44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 6, 2023 11:00AM
Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise and address the issue that the leader of the New Democratic Party has brought to us this morning in the form of a piece of private member's legislation.
It is interesting to look at Bill C-56, a government piece of legislation. I think some of the principles are there. I look forward to hearing the feedback from my friends in the New Democratic Party with respect to Bill C-56. I believe that Bill C-56 is going to be able to make a difference.
Before I get into that, I think it is important for all of us to recognize a few facts. One is that Canadians are hurting in a very real and tangible way. We recognize that. If we compare inflation and the price of groceries in Canada to other places around the world, Canada is doing fairly well, but that does not mean that we just accept that. It is important that we continue as a government to look at ways to bring more stability to the prices of groceries, to even have an impact on reducing the cost of groceries indirectly, which is still important, and directly, provide that support to Canadians. An example of that would be in the last budget. In the last budget we had a grocery rebate. I believe over 11 million people directly benefited from that. That put more money in the pockets of people during a difficult time, ensuring that they would have that additional disposable income.
I would suggest there are many benefits throughout the budget that help Canadians with disposable income, such as the national child care program, the national dental care program, both brought in by this government, again, with the idea of ensuring that disposable income, which could go toward groceries, would in fact, be helped.
More specifically, in regard to the bill itself, when we think in terms of the big five grocery chains, Loblaws, Metro, Sobeys, Walmart and Costco, our government called them from the minister's office here in Ottawa and had them make a presentation to the standing committee in a genuine attempt for more accountability. That was relatively unique. We want to ensure that there is a healthier sense of competition and that consumers are not being taken advantage of, as we know that can take place. In fact, not that long ago, colleagues will recall when Canada Bread company was caught price fixing. Over the last couple of years that allegation was established and the company taken to court. I believe there was an agreed-upon fine somewhere in the neighbourhood of $45 million to $50 million. That was because the government does take this issue seriously.
Bill C-56 deals, in good part, with ensuring there is a healthier sense of competition. Let me give an example. They call it the efficiency debate. Members might recall that Shoppers Drug Mart used to be a stand-alone independent company, producing literally hundreds of millions of dollars in sales throughout the country. They used the issue of efficiency partly to justify the merger of Loblaws and Shoppers. That was the last real significant merger that we saw in the grocery industry. There is no doubt that Loblaws and Shoppers benefited immensely by that, using that particular argument. The ones who lost out were the consumers because there is less competition when two large companies form one, based on the issue of efficiency.
As much as the Conservatives criticize the Liberals, I will remind my friends across the way that the same thing happened while Stephen Harper was prime minister. It was the Conservative government that approved that particular merger. In good part, it was based on the efficiency defence. That is why Bill C-56, which I believe the Conservatives are filibustering, would change the game. I am not 100% sure they are filibustering it, but I would be surprised if they were not. We will have to wait and see, and maybe do a little more research on it. Suffice it to say that Bill C-56 would change the game, because we can no longer use the efficiency argument. We need to have more of a focus on Canadian consumers, and we would see that in some of the changes in the bill.
In Bill C-56, we would see more of an empowerment of the Competition Bureau, giving the bureau additional money and resources to conduct investigations to ensure we have healthier competition in a wide spectrum of areas. The best way to keep corporations more responsible, to prevent price-fixing and some of the shenanigans that take place, which ultimately shaft consumers, is to ensure there is healthier competition. That is why we looked to the Competition Bureau to give the legislation more authority, not only from a legislative perspective but also as a budgetary measure. As a government, we have invested more, into the tens of millions of dollars, so the bureau would be in a better position to conduct the investigations necessary to protect our consumers.
Over the last year, I have been invited to grand openings in the community, and one thing I really appreciate is that it is the small businesses of Canada that provide the backbone to our economy and that are so important to the whole idea of competition. I look at some of the ethnic grocery stores. I am a little reluctant to use the word “ethnic”, so I will say “community-based grocery stores”. Look at the impact they have in the community by providing additional competition, not to mention some wonderful alternative foods. In my community, there are a Punjabi grocery store and a Filipino grocery store that emphasize products from those two communities. Superstores nowadays are starting to broaden their selections, which I suggest has a lot to do with competition. Superstores will start to lose more and more of their market if they do not diversify the types of products they offer.
The same principles apply with regard to prices. We would encourage all opposition members to look at Bill C-56 as legislation that can and would make a difference for the consumers of Canada, for all of us because we are all consumers. The government is focused on having the backs of Canadians, in supporting Canada's middle class and those aspiring to be part of it and in boosting up individuals who need to be boosted, while, at the same time, ensuring that the wealthiest 1% pay their fair share. It is one of the very first actions the government took in 2015; we raised the taxes of Canada's wealthiest 1%. We have the backs of Canadians and will continue to do so through legislation and budgetary measures.
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Mr. Speaker, this debate is not on the merits of Bill C-34, but on the use of time allocation once again. On principle, I will vote against time allocation always because this is the place where legislation gets debated.
Many members of the House are not members of the industry committee. I am not allowed to be a member of the INDU committee. I have very strong views on Bill C-34 and national security considerations on takeovers of Canadian companies, but will not be allowed to speak to this because, yet again, the guillotine is being brought down. The Harper administration did this time and time again, and the opposition knew it was wrong then. The Liberals promised that they would not, and now it is routine. Time allocation is put on almost every bill.
The hon. minister knows the high opinion I hold of him. I want to be able to discuss this legislation. I was the first MP in the House to identify that the takeover of Aecon by the People's Republic of China should have had a national security review. For a long time, I was the lone voice. We finally got it, and the deal was turned down.
I care about this stuff, and I really think every member of the House has a right to participate in debates. Time allocation defeats that right.
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Madam Speaker, I am tempted to remind my friend of the incredibly dismal record of the Harper regime. Over nine years, we repeatedly saw the sellout of important companies: Nexen to CNOOC and Progress to Petronas. We also had the disastrous signing of the Canada-China FIPA, which is one of the reasons why Bill C-34 is so important. This was over a 30-year period, so the Harper government did not sell out Canada just for the period when it was in office, but also for more than three decades.
Diane Francis with the Financial Post, who is certainly not a left-winger, said that the Conservatives:
have demonstrated the worst negotiating skills since Neville Chamberlain....
The terms agreed to by Ottawa [and the Harper government] are unprecedented and would be laughed out of Britain, Brussels, Canberra or Washington. Beijing has negotiated a heads-I-win-tails-Canada-loses deal.
This is the kind of situation that has to be addressed by Bill C-34. We know that the Conservatives have been blocking the passage of the bill, even though they say they support it. Is it not important that we fix the mistakes of the Harper regime, and can the member apologize on behalf of Conservatives for their sellout of Canada?
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Madam Speaker, I always find it interesting that the NDP is stuck in the past. Its members want to keep talking about the last Conservative government or Mr. Harper. My recommendation is that the member and his party start thinking about their future, because it is dismal to tie their wagon to this calamitous Liberal government.
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Madam Speaker, I want to go back a little to when the hon. member was a minister. The deal signed at that time was the Nexen deal. It was signed by selling off Nexen to a Chinese national offshore company for over $15 billion. The deal was signed in Russia in secret by former prime minister Stephen Harper. Does the member have any comments on that?
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Madam Speaker, at least this question relates, although obliquely, to the Investment Canada Act.
With respect to the Nexen transaction, prior to that point in time, Canada had absolutely no rules about how state-owned enterprises could invest in Canada or if they even should be investing in Canada. When that transaction came forward and cabinet had to review it, we said to hold it because with this transaction, there were no rules for us to be guided by. Therefore, Stephen Harper at that time articulated a clear set of rules for when countries like China or state-owned enterprises from countries like China, Russia and Iran, which are hostile actors, want to invest in Canada. We established the first set of rules for that, and of course, that—
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