Canada Revenue Agency  Mr. Speaker, time and time again Conservatives put partisan politics ahead of sound policy. Instead of listening to the concerns of Canadians, the Conservative government is targeting environmental groups. It has spent millions investigating 900 groups that disagree with its ag

Electronic Petitions  Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to be participating in this debate. I want to congratulate my friend and colleague from Burnaby—Douglas for this initiative. In a former life he was a professor of public policy at Simon Fraser University, where he studied the very issues that are be

Respect for Communities Act  Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to Bill C-2 , an act to amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. I remain very concerned about the government's motivation in introducing the bill in the face of a unanimous loss. The Supreme Court of Canada in 2011 unanimously defe

Respect for Communities Act  Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague and friend from Saanich—Gulf Islands for her comments. I could not agree more with her comments, which I thought were really appropriate, about government by stealth. The most remarkable aspect of the Supreme Court's decision is it

Respect for Communities Act  Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague from Laurentides—Labelle for his observation. I think it is very, if the expression can be excused, insightful. I think the reason it is insightful is that the government seems to want to pick a fight with the Supreme Court of

Business of Supply  Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments by my colleague for Durham in this important and very disturbing debate. One of my constituents is Ms. Sheila Fynes. Her son is Stuart Langridge, who took his own life in 2008, having been told by the military that it was a function of subs

Business of Supply  Mr. Speaker, Raymond is a Victoria veteran. He is 93 years old and the last living member of a Lancaster bomber crew. The closure of the Veterans Affairs offices has made it harder for Raymond to find out about the Bomber Command Bar. When Raymond's Bomber Command Bar was approv

Financial Administration Act  Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to rise and speak in strong support of Bill C-473, an act to amend the Financial Administration Act (balanced representation). I commend my colleague, the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, for her hard work on this important initiative.

Business of Supply  Mr. Speaker, the member for Vancouver Quadra talks a lot about trust, and I understand that the model that has been proposed, which I support and the NDP supports, is that of a parliamentary oversight committee, such as the intelligence committee in the United States, made up of

Business of Supply  Mr. Speaker, we are having a debate on the oversight mechanism for CSEC, and this member went on and on about the threats to the security of Canada being very real. I entirely agree with that and thank him for those observations. I was a member of the first team of lawyers advi

Pensions  Mr. Speaker, the whole issue of old age security is another example of the Conservatives' refusal to work with the provinces. The Bank of Montreal just said that 89% of Canadians are going to depend on the Canada pension plan and QPP and that the provinces and experts agree that

Pensions  Mr. Speaker, let us get back to reality. The Bank of Montreal reports that fully one-third of Canadian seniors are planning to rely on the Canada pension plan and the QPP in their retirement. That is going to be around $600 a month. Let us face it; seniors cannot retire on abou

Petitions  Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions to present this morning. The first petition calls for a moratorium on genetically modified alfalfa in order to allow a proper review of its impact on farmers in Canada. This petition contains names of dozens of people from across the province of

Petitions  Mr. Speaker, the second petition calls upon the House to provide a permanent investment plan to support public transit, to establish federal funding mechanisms for that purpose, and to work with all levels of government to ensure a sustainable, predictable, and long-term source o

Taxation  Mr. Speaker, yesterday, we found out that the Conservatives have signed an agreement with the Americans that would implement a U.S. law, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act. This will lead to the disclosure of the confidential financial information of thousands of Canadians t