Rick Perkins

[National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act, February 8th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, this bill is about foreign direct investment in Canada. It is not about providing subsidies to foreign companies to operate battery plants. I would ask the member if she would—

[Health, February 7th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, after eight years of the Prime Minister's incompetence, Canadians are out of money. Now we learn of more Liberal ineptitude.

Medicago closed its doors after receiving more than $173 million of Canadian taxpayer money to develop vaccines. The Liberals prepurchased $600 million of these vaccines that have yet to be produced or delivered. This week government officials said that Canadians are on the hook to pay for these vaccines.

Why is the Prime Minister paying millions of dollars of taxpayer money to a foreign company for vaccines we did not receive?

[Carbon Pricing, February 6th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, after eight years, the Liberals clearly do not know how to fix what they have caused. Maynard made $21,000 last year. That is $1,000 over the allowable limit for the Liberals' one-off programs, but if he did qualify, the one-time payment would do nothing for him for the next 11 months. The carbon tax, by design, is inflationary.

An easy cure to help make eating and heating more affordable for Maynard would be to cancel the Liberal plan to impose a cruel carbon tax on Nova Scotians.

[Carbon Pricing, February 6th, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, after eight years of the Liberal government's mismanagement, Nova Scotians have to choose each month which bill not to pay. Maynard, a senior on a modest fixed income, is using every free community resource to help pay for his heating, eating and telephone. The plan to introduce and triple the carbon tax will only make things worse for Nova Scotians.

To keep Maynard from starving and going homeless, will the Liberals axe their planned carbon tax for Nova Scotians?

[National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act, February 6th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I listened intently to the member for Kingston and the Islands' speech. In my opening speech on this I said that these micro-administrative changes are much needed, but they are likely not to do what is claimed. The government has had the opportunity, over the last eight years, in the existing act, to reject takeovers by Chinese state-owned enterprises of Canadian assets. These include the Tanco mine in Manitoba where the government actually said no to a national security review, and Hytera, which took over telecommunications businesses. The then minister of industry said no to a national security review.

Can this member please tell me what in this bill will ensure that those types of acquisitions by state-owned enterprises are reviewed in the future?

[National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act, February 6th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, the government for which the member was in cabinet actually approved two acquisitions. One was Hytera acquiring Norsat, and the other was a Chinese state-owned enterprise acquiring a mining entity that has 65% of Canada's lithium production. The government approved those without a national security review. There is nothing in this bill that would change that, especially if the minister does not have to go to cabinet.

I would like the member's views on that.

[National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act, February 6th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I know that the hon. member has been a cabinet minister, so I would like to ask her this question in the context of her time in cabinet.

This bill would remove the minister's responsibility to go to cabinet to actually seek agreement to do a national security review and would remove them from having to report back to cabinet on that, unless they deem it to be a national security review.

Do you think that removing cabinet from the process of determining that will help, because in the past, this government, which I think you were in the cabinet for—

[National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act, February 3rd, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I would like to ask the member for Nepean about state-owned enterprises from not-so-democratic countries, or hostile countries. It was recommendation number one of the industry committee's report from the last Parliament on this issue that the threshold for consideration as a national security or net benefit test under this act be reduced from the $415 million to zero dollars, so that every transaction in every type of industry by a state-owned enterprise from a nondemocratic country would be reviewed. That is not in this bill. Would the hon. member support it being amended that way?

[National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act, February 3rd, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I appreciated the speech by my colleague from Windsor West, who I enjoy working with on the industry committee, and the former chair who did marvellous work on it. It is a great report. My personal favourite is recommendation number one, which is that the state-owned enterprises be reduced to zero for review.

The Investment Canada Act focuses on the acquisition of companies. However, it does not focus at all on the acquisition of individual assets. These would be things like a mine sold by a company to a foreign interest; or a technology sold, without the company being sold, to an interest that may not be in Canada's best security interest or net benefit interest. I do not recall hearing about this. Could the member comment on that?

[National Security Review of Investments Modernization Act, February 3rd, 2023]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things I mentioned in my speech, and hopefully one we can explore in committee, is this issue of whether the net benefit test is being used well enough.

We have a lot of corporate concentration in this country. We have oligopolies in many of our industries, and this is one of the reasons why we rank last by the OECD in productivity as a country. The OECD actually projects, going forward, that we are going to be the least productive of the 20 OECD countries in the world.

That is why this bill is so important, that we get to study not just the security issues but also the issues of net benefit and corporate concentration that we have in this country.