Richard Cannings

[Committees of the House, November 19th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, I have enjoyed working with the parliamentary secretary on the international trade committee for the past while. I know he is in favour of the motion here today because he voted for the original letter that we sent to the government.

The member mentioned responsible enterprise in his speech. I just wonder whether he could comment on the fact that the commissioner for responsible enterprise has been before us in committee twice, and that both times she has said that she needs more power to do her job. Nobody is sending her work, because she cannot do it. She needs the power to get documents and testimony from companies, and she does not have that power. I want to know whether the member supports giving her that power so we can have responsible enterprise from Canadians around the world.

[Committees of the House, November 19th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot for his speech.

It has been a pleasure working with the member on the international trade file. I am sorry that I am not on that file anymore, but we have been through all of this together.

I am glad he mentioned Bill S-211, which the NDP also thought was completely inadequate. The Bloc and the NDP voted against it, while the Conservatives and Liberals voted in favour. The member supported Bill C-262, brought forward by the NDP member for New Westminster—Burnaby, which would be a significant and great improvement on what the government is doing.

There are so many things I would like to ask my colleague, because I know he has a lot of good things to say about the subject, but I will hone in on one thing that I know the international trade committee was studying, which is the free trade agreement with Ecuador.

The federal government is now negotiating with Ecuador, and it is clear that it wants to put in investor-state dispute mechanisms to protect Canadian mining companies in their fight against indigenous people, against minorities and people living on the land in Ecuador. This goes against the real sense of what Canada should be doing in the world.

[Privilege, October 28th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, my colleague talked a lot about the failures of the Liberal government, and there are many things I would agree with him on there, but he seemed to blame absolutely everything on the Liberals. I wonder if he could comment on the fact that people in his province blamed everything on the Conservative government in New Brunswick and soundly defeated it in the last election.

[Petitions, October 21st, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to rise here today to present a petition from 118 firefighters in British Columbia. This petition addresses an urgent issue impacting their health. I want to thank the member for New Westminster—Burnaby for sponsoring this petition. It calls for immediate action to ban per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, in firefighter gear and firefighting foam.

PFAS are man-made chemicals known as “forever chemicals” because they build up in the environment and our bodies, and cause serious health issues. We have to help firefighters stay safe and healthy by regulating what we can control of their working conditions. Several countries have banned PFAS. Canada must follow suit. We have to protect those who risk their lives for us. This petition is asking for urgent action on this matter.

[Emergency Preparedness, October 8th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, after a summer of wildfires that destroyed thousands of hectares of forests in the iconic city of Jasper, the Liberals are planning to cut funding for emergency services. To make matters worse, the government has failed to train even a single firefighter in five provinces. It is the government's job to protect communities, but it is letting people down.

We know Conservatives cut services all the time, but why are the Liberals risking Canadians' lives just to help their bottom line?

[Bird Populations, October 8th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, the third report on “The State of Canada's Birds” was released today by Birds Canada and Environment Canada.

Birds are literally the canaries in the coal mine for our environmental health, and previous reports from 2012 and 2019 raised some serious red flags. Today's report shows that some of those concerns are getting worse. For instance, grassland birds have declined by two-thirds since 1970, so something is clearly going wrong in our grasslands.

However, these reports also show that, when we know what is going wrong and have the political will to fix it, we can see dramatically positive results. Hawks, eagles and falcons have increased by a third since 1970 because we banned DDT. Waterfowl have also increased because we started conserving their habitats.

We know all this about bird populations because of the thousands of talented volunteers who go out every day to count birds. These citizen scientists have given us an incredibly powerful measure of the health of our forests, grasslands and waters.

[Business of Supply, October 1st, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague talked at the end of her speech about how it would be common sense for the Conservatives and the Bloc to support dental care in Canada. We obviously think this in the NDP caucus because it was our initiative, which the Liberals, I have to admit, voted against a couple of years ago. They also voted against pharmacare, and now it is common sense too. I am very happy that we are moving those things forward.

I would like to ask the question that my colleague just got. How is it common sense that seniors aged 65 to 75 do not get the same treatment as seniors over 75? They are living in the same circumstances and should get the same supports, which they desperately need.

[Business of Supply, October 1st, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, we are debating supports for seniors here today. Seniors, especially on fixed incomes, are struggling, but I just came from a human resources committee meeting where we were talking about people with disabilities. We have the new Canada Disability Benefit Act that was rolled out by this government. It is only available for maybe one-third of Canadians with disabilities, and it is only $200 a month. It is really a slap in the face to the people with disabilities who really need supports to get out of poverty.

We heard from witness after witness today that this needs to change and that we have to fix these disability supports so that the people who need them really can access them.

[Business of Supply, September 24th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member mentioned a number of programs. He mentioned child care. I have to say that it has impacted my extended family directly. My daughter finally got a good child care position for my granddaughter that has really brought stability and removed stress from their lives. He mentioned pharmacare. He suggested that the Conservatives have not signalled what they think about that. The Leader of the Opposition made it very clear that he did not like pharmacare for Canadians. We have done so much over the last couple of years, with the NDP forcing the Liberals to do things that they had voted against, such as dental care, pharmacare and anti-scab legislation for workers.

I am just wondering if he can tell me why anyone in the House or anyone in this country should have confidence in the Leader of the Opposition and the Conservative Party.

[Committees of the House, September 23rd, 2024]

Madam Speaker, I apologize and withdraw that statement; it was one of his neighbours.

All I will say is that the federal NDP would have a very strong climate policy, the best in this House. It would be better than the Liberals and better than the total lack of a climate policy from the—