Thomas Mulcair

[Taxation, March 8th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, another broken promise, and yesterday's motion contained three Liberal promises, yet they voted against it.

Internal documents reveal that the government gave a secret sweetheart deal to multi-millionaire tax cheats, with no penalties, and even a discount on the interest. Once again, we see there are two sets of rules—one for the wealthy and another one for everyone else. How many other times has this happened, and is the Prime Minister going to call an investigation into this tax scam for the rich?

[Employment Insurance, March 8th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the commitment of the Liberals was for a national child care program within the first 100 days, and as we have just seen, that is another broken promise.

Only 33% of unemployed women have access to employment insurance compared to 43% of men. Women are still more likely than men to work in precarious jobs.

Can the Prime Minister, who claims to be a feminist, tell us why the Liberals voted yesterday against a motion that would have given tens of thousands of women access to employment insurance?

[Child Care, March 8th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, a new report released yesterday proves that the pay gap for women in Canada is actually getting worse. Meanwhile, the costs of child care are astronomical and rising, putting enormous strain on households that include young families and making it more difficult for women to participate in paid work. It is almost always women who wind up making sacrifices in their career when affordable child care is not there.

The Liberals promised Canadians that they would take action on a national child care program within the first 100 days. Where is it?

[The Environment, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, here is a solution for the future: say no when the Americans try to impose new requirements that hurt our forestry industry. That is the problem.

After promising to establish a national climate strategy 90 days after the Paris conference, last week's first ministers meeting on climate change simply managed to produce more meetings. All Canada has is the old Conservative timelines, the old Conservative targets, and no plan to even reach those.

Does the Prime Minister believe that this satisfies the commitment he made in Paris? How proud is he to bring the Conservative climate strategy to Washington—

[Forestry Industry, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, the three elements of today's motion are directly in their campaign proposals. Will they vote with us, yes or no? That is what Canadians will find out today.

The softwood lumber agreement is about to expire. The industry and forestry workers are worried that the Americans are going to once again reduce imports into the U.S. Things have evolved since the botched agreement in 2006. For example, Quebec has revised its forestry regime, thereby responding to American claims of unfair competition.

During his trip to Washington, will the Prime Minister stand up for our forestry industry for once?

[Employment Insurance, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, we are going to get to do that today, if they vote with us. We will see how that goes.

In opposition, the Liberals voted for increasing EI access, 360 hours as the norm across the country, and they were going to repeal the Conservative reforms. During the campaign, they swore they would protect the money workers paid into EI; and that is important because the last time the Liberals were in power, they stole $54 billion from workers and spent it on corporate tax giveaways.

Why are the Liberals now voting against a motion that would do just that, protect the EI fund? Is it because they plan on stealing workers' money again?

[Employment Insurance, March 7th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, members will be voting today on our motion to improve access to employment insurance. These are exactly the same proposals that the Liberals supported when they were in opposition. They even denounced the Conservatives' reform, especially in New Brunswick.

Now that they are in power, the Liberals have broken yet another promise, even though job losses are mounting and action is urgently needed.

Why will the Liberals not support the thousands of Canadian workers who need it most?

[Taxation, February 24th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, as Kevin Page so eloquently put it, “This fudge factor is overwhelming”.

The Liberals promised to close the stock option tax loophole. Their platform notes that about 8,000 high-income Canadians take home more than $0.5 billion each year from this one loophole alone.

However, now it seems the Liberals are secretly telling businesses that they are going to break that promise as well.

Can the Prime Minister finally give a straight answer? Will the upcoming budget close the stock option tax loophole for wealthy CEOs, yes or no?

[Air Canada, February 24th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, so now the Prime Minister is admitting that there has been no firm commitment to build a maintenance centre.

Instead of enforcing the law, as the government has a duty to do, since that is the very foundation of a democratic society where the law applies equally to everyone, the Liberals are going to amend the legislation governing Air Canada to protect the airline from future litigation.

Who is in calling the shots here? Is it Air Canada or the Prime Minister? Will the Prime Minister promise not to touch the act governing Air Canada and will he finally stand up for the 2,600 Aveos workers?

[Air Canada, February 24th, 2016]

Mr. Speaker, for the past two days, the Prime Minister and his Minister of Transport have been saying that Air Canada, and I quote, “committed to establishing a CSeries maintenance centre here”.

That is not true. There is no firm commitment to build a centre. All we have is Air Canada's vague intention to subcontract maintenance. The Prime Minister is obviously misinformed.

Can he tell us why he released Air Canada from what were very clear obligations under the law, thereby reneging on his promise to help the 2,600 Aveos workers?