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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 161

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 15, 2023 02:00PM
Context: House Hansard - 161 - Feb/15/23
Hon. Mark Holland (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)
  • Feb/15/23 3:04:08 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, first of all, it is Canadians who decide who gets to sit in government, not Conservative MPs. The second point I would make is that the member is suggesting that the Conservatives would engage in political interference and interfere with the independent, arm's-length process to engage contracts. Canada has one of the highest standards in the world for how contracts are engaged. Those decisions are made without political interference, and I find it disturbing that the Conservatives continue to come back and say that they would, if that is what I am hearing, politically interfere and make decisions about what the public servants engage in, in terms of contracts.
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Context: House Hansard - 161 - Feb/15/23
Hon. Mark Holland (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)
  • Feb/15/23 3:05:27 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has been in this place for some time. He would recognize that he is absolutely correct to state that the public servants we have are the best in the world. We owe them a tremendous debt for all they do, and that is why we ensure that they are the ones who actually make the decisions with respect to those contracts. Those are made at arm's length. The reality is that one day the Conservatives are trying to cook up these conspiracies and talk about “shadow” whatever they are talking about, and the next day they are talking about Dominic Barton, the former campaign manager to Stephen Harper. They are saying he is right and should be lauded as one of the great Canadians. I do not know what they are talking about over there.
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Context: House Hansard - 161 - Feb/15/23
Hon. Mark Holland (Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)
  • Feb/15/23 3:06:50 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have already indicated that these are decisions made by the public service at arm's length and that it is inappropriate for the members opposite to imply they would use political influence to influence these contracts, but I will talk about what has grown since the Conservatives left power and we have had the opportunity to serve Canadians. As I indicated earlier, there are almost two million more people who have jobs today than when the Conservatives were in power. There are 2.7 million fewer people in poverty, hundreds of thousands of children and hundreds of thousands of seniors who are not in poverty today. That is what has improved. That is what has changed since the Conservatives left power.
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