SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 333 - Jun/17/24

Mr. Gord Johns (Courtenay—Alberni, NDP)

Jun/17/24 12:32:20 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we continue to hear Conservatives today talking about the capital gains tax, when in fact in my riding it is going to impact 118 people. That is who we know the Conservatives are fighting for. They are fighting for the 118 people, just like my predecessors, two Conservatives in my riding. Over 32 years, between the two of them, the only PMB they got passed was for removing the excise tax on diamond jewellery. One cannot even make this stuff up. They did it under a Conservative government majority. What do the Conservatives want to do today? They want to stop dental care, stop pharmacare and get rid of the school food program. They are here to block getting help to people. They are not here to bring forward solutions—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Jun/17/24 12:33:10 p.m.
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I will give the hon. minister a few seconds to answer.

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Hon. Filomena Tassi

Jun/17/24 12:33:14 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I appreciate the member's passion for these programs that are in the budget. I have the same passion. There are measures with respect to capital gains where, in fact, a business, unless it makes over $6 million, is going to be better off because of the exemptions we have elevated. I agree with the member. There are going to be a few that are impacted, but as I said, let us elevate all Canadians. Let us ensure that everybody has—

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Jun/17/24 12:33:46 p.m.
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It is my duty to interrupt the proceedings at this time and put forthwith the question on the motion now before the House. The question is on the motion. Shall I dispense? Some hon. members: No. [Chair read text of motion to House] If a member participating in person wishes that the motion be carried or carried on division, or if a member of a recognized party participating in person wishes to request a recorded division, I would invite them to rise and indicate it to the Chair.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux

Jun/17/24 12:34:56 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we request a recorded vote, please.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Jun/17/24 12:35:00 p.m.
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Call in the members.

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Call

The Deputy Speaker

Jun/17/24 1:18:34 p.m.
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I declare the motion carried.

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Mr. Andy Fillmore (Halifax, Lib.)

Jun/17/24 1:18:53 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is with mixed emotions that I rise to speak in the chamber today for the last time as the member for Halifax. I have informed the Prime Minister that when the House of Commons resumes in the fall, I will not be returning. I rise today to share some reflections as this chapter of my service to Halifax comes to a close. What a chapter it has been: three elections, nine years full of learning, hard work, new friendships, unexpected adventures, plenty of ups, a few downs and, according to the Library of Parliament, 2,414 votes. It is incredible. It is difficult to put into words just how much it has all meant. After a 20-year career as a city planner, I arrived in Centre Block as the first city planner ever elected to Canada's House of Commons. That career instilled in me the value of thoughtful planning to the well-being of Canadians who call our communities home. I saw what poor planning, neglect and underfunding of our communities were doing to Canada, which ultimately was my call to run, that and a convincing conversation with my dear friend and mentor, Halifax's own Dale Godsoe, herself a member of former prime minister Paul Martin's advisory task force on cities and communities. Dale is just now celebrating her 80th birthday. I wish Dale a happy birthday. I ran for office because I wanted to be a voice for Canadian communities like mine, to make the case that our cities and towns could propel Canada toward its best days if we just unlocked their potential. As I have pursued that goal here, I have so many people to thank who have supported me along the way, first and foremost, my incredible daughter, Daisy Isabella Fillmore. We all know too well the immense burden that our lives in politics place on our family and loved ones. That burden is greatest on the teenagers who grow up with a parent in politics. When I was nominated in 2014, Daisy was seven years old. She was eight at my 2015 election. She is now a magnificent 17-year-old off to university in the fall. Through it all, she has been loving, wise beyond her years and mostly patient. She was my beautiful little shadow at constituency events as a preteen and not at all interested in me or my events as a teen. Now, as a brilliant young adult, she has come back to me and supports me in what comes next. I am so profoundly proud of her and forever grateful. She teaches me something new every time we sit down and have a talk. She has been and will always be my north star. I love her beyond my ability to express it.

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Mr. Andy Fillmore (Halifax, Lib.)

Jun/17/24 1:21:37 p.m.
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I also want to thank my family. My big sisters, Jenny Hawes and Julia Doughty,, sat on our beloved Bayswater Beach, back in 2014, and told me to go for it, so I did. My mom and greatest champion, Anne Ellen Fillmore, did not live to see her son sit in this place, but she is with me every day that I am here. My father, Peter Fillmore, always demonstrated the importance of being guided by purpose. Now to my political family, beginning with my remarkable staff team. In Halifax, that is the indefatigable Joanne Macrae, Alec MacKinnon, Mackenzie Lambert and Lew Rogers. Previously, it was Dakota Kochie, Jennifer Drillio, Sarah Dobson, Cameron Lusby and, most recently, Will Regan. Here in Ottawa, it is Breton Cousins and, earlier, Jared Valdes, Matt Conley and Nicholas McCue. From the very first day until the last, seven parliamentary interns, or PIPs, have been a critical part of our team. My thanks to Etienne Grandmaison, Claire Sieffert, Andrew Walker, Enya Bouchard, Angelica Kalubiaka, Sarah Rollason-MacAulay and Camille Cournoyer. In politics, as in life, there is nothing of greater value than teammates who have each other's back, and that has been us for nine years. My team has always been there for me, and I will always be there for them. In Ottawa, I have been fortunate to chair the indigenous and northern affairs committee and to serve as parliamentary secretary to four ministries: democratic institutions, Canadian heritage; infrastructure and communities; and innovation, science and industry. I want to sincerely thank each of those ministers and teams for their work and their support. Coming back to Halifax, I am incredibly grateful to have been backed by an electoral district association led by current chair Martha Reynolds, past chairs Joanne Bouchard and Michelle Daignault, and indeed everyone who served on the board of the association throughout my time as their candidate. I would not have walked these halls for nine years were it not for an extraordinary team of campaign volunteers of every age and background who joined me on the doorsteps, on the phones and at countless events. It takes real guts to climb the stairs to a stranger's door and engage them in the political process, and yet that is what this team has done for over 100,000 doors over three election cycles. These are the people who power Canadian politics: tireless, selfless volunteers. My final thanks is for those to whom I owe it all: the good people of Halifax who took a chance on me and then renewed their trust in me twice more. I came here to be their champion. Whether they voted for me or not, I hope in the end that I have served our city well. Looking back now, we achieved a lot together. We moved Halifax's share of federal funding from the bottom of the pack to eighth out of 338 ridings in Canada. With shipbuilders, we stood up for good shipbuilding jobs and closing the work gap. With community partners, we saved our beloved Northwest Arm from harmful infilling. With provincial partners, we reopened Georges Island in Halifax Harbour after generations of closure. With longshoremen, we defended the Port of Halifax. With veteran advocates, we revived the veteran's ID card. With advocates across the country, we created Canada's first national active transportation strategy and associated fund. With colleagues here in the House, we passed Motion No. 45, my private member's motion that put a green lens on federally funded infrastructure projects. With government and industry partners, we brought NATO's Defence Innovation Accelerator of the North Atlantic, DIANA, to Halifax. With indigenous partners, we secured funding for a new Mi'kmaw Native Friendship Centre in downtown Halifax. And with the Royal Canadian Navy, we established the first-ever Halifax International Fleet Week. These are just some of the projects that I have had the chance to work on and lead as Halifax MP, and yet there is still more to do, like my current effort to open up Canada Post lands in Halifax for housing. Rest assured, my colleagues here and back at home in Halifax will continue to hear from me on this. I also want to express my deepest thanks to my dear colleagues in this place. This experience has taught me not just about the inner workings of Parliament and politics, but about Canada itself. What a unique experience it is to sit in a room with 338 people representing every corner, every single community of our vast nation. In the 42nd Parliament, my seatmate was former MP Pam Goldsmith-Jones, the member for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country. There we were representing the west coast and the east coast, separated by 4,400 kilometres and yet, sitting side by side at the same desk in this chamber, we found so much in common in the Canadians that we represented and in their shared hopes and in their aspirations. In moments of intense debate in this House, when I struggled to see the other side, the thing that helped me make sense of this place was to remember that each of us here in this chamber together represented every single Canadian, regardless of background or persuasion, and that is the beauty of our Canadian democracy. Let us never forget that we do this job in service to every single one of them. This job has taught me a lot about my hometown too. It has taken me into places I may never otherwise have been. I have been welcomed into people's homes, their places of worship, community centres, businesses, workplaces and backyards. I have forged new friendships with communities of every kind, seeing Halifax in a way that has inspired me over and over again. I spoke earlier about the potential of our country's cities and towns to propel Canada toward its best days if only we unlock their potential. I believe there is nowhere in Canada that is more true than in Halifax, a municipality bursting with hard-won potential. Over the last two decades, so many Haligonians have rolled up our sleeves, linked arms and put our collective ambition into action. Together, we have turned the tides of stagnation that had haunted our municipality for decades and turned Halifax toward prosperity and growth. Today that growth has brought many opportunities, but it has also brought its share of challenges, and so today, while I find myself reflecting on the past nine years, my sights are firmly set on the future, because the job is not finished at home. There is still work to do for Halifax, and I intend to see to it.

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Mr. Chris d'Entremont (West Nova, CPC)

Jun/17/24 1:27:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is highly unusual for me to ask a question or even make a comment, but I just wanted to reflect a little on the hon. member's speech when he talked about family. All of us come with some of the very same kinds of challenges when we come here, where we leave family behind in order come back and would like to be able to spend more time with them. What the hon. member is doing is trying to find another opportunity to spend more time at home. I do congratulate him in making his decision on putting his name forward, I think, for mayor of Halifax. I keep hearing that. That is the story going around in the community. With all the things the hon. member has listed, what is the project he looks most forward to that he did not have the chance to do as the member of Parliament for Halifax?

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Mr. Andy Fillmore

Jun/17/24 1:28:51 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, indeed, this place can be very hard on families. I am so grateful that, as a result of COVID, we were able to innovate some virtual protocols such as voting by app, which have made this place more hospitable, friendly and welcoming to family and people with children. This is very important. Collectively, moving forward I hope this place protects those hard-won abilities to do so. As for what is next in Halifax, like the rest of the country, there are a lot of houses to build. There are a lot of people to support in all kinds of different ways. However, there is tremendous optimism in my city, and I look forward to propelling that and keeping the good momentum we have built through hard work going into the future.

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Mr. Sébastien Lemire (Abitibi—Témiscamingue, BQ)

Jun/17/24 1:29:39 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am honoured to rise to celebrate my colleague from Halifax's career in federal politics. I really enjoyed working with him, particularly on the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology. I believe it is possible to be friends with and trust the people with whom we work. I even believe that, together, we could have gotten Bill C-27 passed, if we still had similar responsibilities. That being said, he talked about the many things that have been accomplished in Halifax, but he forgot one: Halifax hosted the Memorial Cup in 2019, which gave the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies the opportunity to win not one, but two cups, the President's Cup and the Memorial Cup, against the Mooseheads. Perhaps I should not mention that here. Perhaps now is not the time. I am sorry. I really appreciate my colleague's ambition in running for mayor. I would like him to tell us what particular thing he is most proud of. What is the greatest legacy he is leaving his city and this Parliament?

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Mr. Andy Fillmore

Jun/17/24 1:30:52 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would tell my dear friend, the member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue, that of course my greatest accomplishment was making sure his Huskies could have a place to win in the Memorial Cup in Halifax. I hope it is a great legacy for both of us from my time in this place. I am very proud of my work with the member on the Standing Committee on Industry and Technology. We worked together on all kinds of matters, such as critical minerals, quantum computing, the Copyright Act modernization, blockchain technologies, crypto and fair competition across industries. We did an awful lot together. If I I were to answer the member directly, my greatest accomplishment was done as a team with everyone in the House who achieved the great things for Canadians that are propelling them forward through what has been a difficult time and have set them up for a strong economy looking forward. We all did that together in so many different ways, and that is the thing I am proudest of.

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Mr. Gord Johns (Courtenay—Alberni, NDP)

Jun/17/24 1:31:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is huge honour and privilege to rise after the final speech of my friend from Halifax. We have done many things together. When he was the parliamentary secretary to the environment and climate change minister, he worked with me on a national strategy to combat plastic pollution and helped get his caucus to unanimously support that. We also worked together on cycling. I had a bill on a national cycling strategy. I remember getting the call the night before the announcement of the first-ever $400 million dedicated to active transportation and an active transportation strategy. The member also supported a health-based approach to the toxic drug crisis. He even broke away from his party and supported my bill. Last, he worked with me to double the firefighter tax credit and the tax credit for search and rescue. I cannot say enough about the member's ability to work across political lines. I appreciate his dedication to the people of Halifax. I know he will be at home watching the last blow on a gale. He will not be missing it anymore. I had to use a maritime comment. Will he be reaching out to the NDP, if he becomes the mayor of Halifax, in ways that we can continue to work together on things that are going to help benefit Canadians and the environment?

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Mr. Andy Fillmore

Jun/17/24 1:33:07 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I really do appreciate working with the member for Courtenay—Alberni. We have done very well together over a long period of time. If I think back to the harmful plastics ban, it was about a week before that bill passed that my daughter, who I spoke about earlier today and who at that time was about 12 years old or so, texted me when I was here and asked me if there was anything I could do about helping sea life, given all the plastic bags and everything. A week later, I was able to tell her that, in fact, we had passed that bill with the member's help. I want to finish with the firefighters' tax credit, an absolutely remarkable thing. I thank the member for the help that he applied to that. In fact, it doubled the credit from $3,000 to $6,000. That had everything to do with the advocacy of the member and other members. We are in a position now where we know the skills of firefighters are going to be called upon more and more frequently throughout the course of the year, and we need to do everything we can to position them for success. Again, collectively, we can all feel good about the way we have been able to position them for that success.

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Mr. Blaine Calkins (Red Deer—Lacombe, CPC)

Jun/17/24 1:34:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today to debate Bill C-69. Here we are again. Another year, another NDP-Liberal budget, and every budget it seems is worse than the one before. This year's iteration of the budget is falsely titled “Fairness for Every Generation”. The title is ironic because, after nine years of the government, virtually every generation in the country is worse off. In fact, I cannot think of a single demographic, other than the Liberal insiders, that is better off in nine years. Our youth can only dream of affording a home after the government has allowed a housing shortfall. According to the Parliamentary Budget Officer, we would need to build 1.3 million homes to close the housing gap. Both renters and homeowners are struggling to pay their bills after the cost of housing has been allowed to double under the leadership of the Prime Minister. Our seniors are seeing their pensions ravaged by inflation. Not that long ago, it used to be that their old age security, CPP and whatever other savings they might have could see them through on a monthly basis. That is no longer the case. The government has directly driven up that inflation, making life unaffordable by continuing to overspend. By piling on another $61 billion of new spending this year, piling on to our already enormous debt, it has proven that it does not plan on changing course any time soon. Parents are struggling with affordability, and it is now difficult for many families to feed their children. We are seeing yearly inflation rates for many food products in the double digits, while a record two million Canadians had to use a food bank in a single month last year, which is incredible. Let us not forget the pesky carbon tax that compounds through the economy, costing over $30 billion of economic activity, as recently highlighted by the Parliamentary Budget Officer. Therefore, not only is it costing us every time we make a purchase, but it is costing our economy $30 billion in output. After nine years of the government creating intergenerational poverty, that would be a more apt name for this budget. We know things are bad for the government when former Liberal Bank of Canada governor David Dodge has called it the worst budget since 1982, when the current Prime Minister's father was the prime minister. Like father, like son, as they say. Instead of cutting back spending, the government has continued to be irresponsible and is spending money that Canadians no longer have. This has forced the Bank of Canada to raise interest rates. The cost to service the debt is now $54.1 billion. One must wonder what $54.1 billion could have been spent on instead of servicing the debt. Like many Liberal bills, the budget has been turned into an omnibus bill to push forward strange and unusual requests that have little to do with budgets or measures, that are so controversial that if tabled on their own would not likely get the support of this chamber. This year's boondoggle is the new tax on capital gains, a direct attack on business owners. It is only after the Conservatives pushed back that the government relented and put the capital gains changes into a separate bill. I chalk this up to pure incompetence, as the government continues to wedge, stigmatize and divide Canadians, and has open class warfare in our tax system. The government claims that this change will bring fairness into the tax system essentially to target the richest 0.13%. Nothing could be further from the truth. What it conveniently ignores is how this tax will likely impact, and only impact, middle-class Canadians. This includes tradesmen, farmers who are worried about the succession of their family farms and small business owners who worry that it may not be worth growing their businesses in Canada anymore after these changes. The immigration stats are proving this to be true. This would not be the typical 1%, but in fact would not be any of the 1% at all. Rather, they are our neighbours, friends and family members, the people who put food on our table and build our homes, and those industrious small business owners who employ people in our local communities and, meanwhile, sponsor the T-shirts for our kids' soccer teams. I would also like to focus the attention of members on another underhanded change in the budget implementation act, and that is the newest changes to the Food and Drugs Act. The NDP vacated its role as an opposition party in March 2022, and instead of holding the government to account, its members have decided to help ease the passage of budget Bill C-47, which was the budget implementation act of 2023. The ghastly bill was a direct attack on Canada's natural health product industry, one of the safest and best regulated industries on Planet Earth. These changes came as part of a push to radically change Health Canada's regulatory framework. Health Canada claimed that the changes were necessary to safeguard public health, but we simply know, with all the powers that it has, that this simply is not true. The major alteration to the act was to change the definition of a therapeutic product to include natural health products. A therapeutic product is essentially a synthetic drug and it has little in common with food, which is the closest commonality that natural health products actually have. This would essentially put natural health products in the same regulatory framework as pharmaceutical drugs. It would also force the industry to pay for Health Canada's costly bureaucratic overhead with expensive new licensing fees and fines. Essentially, by putting a self-funding model in place, what the government would be doing is just taxing the industry with that self-funding regulatory model so that it could free up the $50 million a year, which it already uses to manage the natural health product space, and use that money on some other misguided priority of the government. Previously, natural health products were exempt from much of the regulations in the Food and Drugs Act, as a common understanding is that natural health products are a much lower risk to one's health than a pharmaceutical drug. That is why I introduced my private member's Bill C-368 to repeal these changes to the Food and Drugs Act and return to the status quo, maintaining the distinction between natural health products and therapeutic products. However, if my private member's bill fails to pass, this new budget may also have a big impact on the natural health products industry. That is because division 31 of part 4 of this new budget implementation bill has introduced new ministerial powers pertaining to therapeutic products. Once again, it would be another change to the Food and Drugs Act and Health Canada. Instead of putting it in its own bill, it is tucked into part of an omnibus budget implementation act. The most concerning of these changes is to allow the minister to make unilateral changes on therapeutic products without any basis in science demonstrating risk. Proposed subsection 30.01(1) of the bill states: Subject to any regulations made under paragraph 30(1)‍(j.‍1) and if the Minister believes on reasonable grounds that the use of a therapeutic product, other than the intended use, may present a risk of injury to health, the Minister may, by order, establish rules in respect of the importation, sale, conditions of sale, advertising, manufacture, preparation, preservation, packaging, labelling, storage or testing of the therapeutic product for the purpose of preventing, managing or controlling the risk of injury to health. That might seem innocuous, however, proposed subsection 30.01(3) states, “The Minister may make the order despite any uncertainty respecting the risk of injury to health that the use of the therapeutic product, other than the intended use, may present.” It states “despite any uncertainty”, so there would be no scientific rationale needed anymore, if the bill passes, for the minister to pull any product he or she wants off of the shelf. That is uncontrolled power. The powers that would be given to the ministers are concerning, but what is even more concerning is the combined effect of both budgets on our homegrown natural health product industry. The effect would be catastrophic. Not only is the industry reeling from the changes in the last budget implementation bill, but this one has introduced the element of arbitrary power in the hands of the minister. There is little worse in business than uncertainty, and natural health products are only a small part of what is wrong with this bill and with industries across Canada. Small businesses are closing across our country, and yet, instead of supporting our entrepreneurs, the government uses every budget it has to target them. We need a budget that empowers small business owners instead of penalizing them. In essence, I say not to buy into the budget title. If the last eight budgets from the Prime Minister are any indication, fairness for every generation is simply a pipe dream. As Winston Churchill once noted, “The inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries.” If by promoting fairness, the government means promoting intergenerational poverty, then in its own way, I guess it is fair, but absolutely nobody is better off. Only the Conservatives can restore Canada's fiscal house to order. Instead of saddling Canadian families, tradesmen, small enterprise operators and entrepreneurs with ever-growing regulation and taxation, we would axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime. Canada has a vast and untapped economic potential and it is time for a Conservative government to unleash that potential.

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

Jun/17/24 1:43:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is about fairness for generations. What we have witnessed is the Conservatives being consistent. Members will recall that when it came to having an additional tax on Canada's wealthiest 1%, the Conservatives voted against that a few years back. When it came time for a tax break for Canada's middle class, the Conservatives voted no for that too. When we can look at the capital gains tax and what has been proposed, less than 1% would be affected, some of the wealthiest people in the country, and the Conservatives again are voting no. Where in the platform of the Conservatives does it imply any sense of fairness to Canadians? What I see are cuts, cuts and cuts.

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Mr. Blaine Calkins

Jun/17/24 1:44:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the question from my colleague is sadly preposterous and hilarious in its own right. If we take a look at the wealthiest Canadians, we see that their wealth has actually doubled under the leadership of the Prime Minister. It is the middle class and those who are desperately trying to cling to it who are just hanging on, which is why the government continues to raise taxes to provide solutions to the problems it created in the first place. I do not believe that Canadians want the government to do everything for them. Canadians used to be able to save for their own retirement, buy their own home and pay for their own health care, like dental plans and so on. They used to be able to buy their kids food. The Liberal government brags that there are now 400,000 kids in Canada who need the government to buy them lunch. I dream of a day when the government does not have to do any of that for any Canadians and when Canadians can look after themselves.

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Mr. Sébastien Lemire (Abitibi—Témiscamingue, BQ)

Jun/17/24 1:45:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, of course there are partisan speeches and there are the repercussions they have on people in real life. I would like my colleague to tell me what tools are being given to communities in this budget so they can take charge of their lives, especially as concerns the question of housing and other issues. We need to find a way to decentralize management and trust our people on the ground. There are growing problems. Témiscamingue, for example, needs levers to take charge of its economic development, especially in the forestry sector. Can my colleague commit to making sure that more power and means are given to communities that want to take charge of their development and invest in their economy if we have a change of government in the next election?

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Mr. Blaine Calkins

Jun/17/24 1:46:35 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I am from Alberta, and like a Quebecker, I have very similar thoughts about how much control Ottawa should have on our daily lives. I do believe, as my colleague is from Quebec, that he was trying to say thanks for the millions of dollars that his province receives in equalization and transfers. My province does not receive any of that. However, we do not need to belabour those particular issues. If we actually cut the size of the federal government and allow our provincial governments to do the jobs that they are constitutionally empowered to do, get out of the way and just focus on economic growth and opportunity, reduce the red tape and the gatekeepers, as the leader of my party says, Canadians, including Quebeckers, will be better off.

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