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Nov/8/23 4:11:09 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-242

I declare the motion defeated.

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Nov/8/23 4:11:37 p.m.
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I wish to inform the House that because of the deferred recorded divisions, Government Orders will be extended by 40 minutes.

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Hon. Rechie Valdez

Nov/8/23 4:12:02 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I had technical difficulties on the app, and I am requesting unanimous consent to allow me to change my vote on the opposition day motion to against.

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The Deputy Speaker

Nov/8/23 4:12:14 p.m.
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Is it agreed? Some hon. members: Agreed.

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The Speaker

Nov/8/23 4:13:11 p.m.
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The Chair would like to follow up on the point of order raised by the chief opposition whip regarding an alleged offensive gesture by the member for Avalon during a recorded division held on Monday, November 6, 2023. As mentioned when the matter was first raised, the Chair committed to reviewing the video in order to determine if an offensive gesture was made by the member during the vote. Having done so, the Chair cannot make a conclusive determination as to the nature of the gesture. For his part, the member for Avalon stated that he did not make the gesture in question. The Chair is left with two versions of the same event, and consistent with past practice, the Chair must take members at their word. I therefore consider the matter closed. The final point I would make is the responsibility for improved decorum falls to every one of us. As I said in my statement of October 18, 2023, found at pages 17592 and 17593 of Debates, and I quote: Because of the collegial character of the House and the broad privileges enjoyed by its members, no one—not even the Speaker—can act unilaterally to improve the level of decorum in the chamber. Despite my own strong individual determination to maintaining the dignity and decorum of the House, ultimately those efforts will come to naught without members themselves taking responsibility for their behaviour and conduct, and showing their own personal efforts in comporting their business in an appropriate and civil manner. I will therefore need your help in order to succeed. There was obviously disorder in the House during the vote that took place last Monday. All members must be mindful of the impact that their sometimes heated words and behaviours might have on others. I ask all colleagues to do their part to elevate the proceedings to ensure that they are more respectful and constructive. Remember that Canadians are watching us and that we are all accountable for our words and actions in this place. Rather than finding ways to skate right up to the line of what is acceptable, I would encourage all members to stay well inside the boundaries of respect and decorum. I thank all members for their attention.

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Mr. Ken McDonald

Nov/8/23 4:16:19 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. On Monday, after the vote on the opposition day motion, the member for South Surrey—White Rock rose and accused me of making an obscene gesture. You offered me the opportunity to defend myself, which I did. Your ruling today confirms that the accusation was false. Members of the official opposition used footage of my vote and posted it on social media, encouraging people to email and call my parliamentary and constituency offices. In the last 48 hours, I have received threats of violence. I have had people threaten to cause violence at my constituency office, and I regret to say that I have also received death threats. This is not okay. My staff are scared and members of my family are scared, and this is all because members of the official opposition misled this House and misled Canadians because they were unhappy with the way I voted on their motion. I was elected to this place to represent the people of Avalon. On two separate occasions, I have stood in this chamber and voted in support of Conservative opposition motions on carbon taxes because I believed it was the right thing to do for my constituents. Monday's opposition day motion did not reflect the needs of my constituents, so I voted against it. I will continue to stand up for what is best for the people in my riding. I ask that the member for South Surrey—White Rock take responsibility for her actions, apologize and recognize that this misleading accusation fuelled hate and threats of violence against my staff and me. I thank the Speaker for allowing me to address this matter.

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The Speaker

Nov/8/23 4:18:02 p.m.
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I am not certain that this is a point of order, but I see that the member for South Surrey—White Rock is on her feet, and I would be happy to recognize her.

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Hon. Kerry-Lynne Findlay

Nov/8/23 4:18:19 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, if you are ruling that it is an appropriate point of order, I am prepared to respond, but I do not think it was a point of order. It was a prepared statement, written out. We all face threats being public servants and being in the public eye in this House, including me and many of my colleagues, for a variety of reasons. The ruling here was not that the member did not do what I stated I saw him do and what others stated they saw him do. The ruling was that it was inconclusive.

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The Speaker

Nov/8/23 4:19:11 p.m.
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The hon. member for Regina—Qu'Appelle is rising on a point of order.

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Hon. Andrew Scheer

Nov/8/23 4:19:14 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague, the hon. whip, has raised a very important point. Your ruling is that you are not in a position to make a determination. The Canadians who saw that gesture can and clearly are, and they know what the hon. member did; they can see the obvious gesture. Mr. Speaker, you have said that you are not in a position to take one member's word over another, which is fine. It is now on social media. It lives on there. Canadians, especially the voters in Avalon, can make their own determination about whether they think it is appropriate, when people are struggling with their home heating bills, to get the finger from a member who was voting against our common-sense motion.

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Hon. Andrew Scheer (Regina—Qu'Appelle, CPC)

Nov/8/23 4:23:27 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we had a question in question period today from the hon. member for Edmonton Strathcona that had absolutely nothing to do with the administrative responsibilities of government. It was directed at the Conservative opposition, and you allowed the Prime Minister to respond. In a question currently before you, the House leader for the NDP quoted extensively from one of my previous rulings as Speaker on questions that have nothing to do with the administrative role of government. I just want to quote it, only because it has been referenced in previous points from other members intervening on this question. I said: ...as I said on December 1, 2011, (Debates, p. 3875), the Speaker is called upon to make decisions about the admissibility of questions on the fly. In that regard, since members have very little time to pose their questions and the Chair has even less time to make decisions about their admissibility, it would be helpful if the link to the administrative responsibility of the government were made as quickly as possible. Accordingly, these kinds of questions will continue to risk being ruled out of order and members should take care to establish the link to government responsibility as quickly as possible. I have had a chance to look at the blues and the question from the member for Edmonton Strathcona. There is nothing about the federal government's area of responsibility in it. It was an attack levelled at the leader of the Conservative Party. I wanted to cite that part about making the point as quickly as possible because what we found today is that you allowed basically a 35-second attack against the Leader of the Opposition but did not allow the Leader of the Opposition to respond. You allowed the Prime Minister to respond. I understand why that would be the normal instinct, as it is government members who answer questions during question period. However, what I would urge you to reflect on as you come back to the House on this larger point about these questions is that if you wait until the very end of a question to make that determination and if members do not make a link to the administrative responsibility of the government early, you end up running the risk of having an unanswered attack on a member or another party. When the government has the ability to defend itself, you, as many Speakers have in the past, have allowed the government to answer questions that may otherwise have been ruled out of order for precisely that reason: An attack has been levelled and a charge has been made. The courteous thing to do is to allow a minister who would like to respond to use the opportunity to do so. However, when that attack is made against an opposition leader, there is no opportunity for a response to be made. It puts the House in a difficult situation when we have members being accused of something. In every other aspect of debate, including questions and comments during speeches and when we have motions for time allocation, there is an attack and a counterattack. There is a response to the questions being asked. The scenario we had today was an attack on the Leader of the Opposition, followed by an attack on the Leader of the Opposition. It was a coalition partner asking another coalition partner a question about the Leader of the Opposition. That is the unfortunate situation that arose out of question period today. What I would urge you to do when an attack is being made against an opposition party is to quickly determine early on in the question whether there is as link to government business and then not allow the government coalition partner to respond to an attack from the junior coalition partner. That does not respect the tradition and purpose of question period.

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The Speaker

Nov/8/23 4:23:27 p.m.
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I thank the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle for his intervention on this matter. I am certainly going to review the blues and very much reflect upon what the member has raised about previous ruling that the member had the benefit of sharing with this House when he occupied the chair. I think the member has made a prima facie case as to why it is important to make sure that questions asked quickly come to a point relating to the administrative affairs of government or of a committee chair. It will be useful in the reflection I am working on as we speak, on which I will come back to the House, on the point of order originally raised by the hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby. Speaking of which, I see the hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby on his feet. I am assuming it is on a point of order. I hope it is a new point of order the member is going to make, because I think we have exhausted, on all sides of this House, the issues that have been raised, which are going to be helpful to me in making my determination. The hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby.

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Mr. Peter Julian (New Westminster—Burnaby, NDP)

Nov/8/23 4:24:57 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I will be brief, because I have raised this issue a number of times, quoting of course my friend, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, but also Speaker Bosley and Speaker Milliken. It is absolutely true we have seen a lot of examples from the Conservatives of questions that have had nothing to do with the administration of government. In the case of the member for Edmonton Strathcona, she established that link to government administration in the responsibility for the Canada Health Act in the very first sentence of the question. I agree with the argument of my friend from Regina—Qu'Appelle that questions should carry on government administration. That is exactly why the member for Edmonton Strathcona established that link in the first sentence of her question.

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The Speaker

Nov/8/23 4:25:48 p.m.
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I thank all members for their interventions, and I also appreciate the interventions being brief. I would like to thank again the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle for a very substantive intervention. I hope to come back to the House soon. It might be after the constituency break, but I hope it can be sooner than that.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Nov/8/23 4:26:34 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 six petitions. These returns will be tabled in an electronic format.

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Mr. Kelly McCauley (Edmonton West, CPC)

Nov/8/23 4:27:56 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I move that the 26th report of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, presented to the House on Tuesday, February 14, be concurred in. To start, I want to say that I will be splitting my time with my hon. colleague, the member for Battle River—Crowfoot. Before I begin, I want to mention that this week is the birthday of the member's predecessor, the wonderful Kevin Sorenson. It was his 65th birthday. Since Mr. Sorenson and I used to fly together a lot, I had the pleasure of enjoying a birthday with Kevin one night. We were flying back to Edmonton, we landed and we went to our cars. I got into an Uber to go home and Kevin went to pick up his car from the outdoor lot. It turned out that, although it was a brand new car, it would not start. He thought, “crap, it is my birthday”, and so he went back to the airport to rent a car. He handed over his credit card and driver's licence, but it turned out his licence had expired about five minutes earlier, because we were five minutes in. So, poor Kevin, not only on his birthday did he have to spend it with me on a plane, but his car would not start, he could not get a rental car and he had to catch a cab all the way home to Battle River—Crowfoot. I am pleased to be talking today regarding the study in question. Actually, Kevin, at the time I first started doing some work on public accounts, was the chair of the committee. However, the greening government report that we are chatting about today is actually perfect timing for a lot of reasons, and I will comment on some of the timing as I go. One of the reasons this is great timing is because in public accounts we are actually studying the green hydro sham. I call it a sham, because there are various issues that come up about the government's actions, and I will cover them later in my talk. On the greening government report, I will give a couple of points to give some background. Treasury Board launched the greening government strategy back in 2017 with the ultimate goal to achieve net zero emissions by 2050. I will comment from the Auditor General's report, which says that “The Government of Canada has indicated that it is committed to leading by example in both the domestic and global transition to a low‑carbon economy.” Again, I get back to the great timing, because we just heard from the environment commissioner commenting that the government has not once yet achieved a single one of its environmental goals. Yet, we have here the public accounts committee looking at a report stating that the government's goal was to be a domestic and global leader and transition to a lower-carbon economy, but failed. It is an interesting comment from the Auditor General that said that the federal government is responsible for 3% of all GHG emissions, which is larger than any single corporation or company in Canada. One would think that this government would actually work to reduce its own GHG emissions instead of driving out of business so many companies across Canada. Instead, we see its goal is to reduce GHG by eliminating revenue-producing companies, especially in Alberta, but at the same time growing its own emissions. From the findings of this report, the Auditor General comments that “5 years into the strategy, the [Treasury Board] secretariat’s efforts to reduce emissions were not as complete as they could have been—especially considering...[their statement that they were going to be a] global leader in transitioning”. So here we have the Auditor General pointing out that the government is all talk and no action on this issue. Further into the report there is the comment, “We found that the overall reported results from Crown corporations were neither included on the secretariat’s website nor aggregated”. Why is this important? Again, I talked about timing and the government. Treasury Board does not cover Crown corporations. We, of course, have the green scam going on right now with the SDTC where we have a $1-billion Liberal green slush fund and where we know millions have been diverted to companies without any oversight. Here we have the Auditor General herself commenting that the Treasury Board has provided no oversight on these programs with Crown corporations. The Auditor General continues to argue that the Treasury Board Secretariat of the government also left an important context out of its reporting, such as “an overview of...government's key sources of emissions”; “key activities undertaken by the secretariat”; “opportunities, risks, and related mitigation measures likely to affect the government’s ability to implement the strategy over the remaining 28 years”; and “information about how the strategy supported the United Nations 2030 Agenda.” Liberals did not know what they were doing, they did not know what they were going to achieve, they did not know how they were going to achieve it and they did not know when they were going to achieve it. That pretty much sums up the government in a lot of areas, but especially on the green front. The Auditor General also concluded, “we found that the Greening Government Strategy did not contain sufficient detail about some important commitments. Additional information would give parliamentarians and Canadians a clearer picture of what is to be accomplished, including the government’s plans [how] to transition”. It is very clear that throughout this report it says there was a lack of transparency in the government's reporting. Then the Auditor General finished up commenting on limited risk management. This is important because at this time in the ethics committee and others, we are talking about the $1-billion slush fund, with no oversight and no risk of management on the government's programs for spending. She stated, “We also found that the secretariat did not identify how it would consult departments on their risks in order to come up with a more comprehensive, accurate list of these.... We found that only 8 of 27 departments had created emission reduction plans for...” government programs, and that was all. I want to talk about the SDTC. It is important because the Auditor General has made it clear that Treasury Board, which is responsible for oversight, has not provided oversight. It failed on the oversight of Crown corporations, which the SDTC is, and did not provide risk management or risk mitigation. There is a comment in the SDTC mission statement that says their “investments translate to economic and environmental benefits.” We heard earlier that the environment commissioner stated the Liberals have not achieved one target in their environmental plans. I have to disagree. The Liberals have achieved one plan, and that is stuffing taxpayers' money into connected Liberals' pockets through the SDTC. We have looked up donations from the directors of the SDTC. Tens of thousands of dollars have flown into the Liberal government's coffers and, at the same time, millions are going out the door that are unaccounted for. The SDTC also said, “We help Canadian companies develop and deploy sustainable technologies by delivering critical funding”. The SDTC mission statement further stated, “committed to full transparency”. That is very similar to the government saying “open by default”. Both are not true. We have had to fight in committee to get information. I will read a couple of comments from the whistle-blower on the SDTC about some of the money that was wasted, “There's a lot of sloppiness and laziness. There is some outright incompetence and, you know, the situation is just kind of untenable at this point.” It seems very similar to the $54-million ArriveCAN scandal, but I think this is going to be much larger. The whistle-blower went on to say, “The minister is going to flip out when he hears the stuff and he's going to want an extreme reaction, like shut it all down.” I will note that the minister found out in March and here we are in November before we have seen some action by the government. “It's unlikely that certain members of the board”, we will remember the board that funnelled tens of thousands of donations into the Liberal coffers, “or the entire board, and executives are going to be able to continue to serve. Like they've kind of lost the confidence. So really, the discussion will be the mechanisms for getting them out.” It continues, “...pretty well prepared to talk him off the ledge. Like minister, '[That's a] bad idea, we've got other ideas'.” We have the Auditor General's report on the greening government strategy very clearly laying out problems. Back in 2022, a year ago, we knew there were problems with Crown corporations. In March, whistle-blowers came forward about the waste of taxpayers' money. Now it is November and we still have not seen action. It is very clear that Canadians cannot afford the costly government after eight years and, after eight years, it is very clear the environment cannot afford the government either.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Nov/8/23 4:38:00 p.m.
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Re: Bill S-9

Mr. Speaker, I am sure the member was aware that, according to today's agenda, we were supposed to be debating Bill S-9, which deals with the chemical weapons convention and updating that legislation. It was brought in through the Senate. My understanding was that there would be unanimous consent for getting this bill passed. I wonder if the member could explain why the Conservatives chose to play games today, games that will ultimately prevent Bill S-9 from being introduced. This means that Canadians will have to wait once again because of the filibustering methods of the Conservative Party. How does the member justify filibustering important legislation?

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Mr. Kelly McCauley

Nov/8/23 4:38:50 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the question I would ask of the member is how he justifies the continuing cover-up of this slush fund. At committee, we tried to get this information. The Liberal government and its Bloc allies voted against requiring documents related to the Liberals' green slush fund to be released at committee. He talks about games. I would like his party to end the game of this cover-up and release the information to Canadians, Canadians who are suffering across the country, coast to coast, with paying their bills, paying their rent and affording food. They are struggling, and the government continues to cover up. That is at least $40 million of taxpayers' money wasted.

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Mr. Sébastien Lemire (Abitibi—Témiscamingue, BQ)

Nov/8/23 4:39:38 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the timing of this report is rather odd. I would like to ask my Conservative colleague if that was intentional. The Conservatives have led the charge, which the Bloc Québécois and the NDP support, to get to the bottom of public funds being used or misused in a green fund that was created by the government. We are dealing with an independent group, but we see that the use of funds is not optimal. Is there an order to follow when we question the use of these funds? The purpose of these funds is to invest more in our green economy, which is a good thing, but if, at the end of the day, the money is not going to the right place, we can ask questions about that. Is the member's goal to highlight that today?

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Mr. Kelly McCauley

Nov/8/23 4:40:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I agree with what my colleague is saying. The money is not being used as it was intended. Whether someone is for one type of ideology or the other, we do have very clear rules about our spending. We have clear rules about how the Treasury Board should react and what rules they should follow. It is very clear from the greening government report from the Auditor General that the government is not following the rules. In fact, eight out of 27 of the government's departments refused to hand over documents backing up its emission reduction claims. That is how much confidence the government has in its propaganda. It was only eight out of 27, so 75% of the departments refused to hand over information to the Auditor General to back up the government's claims. Canadians do not believe the government is committed to helping the environment. I think it is only committed to helping its propaganda points.

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