44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 11, 2023 11:00AM
Madam Speaker, yes, members I have talked to are all looking forward to the rebate when we axe the tax and get rid of all the tax they are paying. Canadians know when they go to the grocery store now that they are seeing the increase because the farmers and the manufacturers and the truckers have all incurred increases and are passing them on. Why are food prices the highest they have ever been in the history of Canada? It is because of the carbon tax. Canadians want that tax off. Let us axe the tax.
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- Dec/11/23 2:03:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, last week, more than 1,000 farmers took to the streets of Quebec City to ask for more government support.
Farmers need help to deal with climate change, and yet Canada is investing almost four times less money than the United States and the European Union to support our people.
This puts our farmers at a disadvantage, creates unfair competition and jeopardizes our food security.
For a G7 country that says it wants to feed the whole world, things are off to a bad start. If we want our farmers to feed us, they need to be able to make a living from their trade without having to work a job on the side to make ends meet.
The Bloc Québécois is echoing the message from Quebec's farm businesses loud and clear. The federal government must come up with a plan, a direction and a vision, especially for risk sharing.
Feeding our people is a societal undertaking. Our farmers are central to the solution.
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- Dec/11/23 2:04:38 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, last week, we watched the Conservatives join together to vote against agriculture. When we say that we support our farmers, we have to walk the talk.
They voted against an investment program for our dairy farmers and processors; they voted against our agricultural producers; they voted against the on-farm climate action fund; and they voted against funding for implementing the Indo-Pacific agri-food office, which we know would benefit our agri-food exporters.
The behaviour of the leader of the official opposition does not surprise me. When he had the chance to stand up for our farmers at the cabinet table, he chose to remain seated and support a $200‑million cut.
The leader of the Conservative Party is not worth the risk. When the time comes to support our farmers, he is not worth a nickel.
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- Dec/11/23 2:43:07 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, last Thursday evening and Friday, the Conservative Party of Canada explained exactly who they are and how much they support farmers. In fact, they voted against farmers. For example, there was $337 million for the supply management program; Conservatives voted against it. It is vitally important to the agricultural sector.
I can assure the dairy farmers, chicken farmers and egg farmers in this country that we support them and will continue to do so.
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- Dec/11/23 2:44:26 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I hope that turkey farmer looked at what the Conservative Party of Canada did last Thursday and then Friday.
Conservatives continually vote against agriculture and farmers. We, on this side of the House, will make sure that we fully support agriculture. Conservatives voted against funding for on-farm climate action. On-farm climate action will help the environment.
We have supported farmers; we will continue to do so and take care of the climate in this country.
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- Dec/11/23 2:51:38 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, 133 chiefs from across Ontario are calling out the government's unjust carbon tax as driving up the cost of everything for first nations communities. In what is typically a festive time for many, indigenous families are wondering how they are going to pay the cost of food. The Prime Minister's quadrupling of the carbon tax is driving up the cost on farmers and truckers, which raises the cost of food.
Will the Prime Minister finally cancel his plan to quadruple the carbon tax on families, first nations and farmers forever?
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- Dec/11/23 8:44:52 p.m.
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We are here tonight to discuss Indigenous Services and how, in the Conservatives' opinion, it is failing indigenous people right across this country. What seems to be the constant theme with this department, backed up by the Parliamentary Budget Officer and reinforced by the Auditor General, is that the government is spending more, but achieving less, and the departmental targets reflect those reports.
The department itself is hitting less than 20% of its annual targets. These are targets set by the department itself, but it seems to have an issue with achieving the targets. Indigenous people on the ground expecting a service or level of care are not getting it. We are hearing that over and over again. Not only that, the cost of living crisis that we are dealing with is exacerbating the problem.
Today we heard of another leader within the provincial government, Premier-Elect Simpson, who is now calling for the elimination of the carbon tax, or at least a carve-out, in the Northwest Territories. This is on top of the 133 chiefs across Ontario who are taking the government to court seeking relief. It amplifies the fact that not only is Indigenous Services failing at what it does, but indigenous people are not better off because of the government. The policies are failing and indigenous people want relief. These communities want the cost of their goods and services to come down, not continue to go up.
I will go over some of the Auditor General's reports, which said that ISC failed to provide support first nations communities need to manage emergencies, such as floods and wildfires; actions were reactive instead of preventive, despite first nations communities themselves laying out an action plan; indigenous-led projects were ignored by the department; ISC did not implement a risk-based approach to manage emergencies, which was required under the Emergency Management Act; it did not use information about risks faced by first nations and the capacity of first nations to respond to those emergencies; ISC spent 3.5 times more on responding to emergencies than on supporting first nations communities, in fact, preparing them with 112 unfunded infrastructure projects, 74 of which had been in the department's backlog for more than five years. That list goes on and on. Unfortunately, there are people on the ground in communities that are suffering because of it.
When we have a department that continues to gobble up more and more dollars and does not get results, where are the objectives for reconciliation being met? Unfortunately, people are suffering because of it.
I am looking at the ISC's core responsibilities. Under “Services and Benefits to Individuals”, there is no change in the results. Results, in some cases, are six years old, yet we seen an increase in staffing planned, 1,700 to 1,824, an increase of 7%, but again there is no improvement in services. There is a decrease in services, an increase in the cost of living, indigenous communities are looking for help and asking for relief in housing, health care and the justice portfolio. We have studied all this at committee, but the problems continue to get worse.
A pet peeve of mine, when we were looking at non-insured health benefits, is that ISC is still using a fax machine, if anyone can believe it, to fax prescriptions to the department. It is absolutely incredible that this continues to go on. We hear about this at committee, and people on the ground are hurting because of it.
Let us axe the tax for farmers, first nations and families forever and help indigenous people looking to ISC for help.
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