Rick Perkins

[Privilege, December 16th, 2024]

Madam Speaker, I listened to the member's speech. I believe we are debating the privilege motion on the Liberal green slush fund. I did not hear the Liberal green slush fund or SDTC mentioned in his speech. I heard a lot of other things that seemed more like a budget speech.

I would ask the hon. member why his party continues to vote for the government when the former deputy prime minister will not even support the Prime Minister. In this case, the Auditor General found that almost $400 million was funnelled to companies of Liberal insiders, yet the member did not speak to that issue at all or say whether he will support the motion the House passed, which is paramount, that all documents be unredacted and released, otherwise the government is in total disregard of the role of Parliament and the 600-year history of our power to request documents.

[Points of Order, December 16th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I will try to add to what has already been said. Obviously, not only certain parliamentarians have had access already, when most of us do not, but also journalists have had access to it already. That will leak. There is a precedent. In the mid-to-late 1980s, then-finance minister Michael Wilson's printed budget leaked. There is a printed budget that is available to be tabled now, a fall economic statement. They can table those documents now.

When it was leaked, the then minister of finance had to go to the press gallery, because the House was not sitting in the evening, and he actually had to deliver the full budget so that parliamentarians could get access. This is a similar situation in that we now have select people, some of whom are not parliamentarians, who have access to those documents. I personally believe that it is a breach of my privilege that a journalist has access to those documents and that I do not, when the government can simply table the budget, the fall economic statement documents, in the House now, without giving the speech.

[Privilege, December 16th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to the member's speech this morning. I would just like him to comment a little on the issue of a rare sighting today, a sighting as rare as the mythical dinosaurs or dodo birds. It was a Liberal with principle, apparently. I did not know that the former minister of finance had principle, but apparently she does, and she resigned over excessive spending by the government.

I am wondering whether the member could comment on the fact that the leader of the NDP seems to have less concern or principle. I believe that if the Prime Minister were to stand up and say that there is going to be an election, the leader of the NDP would probably say that now is not the time for an election.

Could the member comment on the apparent principle that the former minister of finance has, compared to the current NDP leader?

[Committees of the House, December 13th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans has skimmed $80 million out of the parliamentary appropriation to the Great Lakes Commission, against the authorization of this Parliament. This is the testimony before committee by the commission itself. The DFO acknowledged that.

Finally, after work of the fisheries committee and the pressure of the fisheries committee opposed by every Ontario Liberal, the Prime Minister assigned the order in council for it to be transferred to Global Affairs, except it was smoke and mirrors, like everything the government does. It was to help kill the sea lampreys, which suck the blood out of fish, somewhat like the Liberals. The issue is that they kept the money in DFO. The DFO still gets to control it, still gets to control the money switched over there, and is still skimming.

Why does the Liberal government believe it is right for over $80 million of taxpayer money to be skimmed out of this program against the authorization of Parliament?

[Labour, December 13th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, today, the Minister of Labour stepped into the Canada Post strike. The workers' union said that it “denounces in the strongest terms this assault on our constitutionally protected [rights]”.

Even the NDP leader said the Liberals will “always step in to make sure the unions have no power.”

On Monday, the NDP leader put his pension before country and workers, voting confidence in the Liberals. Will the government confirm it has ordered workers back to work? What is the price the Liberals paid to keep the NDP leader propping up this anti-worker government?

[Finance, December 13th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, the fundamental rule of Parliament is that no money shall be spent without the consent of Parliament. It is right in the Constitution. Members might want to take a look.

It has been eight months since the year-end, and the Liberals still have not tabled the deficit number. The Liberals are two months late in tabling the public accounts. Bay Street, not Parliament, learned yesterday that the government has sold $3 billion of Air Canada shares. They are blocking Parliament from doing its work. They must have blown by their maximum $40-billion deficit promise massively.

They should come clean: What is the deficit number?

[Finance, December 13th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, after nine years of the NDP-Liberal government, spending has gotten so bad that even Liberals are concerned. The finance minister promised Canadians that the deficit would not be a penny over $40 billion. She promised that it would be her fiscal guardrail. When someone goes over a guardrail, they do not stop. They go right over into the abyss.

The problem is so bad that even Liberal MPs are commenting. “I think that we do need to show fiscal restraint”, said one of them. Another Liberal said this: “I think that if we state that we have a $40 billion guardrail, we stay within those numbers”.

To save her skin from the phantom finance minister, conflict of interest carbon tax Carney, the current finance minister has begun selling furniture in order to pay the rent. Liberals just sold three billion dollars' worth of Air Canada stock in the last 48 hours. Desperate Liberals will do anything to save their sinking ship.

The solution is simple. They should just stop. Stop increasing spending, stop increasing taxes, stop increasing inflation and call a carbon tax election.

[Finance, December 12th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberal minister is so informed, he does not even know that Canada Post is on strike. He is another lost cabinet minister.

More leaking Liberals are speaking out about the economic disaster of the Prime Minister, who has decided to crash through his $40-billion deficit guardrail promise, an obscene number on its own. The Liberal MP for Saint John—Rothesay said that Liberals “need to show fiscal restraint”, like that is going to happen.

Crashing through his promised $40-billion deficit will increase the cost of food. If the deficit guardrail is broken and driven right through, will the Prime Minister allow his Liberal MPs a free vote?

[Finance, December 10th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, there we have it, a real-life Thelma and Louise. The Prime Minister is driving Canadians through the finance minister's deficit guardrail into the abyss. The Prime Minister is throwing the finance minister under the bus. Now, in The Globe and Mail, senior Liberals are throwing the Prime Minister's vote-buying under the bus.

It truly is hard to imagine a deficit number so bad that even senior Liberals are complaining. What is the deficit number that is so large that even leaking Liberals are appalled?

[Finance, December 10th, 2024]

Mr. Speaker, The Globe and Mail is reporting a big fight between the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance. They have blown through every deficit target every year but, apparently, we “ain't seen nothing yet”. Just like what happened to the last finance minister, the Prime Minister does not care about this finance minister breaking her promise that the deficit would not be more than $40 billion. Who cares when the Prime Minister fears for his political life?

I have a simple question. Is the deficit more than $40 billion, yes or no?