Senator Gold: Thank you for the question.

I believe the statements that were made both reflect the government’s position and both can be coherent and true.

[Translation]

Senator Martin: The Trudeau government never proactively disclosed that Accenture was administering the CEBA program. It kept this information from parliamentarians and from taxpayers. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business told The Globe and Mail that it had thousands of contracts with the Trudeau government about various issues with the CEBA loans and had no idea that Accenture was behind all of it. Export Development Canada has acknowledged that this arrangement is ongoing, so we have reason to believe that the Trudeau government has given Accenture more than $61 million.

Leader, what is the total value of the contracts given to date to Accenture to administer the CEBA loans, and how much more will it receive?

Hon. Senators: Agreed

Hon. Raymonde Gagné (Legislative Deputy to the Government Representative in the Senate) moved second reading of Bill C-43, An Act for granting to His Majesty certain sums of money for the federal public administration for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2023.

She said: Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to Bill C-43 which implements the Supplementary Estimates (C) for the 2022-23 fiscal year.

I intend to speak at greater length regarding the spending items contained in Bill C-43 as part of my remarks at third reading tomorrow.

If approved by Parliament, voted budgetary spending for this fiscal year would increase by $4.7 billion — or 2.1% — to a total of $224.6 billion. Much of the new voted spending is intended to provide military aid to Ukraine; help developing countries address the impact of climate change; reimburse First Nations and emergency management service providers for on-reserve response and recovery activities; write off unrecoverable student and apprenticeship loans; and preserve current capacity and service levels at the Canada Revenue Agency call centres.

These estimates also show, for information purposes, changes in planned statutory expenditures. Statutory budgetary expenditures are forecast to rise by $5.6 billion — or 2.6% — to a total of $218.7 billion.

Before concluding my brief remarks, I would like to take the opportunity to thank the Standing Senate Committee on National Finance for their study, and thank Senator Marshall in advance for her work as the critic of this bill. Thank you. Meegwetch.

Some Hon. Senators: Yea.

Some Hon. Senators: Nay.

The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: I believe the “yeas” have it.

I see two senators rising.

And two honourable senators having risen:

The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Call in the senators for a vote at 4:03 p.m.

Motion agreed to and bill read second time on the following division:

The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Honourable senators, it is now almost six o’clock, and pursuant to Rule 3-3(1), I am obliged to leave the chair until eight o’clock, when we shall resume — unless it is your wish, honourable senators, to not see the clock.

Is it agreed to not see the clock? Consent is denied.

[Translation]

Accordingly, honourable senators, leave not having been granted, the sitting is suspended and I will leave the chair until eight o’clock.

(The sitting of the Senate was suspended.)

[English]

(The sitting of the Senate was resumed.)

On the Order:

Resuming debate on the motion of the Honourable Senator Manning, seconded by the Honourable Senator Batters, for the second reading of Bill S-249, An Act respecting the development of a national strategy for the prevention of intimate partner violence.

Hon. Rosa Galvez: Honourable colleagues, I rise to speak to Senator Coyle’s inquiry to find solutions to ensure the transition of society, the economy and the use of Canada’s resources in the pursuit of a just, prosperous, sustainable and peaceful net-zero future for our country and our planet.

In 2022, Canada’s Overshoot Day, in other words the day when our country used its share of all the resources that the Earth can regenerate in a single year, was March 13. Despite its imperfections, this indicator is easy to understand and reflects the unsustainable nature of our socio-economic system. Canada uses the resources for one year in just two and a half months. However, we used to waste much less. In the early 1970s, Canada’s Overshoot Day was around the end of December, where it should be.

It is in our own interest to become a sustainable nation. We need to be more efficient and careful when we use natural resources.

[English]

Our way of life and our behaviours have pushed the current system to its limits. Overall, there is a positive correlation between waste generation and income level. Hence, it’s our responsibility as a developed, rich nation to redress and set an example.

The global demand for material resources is expected to double by 2060. It will cause environmental damage, including rises in greenhouse gas emissions, waste and associated pollution if we don’t find rapid, smart, sustainable solutions and if we don’t change the paradigm of considering citizens uniquely as consumers in a linear economic system that takes, makes and wastes.

The strain on the global climate system has been observed by scientists for decades, and the cause of planet warming is unequivocally the result of human-induced greenhouse gas emissions. Current global average temperatures are close to 1.2 degrees above the pre-industrial levels, while Canada has experienced twice this warming and the Arctic three times as much. These changes are leading to the destruction of basic infrastructure by extreme weather events that all Canadians have experienced. Climate change is a systemic risk because it affects everyone, everywhere. Intense heat waves, melting of permafrost, sea-level rise, shore erosion, forest fires, tornadoes and hurricanes, atmospheric rivers, loss of biodiversity and species extinction are happening here and now. Last year — 2022 — will be known as the year when extreme weather events became the norm and costs of reparations amounted to billions per event.

I recently viewed the film The Issue with Tissue — a boreal love story by Michael Zelniker. I encourage you to watch it. You will see the direct relationship between our consumption habits, the destruction of natural capital and our blunt inaction. Understand this: More than 5,000 wild species are at some risk of extinction in Canada. For example, despite its status as a protected species, the three families of Canadian caribou are at risk of extinction, including the once-mighty George River and Leaf River herds of Labrador and Quebec. Senator Audette can tell you lots more about the disappearance of this species and its importance to Indigenous peoples.

But I’m here to speak about solutions and to say that Canadians are looking and waiting for this chamber to play its role of sober second thought and come up with constructive debate and propose effective solutions to the connected multiple crises that we are all experiencing without leaving anybody behind.

A first solution at hand is that markets address pollution and its impacts. As responsible corporations, they must address the negative externalities exactly as a responsible citizen. They created these negative externalities by providing efficient means to manage them. It is urgent to implement alternative models of production and consumption while addressing the letdowns of our linear system. We must transform to a circular economy where subproducts such as waste and other non-valued materials are reintegrated into the system.

The main principles are actually very simple: use fewer resources; design more durably; ban planned obsolescence; provide service loops, such as repair, that extend within product lifetimes; slow rates of extraction; use less toxic or polluting substances; and improve the collection and management of waste and reprocessing of materials to get the most out of the material by creating value in each stage of reuse. In sum, if a product can’t be reduced, reused, repaired, rebuilt, refinished, resold, recycled or degraded, then it should be restricted, redesigned or removed from production.

A second solution that is dramatically needed if Canada chooses to remain competitive during the ongoing third industrial revolution and knowledge economy is the shift to renewable energy for electricity production.

I was today locked in for the budget. I put out a press release. There is money for electricity — I’m very happy — but we can do better.

The Canadian renewable sector, although thriving in provinces such as Alberta, is, in general, lagging behind the rest of the world. We simply aren’t displacing fossil fuels with renewable energy quickly enough. Most G7 countries have succeeded in decoupling growth from greenhouse gas emissions because they developed and implemented clean energy. Contrary to fossil fuels, electricity from renewables follows learning curves where production costs keep falling dramatically. At present, renewable energy is the safest, cleanest and cheapest, and Canada has the resources to be a world leader. The East Coast alone has enough potential wave power to double our current installed generating capacity.

Dear colleagues, why — despite having the longest coastline, the highest tides and among the highest waves in the world — don’t we use wave or tidal renewable energy?

My office has published a white paper on the best policies for a clean recovery post COVID-19 and a second white paper on sustainable finances aiming at net-zero greenhouse gas emissions before 2050. By implementing similar or adapted approaches to those that have worked around the world, we can not only accelerate the transformation but we can render our economy more sustainable in line with our pressing reality and needs.

Among these approaches, we found several things.

Proposed bills can be viewed through both a climate lens that will consider impacts to future generations and a social justice lens that can ensure benefits and costs of the transition are distributed equitably.

Financial supports for the transition can focus on helping people first and then corporations. When financial assistance is provided to corporations, it should be accompanied by accountability and enforceable measures — verifiable goals that contribute to human and ecosystem well-being.

We can ask if government financial support to development projects protects and regenerates natural capital and ecosystems. We can ask if Indigenous communities have been consulted and if they can be supported in their role as guardians of Indigenous lands and biodiversity.

Fisheries, forestry and agriculture are sectors that still operate under unsustainable approaches. Several fish stocks are disappearing, boreal forests are being clear-cut and agricultural soils are impoverished by overuse of heavy mechanized operations like synthetic fertilization and pesticides. These sectors need to rethink and operations need to be optimized.

We can support actions so municipalities adapt to climate change now by building future-proof critical infrastructure, by building right the first time and in the right places and using natural infrastructure as first lines of defence against flooding and erosion.

Every government investment could go in the direction of building forward better, which coincides with economically and environmentally efficient projects that allow for recouping their costs while serving to reduce inequality.

[Translation]

Dear colleagues, there are many solutions to the problems that we face and can no longer ignore. What we need is the will and the intent to protect our children and current and future generations.

[English]

As President Biden said last week:

A future where we understand that economic success is not in conflict with the rights and dignity of workers or meeting our responsibilities addressing the climate crisis, but rather those things depend on us doing that. . . . Factually.

Colleagues, you know the United States Inflation Reduction Act is a game changer, and we need to step up our game if we don’t want to be left behind.

[Translation]

To conclude, we are hearing arguments about the cost of taking action. I challenge you to justify the economic, financial, societal and moral cost of inaction. In 2011, the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy predicted that the cost of inaction could reach $91 billion a year in Canada by 2050. The Canadian Climate Institute estimates that by 2025, or very shortly, our GDP will have decreased by $25 billion. By 2055, it will be $80 billion to $103 billion lower. Inaction or a business-as-usual approach results in the destruction of our natural capital, which is a significant part of our GDP.

I ask you to consider what you are doing to protect the livelihoods of Canadians and the Canadian economy from the impacts of the interconnected crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, and the financial crisis. I ask you to consider what you are doing to lead the way to a prosperous, net-zero economy.

Thank you, meegwetch.

[English]

Senator Dalphond: I want to thank Senator Dupuis, because that is an excellent question. I think it may even be a suggestion that she is making indirectly to the chamber, because violence varies. There is a legal aspect, of course, but there is also a social aspect. Then there is the Indigenous dimension because, as we know, the number of Indigenous women filing complaints is twice as high and the risk is even higher in remote communities. There are different needs for specific groups, and the committees could look at these different characteristics of domestic violence.

(On motion of Senator Clement, debate adjourned.)

[English]

On the Order:

Resuming debate on the motion of the Honourable Senator Boyer, seconded by the Honourable Senator Marwah, for the second reading of Bill S-250, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (sterilization procedures).

Hon. Donald Neil Plett (Leader of the Opposition): My question is for the government leader in the Senate. It concerns foreign interference in our country.

Senator Gold, Global News reported last week that a member of the other place:

. . . privately advised a senior Chinese diplomat in February 2021 that Beijing should hold off freeing Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, according to two separate national security sources.

That member of Parliament left the Liberal caucus that day, and the next day, he voted with the opposition to pass a motion calling upon the Trudeau government to launch a public inquiry.

Leader, the allegation levelled against this member of Parliament is very serious. It is clear that there has to be a public inquiry; there is no doubt about that. How can the Prime Minister still cling to the belief that a public inquiry is optional, even now? It has to happen, leader. Why can’t he see that? Can you see that?

Hon. Marc Gold (Government Representative in the Senate): Thank you for your question.

The Prime Minister has put into place a number of mechanisms to address the very important issue of the unacceptable attempts by countries to interfere in our democratic processes. Indeed, the mandate given to the special rapporteur, the Right Honourable David Johnston, is such that he will be considering all options, including that of a public inquiry. Canadians should have confidence in the quality of the analysis and advice he will give to the Prime Minister.

Senator Plett: It is not Mr. Johnston whom we have questions about and don’t have confidence in; it is the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister and his office will not come clean with Canadians about what they knew about Beijing’s interference, so they are finding it hard to keep their story straight.

In the same Global News story of last Wednesday, the Prime Minister’s Office, or PMO, said that it “. . . only became aware that a conversation took place after Mr. Dong told us, following recent media questions.”

However, last Friday, The Globe and Mail reported that it contacted the PMO about this conversation on March 3, after which the Prime Minister’s Office asked CSIS to provide a copy of the conversation’s transcript.

Which is correct, leader: what PMO told Global News or what they told The Globe and Mail? Or is neither statement correct? It seems that their storytelling has seen better days.

Senator Carignan: How do you explain that the RCMP gave security contracts to someone who uses two identities? Also, under what name did he sign those contracts with the RCMP?

Hon. Ratna Omidvar: My question is for the Leader of the Government in the Senate.

Senator Gold, I wish to draw our attention to the growing stories of abuse that international students are facing when they come to Canada. I think we all appreciate the boost to our economy — close to $24 billion — and the boost to the bottom line of post-secondary educational institutions, but the underbelly of abuse is a stain on our reputation. I hope you agree with me on that.

While I understand that education is a provincial responsibility, the granting of visas for students is solely a federal one. Can you tell me if the government is taking this seriously and what, if anything, they are doing to correct the situation?

Hon. Marc Gold (Government Representative in the Senate): Honourable senators, I rise today to pay tribute and to remember the life of former senator Landon Pearson, an Officer of the Order of Canada. I would also like to welcome Senator Pearson’s family to the chamber, and to express my sincerest condolences to her family.

Senator Pearson was appointed to the Senate in September 1994 by then-prime minister Jean Chrétien, and served in this chamber for over 11 years. She was, above all, an ardent children’s rights advocate, and a pioneer in bringing these issues to the attention of the public.

[Translation]

Senator Pearson’s tireless work advocating for children’s rights began long before her appointment to the Senate. In 1974, she co-founded Children Learning for Living, a prevention program focused on children’s mental health, located in Ottawa. She was involved in community-based programs such as Mobile Creches for Working Mothers’ Children, a child care service for the children of nomadic construction workers in New Delhi and Mumbai.

In 1979, she made a significant contribution as vice-president of the Canadian Commission for the International Year of the Child and as editor of the commission’s report entitled For Canada’s Children: National Agenda for Action.

In 2006, after retiring from the Senate, she went on to found the Landon Pearson Resource Centre for the Study of Childhood and Children’s Rights.

[English]

Reflecting on her work with children in Mexico, India and the Soviet Union, as well as her experience with the Ottawa school system and as a mother of five children, Senator Pearson explained to the chamber how these experiences convinced her “. . . of the indivisibility of childhood and of the global nature of children’s issues.”

In their advocacy, our colleagues Senator Moodie and Senator Miville-Dechêne continue in this “Pearsonian” tradition. But, as you well know, many issues remain pressing. According to Amnesty International, over 61 million children do not attend primary school, an estimated 150 million children are sexually assaulted every year and at least 330,000 children are held in immigration detention in 80 countries every year.

As we remember Senator Pearson, let us be reminded of the need to continue to make these issues more visible and — to quote again from Senator Pearson — that “we all have a stake in the well-being of the world’s children.” Thank you, colleagues.

Hon. Scott Tannas: Honourable senators, let me begin by quoting one of my predecessors, Senator Joyce Fairbairn. She said in this chamber:

. . . throughout history there are times when the stars and the planets are aligned to produce spectacular events. I would say that one of those occasions was the day Landon Pearson was summoned to the Senate on September 15, 1994.

Colleagues, Canada has lost one of its strongest advocates for the rights of young people in the form of the Honourable Landon Mackenzie Pearson. During her time in this place, she held the very distinguished title of being “the Children’s Senator” for her tireless advocacy for the rights and well-being of young people in Canada and internationally.

She was the co-chair of the Special Joint Committee on Child Custody and Access that produced the report entitled For the Sake of Children, which interpreted the consequences of family breakdown from a new perspective: the children themselves. She was a Canadian representative at the United Nations World Summit for Children and the United Nations Special Session on Children — that was under two different prime ministers from different parties. She was also an adviser to the Minister of Foreign Affairs on the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.

During her 11 years as a senator, she was described as an individual with sharp eyes and ears, a clear mind, a big heart and the ability to watch and learn. Her passion for children was described as constant, persistent and often dogged. She often said, “When one door closes, another opens,” which showed her commitment and dedication.

We offer our sincere sympathies to her children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and to all children in Canada.

Senator Gold: Thank you for the question. It is an important one. I do not know the answer specifically to your question, but I would remind senators that in recognition of the need to support the institutions and researchers, the government launched the Advisory Panel on the Federal Research Support System last October, which is designed to advise the government and provide expert advice as to how we can maximize the impact of the research and the downstream innovation that research can give rise to.