not name any of them. He does not present his own facts. To the hon. member, I will say the statement again, which is so often apt for him: He is entitled to his own opinions but not his own facts. The fact of the matter is that this is the Liberal record on climate. Own it.

These guys want to have a culture war in the next election about climate change, but only about the carbon tax. The Conservatives want to say no, and the Liberals want to say yes, as if that were the only thing we needed to wrestle with in this country. How much of a failure of ambition that is from the Liberal government, which came in with such a strong mandate to do something about this. A carbon price is important but not the only thing, obviously, because the Liberals are failing on their own weak promises at the Paris climate agreements.

[Business of Supply, May 7th, 2019]

Madam Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise in the House of Commons.

For Canadians who do not understand how the process works, we allow opposition parties to propose a few motions per year. The motion from the Conservatives today asks the government “to stop raising the price of gas by clearing the way for pipelines and eliminating the carbon tax on fuel.” This is weak sauce, as we say in politics, simply because while the Conservatives claim to Canadians that they understand how the oil and gas industry works and how the price at the pump works, they put forward motions like this that clearly show their unwillingness to think about the issue fully.

I will give members one example. In 2006, the NDP, then in opposition, asked the then Conservative government to establish a gas ombudsman, someone who would look at the price of gas at gas stations across the country. We have all had the experience that just prior to a long weekend or a significant date, suddenly the price at the gas pump accelerates dramatically. We told the then Conservative government to be consumer friendly and look at how the agencies were sometimes colluding and at how the stop in production at various times throughout the year caused prices to spike, which was fortuitous for the gas companies but a great disadvantage for working-class Canadians.

During their 10 years in office, the Conservatives were not preoccupied or at all concerned about the price at the pump. Now they see a political opportunity to bash away at the current government, which has lost a great deal of credibility as climate champions. I do not think anyone believes the Prime Minister anymore, even if he puts his hand on his heart, that the Liberals truly believe in fighting climate change, because actions speak much louder than words.

It is important to start where the Conservatives and the Liberals have common ground on this issue, because there is actually more common ground than I think Canadians realize.

The Conservatives and the Liberals both believe in Stephen Harper's climate targets. The Conservatives brought them in, and the Liberals are maintaining them as the targets for Canada through the Paris Agreement. As the Auditor General and the commissioner of the environment have pointed out, the Liberals are failing to meet even the Stephen Harper climate targets. In fact, just last year, our carbon footprint went up by 12 million tonnes under the government.

The Liberals keep claiming that they are fighting climate change and are doing all these great things, but the evidence shows that not only is the curve not bending down, it is continuing to turn up. Liberals say do not worry, we will get there.

Another point of agreement is oil and gas subsidies. As members know, again according to the Auditor General's reports, we give the oil and gas industry about $1 billion to $2 billion, depending on the year, in direct subsidies. A lot of Canadians ask why that is. In times of profitability, which is most of the time, this sector makes a lot of money. Why are we subsidizing it?

That is a good question. When Stephen Harper was prime minister, he told the OECD, with hand on heart, that Canada would get rid of them as a country by a particular date. He then did nothing about it.

In the last election, the Liberal Prime Minister told Canadians not to vote for the Conservatives, because they do not believe in climate change. He told Canadians that the Liberals did believe in it and would get rid of subsidies to the oil and gas sector. It is three and half years later. We just saw the last federal Liberal budget, and the oil and gas subsidies remain. The Conservatives and the Liberals are in total agreement.

We asked the federal government, given how much it is spending on subsidizing the oil and gas sector, how much it is spending on the so-called alternatives, which are increasingly cost-efficient, such as wind energy, solar energy, tidal energy and geothermal energy. For three years I have been asking the government for the numbers. What is it spending and encouraging on that side of the ledger? We know what it is spending on oil and gas, but what is it spending on the alternatives. The government will not tell us, and I suspect that the number is not very good.

The last important point for today on which the Liberals and the Conservatives agree is on the expansion of the pipeline sector in Canada for the export of diluted bitumen, particularly with the hope that it will move to Asia.

We export diluted bitumen off the west coast of British Columbia right now. One may think that the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion was for opening up the Asian market, because we cannot get any oil to the coast. We do get oil to the coast. About 330,000 barrels of oil will go there today. People might think that Asia is grabbing up that oil, thereby increasing the price for all Canadian producers and bringing in more tax. That is not the case. Where does all that oil go?

It goes to the United States. Virtually 95% of the diluted bitumen that hits the west coast goes to the United States. Clearly, expanding that is going to solve, exactly what problem?

Not only are the Liberals and Conservatives in violent agreement on the issue of expanding diluted bitumen exports, which is the lowest, rawest form of oil, the least valued form of oil that we can get for the Canadian economy because it produces the fewest jobs—there is no valued added whatsoever—but the Liberals went out and bought a 65-year-old pipeline for the golden price of $4.5 billion of our money. I love when Liberals say that it is turning a profit, without doing the full accounting of the pipeline. I love that they do not include any of the risk factors that normal business people who do things like accounting normally would.

The Liberals bought a 65-year-old pipeline with the plan to spend another $10 billion to $15 billion. It is such a great pipeline that no one else wanted to buy it. There was not a single oil and gas company anywhere on the planet, not the Americans, Chinese, Brits or the Dutch, that wanted it. It was such a fantastic deal.

Can members imagine wanting to sell their old used car? There is simply no one who wants to buy it except the Canadian government, which says that it got a deal. The beat-up old wreck is one of the best ever, and it is going to keep pouring more money into it.

Imagine that the Liberal government is in the rental movie industry and saying it is going to have better DVDs. Never mind Netflix, it is going to get better signage for its Blockbuster outlets. The Liberals say, “Trust us. This is how it is going to go. We are going to spend your money wisely.”

On all of these things, the Liberals and Conservatives agree. In fact, they have the same targets. They believe in subsidizing the oil and gas sector consistently. They want to increase diluted bitumen to the coast at great cost to our climate. They talk about a carbon price, which is an element of a plan, but it is not a plan in and of itself. We know about this in British Columbia. The B.C. government, back in the Gordon Campbell days, did not just bring in a price on carbon, it brought in a whole bunch of other initiatives.

The Liberals will not tell us how they are going to meet even the Stephen Harper climate targets, because they cannot. They have been in government for three and a half years, and what the Liberals said they were getting elected to fix has become worse by the numbers. There was an increase of 12 million tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere last year under the so-called climate-fighting government.

When Canadians pull back, they get very concerned. They read the same reports that we all do. There is the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, talking about how, if in 12 years we do not bend the curve dramatically, we are not only headed to 2° or 2.5° of warming, but we will go way beyond that tipping point. We know about the effects on the Arctic. We know the effect of melting ice in the north. We know the effects of increasing intensity of forest fires.

Allow me to speak for a moment directly of my constituency, Skeena—Bulkley Valley in northwestern British Columbia. We broke the record for forest fires two years ago. It was unprecedented. We had never seen anything like the intensity of the burns. We had almost every fire region in the province alerted with fire emergencies. The scope of it was something we had never seen before. Then, we broke the record again last year.

We have some very resource-dependent, hard-working, quite conservative communities in my riding. We had forest firefighters who had been in the business for 30 years, not exactly the tree-hugging David Suzuki types, coming to me and saying that these fires were different. They had been fighting these fires for three decades, and they had never before seen the intensity that they were seeing. They said that the normal patterns of the fires were different. The scale and speed and scope of what they were seeing was different, and it is the climate.

Farmers are not understanding how the precipitation works anymore, because we do not get the snowfall we used to get, or the consistent patterns.

We have seen flooding. The city of Ottawa, where Parliament exists, declared a state of climate emergency. We are watching flood patterns change. The 100-year floods, 500-year floods, are happening every two years.

This is exactly what was predicted. The only thing that the global climate scientists were wrong about is that they thought it would not start happening until 2030 or 2040. Here we are, not even in 2020, and it is happening now.

If members want to debate gas prices, that is fine; we can talk about that. Let us talk about companies that gouge Canadians at the pump. If members want to talk about carbon pricing, that is fine; we can talk about that. However, it has to be in a plan that gets us to where we need to go. As we know, Canadians use more energy per capita and produce more greenhouse gases per capita than any other country in the world.

We have a lot to account for. We cannot continue to stand on the world stage, waggle our finger at other countries and say to be more like Canada. That is not a solution today. However, it should be a solution for the future, and I think the NDP will bring forward that green and bold new plan that will fulfill that promise.

[Criminal Records Act, May 6th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, I will ask my question in English since this is a very complex subject.

Indigenous people and black Canadians are dramatically overrepresented in possession charges. We heard from the Native Women's Association of Canada, along with the Canadian Association of Black Lawyers. Not only were they not consulted about this legislation, but the groups affected, particularly low-income Canadians, indigenous people and rural people, are much more likely to have also faced penalties for what are called administration of justice offences, such as failure to appear and false name. The combination of those, what is determined as a very low-level, non-violent crime plus a marijuana charge, would exempt them from the pardon system that the member's government is promoting.

Would my friend comment on the idea of actually allowing the discretion of parole boards to allow those who face an administrative justice penalty along with a possession penalty to also receive a pardon? As he talked about in his speech, allowing people not to carry around that penalty, that criminal record, would open them up for opportunities of travel, but most importantly, jobs.

We know the circular effect of the criminal justice system, which has been described by the Supreme Court of Canada as inherently racist and systemically biased against these people. We do not want to circle around by having the simple combination of possession and administrative penalty exclude them from ever having that record pardoned and having the ability that all Canadians hope to have, which is to make their lives and the lives of their families better.

[Criminal Records Act, May 6th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, I do not know if anyone else is picking up on this point. It seems as though the Liberals want to rerun the 2015 election, and I wonder why that is the case after four years in office. One would think that they would want to run the 2019 election, but instead they want to go back and rerun the 2015 election, when they promised that it was going to be the last election under first past the post. Here is a news flash for my Liberal friends: Apparently 2019 is going to be under first past the post. The Liberals promised all sorts of things, so they are selective when they say that they are delivering on their mandate.

Here is a specific question to the Liberals who know.

Here are the facts of the matter: Marginalized Canadians, indigenous Canadians and poor Canadians will not have the same opportunity to receive a pardon as wealthier white middle-class Canadians will have. How do I know? It is because that has been the testimony on this bill at committee.

I have a simple question for my friend, and I would like his personal position, not the party position.

Marginalized, indigenous and poor Canadians again are overrepresented when there is a combination of a simple possession charge with an administrative justice charge, such as a failure to appear. These people have the worst access to the criminal justice system, and the Supreme Court of Canada has said they will face racism and systemic discrimination in that criminal justice system. The combination of those two things means that those Canadians will be excluded from ever receiving a pardon and will drag that criminal charge around for the rest of their lives. We know the impact that this will have on them and their families.

Would my friend see an amendment to allow people with those administrative justice charges to also have an opportunity to receive a pardon under this legislation?

[Criminal Records Act, May 6th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, hon. members can be forgiven because it just happened a little while ago, but we just heard testimony from the Canadian Association of Black Lawyers, as we did from the Native Women's Association of Canada. Neither were consulted about the bill. This is kind of shocking and hypocritical of the government, because those are, in particular, two of the groups of Canadians that have been identified historically and presently as being discriminated against, particularly on marijuana laws and particularly when seeking a pardon. The Liberal system has been set up very well for middle- and high-income folks, folks who are white, folks in the suburbs, but not for folks who are overrepresented in our prisons and in our justice system.

Mr. Cudjoe, a representative for the Canadian Association of Black Lawyers, said that in his community, this will be seen as a token gesture. Why? When it comes to a simple possession charge combined with any charge of administrative justice, which is a failure to comply, a false identity presentation, and what Liberals themselves have said are very low level discriminate crimes, the combination of those two things will exempt people from this pardon process. They simply will not be able to get a pardon under this system.

I ask Liberals consistently, if the whole target of the bill is to help people get back into the system, particularly those who are marginalized, racialized, low income, if those people will not be able to qualify under the rules that the Liberals have set down in the bill, then what is the point of this exercise and who is it actually going to serve?

[Criminal Records Act, May 6th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, I am going to try again. A Liberal is a Liberal, so let us talk to this Liberal about the idea that the Liberals talk about the two large groups of Canadians who have been impacted and overrepresented in our criminal justice system and overrepresented by criminal charges when it comes to marijuana possession. That is indigenous Canadians and black Canadians.

The two largest representative groups were before committee just 30 minutes ago. When I asked if they were consulted, they said no. When we asked what the flaws were in this process, they both argued for expungement, which is what the NDP has suggested, which the Liberals voted against and killed. In fact, more Conservatives than Liberals voted for expungement, because they understand, perhaps, the effects of this on a person's life.

The Liberals keep talking about wanting to reintegrate people and not having them drag around a criminal record for the rest of their lives. We agree. We have suggested an amendment, so I would like my friend's thoughts on this. If someone has an administrative charge, such as failure to appear, which all would consider a low-level crime, in combination with a simple possession charge, that person would be excluded from the bill. He or she could not get a pardon under the Liberals' proposed system.

I would argue that the bill, introduced so late in the session, did not have proper consultation with Canadians who would actually be impacted by it. That is one of the reasons the Liberals did not understand why this was so important. For marginalized, low-income or indigenous Canadians, these administrative charges are common along with possession charges.

Would my friend agree that we need to have some discretion in the application so that with administration charges along with simple possession of marijuana, someone might also be able to obtain a pardon under the bill? Would that not be a welcome change for those Canadians we are looking to help out?

[Criminal Records Act, May 6th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to my friend's words very carefully. We know that the Canadians who are affected by this situation are particularly indigenous, marginalized and racialized Canadians, who have been long affected by marijuana laws. In particular, regarding the idea of pardons or expungements, I just came from the committee studying this bill. We heard from the Canadian Association of Black Lawyers and the Native Women's Association of Canada, two groups that are particularly focused on representing those Canadians. Neither of them was consulted by the government in drawing up this legislation.

What is devastating to me is this. In putting this bill together, not only did the Liberals not consult with the people affected, but they also ignored a particular condition that both witnesses brought up today, which is that if there is an administrative penalty or charge against someone—for example, a “failed to appear” charge—and they have a simple possession charge, they are omitted from this bill. They cannot seek a pardon.

Where I live in northern British Columbia, failures to appear, particularly for the marginalized, poor and indigenous people, are unfortunately quite common. We had a case last year of a young indigenous woman charged with simple possession and failure to appear. It was eight hours from her community by road to the courthouse. She had to hitchhike because there is no Greyhound or public transport service. All she could do was beg, borrow or steal a ride to get to court. She did not, and now she has an administrative charge, which my friend would know disqualifies her from receiving a pardon.

We agree with his comments about returning to society and being able to be a fully participating member. However, does he not understand the need to amend this bill to make the changes to help those whom the government claims to be seeking to help?

I do not understand why the Liberals did not consult. It is obvious now in this bill that their failure to consult has produced a flawed bill for Parliament.

[Criminal Records Act, May 6th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, we can forgive Canadians trying to follow this debate who might not know the distinction between an expungement and a pardon. Pardons exist right now within the legislation. We also know that pardons can simply be revoked at some future date. A future parliament can decide that it was a mistake and bring those convictions back onto people's records.

Liberal colleagues, time after time, have said that they think expungement was probably a better idea but that they just could not get around to it. We have about four or five weeks left in the parliamentary sitting. For a piece of legislation this important, this significant and this complicated to come this late expresses the government's lack of priority for the issue.

There are 400,000 Canadians wondering what is going to happen to their criminal charges for possession, which is not trafficking or anything else. We know indigenous communities and people of colour are overrepresented in this group. They are wondering where they sit in the Liberal priorities for justice. They know any pardon they get can be reversed and that the legislation has been introduced so late that it may not actually pass into law prior to the election in October of this year.