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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 75

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 19, 2022 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 75 - May/19/22
Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:13:10 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I would encourage people in Canada to shop local, yes, and they can visit my hometown of Dundas.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:13:19 p.m.
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Madam Chair, this is beautiful. The minister's own departmental plan, on page 19, if she wishes to check, targets for this year a 15% decrease in purchases from Canadian small businesses last year. How is this supporting small businesses?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:13:35 p.m.
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Madam Chair, we are working very hard to support small businesses. I do not agree with the premise of that question. In fact, during COVID-19, over 40% of the funds spent were spent on domestic production.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:13:47 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I even noted on what page in the departmental plan, signed by the minister, the target decrease was. Now, the previous minister for PSPC testified in committee that Amazon was a Canadian company. Is this why the Liberals are giving so much to Amazon and not buying from Canadian small businesses?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:14:09 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I think the member is confusing the contracts. This is with respect to the cloud services we have procured.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:14:21 p.m.
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Madam Chair, actually, last year, the government purchased $20 million in goods, not including the cloud services, from Amazon. This year alone, year to date, in just two months it is $10 million. How is buying from Amazon supporting small businesses?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:14:42 p.m.
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Madam Chair, these are all small transactions, which is the result of the numbers the member is speaking about.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:14:53 p.m.
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Madam Chair, an Order Paper response showed over 7,000 pages of purchases from Amazon instead of from small businesses. Amazon's market cap is $1.5 trillion. How is this a Canadian small business?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:15:09 p.m.
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Madam Chair, the web services are the big-ticket item. The smaller items are items like pencils and things like that.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:15:19 p.m.
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Madam Chair, that is not the case. The large majority of dollars in purchases from Amazon are not for web services, and the Order Paper response provided by the government shows that. Why is the government spending so much on Amazon and not on small Canadian businesses?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:15:39 p.m.
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Madam Chair, actually, we are absolutely supporting small and medium-sized businesses. As I have said, 42% of COVID spending with respect to procurement was for Canadian domestic businesses. We have entered into major contracts. Millions of masks are being produced locally here and we are going to continue to do that.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:15:59 p.m.
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Madam Chair, there is $32 million in purchases from small businesses for direct non-cloud services, and about $20 million for cloud. That is the truth, right from the government's own numbers. Amazon has sold items promoting Xinjiang cotton, three of which directly use forced labour. Will the minister immediately end all government Amazon purchases and buy from local Canadian businesses instead?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:16:25 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I would like to add, with respect to the support for small businesses, that we have Procurement Assistance Canada. It helps small businesses, as I spoke about earlier this evening, to navigate in order to procure goods. We are going to continue to support them.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:16:42 p.m.
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Madam Chair, the House voted unanimously that what the Communist Chinese government was doing to the Uighurs was genocide. I will repeat the question. Amazon is selling items purchased from Xinjiang that are knowingly using forced labour. Will the minister immediately end purchases from Amazon and send those purchases to small and medium enterprises?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:17:06 p.m.
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Madam Chair, we have provisions in our contracts now that do not permit forced labour to be used, and if it is used we can terminate the contract.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:17:16 p.m.
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Madam Chair, will the minister immediately terminate all purchases from Amazon, seeing as it is selling items made with forced labour?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:17:24 p.m.
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Madam Chair, we will continue to work to enforce the terms of our contracts to ensure that there is no forced labour and that the obligations of the contract are fulfilled.
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Mr. Kelly McCauley
  • May/19/22 8:17:38 p.m.
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Madam Chair, Panasonic has received $32 million in contracts from the Liberal government despite sourcing materials from factories using Uighur labour. Panasonic has refused to alter its practice. Will the Liberal government immediately stop buying from companies using forced labour?
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Hon. Filomena Tassi
  • May/19/22 8:17:56 p.m.
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Madam Chair, I am pleased to talk about the progress we have made with forced labour. PSPC has now put in a code of conduct that has to be signed. There are provisions in the contracts that say if there is forced labour, we have the opportunity to terminate the contract. We are going to continue to move forward in this regard because we are absolutely against forced labour and—
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The Deputy Chair
  • May/19/22 8:18:15 p.m.
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The hon. member.
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