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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 246

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 3, 2023 10:00AM
  • Nov/3/23 12:12:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is almost like there is an echo or we are getting an encore for people who did not have the opportunity to hear from the House leader of the NDP yesterday. As the Speaker knows, all the questions that came from the official opposition today dealt with the question of the government's unaffordable carbon tax and its effect on people's ability to feed their families, heat their homes and house themselves. Our questions were about support for that and a motion that is before this House to take the tax off so Canadians can keep the heat on. We encourage all members of the Liberal caucus to join us in this common-sense motion and vote for it on Monday.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:13:48 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have another supplemental to the decision that you will ultimately be ruling on. I listened with great interest to the comments made my colleague from my neighbouring riding. I would draw to your attention that what he is saying is not entirely true. I would encourage you, in your ruling on this, to review the question from the member for South Shore—St. Margarets because he specifically asked a question of a Liberal member. He did not ask a question of the government. He did not ask a question specifically about policy. He was asking a Liberal member. I hope you will take this, along with all of the other information that you have received, to properly review it and provide a response to this House in due course.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:14:37 p.m.
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I would like to inform my colleagues that the issues that have been raised will be taken into account in the Speaker's ruling that will be handed down shortly. The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:15:00 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36(8)(a), I have the honour to table, in both official languages, the government's response to 22 petitions. These returns will be tabled in an electronic format.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:15:43 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present to the House, in both official languages, the report of the Canadian Delegation to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe Parliament Assembly respecting its participation in the 22nd Winter Meeting in Vienna, Austria, from February 23 to 24.
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Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the seventh report of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage in relation to Bill S-202, an act to amend the Parliament of Canada Act (Parliamentary Visual Artist Laureate). The committee has studied the bill and has decided to support the bill back to the House, with amendments.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:17:47 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I move that the third report of the Standing Committee on National Defence, presented on Monday, April 24, be concurred in. It gives me pleasure to have the opportunity to debate concurrence on this important report tabled in the House of Commons. The Standing Committee on National Defence undertook a lengthy and comprehensive study of Arctic security. Arctic security is Canadian national security and continental security, and it is under significant threat. We are in a rapidly evolving threat environment that the current policy of the government is not ready to face. There are 26 recommendations, which are extremely important. I think it is important that we have an opportunity to get government members on the record to say whether they support this or not and to get a vote on these important recommendations. We had a very co-operative committee. We heard from a variety of witnesses, about 46, if I recall. All parties were able to bring them to committee to hear a variety of perspectives on Arctic security and how best to undertake an improvement of our policy on Arctic security. The New Democratic Party dissented from the other parties and has a supplemental report. I imagine its members would look forward to having an opportunity to get on the record whether they utterly reject this committee report, given their dissension on some of the points they identified in their report. These reports are important. They inform the government. It is important that members of Parliament have the opportunity to both debate them and have their views recorded for their constituents. The recommendations, if adopted, would be transformative for our Arctic security. Therefore, I will bring to the attention of members a number of them. The first recommendation states, “That the Government of Canada immediately begin the process to procure undersea surveillance capabilities for Canadian Arctic waters in order to detect and monitor the presence of foreign threats to our national security.” We heard expert testimony from the Canadian Armed Forces. We heard from academic experts from Canada and other allied countries. It was really quite sobering to hear about and learn from experts the shortcomings and gaps in domain awareness. The Arctic region is an enormous land mass that represents three-quarters of Canada's coastline, so domain awareness is extremely important for the security of Canada, for continental security and for our sovereignty. The ability to detect and monitor the presence of foreign threats in this environment is challenging. The infrastructure we have presently is not up to it, and there are many areas of domain awareness that need immediate attention. There are some more specific recommendations I am going to get to, but the committee is recommending that the Government of Canada immediately begin its process to procure undersea surveillance capabilities. That takes us to the second recommendation, which is a little more specific. It states, “That the Government of Canada undertake on an urgent basis a procurement process to replace the Victoria-class submarines with new submarines that are under-ice capable for operations in our Arctic waters.” At present, Canada has a fleet of four submarines, and there is a long and tragic history of the submarine procurement that occurred a generation ago. Of these four submarines, at most we can have one in the water at a time. In 2019, I believe, we went a whole a year without a submarine sailing in Canadian waters. This is unacceptable in the current threat environment in which find ourselves given the sheer volume of our Arctic space and Arctic coastline. However, even when these particular submarines are in the water, they cannot operate under ice for the length of time required to ensure subsurface domain awareness. These submarines cannot traverse the Northwest Passage. They cannot go from Atlantic to Pacific coasts. We desperately need superior capability for subsurface domain awareness, and the committee has recommended that this procurement be undertaken urgently. I am not going to have time to go through all the recommendations, but one of the others is also quite specific and gets into subsurface detection and the ability, not necessarily vessel-borne, to have the sonic capability to detect submarines in our waters. In fact, we had expert testimony that said presently there is no ability to have full domain awareness, either surface awareness or subsurface awareness. This needs to be done urgently. Part of the emerging threat environment was brought forward and expressed quite forcefully by the chief of the defence staff, General Eyre, who said that we are in the most dangerous period and that the threat environment is greater now “than at any time since the Cold War”. He said perhaps there has been no greater threat environment facing Canada since the beginning of the Second World War. This is testimony from the chief of the defence staff, and that is the urgency of the crisis of preparedness we face now. It is greater than the heights of the Cold War according to our own chief of the defence staff, and this was echoed by other experts at our committee. The third recommendation in this report says, “That the Government of Canada reconsider its longstanding policy with respect to the U.S. Ballistic Missile Defence program.” I will note that for this one, there was division on the committee, and members will see from the supplemental report by the New Democratic Party that it did not agree with this recommendation. Again, part of the reason it is important that we have concurrence debates and concurrence votes is so that members can go on the record and declare whether or not they support important recommendations that have been made to the government. The report notes: Witnesses raised concerns about Canada’s lack of a missile defence system, suggesting that the country is currently vulnerable because of virtually no capability to intercept inbound missiles of any type. [Experts] referred to Canada’s lack of participation in ballistic missile defence (BMD) and to the Government of Canada’s February 2005 announcement [and decision] that Canada would not join the United States in a [ballistic missile] program. This happened many years ago, and the threat environment is different today. We see what is happening throughout the world. We see the threat that Russia poses to its neighbouring countries and see its global ambition. It is clear that Russia considers Canada one of its targets, and we see it in a number of ways. We need to be prepared for the threat that Russia poses to our security and sovereignty in the Arctic. We need look no further than the illegal and utterly shocking invasion of Ukraine to see the kind of threat that Russia poses to its peaceful neighbours. Canada is a peaceful neighbour in the Arctic region, but we need to adapt to the threat environment in which we find ourselves. The recommendation of this committee on revisiting the decision from 2005 is an important one that members of this House should have the opportunity to both debate and vote on. That was the third recommendation. The fourth recommendation says: That the Government of Canada urgently address the personnel crisis in the Canadian Armed Forces by fast-tracking the recruitment of new members, aiming to complete the recruitment process in under six months to ensure we have the level of personnel needed to defend our Arctic now and into the future. Perhaps the greatest crisis of the Canadian Armed Forces is personnel. There are 16,000 vacant positions that need to be filled just to get us up to the strength that our current planning is based on. However, it is even worse than that, because we heard testimony in subsequent studies, and have heard reports of this as well, that there are 10,000 undertrained and undeployable members within the CAF. We need 16,000 new recruits and need to get 10,000 existing recruits up to deployable readiness. That is without undertaking a series of these other recommendations that would involve new kit, new capability or new tasks that our forces can undertake. We have to do something about this. This affects every part of the Canadian Armed Forces. I asked one of the generals if he could identify which position needs to be filled the most. We have been told that it is everything from cooks to pilots and electricians to tank crew members. There are tremendous opportunities in the Canadian Forces, and we need the forces itself to ensure that its processes can be tightened and that we can bring people in more quickly. There is frustration expressed by some people wishing to join the forces, who say that it takes too long to get through the process and into the door. I hope we can debate many of these recommendations. The fifth recommendation says: That the Government of Canada undertake a comprehensive survey of our infrastructure, including military, civilian, and corporate holdings, as well as natural resources, mining and mineral operations in our Arctic for the purpose forward planning for NORAD modernization, developing a strategy for critical infrastructure investments and protecting Canadian interests from malign foreign actors. There is a lot in that recommendation. It is about our own awareness of what is in the Arctic. The private resources, natural resources and even government resources that exist are not properly inventoried in a way to best come up with an efficient and effective strategy for NORAD modernization. We had quite strange testimony. I thought it was incredible to learn that in Inuvik, there is a privately owned hangar adjacent to the runway. I would like to have the opportunity to travel there and see what is on the ground. We had testimony that it is not only the only hangar in which a CF-18, or perhaps a future F-35, could be hangared, but it is also the only building where refuelling aircraft can be hangared. The government let its lease with this private facility lapse, or did not renew its contract with the operator. The operator has a business to operate. He owns the building. Its purpose is to hangar large aircraft in a remote community. Do members know who was interested in taking over this building? The owner had inquiries, as a business that had to make a decision on whether to sell the building or find a new tenant, from the United States government and from the People's Republic of China's Ottawa personnel, who came kicking tires, looking around at this military facility in Inuvik. That is quite staggering. The testimony from the vendor was very interesting, and it reveals just how thin resources on the ground are in remote communities and remote places. We cannot park a CF-18 overnight when it is -45°C and just go out and start it in the morning. We are not talking about simply taking out a driver's licence, scraping off the windshield, getting in and going. These aircraft need to be hangared, and the personnel have to have a warm place to go inside during things like the refuelling process or any kind of maintenance. It is bitterly cold, life-threateningly cold, in this environment. The equipment needs to be stored properly, and the people who work there need to be able to stay warm. It is things like this, figuring out what private assets exist that could be utilized in partnership with the Canadian Armed Forces or with the Canadian government. The urgency of NORAD modernization is something that is in the recommendation I just went through, and it is also in subsequent recommendations. There is, for example, the present satellite system. It is believed that the RADARSAT mission will be at end of life before we have any replacement for it, so we are looking at a gap, perhaps of years, without proper radar satellite capability in the Arctic if we do not act immediately. Therefore, this is an urgent recommendation. It goes to the broader NORAD modernization issue, where we absolutely must get our NORAD systems in partnership with the United States. This is tricky because its expenditure, as well as ours, is high, but the current government has placed parts of NORAD modernization in its budget. However, we have not seen any concrete steps to ensure that we will not have critical failures of our Arctic domain awareness. We lack and desperately need over-the-horizon radar. We need much to ensure our Arctic safety. It is all in the report, so the report is of critical importance for Canada's future Arctic security. I urge members of Parliament who have not read it to do so, to bring their voices to the debate on it and to register their support for it. With respect to the NORAD modernization and the financing of these large procurements, the government is lapsing in much of its spending, so we are concerned that sometimes it even puts things in the budget, authorizes it through the Treasury Board and then does not even get the money out the door. I look forward to the questions members will have about this important report.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:38:01 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, due to climate change, the north is opening up. Due to the warmongering of Russia, the threat to the Arctic is increasing. Is the member aware of the technologies required for ISR: intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance? The technologies almost do not talk to each other. There is a need for the integration of the various technologies to handle ISR operations for the entire north, especially the Arctic region. Does the member have any comments on that?
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  • Nov/3/23 12:38:45 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the report did talk about the changing environment in the Arctic and the pace of, for example, the navigability of portions of the Northwest Passage. There is a lot in the report about domain awareness. I am not going to get into the specifics of the technology available as part of the report debate, but the report does talk, in great detail, about how the changing environment in the north affects our threat analysis and the evolution of our domain awareness needs in the Arctic.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:39:40 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. My colleague's speech is very interesting. Committee reports deserve to be debated, and those debates deserve to be heard. I am just wondering how many members are interested in the speech. I would ask the Chair to verify whether we have quorum today.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:39:58 p.m.
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We will call for quorum. And the count having been taken: The Acting Speaker (Mr. Gabriel Ste-Marie): The House has quorum, by a generous margin. The hon. member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:40:39 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to commend my colleague for bringing the motion forward. I would argue that other than the affordability crisis that we are dealing with in this country right now, the government's priority always has to be the defence and security of its citizens. We obviously have a weakness when it comes to what we need to do to improve things in the Arctic. I am looking forward to reading the whole report in great detail, considering my own past experience, in particular with recommendation 3 around ballistic missile defence. I would like to ask my colleague to expand, because it is more than just ballistic missile defence; we are dealing with hypersonic missiles and other threats. We are seeing this coming out of the Ukraine war as Ukraine fights against Russia's illegal invasion. We are seeing this with North Korea as well, as Russia, China and other nations are putting increased technology into North Korea as it develops these capabilities. It is absolutely essential that Canada invests appropriately and reconsiders our policy around how we are going to have an all around air defence policy. I would like my hon. colleague to please expand on that.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:41:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his service to Canada, both when he served in the CAF and now as the member for Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound. The recommendation is an important one. There was a decision made in 2005. The debate seemed settled for quite some time. However, the threat environment has changed. It is incredibly important. We cannot remain stuck in an old threat environment as new ones emerge. We heard testimony during the study. Major General Michael Wright stated that Russia sees North America as a single target. We are part of a continental defence system with the United States. There are concerns in the United States about Canada's contribution to NATO and ensuring that Canada does its part to participate in continental defence.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:43:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to serve with my colleague on the Standing Committee on National Defence, where something rather remarkable happens often, that is, members reach a consensus. One thing that came up a lot during our study on the Arctic and other studies we have done, particularly during discussions of the spy balloons intercepted over Canada, is the fact that Canada's Arctic radar coverage is very poor. We heard in committee that less than half of the Arctic region is covered. I would like to hear what my colleague has to say about the risks arising from the fact that we have no way of knowing exactly what is going on in an area as vast as the Arctic. As we know, climate change is expected to make the Arctic increasingly accessible to people from outside the country. It could well become an area of growing interest to countries other than Canada as well.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:44:25 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the member raised an excellent point that the balloon incursions occurred while we were in the midst of the study. They revealed quite clearly the limitations of domain awareness and the importance of domain awareness and being able to detect objects in our airspace, but there is also coastal defence and awareness. We heard at committee about rangers who do incredible work in the Arctic, but we cannot rely just on the hope of seeing a passing vessel that might be traversing our waters without a transponder and that would potentially be invisible to Canadians. Yes, there are gaps in domain awareness. There are growing threats in the subsurface, on the surface and in the air, everywhere we look at it. We need better radar. We need over-the-horizon radar. We need to get the satellite system replaced or we need a path to replacing it before it fails, and we need to do it quickly.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:45:38 p.m.
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Uqaqtittiji, the indigenous and northern affairs committee also had a study on the Canadian Rangers. I am glad to see that there were also discussions about the Canadian Rangers in the report. It is great that it heard a witness from my riding, Calvin Pedersen, who is a fourth-generation Canadian Ranger. I could also see in the report that some of the same issues that were addressed at our committee were also addressed at the member's committee, including what the results of the lack of investments in the north have meant, not investing in health care, housing and other activities that would allow better engagement of northerners to participate in Arctic security. We see that the Canadian Rangers do want to participate in Arctic security. I wonder whether the member agrees that recommendations 21 to 25 are very important recommendations in the report and that the government must take these recommendations and act on them as a priority.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:47:05 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am glad the member brought up the rangers and her constituent who gave excellent testimony to the committee that was very informative for the recommendations we made. I did not have time in my speech to get through all the recommendations, so I am glad I can now. I do not know how many I will hit, but let me start with recommendation 21: “That the Government of Canada immediately increase the equipment usage rate for Canadian Rangers.” This is a source of frustration for Canadian Rangers: the compensation for their own equipment that they need to use.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:47:51 p.m.
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  • Re: Bill C-57 
Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to see you in the Chair. I have a question for the member opposite. While I can speak about defence spending all day and would love an opportunity to sit down and discuss this with him, we were scheduled to discuss Bill C-57, the trade agreement between Canada and Ukraine. I am at a loss to understand why we moved a concurrence motion again today to eliminate the opportunity to speak about this important piece of legislation.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:48:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am not responsible for managing the government's calendar, but I do have an ability to bring forward a concurrence debate at Routine Proceedings, which is the correct time to introduce it. We had debate on that bill earlier today. I am sure we will have another opportunity for debate on that bill as soon as the government calls it next.
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  • Nov/3/23 12:48:49 p.m.
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  • Re: Bill C-57 
Mr. Speaker, that is a cop out. That is what we just finished witnessing from a Conservative member. He says the Conservatives are not responsible for setting the government agenda and that is the reason, so do not blame them. The Conservative Party is a destructive force on the floor of the House of Commons today. There is absolutely no doubt about their intentions to prevent legislation from passing. The real shame of it all is to look at where and how they are using concurrence motions to play games with very important issues that Canadians want us to address. I say shame on each and every Conservative member who continues to want to filibuster on important pieces of legislation. I am sharing my time with my colleague from Etobicoke Centre. There are many opportunities for the member and the Conservative Party to have the debates they want on all these reports that they continue to bring up in order to prevent debate on government business. The member, in his speech, made reference to the mean Russians and what is happening in Ukraine. I agree, the illegal invasion by Russia into Ukraine is absolutely disgusting, and Canadians understand that and believe it also. The President of Ukraine, President Zelenskyy, was in Ottawa back in September. A country is at war, the president comes to Canada to sign a trade agreement and the Conservative Party of Canada is playing games. As opposed to seeing this legislation debated and passed, we see the type of kid's play coming from the Conservative Party of Canada. That is the reality of it. What does the member say? The most recent speaker said they were not the ones who set the government agenda, as if they have nothing to do with what is taking place inside the chamber. If we want to talk about being obstructionist and preventing legislation, we can say that we do not see any concurrence debates coming forward from the Conservative Party on opposition days. Where is the concern about the issues that they raise then? It is not there. It is absolutely bogus. We were expecting to debate Bill C-57 today. We have been waiting for that debate to hopefully collapse and go to a standing committee. We get the Prime Minister of Canada and the President of Ukraine signing a trade agreement, and then we get the Conservative Party of Canada filibustering. It is filibustering free-trade legislation more than any other political entity in the House. Is that not ironic, to a certain degree? At the end of the day, there are many different avenues. We are all concerned about Arctic sovereignty. It is an important issue. If it were really as important as the Conservatives say it is, so much so that they had to prevent the debate on free trade between Canada and Ukraine, why did they not bring it up as an opposition day? Why did they not introduce it as an emergency debate or request that the government have a take-note debate on it? Why did they not ask one question on it during question period today? However, they still felt it was so important to bring up. Let me give a rationale: We get the member for Cumberland—Colchester standing in his place and saying that the Ukraine trade debate, the legislation to enact the agreement, is woke and that Canada is taking advantage of Ukraine. That is what one member of the Conservative Party has said. Do they not know any shame? They cannot have it both ways. They cannot say they are strong allies and support solidarity for Ukraine, then behave as we have witnessed. This is not the first concurrence report to prevent this legislation, Bill C-57, from being debated and passed. They even get members who will stand up and talk about sympathy. Earlier this morning, one member said the free trade agreement is not only good for the economy, but it is also all about hope. Yes, it is good for the economy. There is no doubt about that. Canada and Ukraine will benefit economically, in many different ways, because of the legislation. It is more than that. We are the first country to work with Ukraine during a war period, to actually go ahead and get a trade agreement. We can think of the morale boost of that and the statement it makes, worldwide. As the world unites in solidarity to support Ukraine, what does the Conservative Party of Canada do? It filibusters important legislation that is going to make a powerful statement to the world in regard to the relationship between Canada and Ukraine and in recognizing Ukraine as an independent state, including Crimea. This is such an important thing, and Conservatives want to play games. We have seen them move other motions for concurrence on other important pieces of legislation. It is not just the trade agreement. However, I think the trade agreement amplifies the degree to which the Conservative Party has one intention. Its whole political scheme is bumper sticker politics, trying to make things as simple as possible. They believe that Canadians are stupid and that they are going to believe everything that the Conservatives say on a bumper sticker. That is the type of politics we are witnessing from the Conservative Party today. It is reckless. It is risky, and they are not going to fool Canadians at the end of the day. We are concerned about the Arctic. We appreciate the fine work that all our standing committees put in. However, if the member was being honest in talking about the report, why did he not talk about the billions of dollars the implementation of this report is going to cost? He referred to submarines. Does the member know how much a submarine costs? He is saying submarines, plural. He is talking about several submarines, with a bill totalling $10 billion. That probably would not even cover the cost. The Conservative Party talks about how, if they are going to spend a tax dollar, it is going to cut and find a place for it. For these multi-billions of dollars that it is prepared to commit, based on this report, where are Conservatives going to find those cuts that they talk about? Are they going to go after our senior programs or child care? Where are they going to come from? There is a hidden agenda across the way, and it will be unveiled. More and more Canadians are going to find that there is absolutely no substance to the Conservative Party that goes beyond a bumper sticker. That is what we are going to find out. The best example of that is in regard to the Conservatives' whole idea of the environment. They have no clue whatsoever about what is in the best interest of the environment. They flip-flop like a fish on a dock, all over the place. They do not know where to land on the issue. I guess they cannot get their climate policy on a bumper sticker, and that is the problem. We look to the Conservative Party as an opposition party that is supposed to be recognizing that Canadians, in the last election, voted for a minority situation. However, part of having a minority government is that it also puts some pressure on the opposition party to behave in a somewhat responsible fashion. Its actions, in virtually every way, are to prevent legislation from passing. As we can see, I really believe that there are members that are actually thinking, in the Conservative Party, of voting against this legislation. It is not as though we are asking for Bill C-57, the Ukraine-Canada trade deal, to pass third reading in 24 hours. However, I will say that Christmas is going come quickly. We have to get it to the Senate. It has to go through the standing committee. It has to come back to the House. I think it is fair to request and see that important legislation of this nature should be able to pass through the whole system, royal assent and all, before Christmas. I would like to see the Conservatives stand up and agree with that point.
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