44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 16, 2022 11:00AM
Madam Speaker, listening the member reminded me of a discussion that was held in the Prairies a number of years ago when I had a western separatist tell me that western Canada should leave the rest of Canada.
I believe we have a healthy federation with people who understand the true value of a united Canada in all regions of our country. The legislation we have before us today is there to protect the interests of the people of Quebec, just as other changes have taken place for the other provinces the member made reference to in his comments.
At times there is a need for constitutional changes, as we have seen in the past with other changes, whether they were in the territories, P.E.I. or Nova Scotia, and adjustments have been made to ensure regional interests. That is, in fact, what is happening today. We are seeing a minimum number of seats established for the province of Quebec, and that is a good thing.
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Madam Speaker, what a Monday. Only the member for Winnipeg North could tell us that the federation is healthy and he hangs out with separatists. I find that hilarious.
He voted to recognize the nation. It is not my fault that the Quebec nation belongs to Quebec and that the Canadian nation decided to have nine provinces. There are other places where nations are recognized, such as the UN General Assembly, where each one has a seat, but I can understand him not liking that. That may be why Canada has not been able to get a seat on the UN Security Council.
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Madam Speaker, I always enjoy hearing from my colleague from Mirabel.
I am very familiar with his part of the country, which, as we all know, is experiencing a housing crisis.
What I find harder to understand is the Bloc Québécois's attitude toward Bill C‑14, which establishes a minimum number of seats for Quebec in the House of Commons. That is an important aspect.
I almost get the sense that he opposes the bill even though it will guarantee a minimum number of seats, which is something that was extremely important to Quebec.
I have lived in several parts of Québec, including Saguenay—Lac‑Saint‑Jean, the Eastern Townships, Montreal and the Outaouais. I feel there is a consensus, including in the National Assembly of Quebec, that Bill C‑14 on the minimum number of seats should be passed.
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Madam Speaker, I used to work as an educator. I taught for many years.
As I explained to the House, we still have work to do, and Bill C‑14 does not meet its objectives, because political weight means a certain number of seats as a proportion of the total. Kids learn that in grade two or three.
The only thing the member's comments convince me of is that we need to ensure that education is properly funded.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for his speech.
The commissioners need to work on boundary redistribution in Quebec. The bill is going to set the number of ridings at 77 or 78.
Does my colleague think it is important to set this number as soon as possible?
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Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Lévis—Lotbinière, who is also my office neighbour. He knows how much I like him.
The Liberals enjoy making us sit until two o'clock in the morning. They say they like to debate and move things forward. If we work quickly and effectively, we will be able to determine exactly the right thing in time.
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Madam Speaker, of course I really liked the speech given by my colleague, who is always very passionate and very engaged.
He talked about the different areas that Quebec has to constantly fight for, such as seniors, health and language.
When it comes down to it, would the Bloc Québécois and Quebec not be better off with just a single seat, but one at the UN? He mentioned that at the end of his speech.
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Madam Speaker, spending a weekend in Charlevoix does not make one an expert on Quebec.
Quebeckers know that we can do two things at once, and they support our efforts to defend Quebec's political weight. The correct weight would be 100%, and we would no longer be here.
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Madam Speaker, I obviously really enjoyed my colleague's answer.
I am pleased to be discussing this issue. I will start by making a connection with Bill C-14. The connection may be a little hard to understand at first, but my colleagues will see where I am going with this.
I am deeply outraged right now. Usually, when I am outraged, I tend to get excited and raise my voice in the House. I will try to remain calm while discussing a fundamental matter, something that happened this weekend.
I have been a member of the House for two years now, and I have heard many of our Liberal friends tell us that they are aware of the decline of the French language in Quebec and that its survival is a priority for them. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, who was the minister of official languages in the last Parliament, tried to win us over here in the House by saying that French was in danger, that her government was aware of that, and that it was going to do something about it and table a bill with teeth.
Suddenly, the Liberals called an election and everything stopped, even though they had told us that it was a very important issue for them. They called an election, and it cost $600 million to go back to square one.
Now here we are. We have a new Minister of Official Languages who also spoke about how important the issue is and said that her government was aware of that. The Prime Minister and all of the members across the aisle said the same thing. As my colleague mentioned earlier, the vast majority of members in the House even voted to recognize Quebec as a nation whose sole official language is French.
That was a few months before the election. Obviously, they were going after seats in Quebec, in particular those held by the Bloc Québécois. They had to make a show of being interested.
For two years, the government buddied up to us, saying that it understood that French was in decline in Quebec and across Canada, and that it was going to introduce legislation to fix that. However, the federal government is not the only government that can pass legislation on French. Right now, Quebec is preparing to pass legislation on French. Quebec is trying to give teeth to Bill 101, to make French the language of instruction. Bill 101 has been undercut 200 times by the Supreme Court of Canada based on a charter that Quebec never signed.
This weekend, we saw seven Liberal members of the federal government protest in Montreal against Bill 96. By chance, although there is no such thing as chance, the members protesting in Montreal on the weekend were among the nine Liberal members who had abstained from the vote to recognize Quebec as a nation. Most of them represent Montreal ridings.
The hon. member for Vimy even posted the following on Twitter: “Today I stood with my colleagues for the Bill 96 protest.”
That is something. We are working to improve the fate of French, and the government says that it is aware of the problem, but then government members go to Quebec to protest against legislation that would put some teeth back into Bill 101, teeth that it lost because of the charter.
What the member said next is particularly interesting. She said, and I quote, “Students, regardless of their background, should have access to an education in the language of their choice.”
Bill 101 is likely the most important piece of legislation that has ever been voted on in the history of Quebec. The great Camille Laurin, René Lévesque, Jacques Parizeau and all of the MNAs and ministers that made up the first Lévesque government led one of the first reforms to Bill 101, because even René Lévesque had a problem with that. I will explain why. Before Bill 101, 90% of immigrants who came to Quebec went to school in English. People settled here and chose to learn English. We were losing the battle, and so legislation was needed.
Earlier, I mentioned René Lévesque. It was humiliating for him to have to legislate on an issue that is taken for granted everywhere else on earth. If someone goes to Germany, they do not ask whether they need to learn German. If someone goes to Spain, they do not ask whether they need to learn Spanish. If someone goes to Poland, they do not ask whether they need to learn Polish. In Quebec, however, the language issue was a problem, so legislation had to be passed. That is what we did.
Our Liberal friends, those who do not recognize the Quebec nation, those who have a problem with the fact that there is a common language in Quebec, are attacking one of the core principles of Bill 101, after 50 years of struggle of strife.
There are children of Bill 101 everywhere. There have been television shows on the subject. People come from around the world and learn French. Our Liberal friends want to tear that down. Personally, I think it is shameful. I am outraged. The Liberals are talking out both sides of their mouth.
Does the Minister of Official Languages agree? Does she take responsibility for members of her own government going to protest in Montreal against one of the most important laws ever passed by Quebec? I am eager to hear what the hon. Minister of Official Languages has to say.
During the election campaign, the Prime Minister gave speeches with his hand on his heart. He visited my riding, Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, three times. He really wanted the Liberals to win the riding. I took them on, and I am the one proudly representing the riding of Longueuil—Saint-Hubert.
When the Prime Minister came to my riding, he spoke of language and culture. He said that these were two subjects that were important to the Liberals. He said that they were going to protect the language and culture. However, on the weekend, we witnessed an absolutely appalling spectacle. I am totally outraged, but I must contain myself. I am eager to hear what the Minister of Official Languages and the Prime Minister have to say about this.
This brings me to Bill C-14. In fact, the two are connected. What does the bill say? It talks about “minoritizing” Quebec. In fact, Bill C‑14 institutionalizes the minoritization of Quebec.
I am certain my hon. colleague is better at math than I am, since he is an economist, but this equation is easy. Quebec has 78 out of 338 members; with this bill, it would have 78 out of 343. We would have less weight, which means that Quebec would have less clout to defend its language.
The logical corollary is that we should have more members from Quebec. It is obvious that there must be more Bloc Québécois members in the House to stand up for language and culture.
Last week we discussed Bill C-11. We heard our Conservative friends quote one single academic—St. Michael Geist, pray for us—saying that Canada was going to become a dictatorship where freedom of speech would be abolished. That is what they said. Heaven help me. I was so sick of hearing it that I was nearly ready to sign something so that they would stop repeating it. I was very close to saying yes, that is right, I agree.
It is chilling to realize that we have to fight constantly to protect culture in Quebec.
When we spoke about Bill C‑11, we mentioned how Quebec artists are at a disadvantage on the major platforms. Two years ago, at the ADISQ gala, Pierre Lapointe said he had launched a successful song on social media. It was streamed one million times, but he was paid only $500. That is outrageous.
Quebec is home to artists who are known the world over. We have filmmakers, musicians, actors and directors, including Robert Lepage, yet all this culture is wasting away because the web giants are taking up all the space.
In conclusion, Bill C‑14 aims to minoritize Quebec. In its current version, it is difficult to accept. We will see how we are going to fight it.
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Madam Speaker, I trust that the member is familiar with Bill C-14, the bill he is debating today. In anticipation that the Bloc will be supporting the legislation, my question for him is related to whether or not he will be voting for it. Does he agree there is a need to see the bill pass so that the people of Quebec are able to see a redistribution of the boundaries?
With regard to the content of his speech, I can assure the member that our current Prime Minister, as well as Liberal prime ministers throughout the ages, has been there not only to protect the important identity and French distinctness of the province of Quebec, but also to ensure that the beautiful French language continues to grow and prosper throughout our great country.
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Madam Speaker, my colleague tells me that the Prime Minister will work to preserve culture.
I hope that he will say so to the hon. member for Vaudreuil—Soulanges, the hon. member for Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, the hon. member for Mont-Royal, the hon. member for Vimy, the hon. member for Pierrefonds—Dollard, the hon. member for Saint-Laurent and the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Louis, who were all present at the protest against Bill 96 in Montreal this past weekend.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his speech. He did not say much about the substance of Bill C-14, but I have one question for him.
What advice should we be giving the commissioners who will be redrawing Quebec's boundaries, in order to avoid mistakes? I am certain they are watching right now.
Could my colleague point the commissioners in the right direction?
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Madam Speaker, my colleague asks a good question, but the essence of my speech is that we do not want to lose our political weight.
Who would want to lose political weight? Who would want to lose representation? Who would want to lose a presence here, where decisions are made that affect people's everyday lives? That is what we want to maintain. We want to maintain Quebec’s political weight. Numbers are one thing. We can always discuss them, but what is essential for us is to maintain our political weight so that we can fight for the issues I mentioned.
There are about a hundred of them. The hon. member for Mirabel named several earlier. If we were not here, nothing would be done about these issues.
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Madam Speaker, the reality is that the French language is in decline in Canada. We believe this bill is essential, not only out of respect for Quebec, but for French across Canada.
Does my colleague believe that this is part of the solution for reversing the decline of the French language in Canada?
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Madam Speaker, to answer my hon. colleague, I will quote Pierre Bourgault, who said in his day that to fight for French in Quebec—but this is also true for Canada—is to fight for all the languages of the world against the hegemony of one. In this case we are talking about English.
Obviously it is a problem across the country. The numbers on French outside Quebec attest to the failure of the Official Languages Act that was introduced in 1969. We have to work on strengthening it. We have to work for French outside Quebec, but working for French in Quebec is just as important.
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Madam Speaker, I very much appreciate the speech by my colleague from Longueuil—Saint-Hubert, but I have a question for him.
He would like there to be more Bloc Québécois MPs, but the Bloc is already overrepresented if we are talking about proportional representation in Quebec. Under proportional representation, there would be seven fewer members for the Bloc Québécois and seven more members for the NDP.
My question is simple. Does my colleague agree with implementing proportional representation in order to have every Quebecker's vote count?
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Madam Speaker, I will answer by asking another question.
In the 20 years I spent fighting for French in Quebec, there was one thing that I found very fascinating: There were never any federalists at the protests. My hon. colleague from La Pointe-de-l'Île can attest to that.
It is odd. That should be a given. Preserving culture should also be important to Quebeckers who believe in Canada, but that is not the case at present. That is something that has always somewhat bothered me. I hope it will be different in the future.
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Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time this afternoon with the member for Cypress Hills—Grasslands.
I am glad and honoured to offer comments on Bill C-14, an act to amend the Constitution Act with respect to electoral representation. I will start by talking a bit about what is in the bill, followed by what I am disappointed to see is not in it.
As has been shared in this place, the bill focuses on ensuring that when the number of members of the House of Commons is readjusted every 10 years, provinces will not have a fewer number of representatives than were assigned in the 43rd Parliament. As their populations might grow, some might be assigned more.
This is very reasonable and has been done before, 1985 being one recent example that has been shared quite a few times in this place. In fact, a province has not lost a seat since 1966. It is reasonable that we continue to build on the principle of representation by population, while also being sensitive to regional representation issues and the size of ridings to ensure that MPs can best support their constituents.
My only question on the core substance of what is in the bill is that it refers to the 43rd Parliament specifically. My question for the governing party is this: Why not create an evergreen version of the bill? If we want the most amount of time in this place focused on the greatest issues facing Canadians, why continue every 10 years to do this process for the census review? I would expect to see parliamentarians in 10 years' time probably having a similar conversation. It seems more efficient to simply say that we would ensure no province's allocation is ever reduced. Of course, as the review is done, some allocations might be increased based on population.
I will now move to what is not in the bill, and I will start with promises made just a few weeks ago in the Liberal-NDP supply and confidence agreement. It included three additional promises to make elections more democratic and more accessible. I wish these promises made so recently were included. What a wonderful opportunity to follow through on these very recent promises made: expanding election day to three days of voting to make sure that more folks can get out to vote, allowing folks to vote at any polling place in their electoral district and improving the process of mail-in ballots knowing that so many Canadians across the country are looking to that process.
I have heard the governing party say that this last piece was really important and that it wanted to move more quickly on it. Well, in my view, all four of them are really important, and I would encourage the governing party to look into how quickly it can move forward on following through with the promises made just a few weeks ago.
More than that, let us recognize that the bill is really just working within an existing winner-take-all system that leads here: Millions of Canadians's votes are not reflected in the makeup of the elected parliamentarians in this place. For my part, I spent the last number of years knocking on door after door in my community, and one of the most difficult conversations I had was with neighbours of mine who told me, “You know what? I'm not planning to vote at all. My vote doesn't count. It hasn't counted before, and I have given up on the partisan, toxic nature of that place. Move on.”
It was a sad moment to recognize that so many, not only in Kitchener but across the country, have just given up on our democracy. I recognize that they are looking for our parliamentarians to say that every single vote should count. Addressing this means bringing in legislation for proportional representation in the way that so many other democracies around the world have, and recognizing that the percentage of seats in this place should recognize the percentage of people who voted for a party.
The good news here is that this promise has been made before. However, in this case, the promise dates back over 100 years. It was first promised by a Liberal government in 1921. It is a promise that was repeated over 1,800 times in 2015 by the governing party, which said it would make sure that every vote counted.
Many Canadians are familiar with the line that 2015 would be the last first-past-the-post election. There was so much excitement. I know there are some members in this place today who have also been pushing for this over the last seven years, from all parties. In fact, a member of the Conservative Party fairly recently publicly shared her support for moving toward proportional representation.
This is why I am disappointed that seven years later, there is still no mention of proportional representation in this bill or any others, recognizing that in other parliaments around the world, moving to proportional representation has led to more diversity among elected representatives. It has led to a more stable governance. It has led to more collaborative approaches, wherein parliamentarians are incentivized to work together to get things done on behalf of constituents across the country.
Of course, it provides more power to the elector. What do I mean by that? As one example, some members of this place will know that it is a real priority for neighbours of mine in Kitchener Centre to see more ambitious action on climate. We should be addressing the climate crisis as the existential threat that it is. A recent poll showed that 66% of Canadians across the country want to see more ambition from the federal government when it comes to action on the climate crisis. Of course, that 66% looking for more ambitious action on climate is not fully represented in this place. Why? It is because we do not have seats in this place that represent Canadians across the country.
I will again put a call out to the governing party to follow through on this promise. Whether it is from seven years ago or 100 years ago, I encourage the governing party to follow through on it.
The last piece of disappointment is with respect to a private member's bill that the governing party has not yet promised to support, but I hope it does. It is Bill C-210, from the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley. He is putting forward legislation that other members of this place have previously put forward, including the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands and I believe the member for Vancouver Kingsway.
The bill calls on us to reduce the voting age to 16 years old. It is calling for this place to engage young people in their future and recognize that so much of what is discussed here, whether it is with respect to the housing crisis, the climate crisis or many of our priorities, is going to affect young people more than anyone else. Not only is it the right thing to do to align the voting age alongside so many other powerful marks we offer for young people to recognize as they grow into adulthood, but what a meaningful change it would be to ingrain voting habits at a younger age, recognizing that it is young people who are often heading off to post-secondary education.
In our current structure of allowing young people to vote at 18, often the first time to vote is soon after they have moved out into a community they might not know as well. Would it not be more advantageous for a young person to vote for their first time in their home community, where they have grown up, with a parent to have that kind of support and to ingrain good voting habits at a young age?
I will continue to encourage all members of this place to support Bill C-210. Knowing it is not included in the government's legislation, there is another opportunity for members in this place to support voting at a younger age.
I will summarize by saying again that I will be supporting Bill C-14 because it is a reasonable piece of legislation, recognizing it does have wide support from many parties in this place. I would encourage the governing party to go further and recognize there is so much more we could do specifically when it comes to ensuring that this place better reflects the interests of Canadians across the country.
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Madam Speaker, having sat on the Special Committee on Electoral Reform with his colleague, I can assure the member that in what we heard during testimony throughout that six months, we did hear a lot about the voting age. We heard a lot about civics engagement. We heard about people wanting people to work together.
Over the last couple of weeks, I have noticed a shift. For instance, my own PMB has the support of four parties, which actually jointly seconded it. We have an agreement with the NDP on supply and confidence motions. This is what Canadians want us to do. They want us to work together.
Could the member elaborate a bit on how Bill C-14 would help reinforce the belief Canadians have that parliamentarians are here for them to work together to do what is in their best interests?
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Madam Speaker, I could not agree more with how important it is to see more respectful discourse in this place.
To the member's point, when this bill was last debated on April 7, I read some of the Hansard record on it, given that on that particular day there was another major event happening with respect to the federal budget. I recognize that for this piece of legislation there was more respectful discourse in this place. I also recognize that for private members' bills, including her own, I see opportunities for that.
I celebrate that while first past the post will never get us far enough, the supply and confidence agreement is an example of parliamentarians recognizing that this is what Canadians have voted for within first past the post. Let us see more parliamentarians working together to get things done. That is exactly what we should see here and it is what Canadians expect of all parliamentarians. For my part, that is exactly what I am committed to continuing to do.
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