Emergency Debate
Mr. Speaker, I will assure you that I did not have very much to do with the building of the Confederation Bridge. Tonight, we are debating in this emergency debate another instance of nature trying to kill us. We have seen that a big hurricane has hit the east coast of Canada. To some degree, the very nature of civilization or being civilized is our war against nature. It is our war to ensure that…
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Mr. Speaker, I am presenting a petition on behalf of Canadians across the country who are opposed to the COVID–19 mandates and want them all to come to an end. The petitioners state that throughout the pandemic truckers have served Canadians, that they are heroes and that they have been subjected to the vaccine mandates that have impacted our supply chains. The petitioners say the Prime Minister h…
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Mr. Speaker, I am presenting a petition on behalf of Canadians who want a permanent end to the ArriveCAN app, the vaccine mandates and all COVID mandates. Currently, the government has only suspended some of the mandates, but thanks to opposition pressure, they will be getting rid of the ArriveCAN app and the border mandates. The petitioners note that other countries around the world have removed …
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Madam Speaker, I am not entirely sure what the member means by “emergency funds”, but I would again point out that I am very disappointed that this is such an empty and vacuous bill. The prerogative of the government is that it gets to propose things, but this is hardly a proposal. This is three words on the top of a blank page. Members keeping saying to send the bill to committee, but I am not ex…
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Madam Speaker, I, too, am standing to present a petition in the House of Commons today. The petitioners are concerned about the values test that the Liberals have promised to impose on charitable status organizations across the country. The government has previously used a values test to discriminate against worthy applicants in the Canada summer jobs program, to deny funding to any organization t…
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With regard to the government's website for the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, as of June 21, 2022: (a) why does the “Status of House Business” link direct visitors to a page from the last prorogation of Parliament, as of August 18, 2020; (b) who was responsible for keeping the website accurate and with current information; (c) are there any quality control measures in place to …
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With regard to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada: (a) what is the number of applications (i) received in total, (ii) accepted, (iii) rejected, for visitor visas to Canada, broken down by year since 2016, and by reason for visiting; and (b) what is the breakdown of (a) by country of applicant?
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Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague for introducing the topic of euthanasia or MAID into this conversation. The minister talked extensively about how people with disabilities need to feel valued. I hear over and over again from the disabilities community in my riding that they are very concerned about the euthanasia regime in Canada and how it makes them feel undervalued. I am wondering…
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Madam Speaker, I too would like to speak to this today. What would sum this bill up the best is, “We are the government; just trust us”. That essentially is what this bill is all about. It is an empty shell of a bill. In some ways it is lacking in courage on the part of the government. People might ask me why I say that. Governing is hard work and it takes effort. I would say that this bill has no…
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Madam Speaker, I always appreciate the thoughts of the member for Winnipeg North. We get to hear a lot of them. Nonetheless, yes, it sounds like the sentiment of the bill, a benefit for the disability community in this country, is universally supported in this place. The devil is in the details and that is why we are here to debate things. I would point out again, as I did at the beginning of my s…
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No, that is not contrary at all, actually. Most of the emails were calling for me to very much not support that particular bill. However, I would point out that it is within the NDP's power to change this Parliament, as it has put together a confidence agreement with the government. While NDP members seem to share my disappointment in Bill C-22, I would point out that they are continuing to suppor…
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Madam Speaker, the bulk of the bill is on the so-called regulations side of things. Again, I do not know if we can determine in the regulations that the minister should tie this to a particular percentage point or something like that around inflation. I note that inflation is probably the number one reason that folks from the disability community are communicating with me to say that it is getting…
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Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her work. It sounds like we are in agreement that this bill is lacking in details. I was very much looking forward to having details on this bill. As the member noted as well, this bill was in the works prior to an election that nobody asked for or needed, so I am hoping, like her, that the Liberals will be able to put some details in the window. We will …
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Madam Speaker, I must say that very few bills have elicited such a response as Bill C-223. In my constituency office, I have had thousands of people communicate with me over that particular bill. I will not be supporting it. However—
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
With regard to the Department of National Defence, the Canadian Armed Forces, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, since January 2020: what are the details of any contracts or partnerships with non-Canadian entities or states to conduct operations within Canada, including the (i) start and end dates, (ii) contracting parties, (iii) file number, (iv) nature or description of the work, (v) value o…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, thanks to the Harper Conservatives, the Liberal government has an important tool to protect kids abroad from sexual exploitation: The Liberals can refuse passports to Canadians who are likely to travel abroad to exploit children. However, the Liberals are not doing this. Since they have come to power, they have only revoked 13 passports for child predators and refused eight. There are…
Read full speech →Private Members' Business
Mr. Speaker, the member behind me says that the centre of Canada is Provencher. I can be certain that it is not, because I think that from Provencher someone could spit and hit the American border. Given the fact that my riding, Peace River—Westlock, is in northern Alberta and the centre of Alberta is a seven-hour drive from the American border, I can assure colleagues that the geographical centre…
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Mr. Speaker, the other thing I would like to talk about in my riding in particular is this. Where I come from, we do basically three things, forestry, farming and fracking, the three Fs, as I like to call them. They are exciting things that happen in northern Alberta. It is a very diverse part of the province, with extremely fertile farmland, the boreal forest that covers the majority of the ridin…
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Mr. Speaker, I want to add my voice to this debate on changing the riding name. Given that we are talking about riding names, I often talk about my riding and the beautiful riding that it is. Peace River—Westlock is the name of the riding. Although the name includes two of the towns in my riding, it does not necessarily do it justice, in the sense that I represent over a sixth of the province of A…
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Mr. Speaker, why now? With the redistribution that is happening, is this an important time for this to be coming up?
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, at page 662 of Bosc and Gagnon, it states: The intent of the question-and-answer period after closure motion has been moved is to promote ministerial accountability, and it provides an opportunity for the government to justify its use of this measure. This is not an opportunity for the fourth party in this place to hold the opposition to account.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to apologize for disrupting the House and calling the member names.
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I want to present a petition today. Petitioners from across the country, and in this case particularly from Scarborough, are calling on the government to enact legislation that would prevent Canadians from going abroad and participating in the illegal organ harvesting that happens around the world. The petitioners are calling on the quick passage of two bills: Bill C-350 and Bill S-24…
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Madam Speaker, I want to note that it seems that Bill C-21 was brought in on the back of American politics. I am wondering what the member has to say about importing American politics into Canada.
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Madam Speaker, I want to add my voice as well to the debate around Bill C-21, which is a very sinister bill that comes out of the evil intentions of the Liberal government. Why do I say that? It is because the bill before us will do nothing to end the crime sprees that we are seeing happen across the country. The bill will do nothing to end the violence that is happening in our streets. The bill w…
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Madam Speaker, the thrust of my speech was around providing the political support to restore law and order in our communities. The Liberals fundamentally do not support our law enforcement and fundamentally do not support our justice system to ensure that criminals can be brought to justice. The Liberals reduce the sentencing whenever they can. They tacitly support the “defund the police” movement…
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Madam Speaker, I could not agree with my colleague more. This bill is a sinister bill that goes after law-abiding Canadians, rather than doing the hard work of going after criminals and gangsters, who are operating in broad daylight in our country. We need to ensure that our justice system and our police forces have the trust of Canadians and that Canadians, when they look out in their communities…
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Madam Speaker, I would just note that for a very long time already, in order to get a firearms licence in this country, people have to have it signed off by their conjugal partner. That is a fair analysis. I also believe they can revoke that consent at any time. The law was good on that. The Liberals are tinkering around the edges once again. Again, this is a distraction from the hard work that ne…
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Mr. Speaker, I join with my colleagues in discussing Bill C-9 today. I am appreciative of the bill and the fact that it would grant the premise that we have been advocating for a very long time, and that Liberals have been arguing against for a very long time, that judges need to be held accountable. There needs to be a remedy for egregious actions on the part of judges. I believe in the fallen na…
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Mr. Speaker, I would note that we are still waiting on a Canadian Bar Association response to this particular legislation. I know that I am looking forward to their response in particular. In that regard, I would say I think we have to bring this bill to committee. However, I want to reiterate I am very appreciative that this bill grants the premise that there needs to be judge accountability in t…
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Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for Kelowna—Lake Country for her advocacy around addictions. I know that is likely where a lot of the issues that we face in this country come from, so we have to work to ensure that we have a society that can treat addiction and does not just put addicted people on palliative care and basically say we will provide them with the drugs they need rather than t…
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Mr. Speaker, I am in favour of moving this bill along quickly, although I am not in favour of shortcutting the process. I have experienced that in this place. I have seen bills moved forward very quickly, only to have groups come forward later on, saying they never had the opportunity to present at committee and that they had an amendment they thought was needed for that particular bill, but becau…
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to follow up on a question I asked the government. In May, I asked the Minister of Transport, once again, when he would allow Canadians to fly and end the travel mandates. I pointed out how Canada is virtually alone and an outlier in requiring vaccinations to fly. Iceland, Sweden, Ireland, France, the U.K., Argentina, Costa Rica, Denmark, Hungary, Jamaica,…
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Madam Speaker, as I suspected, the parliamentary secretary does not really believe Canadians' rights are absolute, but rather exist at the whim of the government. One of his colleagues has stated, “The massive majority of Liberal MPs want the mandates to end.” His colleague also noted that “There's never any straight or particularly convincing answer”. Again, we see that right here today. There is…
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Mr. Speaker, I have a number of petitions to present this morning. I am presenting the first petition on behalf of Canadians who are concerned about certain charities that are being targeted based on their views. The petitioners call on MPs to ensure that charities that hold views different from the government's do not lose their charitable status.
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Mr. Speaker, the next petition comes from Canadians from across the country who are concerned about the increase in trafficking in human organs. They are calling on the government to pass legislation that would prevent Canadians from going abroad to purchase organs and to ensure that no financial transactions happen in the pursuit of gaining organs.
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Mr. Speaker, the next petition is from folks living in Fox Creek and Swan Hills. These are two towns located in northern Alberta. The petitioners say that the rising costs of heating and fuel make life more expensive, particularly for those living in the north. They also have to travel great distances to get groceries and go to shopping centres. They are calling on the government to move the arbit…
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Mr. Speaker, the next petition is from Canadians from across the country who are concerned about the changes to the law around conversion therapy. They are calling on the government to define the definition in a way that does not ban talk therapy. They are calling on the government to ensure that parents and clergy are able to have discussions with children around their sexuality. They call on the…
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Mr. Speaker, the next petition is from Canadians from across the country who are concerned with what is going on in Azerbaijan with the detention of Armenian prisoners of war. They are calling for the immediate release of those prisoners of war, for the government to use all diplomatic tools to advocate that those being held be released, for the condemnation of the ongoing state sponsor of anti-Ar…
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Mr. Speaker, the final petition is from Canadians from across the country who draw the attention of the House to the ongoing campaign against the Uighur population by the Chinese Communist Party. They particularly note the birth suppression that is happening there through forced sterilization and abortion. They also want to call to our attention some of the photos that we have seen of folks lined …
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Madam Speaker, I have risen in the House many times and asked many questions raising issues around the Liberals' punitive, divisive and discriminatory vaccine mandates. I have spoken to many individuals across the country, particularly one gentleman named Cayle, a young man who drove all the way here from Vancouver Island because he could not fly to protest these vaccine mandates. I know that the …
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Mr. Speaker, the member talked about holding the web giants accountable. MindGeek and Pornhub claim to be one of the largest sites on the Internet with over 11 billion viewers every year. There is enough content on their website that, if someone had to watch it all, it would take them 572,000 years. MindGeek and Pornhub are a major part of the problem on the Internet. It is probably one of the big…
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Mr. Speaker, that is duly noted. I would like to think that the Liberals would have learned their lesson after the debacle of Bill C-10 in the last Parliament, but only this government would be able to introduce a bill that is even worse than the original. The Liberals claim they are trying to level the playing field between traditional and online media. However, it is already incredibly difficult…
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Mr. Speaker, I rise today in regard to the Liberals' efforts to fast-track a bill through Parliament that would allow the government to censor what Canadians post. The Trudeau Liberal government and its NDP allies are pushing through a motion in the House to curtail Parliament's responsibility to examine Internet regulation, Bill C-11—
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Mr. Speaker, that is precisely what my whole speech was about. There is an area of the Internet that we need to work on to ensure that children are not gaining access to it and ensure that it is not ending up in front of the eyes of children. This is something that is going to be hard. It will be difficult, and it will take effort. However, one of the things that I have been frustrated with is tha…
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Mr. Speaker, I am very excited about the amendments I have moved at committee. However, I would just generally say that I am not supportive of the bill in its entirety. Even if those amendments were to pass, I would not be voting for this particular bill. I think that those amendments would improve the bill. It would allow the CRTC to focus on that. However, I am looking for the government to take…
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Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for his work at the justice committee. He has been thoughtful and logical in pursuit of his work there and I appreciate that. In northern Alberta, crime is generally on the rise. In particular, rural crime around theft is a big issue, and firearms are often involved. Folks who are travelling around stealing things in northern Alberta often are armed. Th…
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Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this important debate today on Bill C-5 at third reading. It is disappointing that this bill was returned from committee virtually with all the same flaws that it arrived there with. One of the issues I want to highlight with Bill C-5 is how it would allow dangerous criminals to avoid jail time and to serve their sentences at home, in the community. In particu…
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Mr. Speaker, I am sure that you are well aware of the Gladue principles, as am I. The Gladue principles often come with a Gladue report. That is something that is done and offered back to the judge, saying what a situation is for a first nation, Métis or Inuit person in Canada who can ask for a Gladue report to be done and submitted to the judge. These kinds of things should always be taken into a…
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With regard to the Canadian Police Information Centre (CPIC) and information about former prostitution offences committed prior to 2014, in relation to section 210, former section 212(1)(j), and former section 213(1)(c) of the Criminal Code: (a) when these offences were committed, what information was entered by police services to the files of offenders in the CPIC; (b) are the circumstances of th…
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