44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 26, 2023 10:00AM
- Oct/26/23 3:15:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt that the last few years have been tough on western Canadian farmers. I have been a farmer myself. I know bad years can have a negative effect on the bottom line and on one's mental health.
Last week, we announced $219 million of federal funding to support our western Canadian farmers with costs related to drought conditions and wildfires. We have stood by and will continue to make sure we stand by our Canadian farmers and ranchers.
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- Oct/26/23 3:16:04 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, last week, a British member of Parliament who travelled to Canada was detained three times and interrogated by Air Canada personnel. He said he was told it was because his name was Mohammad. Sadly, this is reflective of the travel experiences of far too many racialized people.
Air Canada says that it followed every single protocol. Is this true? If not, what is the minister doing to ensure this never happens to anyone ever again?
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- Oct/26/23 3:16:40 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the second I was made aware, I contacted Air Canada. Air Canada has apologized. Apologizing was the right thing to do.
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- Oct/26/23 3:16:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the horrific events in Israel and Gaza should not be used to support a particular cause. Innocent people have been killed. No one should use those deaths to justify more violence. Calling for a boycott of a Toronto business just because it is owned by a Jew is repulsive. Defacing offices of MPs or MPPs serves nothing. Hatred and intimidation do not advance the search for a just and durable peace in the Middle East.
Can the Minister of Public Safety ensure that Canada's hate laws are being upheld and that violent protests are not being permitted?
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- Oct/26/23 3:17:39 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, what we are seeing in the wake of the violence in the Middle East manifesting in this country in terms of divisions, intolerance and active hatred is repulsive. It is, frankly, un-Canadian.
I agree completely with the member who just raised the question that these are things we must all stand against. Incidents of anti-Semitism, Islamophobia and intolerance toward one another are not what we stand for as a people or as a Parliament. We have conviction now more than ever in our belief that combatting hatred is a task for all of us, one we must stand united on and must pursue with vigour.
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- Oct/26/23 3:18:49 p.m.
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It being 3:18 p.m., the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion to concur in the third report of the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities.
Call in the members.
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- Oct/26/23 3:32:40 p.m.
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I declare the motion carried.
The member from Regina raised a very good point, and it has been made before by a colleague in the House. I thank the colleague for making this point. When it comes to votes, I ask that colleagues follow the instructions of their whips and their House leaders so that they either quickly move out of the House to conduct their vote electronically or take their seats as the two main whips take their seats. This is so that it is very clear who is going to be participating in the vote in person.
There will be a time when the matter will be a matter of confidence, and it is important that the Table and the Chair are entirely convinced of the eligibility of members to vote. I ask members to please, when there is a deferred vote after question period, make themselves scarce and leave the room if they do not wish to participate in the vote in person.
I wish to inform the House that, because of the deferred recorded division, Government Orders will be extended by 13 minutes.
One of my favourite times of the week is inviting the hon. House leader of the official opposition to ask the Thursday question.
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- Oct/26/23 3:34:40 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am hoping the government House leader can update the House as to the business of the House for the rest of this week and into next week, and if she can let the opposition know the degree of certainty for the calendar.
We have recently had a few changes after the Thursday statement, and we do have a constituency week coming up, along with some supply days that we are expecting. Therefore, I just want to know if the House leader can confirm that this is now set in stone for the next few weeks once she updates the House.
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- Oct/26/23 3:35:10 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I do not want to commit to setting anything in stone, but I will commit to it being very likely that this will indeed be the calendar for next week.
This afternoon, we will continue report stage debate of Bill C-34 concerning the Canada Investment Act. Tomorrow, we will begin second reading of Bill C-52, the air transportation accountability act. On Monday and Wednesday, we will return to debate on Bill C-34.
Next Tuesday and Thursday shall be allotted days. I know that is what the member is particularly interested in. I am sure it is the best part of his week; I am not sure it is the best part of my week.
I would also like to inform the House that the Minister of Veterans Affairs will be delivering a ministerial statement on Thursday, November 2 to acknowledge the beginning of Veterans' Week.
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to share with my colleagues some of the other ideas that emerged during the work of the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology. One of the most important changes for which the Bloc Québécois vigorously advocated involves transparency provisions.
I know how important transparency is to you, Mr. Speaker. We could have included other provisions, but I sense that you are particularly attentive to transparency. It is an important concern that witnesses have mentioned, and it has been reflected in the technical documents that have been presented to us.
I stressed the need for greater transparency in the national security decision-making mechanisms. I went to the right school, some might say, and I think I have colleagues who have influenced me, in particular the member for Joliette, whom I would like to recognize.
This includes more information from agencies responsible for decisions related to national security. It is a legitimate request to want to understand how the decisions are made and what criteria are taken into account.
The minister's obligation to publicly present his or her decisions is significant progress in fostering public understanding. This will allow citizens, businesses and stakeholders to better understand the process and the motivations underlying national security decisions.
We remain firmly committed to acting in the best interest of the Quebec nation, ensuring that our national interests are preserved in harmony with our democratic values and our quest for an open and transparent governance.
We think it is a shame that the government restricted and limited the amendments to Bill C‑34 to the single issue of national security related to foreign investments.
I think there was some consensus around the table with respect to the fact that the government missed an opportunity to review the thresholds for mergers and acquisitions, especially when it comes to guaranteeing that the foreign investments have a net benefit for Canada.
We therefore support this bill and will continue to demand loud and clear that the government introduce a new bill to also review the other sections of the Investment Canada Act.
That said, it was high time to address national security issues related to foreign investment.
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Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member just now and before question period, and my primary concern is dealing with foreign interference, which, as I said previously, takes many different forms. What we are debating today is from an investor's perspective, and that is the reason we need to modernize the act after 14 years, given AI and technology, to protect our industries here in Canada and to make sure that interests here are served, first and foremost.
I wonder whether the member could provide his thoughts with regard to the passage of the legislation. Would the Bloc like to see any other things in the bill apart from the amendments we are debating today?
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Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned, the Bloc Québécois intends to vote in support of the bill. However, the main amendments that we wanted to include were not compatible with the bill. From the outset, when we were talking about modernizing the Investment Canada Act, the Liberals should have included this notion of revising thresholds.
Let us take COVID‑19, for example, with our airlines. When the value of our airlines plummeted to the point where they finally fell below the mandatory review threshold, which was triggered, foreign companies—Chinese, American and others—were able to buy up flagships like Air Transat for a song.
The consequences would have been disastrous. What we need to do with the Investment Canada Act is to go deeper into the issue of thresholds. All the same, I am delighted that transparency has increased. Let us take the example of Lowe's, a classic in Quebec, with the sale of Rona. We never knew what the compromises were. Five years on, we realize that these compromises may not have been respected.
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Mr. Speaker, that was a good speech.
Before question period, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government said that Canada was a good place for investors.
However, investors keep leaving. There are a lot of rules, like those arising from the passage of Bill C‑69, the carbon tax is too high, and we have measures that do not exist in other countries.
Why is there nothing in this bill to deal with that problem?
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Sarnia—Lambton for speaking French and for the effort that she makes. I commend her for that.
That is indeed a major problem. How can we bring in foreign capital to grow our economy? What was of particular interest to me in the context, and I had the support of my Conservative colleagues in that regard, was how to regulate critical and strategic minerals, particularly when it comes to the electrification of transport. How can we be sure to maintain ownership of our critical resources for the sake of national security? About 30 of them were targeted, including lithium.
Imagine if our companies had to depend on Chinese lithium. In theory, there have been acquisitions by Canadian companies, but they were overseas and bought back by the Chinese. We were told that that was of no value, so there was no need to conduct a review under the Investment Canada Act. Imagine that this happens and we do not take action. I think that we would want to protect our interests in such a situation.
When it comes to the electrification of transport in the new economy, we need ownership of our resources. If we want people to invest here, then we need to own our resources.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague brought up excellent points. I wonder what he thinks about the fact that, in natural resources, we have had Vale, Rio Tinto, Xstrata and United States Steel take over the Canadian companies Inco, Alcan, Falconbridge and Stelco. What happened? We gave up all of our natural resources to foreign companies.
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Mr. Speaker, one of the dangers is indeed investing heavily at the end of the supply chain.
We are happy to see companies like Stellantis and Northvolt investing here, but we are at the end of the supply chain. No one is investing at the beginning, in other words, close to our mining companies, so we can protect our resources. We need to unblock the entire supply chain to ensure that we put lithium from Abitibi—Témiscamingue or Quebec in our cars instead of Chinese lithium.
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Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-34, as well as to the amendments being proposed today, amendments that are actually pretty important to consider. I will be considering them, as will the NDP.
The amendments pertain to the independence of the minister, in particular where the minister could have ultimate authority with less cabinet oversight. As industry critic for about 17 of my 21 years here, I can think of some deals that were not even looked at by certain ministers. I am not sure whether this would solve it, because I know they actually brought some of these things to the cabinet table in successive Conservative and Liberal governments and they were allowed to be taken over.
The reason I asked my previous question about natural resources, and I want to touch a little on that, is that the companies in the mining industry that are now owned by foreign conglomerates used to be Canadian champions. Now, the battery supply and different minerals necessary for electrification of vehicles in our corner of the world are very much affected by that. It is the same with the independence. What is also important and has not been taken much into account by either of these two parties in the last number of years is the number of tax subsidies, reductions and investments that those companies have gotten from Liberals and Conservatives that let them actually go out the door.
I want to talk about a more recent case, and then I want to get to natural resources. The most recent one is Nemak in Windsor, which is the Mexican-based company that got a series of investments. It was bought out, previous to that. It got a series of subsidies from the federal and provincial governments of the day, a federal Liberal government and a provincial Conservative government. There were no conditions on the investment of those subsidies. They went towards a new transmission update, a new motor update and other types of innovation. They then took that and put it in Mexico, and closed the Windsor plant down. We had to fight to get the workers' wages back. Our bankruptcy and solvency laws are actually very much against workers right now. We lost this opportunity, but we funded the loss of our opportunity after we let the company be taken over.
The reason I talk a little about the auto sector is that we had to have some foresight. Successive Conservative and Liberal governments have never had that. Some Canadians might remember Inco, Alcan, Falconbridge and Stelco. They are all gone. All were Canadian giants in natural resources, and the industry is now owned by Vale, Rio Tinto, Xstrata, and U. S. Steel. Some have even changed since then. All were foreign interventions in the Canadian system of natural resources.
Who owns the natural resources? We do, as Canadians. It is a privilege to be able to mine those resources. We are the ones who actually have the asset. It is no different actually from the spectrum that we have for our telecommunications industry, where successive Conservative and Liberal governments have taken in $21 billion from taxpayers and allowed companies like Shaw, Telus, Bell and others to charge some of the highest rates. From the year 2000 to this past year, we actually took in, under successive Conservative and Liberal government, $21 billion in spectrum auction of the airwaves above us that Canadians own. Then we let them charge us some of the highest prices in the world, with some of the worst practices.
That is important, because natural resources are at a premium now, especially when we are looking at lithium ion and different types of minerals related to the new economy and the emerging auto industry in electrification. It actually goes further than that. There was a big loss with respect to getting the next chips and innovation related to the electronics industry. The shortages were high. The U.S. is spending billions of dollars in investment. In microchips, we were actually a leader at one time, in Mississauga. We let that be bought out, closed down and shipped over to Taiwan. All of it was approved under Liberal and Conservative governments in the past, after policies of reducing corporate taxes and giving subsidies with no conditions and terms. Companies were bought up, closed down and, with less competition, moved out of the country.
Finally, and I have raised this in the past, when China Minmetals was on the lookout to buy Canadian natural resources in the oil patch, what is interesting about that is at that time, back in, I think, 2004, there was no national security review screening, and that was okay, if members can believe it. Paul Martin was the finance minister at the time, and he later became Prime Minister. It was okay with the Conservatives and Liberals for China's national industries to own Canadian natural resources, but it was not okay for Canadians to own Petro-Canada, so we sold off our shares in Petro-Canada. We took a bath on it because six months later, the prices skyrocketed, at a time when it was okay for China to invest. All the records are here. All the documents are here. At the same time, we could not have a national champion like Petro-Canada, heaven forbid, but at the same time we brought in investments from China. Now the Liberals are talking about concerns and reservations, but we do not have those resources under control anymore.
We are looking at the same thing with competition right now. If we look at the frustrations in the grocery industry and all the different consumer industries, they are of concern. There is a pattern here. All these industries I have talked about had to be approved by the minister and cabinet, so I am empathetic to the Conservatives' amendment here for a cabinet review, but when we have a party that is destined ideologically to sell off Canada, it does not matter if it is one person or 12 in the room making the decision to sell off those jobs and those investments. That is the problem.
When we look at some of the most historic ones, such as Lowe's buying Rona, how well did that work out? Now it is going back to the Rona brand, because people trusted it because it was a Canadian company. What did we do? We allowed Lowe's and basically Home Depot to be the competitors, and we eliminated the Canadian competitor by allowing it to be bought up. What Rona got as a condition and term was a supposed corporate office, I cannot remember if it was going to be in Quebec City or Montreal, but in one of those two places. We know that was a facade.
At the same time, we saw it in the retail sector, which is just as important, with electronics. We used to have Future Shop. It is gone. Now we have Best Buy, and that is it. It only had a limited market to begin with, but on top of that, Best Buy said it would sell off the Canadian component as well so that it would have no competition. If we wonder why we have less competition, it is because ministers and multiple cabinets are ideologically driven, not from a business sense, by competition or all the other things that are important to the consumer society. The United States has laws preventing that from happening. What we have are ideologically driven governments that want to sell off Canada and say it is okay because that is the way of doing business. However, it is not the way of doing business anywhere else but Canada. The United States has anti-competitive laws for those things that break up companies like Microsoft and others when they have gone too far. We do not have any of that stuff here.
There are so many cases it is unbelievable, but another one I want to note is Zellers and Target. It is one of the most eye-popping ones. During the retail market struggles when companies were losing money, Zellers was still making a profit, even with a union that provided benefits for its employees. What did we do? We opened the floodgates. We let Target come right in and take over Zellers and close some of them down. A few months after that, Target realized that maybe it was not so hot for the Canadian market, and after about a year it ended up closing those stores. The workers were gone. The pensions were gone. The benefits were gone. The stores were gone. Zellers is trying to make a return now, but what does it matter when we had a minister, cabinet ministers and parties in power who were ideologically driven to basically give Canada and the investments away?
It is not the same free market as in the United States. I live close to the U.S., and I know it has much stronger laws that protect consumers than in Canada. It is about time we got them here.
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Mr. Speaker, the member for Windsor West has been a long-time member of the industry committee and has a good knowledge of the various industrial sectors.
I want to ask him about the impact of foreign ownership on certain segments of the industrial sector. For example, almost every company in the steel or aluminum industry is foreign-owned, and none of those steel and aluminum sector companies have had any capacity during the last 20 years. The stagnation we see with this foreign ownership does not impact the economic security of Canada, which can also be related, in one way or another, to the national security of Canada.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague has been on this committee and others as well. His question is a really good one, and I really appreciate it.
We can look at national security and a number of different things through the lens of Stelco in Hamilton, which was bought up by U.S. Steel. It actually moved some of the operations to Zug Island in Detroit, where its operations caused what was then called the Windsor hum, even though it came from Detroit. The operations there made vibrations and problems.
I will conclude by saying it is a great example, because we gave up the capacity to grow and expand our steel and aluminum industry, and then the company pulled it out because they wanted less competition. The end result was that we had a painful exercise with workers who lost pensions, jobs and so forth.
That is why I appreciate this question, because it is about national security, and it is also about personal security for our workers who are actually in these sectors.
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Mr. Speaker, during the clause-by-clause study at the industry committee, the government members voted against a Conservative amendment that would subject state-owned enterprises in countries like China to a mandatory national security review.
I would like to know what the member's thoughts are as to why the government would vote against such a common-sense amendment that would protect Canadian assets, especially in minerals and natural resources.
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