44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 6, 2024 11:00AM
- May/6/24 11:20:24 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, something that needs to be emphasized is that, when we talk about interference, there is not one single country; there are a number of countries. We have a responsibility to protect our citizenry.
Could my colleague amplify the fact that we all need to take responsibility for ensuring that we are talking about more than one country?
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- May/6/24 11:58:50 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we request a recorded vote, please.
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Mr. Speaker, what a pleasure it is to rise to start the debate on Bill C-69.
Governments have an opportunity every year to set down in legislation initiatives that could have a wonderful impact. I look at Bill C-69 as a budget implementation bill that would really make a difference in the lives of Canadians. I would like to think that all members of the House would get behind the legislation and the budget for the many positive initiatives the budget would put in place for the benefit of all Canadians, no matter what region of the country they are in.
I personally think there is a theme to be taken from the budget, which I hear many of my colleagues talk about, whether it is the Prime Minister or members of caucus, and that is a sense of fairness. We need to think about generation X and the millennials, and how the government can ensure there is a higher sense of fairness. We saw a good example of that in 2015-16 when we brought in our first budget. Taxation policy is important. Through the legislation and the budget, we will see there is a higher sense of fairness as we are look to the wealthiest in the country to pay a fairer share.
This is not the first time. In fact in 2015-16, we put a special increase on the tax on Canada's wealthiest 1%. Today it is even a smaller percentage. We recognize there is a need for us to provide the good-quality programming the government has had over the last number of years, much of it being enhanced in the budget and legislation. Some of the programs we are seeing for the first time, and others are a continuation. What it really means at the end of day is that we have a government that very much cares about the well-being of Canadians and wants to support them in a fair fashion.
If we look at overall government policies over the last eight-plus years, we will see that, in comparison to other countries in the world, Canada is doing relatively well. I will highlight a few of them. However, before I do that, I want to talk about the last few times the Prime Minister came to Manitoba. In my opinion, they highlight three areas Canadians understand and the fact that they very much appreciate the government's making them a high priority.
Last year, the Prime Minister visited Stanley Knowles School in Manitoba, which is pretty close to the heart of Winnipeg North, to highlight child care. He visited a child care facility at Stanley Knowles School, and the reception was exceptionally positive as people understood what the Government of Canada was doing. For the first time, we have a national child care program that ensures $10-a-day day care. It has had a profoundly positive impact in the province of Manitoba and, indeed, in all of Canada.
The Province of Quebec instituted it many years ago. We took the idea and turned it into a national program. As a direct result, not only are we making child care more affordable for Canadians but we are also enabling more women than ever, on a percentage basis, to get engaged in the workforce. It is no real surprise, as we anticipated that would happen. There are many benefits, as we have seen, of the $10-a-day child care program, the first ever by the national government. Every province and territory has now signed on, recognizing the true value.
For the second visit from the Prime Minister, I was able to participate in a press conference. The single greatest issue I have seen over the last 30-plus years as a parliamentarian, in my constituency and, I would argue, across Canada, is the issue of health care. We love our health care system. We are passionate about it. In fact, when I talk to many people and ask them what makes them feel good about being a Canadian, our health care system is often what comes up as the thing that helps us identify as and feel good about being Canadian.
As members know, working with all the different provinces, the federal government came up with a generational commitment of $198 billion, not million, over 10 years. That would enable long-term financial planning in an area that Canadians are genuinely concerned about. At that particular press conference, we had not only the Prime Minister but also the national Minister of Health, the Premier of Manitoba, the provincial minister of health and the most important people, the health care workers there to witness the announcement for the Province of Manitoba.
What took place in Manitoba is taking place across the country because, for the first time in over a generation, we have a Prime Minister who is committed to ensuring that we have a world-class health care system that deals with the issues we are hearing about at the doors from people. There are concerns about family doctors; concerns about health care workers; concerns about how we are going to be able to get things, such as credentials, recognized; concerns about how we can ensure that health care workers are being valued; and concerns about how we can bring additional health care workers and support staff into the system so that we are able to meet the expectations Canadians have.
We are looking at ways in which we can expand into mental health like we have never done in the past. This is a government that cares about health care and is looking at the Canada Health Act and the benefits it provides every Canadian in every region.
I made reference to child care and gave credit to the province of Quebec. For health care, a great deal of credit goes to the province of Saskatchewan, where it originated. More recently, we had the Prime Minister come to Winnipeg, and this time we were involved in a press conference that included not only the national Minister of Housing but also the premier of the province, provincial ministers and the mayor of Winnipeg. At that particular press conference, we dealt with the issue of housing.
We are very much aware of the needs for housing. I have stood in this chamber on numerous occasions to talk about the importance of the issue of housing. It is somewhat hypocritical of the official opposition to stand in its place and criticize the federal government for not doing enough on housing. I compare what the Conservatives did when they were in government, and in particular the current leader of the Conservative Party, who I think built six non-profit housing units in total. He spent hundreds of millions and was able to get six built, but I did not necessarily want to get to that. It is a bit off track.
The point is that we had a wonderful press conference with different stakeholders out in Transcona, where we had great participation from a wonderful housing complex, and we had the opportunity to talk about some of the things the federal government is doing. Working with the different levels of government, we are going to have an optimum impact on dealing with an issue that is so critically important to all Canadians.
What is providing a great deal of comfort is the fact that it is something we have been talking about for months now, even longer. I would not be surprised if we went back a couple of years, when members might have heard me talking about the issue of housing and how the best way to deal with housing issues in Canada is to have all three levels of government, and other stakeholders, engaged. That is the only way. It is not one level of government that cures all. It is going to take all levels of government working together, as well as the non-profit organizations.
I often talk about Habitat for Humanity. Habitat is a wonderful organization. It has likely done more in building affordable housing than any other non-profit organization, at least that I am personally aware of. In the province of Manitoba, we are talking about hundreds of homes over the years. I believe we are somewhere in the neighbourhood of 600 homes built, all of which are affordable. These homes were provided to individuals who never would have had the opportunity to have housing.
We had the stakeholders, the premier, the mayor and the Prime Minister in Winnipeg talking about things such as accelerating funding, providing supports to the City of Winnipeg so it can speed up its process, working with the province to ensure there is going to be more non-profit housing units built and that the province would be at the table, both in a financial fashion and with other forms of resources. This is to complement other budgetary measures, which dealt with, for example, the GST removal on purpose-built rentals for the country. These are initiatives for which Ottawa is not only taking upon itself and demonstrating leadership on but also working with the different levels of government. We are talking somewhere in the neighbourhood, through this budget, of just over four million new homes as a target in the coming years. That cannot be done by the federal government alone, and we have demonstrated our willingness to work with the different stakeholders, including our partners.
There is also our commitment to indigenous housing and working within indigenous communities. In Winnipeg, indigenous communities stepped up and worked with the Hudson's Bay Company to develop housing in downtown Winnipeg. There is also what is taking place in rural communities across the country.
The budget shows how important it is that we not only have a higher sense of fairness but also that we move forward with a healthy, stronger economy, which is in the best interest of all.
One of the things I took away from the budget, which the Deputy Prime Minister made reference to, is something I want to highlight because, to me, it really does matter. It puts things into perspective. No matter how much the Conservatives want to spread misinformation, the reality is that, in comparison to other countries around the world, Canada is doing exceptionally well.
I will give an example from the Deputy Prime Minister's speech and the stats on foreign direct investment. People and companies around the world looking at where to invest their hundreds of millions and billions of dollars will often look at Canada. Not only will they look at Canada, but they will also invest here. With direct foreign investment, on a per capita basis, Canada is number one out of the G7 countries. That is number one in direct foreign investment.
Throughout the world, per capita, Canada is number three. I would suggest that people, businesses and corporations around the world that are taking a look at where to invest are looking at Canada, and that is not an accident.
Let me elaborate on that. No government in Canada's history has signed off on more trade agreements than this government, under this Prime Minister, has. No government in the history of Canada has signed off on more trade agreements than this government has. Canada is a trading nation. We need trade. All of us benefit from it. That is one of the reasons why, I would argue, people around the world are not only looking at Canada but also investing in Canada. They are doing that because they see the stability that is here, along with a myriad of other positive attributes.
Members can take a look at the investments. The Conservatives have been critical. They do not like the fact that we are helping Volkswagen, for example—
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- May/6/24 12:18:54 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I do not how many times, when I was sitting on the opposition benches and Stephen Harper was the then prime minister, I could have called for a quorum count because there were no Conservatives in the chamber. I am talking about nine years ago when the Conservatives had a majority government.
I will stay away from the games that the member opposite wants to play because I know he is a little sensitive about the issue of just how well Canada is doing in comparison to countries around the world, contrary to what the Conservatives say. The Conservatives have been going around the country with misinformation. They want to say that Canada is broken. If they really and truly believe that Canada is broken, what does that say about the world, when Canada is doing so much better in so many ways than the rest of the world? The bottom line is that the Conservatives are like a dark cloud, going all over the place to spread nothing but bad, sad news, which is often, consistently, based on misinformation.
Where was I? I was talking about investments in Volkswagen. On the one hand, there are the far right Conservative Party members saying that they do not support the Volkswagen investment. Members can imagine a manufacturing plant that would take up the size of 200 football fields. It is going to be the largest manufacturing plant in Canada, in terms of land usage, and they are all to be green jobs. Doug Ford, the Progressive Conservative Premier of Ontario, is also putting up substantial financial support. At least he recognizes the value there. Just the other day, Honda made another huge investment in Canada. I believe it is Honda's largest investment ever in North America, and it deals with the electrification of vehicles.
The government sees that green jobs are good jobs. We are investing in them in a very real and tangible way. We are going to see thousands of direct and indirect jobs. This is a government that understands the value of a healthy economy. Since being elected, we have generated well over two million jobs. In the same amount of time, we have had more than double the number of jobs that were created under Stephen Harper. We understand the benefits of a strong, healthy economy and of supporting Canadians.
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- May/6/24 12:23:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it was not that long ago when we had a worldwide pandemic. We literally spent billions and billions of dollars to support Canadians. Through CERB, we supported more than nine million Canadians. We supported hundreds of thousands of businesses, both directly and indirectly, again, costing billions and billions of dollars. The Conservative Party voted in favour of those expenditures. Therefore, with respect to much of the debt that the Conservatives criticize today, they actually voted in favour of our spending that money. It is like giving a kid a candy bar and then criticizing the kid for eating it. Really? The Conservative Party knows no bounds when it comes to hypocrisy and shame. Canada's debt is very much under control—
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- May/6/24 12:25:10 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think of the commitment in terms of working with the different stakeholders, provinces and territories building a stronger and healthier Canada. This is the big difference between me and members of the Bloc: I do not see the federal government strictly as an ATM; I believe that the federal government has a role to play, for example in things like a national pharmacare program and a national school food program. We have the Canada disability benefit, which I would love to have been able to expand on. We have the Canada dental program. There are so many things in which, as a progressive government, we are supporting Canadians in a very real and tangible way. That means working with people and working with different jurisdictions in order to have that profoundly positive impact, and I am very proud of that.
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- May/6/24 12:27:03 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate the question, but I can honestly say that the strongest advocate I have ever seen with respect to firefighters is my friend the former deputy House leader, now parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Emergency Preparedness.
What I like about the budget is that it is a true reflection of what Canadians have been advocating for to parliamentarians, both opposition and government members. I truly believe that. Therefore, when we look at the budget, what we see is a reflection of the values and thoughts of Canadians with respect to the type of budget they want to see. That is why, in my previous response, I made reference to things such as pharmacare, the national school food program and other types of social programs, along with economic policies that are going to help build a stronger and healthier economy.
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- May/6/24 12:29:10 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is important that we look at it from a holistic approach. At the end of the day, as a national government over the last seven or eight years, we can say that no government in Canada's history has invested more into housing, and we have done it in different ways. In this budget, we continue to amplify the need to get homes built as quickly as possible. That means, for example, working with the municipalities. I referred to the city of Winnipeg. I think it was around $192 million back in December, when we had a major announcement to try to speed up the processing of permits and so forth.
Sometimes the money that is allocated benefits not only for-profit, but also not-for-profit organizations. I know that I, for one, continue to want to promote and encourage more development in the whole housing co-op area.
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- May/6/24 12:30:45 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, all of the investments we have put into our Canadian Armed Forces, if not directly then indirectly, are a great way to prepare for all the different types of emergencies that take place in Canada. Many years ago, I participated with members of the armed forces in the city of Winnipeg to battle floods. During the pandemic, members of the forces, who are well trained, helped take care of seniors. Therefore, any sort of investment in the forces is always a good investment, from my perspective.
When we talk about volunteer firefighters, the tax incentives and the dollars allocated to support them are a very powerful step in the right direction. However, knowing my colleague who asked the question, she will continue to be at the table to want more yet.
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- May/6/24 12:59:09 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is interesting that the Conservatives would incorporate the issue of housing into the amendment itself. All one needs to do is take a look at the leader of the Conservative Party. When he was minister of housing, it was virtually a disaster. Hundreds of millions of dollars were spent, and I think six non-profit housing units were actually built during his term as minister. We have a government today that is bringing in budgetary measures and working with municipalities, provinces and different stakeholders to build more units.
What more does he believe the Conservative Party could actually do to see more houses built? Is he suggesting that we go back to the way it was when his leader was the minister of housing?
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- May/6/24 1:14:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am sure the member would not be surprised that I disagree with him.
Looking at this budget, there are many progressive aspects to it, whether it is pharmacare, the national school food program, the disability benefit or the expansion of the Canada dental program. These are all programs that would benefit Canadians in every region of the country.
The issue my friend brings up is in regard to giving cash to provinces. From my experience of being a provincial MLA for almost two decades I can say that, for a lot of the provinces and a lot of provincial politicians, that is all they want from Ottawa. They want the government to give them money and they do not want to be held accountable for how they spend the money. They just want the money. However, the expectations of the people we represent are higher than Ottawa just being an ATM machine.
I wonder if the member would recognize that one of the ways we could have programs that help lift all Canadians is by instituting a national program. Does the member not recognize there is value, for example, in a national school food—
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- May/6/24 1:30:01 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am curious as to the member's thoughts on the pharmacare proposal that is within. I think that seniors, no matter what area of the country they are in, particularly those with diabetes, would recognize that having national pharmacare is a very strong, positive thing, just on that point alone.
Does the Bloc support Canada providing pharmacare coverage and recognize that at least we are moving in the right direction?
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- May/6/24 3:11:26 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 28 petitions. These returns will be tabled in electronic format.
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- May/6/24 3:25:50 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. First and foremost, one is not supposed to be reading a petition into the record. One is supposed to give a summary of it. Petitions should not be politically targeted in terms of the member giving a political statement at the same time.
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- May/6/24 3:30:46 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the following questions will be answered today: Questions Nos. 2456 to 2458, 2460, 2461, 2471, 2473, 2477, 2482, 2484 and 2485.
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- May/6/24 3:31:28 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, if the government's responses to Question Nos. 2459, 2462 to 2470, 2472, 2474 to 2476, 2478 to 2481, 2483 and 2486 could be made orders for return, these returns would be tabled in an electronic format immediately.
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- May/6/24 3:31:42 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I ask that all remaining questions be allowed to stand.
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- May/6/24 3:56:18 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, health care is such a critical issue. It always has been in my 30-plus years as a parliamentarian. We talk a lot about health care. We have achieved health care accords or agreements with different provinces and territories. We made a $198-billion commitment toward health care. That is talking about future generations.
For many years, I have been a very strong advocate for a pharmacare program, and my question to the minister is this: As I see it, a pharmacare program is a huge step forward toward the type of health care system Canadians want to see here in Canada, and I am wondering if he could provide his thoughts on how the pharmacare legislation we are proposing today would complement our health care system into the future.
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- May/6/24 6:45:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the Bloc party's position on the legislation does not surprise me. For separatist reasons, the Bloc does not believe in national programs. My issue is more with the Conservative Party's opposition to the legislation.
When listening to the speeches, Conservatives seem to acknowledge that the federal government has no role to play in health care. I would like to remind my Conservative friends across the way, as well as members of the Bloc, that there is a thing called the Canada Health Act. Canada does have a responsibility. A vast majority of Canadians, in all regions of the country, recognize that the federal government has a role to play in health care, and that goes beyond just handing money over to provinces.
We have the health care system we have today because the province of Saskatchewan kind of started it, but the federal government made sure all Canadians would be able to receive it. Would the member not acknowledge that, at the very least? Is that not a good thing?
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- May/6/24 7:01:28 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am looking for clarification from the Bloc members. They seem to give the impression that prescription drugs are free in the province of Quebec. I would ask the member if he could, for clarity purposes, give an indication of whether people are charged any sort of deductible or fees.
Different provinces have different mechanisms. Some have private and some have public. I am wondering if he could expand on exactly what type of plan there is in the province of Quebec and how it applies, in particular for contraceptives.
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