Pierre Poilievre

[Questions on the Order Paper, April 5th, 2019]

With regard to personal income tax rates: (a) does the government plan to increase personal income tax rates; (b) what are the details of any discussions or meetings where the possibility of increasing personal income tax rates was discussed, including (i) date, (ii) participants and location; and (c) do any supporting documents exist about any plan to increase personal income tax rates, including but not limited to, e-mails, briefing notes, memos and reports, and, if so, what are the details of such documents?

[Questions on the Order Paper, April 5th, 2019]

With regard to the GST/HST: (a) does the government plan to increase the GST/HST; (b) what are the details of any discussions or meetings where the possibility of increasing the GST/HST was discussed, including (i) date, (ii) participants and location; and (c) do any supporting documents exist about any plan to increase the GST/HST, including but not limited to, e-mails, briefing notes, memos and reports, and, if so, what are the details of such documents?

[Justice, April 5th, 2019]

Madam Speaker, the journal entries, text messages and audio recordings show that at least 12 top government officials, including the Prime Minister himself, interfered in the criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin, yet only two have appeared. Their appearances were so disastrous that both of them have had to resign from their jobs.

The remaining 10 have not been called upon to answer for the interference we know they engaged in as a result of documented records proving it. Will the government allow the ethics committee to continue an investigation that will bring them all forward?

[Justice, April 5th, 2019]

Madam Speaker, former PMO puppet master and best friend to the Prime Minister showed up before the justice committee and claimed that there was no conversation whatsoever about the inappropriateness of the Prime Minister's political interference in the SNC-Lavalin affair in September, in October, in November and in December, yet now we have 41 pages of journal entries, text messages and audio recordings that show there was nothing but conversation about that political interference. It is documented.

Given that this former PMO puppet master lied before the justice committee, will the Liberals allow the ethics committee to investigate what other falsehoods the government might have told?

[Justice, April 5th, 2019]

Madam Speaker, the Prime Minister looked 37 million Canadians in the eye and said, “If anyone, including the former attorney general, had issues with anything they might have experienced in this government or didn't feel that we were living up to the high standards we set for itself, it was her responsibility to come forward, it was their responsibility to come forward, and no one did.”

This week the Prime Minister admitted that this statement was false, that in fact his former attorney general looked him in the eye and warned him against politically interfering in the SNC-Lavalin prosecution.

Now that we know the Prime Minister stated this public falsehood, will he allow the ethics committee to investigate what others he might have told in this affair?

[The Budget, April 4th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, many of them are not facts.

The member has said that the average Canadian is $2,000 better off. That is just not true. In fact, Statistics Canada has released the data on median income and it has barely budged in three years. At various times, it has actually gone down. In the previous 40 years, there was growth in median income under only one prime minister, and that was Stephen Harper. People do not have to take my word for it. That data comes right out of the Liberal budget in 2016. It showed that there was a massive drop in median incomes under the father, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, that it took about 20 years just to begin to recover those losses and then we had the single biggest and best period of median income growth on record under the previous Conservative government.

Under the next Conservative government, we are going to beat that record.

[The Budget, April 4th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, this is one of the great popular misconceptions. A lot of people think big business does not like regulation. Actually, a lot of big corporate business likes to use excessive regulation in order to keep out competition, and it is often in the sectors where we have the heaviest regulation that we have the least competition. The lobbyists for those powerful corporate interests then influence the regulators and the politicians to make it more and more difficult for anyone to break in. Why should we be surprised by that?

Powerful big incumbents have the resources to lobby. Entrepreneurial upstarts do not. They are scrambling just to get by. That is why we always see these powerful corporations stepping up with more and more recommendations for government intervention. It is designed to protect their ability to stay on top. We believe in opening up the free market to true competition so the entrepreneurial upstarts can get ahead, can do as Benjamin Franklin said, and that is “Do well by doing good”.

[The Budget, April 4th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for his very gracious remarks and also for the counsel and mentorship he has been providing me the last several days. Regularly he has come over to express concern for my physical well-being, and he has given me a number of tips on how to survive this enduring task. I thank him for that in a very sincere way.

He also raises an important concern about the privileges that the government continues to protect for those with the most. He is quite right that while middle and working-class people are paying more and more, struggling harder and harder just to get by, those with connections to government have never done better.

I think the member will agree that we need to bring back the ladder of opportunity and make it available for all to climb, rather than, as the current government has done, pulling that ladder up over the castle walls so no one else can climb it.

We as Conservatives will continue to work to create that aspirational Canada where people can get ahead rather than just get by.

[The Budget, April 4th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, I am a little disappointed in the hon. member. I wanted to be generous in helping him to prepare his question for me, so I gave him 15 hours to prepare, and that is what he produced. The rhetorical factory in the PMO must have broken down. It is not cranking out any more good rhetorical widgets. As a result, even in 15 hours of chugging away, that is best we could have from across the way in the House of Commons.

He says that these are personal attacks, that it is character assassination. I have just spent the last 15 hours reading text messages, audio recordings and journal entries written by Liberals about Liberals. If he thinks they are personal attacks, then he should look around him at the mess that he and his team have created and that his own party members, and now former party members, have told us all about.

[The Budget, April 4th, 2019]

Mr. Speaker, thank you for giving me the opportunity to address the member's points. As the member correctly points out, I have been speaking for as long as 15 hours. If at any moment I were to have stumbled and for a brief instant touched my chair, I withdraw that stumble. It is now therefore withdrawn. The motion is tabled in the House of Commons and I thank you for finding it in order.