Pierre Nantel

[Business of Supply, March 21st, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague for his very lively speech. However, I would urge my colleague from Louis-Saint-Laurent, in the Quebec City region, to be cautious when he talks about Beau Dommage, which is very much a Montreal group. The words of the song 23 décembre definitely talk about Mr. Côté, not Mr. Tanguay.

That said, my colleague also talked about Robin Hood and Liberal mismanagement. During the election campaign, the Liberal Party promised the moon and a small deficit. The campaign was led by people who did not think they would one day form the government. They wondered what they could do to stand out and they would say anything. Now, Canadians are left with nothing much.

Indeed, many Canadians travel, but I would not go so far as to say, as my colleague did, that all Canadians travel by air, because many of them are not well-off, and I see that in my riding. However, what is true is that Canadians are still the ones who will pay for the lies the Liberal government told during the election campaign.

I would like to hear what my colleague thinks about that.

[Canadian Heritage, March 20th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, last week the closure of the HMV stores led to the bankruptcy of the distributor DEP, which has put an abrupt stop to the marketing of Quebec artists.

From Vincent Vallières to the Montreal Symphony Orchestra and Florence K, DEP's bankruptcy seems to be the latest sign of the collapse of Quebec's recording industry and a new source of worry about Canadian content.

Canada must move swiftly to regulate all the new online providers, whether they are based in Montreal, Los Angeles, or some other tax haven.

Can the minister tell us what she has done to ensure that these new players contribute to our ecosystem and to the same tax system as everyone else?

[National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act, March 10th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, this is an extremely sensitive topic. Bill C-51 came up a lot during the election campaign. People talked about a great darkness, as my colleague opposite said. However, the Liberals supported Bill C-51, saying they would figure it all out later on, and that member was part of the team in charge in another capacity then.

Canadians have not forgotten. They remember. They remember that Bill C-51 was outrageous, regardless of what my colleagues over here think, and that the Liberals said they would figure it all out. The PMO has some nerve thinking it can appoint the committee chair.

Would my colleague care to comment on that? It makes no sense.

[National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians Act, March 10th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. However, I have to admit that I do not know what is happening here, because the people elected us to represent them in the House of Commons and to talk about federal issues.

The very principle of having committees that deal with specific subjects is based on the fact that this allows us to take a closer look at the details of certain bills. The Liberals made a commitment to create this oversight committee. The parliamentary committee that studied the issue made a series of recommendations and heard a great deal of testimony, which the government is completely ignoring. Why?

[The Environment, March 10th, 2017]

How about pro-environment, Mr. Speaker?

Our Prime Minister keeps making promises and saying just about anything while courting American oil companies so they might award him some fairly dubious prizes.

How can this government even dare to claim that it wants to meet its objectives, which it committed to by signing the Paris agreement, when clearly the Minister of the Environment is being told to keep quiet?

When will this government finally be true to its word and join the G8 countries that have a strategy for the electrification of transportation?

We are not going to meet our COP21 targets with four charging stations.

[Business of Supply, March 9th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech, especially considering that the member for Saint-Jean is very familiar with the reality facing our soldiers, at least with respect to military bases and their families.

We will recall that a while ago there were disagreements about the interpretation of the mission. It was often called an advise and assist mission, when clearly our troops deployed there are put in harm’s way. I would therefore like to know the reasoning behind the decision to not grant this danger pay.

Is it because, deep down, they want to deny that our troops there are being put in harm’s way?

[Business of Supply, March 9th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. I can see how deeply he cares for our military, and rightly so.

We certainly cannot disagree with giving deployed soldiers danger pay. They are far from home just like us, but in addition to being far from home, they are in danger zones. Compared to that, being here in Ottawa is not so bad.

However, there is something of a disconnect here because the member was part of the previous Conservative government that cut the army's budget to the bone. Does he see a cause and effect relationship here with the current government's attempts to pinch pennies when it comes to health care and our military families' peace of mind? Are we not lying in a bed that his party made when it was in government?

[Business of Supply, March 9th, 2017]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech.

He is evidently very familiar with this subject, and I commend him for sharing his knowledge with us. He is quite right to say that we cannot change the working conditions of someone who travelled far away to work in a danger zone. Naturally, we agree with him.

However, I remind him that it, even though he was not a member at the time, his party's government misled us by stating that it was not a dangerous mission and that it was sending soldiers there to provide support and training. That was a serious mistake, and the mission was underfunded.

I would like my colleague to comment on that.

[Business of Supply, March 7th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for the question. I also appreciate his knowledge on this topic. He provided some clarifications to my response to the member opposite.

It is quite clear that over the years a tax evasion policy, a tax haven policy, has taken hold. Companies, especially multinationals, have been able to choose where to deposit their profits. It is wrong. It makes no sense. Any normal person can see that this is not right. This would be a non-issue if we lived in a society where everyone's needs were met, but when we have a hard time bathing our seniors, this money could evidently be put to good use.

[Business of Supply, March 7th, 2017]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question as well as the overview he gave. I often find him to be a little long-winded but this time, it was very appropriate to reset the scene.

Investing $444 million to form a squad to go after those tax shelters and people who profit from them, who are clearly abusing the system, is great. Investing the money needed is great, but that said, we need to see some results. For instance, during question period today, it did not exactly reassure us to hear the Minister of Finance reply with the same old broken record.

The truth is, we would like to see the government show some international leadership on coordination efforts, or regarding companies that take advantage of tax shelters by hiding their profits in places that are clearly in on it. We want to see a government that wants to resolve the problem and take the lead on this. For months I have been asking the Minister of Canadian Heritage whether she got the message to the Minister of Finance and whether the government is finally going to collect GST and provincial taxes on international services that are provided over the Internet. We have not received an answer. That is the least the government could do. Canadians want to see companies pay their fair share.