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Mr. Mike Morrice (Kitchener Centre, GP)

Jun/9/22 3:07:52 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we are facing a housing crisis in this country, and my community is reeling. There are 53 people who have resorted to pitching tents on publicly owned land in downtown Kitchener, but they are being evicted at the end of the month. They are among the 412 people who we know are unsheltered in Waterloo region. Municipal leaders have been sounding the alarm for years, asking for more targeted housing funding and urgent mental health and addictions support. If the Minister of Housing were to visit this encampment, what would he say to those living in tents, who have been left behind by decades of unjust housing policies?

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Hon. Ahmed Hussen (Minister of Housing and Diversity and Inclusion, Lib.)

Jun/9/22 3:08:32 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, whenever Canadians find themselves on the street, it diminishes us all. We have invested over $562 million in the federal Reaching Home program, which targets the most vulnerable Canadians on the street. In addition to that, during the pandemic we invested another $400 million. We are giving stability and certainly to frontline organizations serving the most vulnerable. Through the rapid housing initiative, as well as the co-op housing program, we are providing permanent housing solutions to house the most vulnerable people in our community.

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 3:09:11 p.m.
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I wish to draw the attention of members to the presence in the gallery of the Hon. Mike Farnworth, Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General for the Province of British Columbia, and the Hon. Josie Osborne, Minister of Land, Water and Resource Stewardship and Minister Responsible for Fisheries for the Province of British Columbia. Some hon. members: Hear, hear!

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 3:09:40 p.m.
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The member for Kildonan—St. Paul is rising on a point of order.

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Ms. Raquel Dancho

Jun/9/22 3:10:02 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-21

Mr. Speaker, there have been consultations, and I believe you will find unanimous consent in the House for the following: That, given that the debate on combatting gun violence needs to be depoliticized, centred on the rights of victims and the safety of communities, the House call on the government to divide Bill C-21—

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 3:10:16 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-21

I am getting a lot of nays. I have been getting a lot of feedback from members on both sides on unanimous consent motions. I encourage members to maybe talk to people beforehand and make sure that there is unanimous consent before bringing motions forward. This is for all members; I am not pointing out anyone in particular. We do not want to cut people off when they are trying to get a point across and trying to get unanimous consent. I am sorry, but I do not believe we have unanimous consent. On a point of order, the hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan.

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Mr. Garnett Genuis

Jun/9/22 3:10:48 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I wonder if you could clarify the process. Is it your ruling going forward that if a member is saying “no”, you will stop the reading of the motion? I think we have had cases where some members were saying “no” and yet the member continued with the unanimous consent motion.

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 3:11:06 p.m.
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In fact, I have been getting this from both sides. Both government and opposition members have been asking for that exact type of behaviour, rather than let it all go through. Sometimes unanimous consent motions are used as a method of getting a message across, but that is what S.O. 31s are for. If we can just shift everything over, we can use it that way. We will do our best to make that happen.

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 3:12:02 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-19

It being 3:10 p.m., pursuant to order made on Thursday, November 25, 2021, the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the amendment of the hon. member for Calgary Forest Lawn to the amendment of the hon. member for Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola to the motion at third reading of Bill C‑19. Call in the members.

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 3:44:41 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-19

I declare the amendment to the amendment defeated. The next question is on the amendment. If a member of a recognized party present in the House wishes to request a recorded division or that the amendment be adopted on division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair. The member for Longueuil—Charles‑LeMoyne.

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Mrs. Sherry Romanado

Jun/9/22 3:46:19 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I request a recorded division.

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 3:58:14 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-19

I declare the amendment lost. The next question is on the main motion. May I dispense? Some hon. members: No. [Chair read text of motion to House] The Speaker: If a member of a recognized party present in the House wishes to request a recorded division or that the motion be adopted on division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair. The hon. member for Brampton North.

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Ms. Ruby Sahota

Jun/9/22 3:59:06 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I request a recorded division.

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The Speaker

Jun/9/22 4:11:08 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-19

I declare the motion carried.

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Mr. John Brassard (Barrie—Innisfil, CPC)

Jun/9/22 4:11:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am very glad to see you in the chair. I hope you are getting your strength back. You sound like it. You are doing a good job of keeping everybody in good spirits. Before my question, there are a couple of issues that I want to bring to the attention of the government House leader. Number one is that we are requesting a take-note debate on the issue of food security, which is having a significant effect around the world, as members know, as a result of many geopolitical issues. The second thing is a request to split Bill C-21 so that we can work on victims and the protection of victims in domestic violence. The third thing is that there have been significant concerns among stakeholders and advocates right across the country regarding Bill C-11. We are seeing some draconian measures being proposed by the government to deal with this piece of legislation. I am concerned about that. Before I ask for the schedule, I am wondering what the government House leader's plan is to effectively silence the voices of millions of people who voted for opposition MPs in this place and, furthermore, what his plans are to contribute to a further decline in democracy in this place over the course of the next week.

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Hon. Mark Holland (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Jun/9/22 4:12:48 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the cornerstone of democracy is voting and showing up to this place and participating, and that is of course what we do. Whether it is Bill C-11 or Bill C-21, there will be an opportunity, obviously, to continue debating legislation. On Bill C-11 specifically, there were nine days at committee and many days at second reading. We have opportunities at third reading, and it will be going to the Senate. It is taking essential action to protect Canadian creators and Canadian heritage. We are proud to support this bill, and part of the thrust and parry of this place is that sometimes we disagree. That is not a representation of a decline in democracy; it is proof of it working. This afternoon, we will continue with the report stage of Bill C-5 in respect of mandatory minimums. We will then call second reading of Bill C-21, the firearms legislation. Tomorrow, we will debate government Motion No. 16 regarding proceedings for Bill C-11, as I was mentioning, on the Broadcasting Act. When we return next week, we will focus on this government motion debate and continue our work on Bill C-5 and Bill C-11, as well as on Bill C-14 concerning electoral representation.

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Mr. Garnett Genuis (Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, CPC)

Jun/9/22 4:14:21 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-5

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak today to Bill C-5, a piece of government legislation aimed at reducing sentences for crimes, including very serious crimes such as sexual assault, kidnapping and weapons trafficking. Many of my colleagues on this side have ably spoken to the core issues in this bill, in particular the question of whether lower sentences and conditional sentences are appropriate for these kinds of very serious offences. I am not going to repeat their arguments today. Instead, I want to respond to what seems to be the main rationale that the government is using to defend this legislation. Comments from government members on this bill have generally avoided reference to the substantive measures in it and, in particular, to the changes to sentences for serious violent crimes. It is revealing that members of the government do not want to actually talk about and defend their decision to lower sentences for serious crimes. The government's attempt to justify this bill has focused on noting, correctly, how the problem of systemic racism leads to the over-representation of Black and indigenous people in our justice system, but then claiming, incorrectly, that this bill somehow addresses that problem. It is a fact that there is nothing in this bill to address any kind of racism. It contains no measures respecting anti-racism training, no measures to discourage racist behaviour, no funding for communities that are victims of racism and no special procedures to protect the rights of historically marginalized communities when they encounter the justice system. In fact, while the government evokes the challenges facing Black and indigenous Canadians every time this bill is discussed, the bill itself does not even contain the words “Black” or “indigenous”. A quick search of this bill shows that the bill actually says nothing about race or racism, either. This is a bill that is not about, and says nothing about, the racism facing Black and indigenous Canadians, yet the government's justification for this bill is to claim that it would do something that it demonstrably would not do for those communities. The government purports to believe that lowering sentences overall will somehow address the disproportionate representation of certain minority communities in the prison population. This seems, on the face of it, to portray a certain misunderstanding of how fractions work. Changing the average sentence for a particular crime from, say, four years to three years would do nothing to change the proportion of people from a particular community who are serving time for that crime. Reducing overall sentences would do nothing to change the proportion of those in prison who are from a particular community. Any mathematically sound strategy for reducing over-representation would obviously need to reduce sentences for the over-represented group only, increase sentences for the under-represented group only, or, best of all, identify and confront the root cause of over-representation in the first place. However, reducing sentences for both over-represented and under-represented groups by the same proportion would not actually address the phenomenon of over- or under-representation. In fairness to the government's position, it is not always quite that simple. It may be that there are certain crimes where the over-representation of certain communities is greater than other crimes. For example, in the case of drug crimes, there may be certain kinds of drugs that are more prevalent in some communities than others. There are cases and places where offences involving drugs that are more common in minority communities have carried more severe sentences than offences involving equivalent drugs that are more common in majority communities. In such cases, measures to equalize the sentencing for equivalent kinds of substances that are more or less common in different communities would be a step toward addressing the problem of over-representation. However, that is not what Bill C-5 would do. Bill C-5 would not make these kinds of granular adjustments. Rather, Bill C-5 is a relatively short bill that would lower sentences for broad categories of offences. I see no reason why these reductions in sentencing parameters would impact over-representation in any way. Perhaps I can make this point clearer with an analogy. We know that Black and indigenous people are over-represented in our justice system and also under-represented in our post-secondary system. We need to address the way that systemic racism leads to over-representation in penal institutions and under-representation in institutions that often lead individuals to positions of power and privilege. If members were to imagine—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Jun/9/22 4:18:15 p.m.
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Order. The hon. member for Rivière‑des‑Mille‑Îles on a point of order.

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Mr. Luc Desilets

Jun/9/22 4:18:19 p.m.
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Re: Bill C-5

Madam Speaker, with all due respect to my colleague, I should mention that he is speaking too quickly for the interpreters to keep up with him. They tell us that it is very difficult. He is hyperactive like me. Out of respect for the interpreters, I would ask him to slow down if possible.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Carol Hughes)

Jun/9/22 4:18:36 p.m.
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I know that we have raised this in the past, so once again, I am wondering if the hon. member could slow down a bit to ensure that every parliamentarian hears what he has to say. It is very difficult for the interpreters to interpret properly if the speed of the speech is too quick. I am not sure if the hon. member has provided a copy of his speech to the interpreters. If not, again, I would remind all members to please do so. It is something that we hear about on a regular basis. It is very difficult for interpreters to be able to follow the speakers in the House.

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