Parliamentary Speeches

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, first, I would like to wish everyone in this chamber and all of the people of Saskatoon a merry Christmas and a very happy new year. This is the time of the year that many of us get to spend with family, friends and other loved ones. For some of us, it is truly a joyous season full of wonderment. For others, the holiday season reminds us of people lost and of relations lost. It is a h…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, providing funding to all organizations big or small is a laudable goal, and it is something we need to work on, but that is not what I see here. What I see in this legislation is too much risk. The government would insert itself into this process at the risk of being able to essentially contaminate the well, as they say. There is too much ability here for the government, and frankly a…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, we have a wonderful thing in the free market, and we need to allow companies to flourish. I mentioned one example from Saskatoon, and there are many more. We have a radio station in Saskatoon, 650 CKOM. John Gormley runs a show there, and he does a great job. He has managed to figure out how to use social media to his advantage. I am quite certain they make a great deal of money from …

Oral Questions

Madam Speaker, residents of Saskatoon are suffering because of the carbon tax. It makes the cost of everything increase. Fuel and home heating are more expensive, and so is food. Some 20,000 people are using the Saskatoon food bank each month, and 40% of them are children. This tax plan does nothing for the environment. Instead, it is ripping a hole in the bank accounts of Canadians. Will the Libe…

Statements by Members

Mr. Speaker, Canadians are hurting. They look around at what has happened to this country of ours over the past seven years and realize that everything seems broken. Canada is caught in a broken experiment of woke NDP-Liberal policies that remove prison sentences from violent offenders, flood our streets with illegal drugs and increase homelessness, crime, overdoses and death. Downtown in our city…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, obviously the parliamentary secretary is not paying a lot of attention to the Conservative leader, and I guess I can understand that. Our party leader has a very clear, very simple message. He is concerned about the cost of living for Canadians. He is going to work very hard to undo some of the terrible Liberal policies that have caused inflation to go out of control and interest rate…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, that gives me a great opportunity to point out something I mentioned in my speech, and that is the fact that NDP members, whether it is on Twitter or even in the House, talk as if they oppose the government, as if they are unhappy with the government, yet they support the government when they vote every single time, regardless of what they say. What is really important to remember is …

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to rise in the House and speak on behalf of the constituents of Saskatoon West. Of course, we are debating a motion tonight, which is the latest attempt by the NDP-Liberal coalition to change the rules of Parliament to make up for its incredible incompetence when it comes to moving legislation through this House. As Jodi Taylor said, “Lack of planning on your p…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, I believe it is not proper to call out the presence of or the absence of anyone in the House. I would also make note that it is the Liberals' job to do the work in the House, with their NDP lapdogs. It is not being done properly.

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I hate to be a nag but it looks like we do not have quorum in the House.

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I am just curious; I do not think we have quorum in the House at the moment.

Routine Proceedings

With regard to the Temporary Foreign Workers Program, broken down by province and territory, and fiscal years from 2018 to present: (a) how many work permits have been processed by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, and are expected to be processed for 2022-23; (b) of the permits in (a), how many of those migrants have come to Canada to fill jobs; (c) what employment sectors have those …

Routine Proceedings

With regard to the Temporary Foreign Workers Program, broken down by province and territory, and fiscal years from 2018 to present: how many Labour Market Impact Assessments have Employment and Social Development Canada (i) undertaken, (ii) completed?

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, it would seem that the debate today is all about ArriveCAN, and it should be, because the questions are very good. The app was, first of all, mandatory, so I find it interesting that the minister bragged about how many people downloaded the app. They had to download the app; they did not have an option. The real question is the $54 million that it cost. We already know payments were…

Statements By Members

Mr. Speaker, winter is coming and Canadians are about to pay the true price of this tired, worn down NDP-Liberal coalition. Thanks to its carbon tax, everything has gotten more expensive, from groceries to gasoline to home heating, but the leader of the NDP talks out of both sides of his mouth. On October 24, the Conservatives moved a motion to remove the carbon tax from home heating and make life…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, I am just happy that today I was able to shock the member for Winnipeg Centre.

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, what the whole situation boils down to is a lack of confidence in the justice system. When a victim is unsure if a perpetrator will be held to account, and particularly unsure if a perpetrator will ever be incarcerated or see any consequences for their actions, it is very difficult for a victim to go through the mental anguish and pain of a court process. That is exactly why we need t…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, it is an honour and pleasure to speak in this House on behalf of the citizens of Saskatoon West. Of course, I am rising today to speak to the bill before us, Bill C-9, which makes changes to the way federally appointed judges can be removed for misconduct. My approach today will be a bit different. I am not a lawyer, so I am not well versed in how law works and all the details and tec…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, I am a little disappointed that the parliamentary secretary did not ask me the standard question he has asked all the other people who have talked. I spoke to that a little in my speech, but I want to reiterate it because I want to answer the question that he really wanted to ask me but could not. It is so important in this House, when it comes to legislation, that we do not ram legis…

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, I believe that corporations need to pay their fair share of taxes, absolutely. Also, if the member had listened to my speech, she would have heard me say that we need to fully utilize the gifts we have been given in our country, which are our natural resources, whether they be oil and gas, forestry, minerals, agriculture or potash. There are all kinds of them. Our country's wealth w…

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, the member uncovers a serious problem that I am sure the Liberals will have with this legislation, which is that health care is fundamentally a provincial jurisdiction issue. While the federal government does transfer funds and does dictate certain requirements to the provinces, ultimately the provinces are the ones that carry out these things. In having money transferred to the pro…

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, I understand that governing is hard and making decisions can be difficult, and many times we have to face trade-offs. However, I would suggest that the mental health crisis we have in our country is the biggest problem we face right now. Yes, dental health and care for teeth are important, and I do not deny that at all, but I think if we have to pick one first and the other second, …

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, as always, it is an honour to rise and speak in the House on behalf of the constituents of Saskatoon West. I thought it would be fair to let members know, right up front, that I am planning to vote against this legislation. I know they are always curious about why we vote the way we do, so I would like them know why I am going to be voting that way. First, I want to set the stage re…

Routine Proceedings

Mr. Speaker, it is a great honour to speak to this motion today. I will be splitting my time with the member for Peace River—Westlock. I am proud to speak to this motion on behalf of my constituents in Saskatoon West. It is a very important motion and I want to note that the motion came from the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, of which I am a proud member and have been since thi…

Routine Proceedings

Mr. Speaker, we cannot really control what the rest of the world does with this. We can designate this situation to be a genocide here in Canada. We can take those actions. More importantly, actions we can take that are significant are, for example, blocking products that are made with Uighur forced labour. That is something we can do in Canada. Just last month the European Union banned exactly th…

Routine Proceedings

Mr. Speaker, it is a shame when we see situations repeat themselves. We all know the story of Rwanda and how Canada played a very important roll in that situation. The things that the government, or the rebels in that case, did to the Tutsi people were horrific, and many of the same things are happening right now to the Uighur people in the Xinjiang province of China. One of the big errors we made…

Routine Proceedings

Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned, it is a very important bill. It is currently at the foreign affairs committee, and it really needs to move through the House and become fully adopted. It is one of those bills that is a no-brainer. We should not be allowing people to harvest organs and then get paid to have those organs used. It is one more way that the Uighur people are being violated and taken advant…

Routine Proceedings

Mr. Speaker, I really did appreciate learning more about organ harvesting and all of the terrible, tragic things that are happening there. I want to ask the member a different question, though. One of the other related topics is the idea of Lululemon, Target and Walmart all having products that potentially come from the forced labour of Uighur people in China. Uighur people are removed from their …

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, there are a lot of items in this bill that have been talked about. You mentioned plastic straws and things like that. A few years ago, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle introduced a bill to ban sewage dumping in our country, which was defeated by all opposing parties in Parliament. I am curious about your thoughts as to where something like dumping raw sewage into our rivers and ocea…

Routine Proceedings

Madam Speaker, this is a very important issue. We have just heard that one of the impacts of the Russian war on the world is IT infrastructure. Another one is energy security. Think about Canada having the third-largest reserves of oil and natural gas in the world and about the German chancellor who came to Canada looking for help with potential energy sources and we could not provide that, unfort…

Routine Proceedings

Mr. Speaker, it is difficult to follow gophers, but I rise today to present a petition on behalf of 90 Canadians calling on the Government of Canada to enshrine in the Criminal Code the protection of conscience rights, for physicians and other medical professionals, from coercion or intimidation to participate in euthanasia. Petitioners note that coercion, intimidation and other forms of pressure …

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, it was interesting listening to the parliamentary secretary talk about the fact that EI and CPP were not taxes. I would refer him to his government's own website, where it clearly states, under the tax basics section, that they are, in fact, taxes. I am not sure if he is aware of that, so I wanted to make him aware of it. Also, the member talked a lot about the ways that the governm…

Oral Questions

Mr. Speaker, the finance minister may want to consult the Government of Canada's financial literacy website. The section called “Tax basics” lists the types of taxes Canadians pay: income tax, GST and, yes, the federal payroll taxes of EI and CPP. Despite the finance minister's protests, her own website clearly states that these are taxes. Any tax hike, including raising payroll taxes, only serves…

Statements by Members

Madam Speaker, our new Conservative leader will put people first: their retirement, their paycheques, their homes and their country. That is why, this past June, I introduced my first private member's bill, Bill C-286, the recognition of foreign credentials act. This legislation will streamline the process of connecting skilled immigrants with jobs that our economy desperately needs. This is a vit…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, the government has a role to play in helping our economy in many ways. Helping people who are not able to work and who need a leg up is part of the whole role of government. It is one of the key roles of government. However, governments cannot do that effectively when they are crippled financially. That is the whole point. We need to keep government out of the areas that it should not…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, it is a good point. We need permanent solutions to these problems. A temporary tax relief measure like Bill C-30 is helpful, as I said, but it is only temporary. What we need to do is get government out of the way of our economy. The government is stepping in and messing around with the economy in ways that cause businesses to make decisions differently than they would have before. It…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, I think the member's question demonstrates quite clearly the issue that we have here. The government does not really understand how economics work. All economists are willing and very happy to explain to people that, when governments add a lot of money to the economy, it causes inflation. It is a proven fact. It happens all the time, and we are seeing it right now. Yes, it is happenin…

Government Orders

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Kenora. It is an honour to rise to speak on behalf of the constituents of Saskatoon West, but before I speak to this legislation, I would like to let everyone in Atlantic Canada know that my thoughts and prayers are with them as they recover from this weekend's terrible storm. This is a very difficult time, with property destruction, inj…

Madam Speaker, it is an honour for me to rise today to pay my respects to the late Queen Elizabeth II. She was the only monarch that I have ever known and I am saddened by her passing. This will be a time of great adjustment, not just for our institutions and our country but for individuals like me. Much has been said over the past week as the world has been mourning her passing, and many words ha…

Routine Proceedings

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-286, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (recognition of foreign credentials). Mr. Speaker, it is a great honour for me to rise and present my very first private member's bill in this House, the recognition of foreign credentials bill. I am bringing forward this legislation in my role as deputy shadow minister for immigration to help immig…

Private Members' Business

Madam Speaker, I am very proud to be here today to speak on Bill C-232 this evening, which would proclaim April as Arab heritage month in Canada. I appreciated listening to the speech of my colleague for Scarborough Centre and to hear all of the people she named, all of the distinguished people of Arab descent. It is quite significant in our country. As many Canadians know, we have a long traditio…

Private Members' Business

Oh, it is the best, Madam Speaker. I will not pass judgment on that, but I do know it is the first. I must emphasize how proud I am to support this legislation. Canadians need to understand the positive accomplishments that the Arab people have brought to our planet and our country. It is not just the bad stuff they see on the TV and the Internet. There is much more to it. In Canada, the contribut…

Oral Questions

Mr. Speaker, I do not think Putin's invasion affects Maine, but gas is going for $1.88 in Saskatoon today. People have to choose between filling up their gas tanks and putting food on the table. These are hard-working Canadians who commute to work, take their children to hockey and cook meals for their families. Postponing the increase in the carbon levy is absolutely within the minister's control…

Statements By Members

Mr. Speaker, today is Friday the 13th, a very scary day for Saskatchewan agriculture. Here in this House the environment minister and the agriculture minister are creating their own horror movie. Like Freddy and Jason before them, they are slashers. This time they want to slash two key industries in Saskatchewan, farming and fertilizer production. In Saskatoon West, Nutrien, the largest fertilizer…

Private Members' Business

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today on Motion No. 44, which seeks to force the government to: ...develop and publicly release within 120 days following the adoption of this motion a comprehensive plan to expand pathways to permanent residency for temporary foreign workers, including international students, with significant Canadian work experience in sectors with persistent labour shortages.…

Oral Questions

Mr. Speaker, last week the minister bragged about her visit to the Saskatoon “out-of-Service Canada” office, yet, after her visit, the daughter of my constituent, Viktoriia, still cannot get a passport, because they lost her birth certificate. By contrast, the Bangladesh High Commission sent six people to Saskatoon on the weekend, and they processed 800 passports in two days. How is it that a fore…

Routine Proceedings

With regard to the Temporary Foreign Workers Program (TFWP), human trafficking and sexual slavery: (a) since the use of the TFWP to actively recruit and sell individuals into sexual slavery in the early 2000s, what internal policy safeguards does (i) Employment and Social Development Canada, (ii) Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, (iii) the Canada Border Services Agency, (iv) the RCMP, …

Routine Proceedings

With regard to the response to question Q-143, tabled in the House of Commons on January 31, 2022, on which, on page six of the English version the fourth line from the bottom reads “3236.0-Massage Therapists 672”, and broken down by fiscal year starting in 2015-16: (a) how many temporary foreign workers in this employment sector (i) applied for work permits, (ii) received work permits, (iii) came…

Government Orders

Madam Speaker, sometimes these things are hard to hear, I understand, but what Gerald Butts said is, “If you’re getting your news from outlets whose primary purpose is to divide you from your neighbours, the topic doesn’t matter. It’s long past time we figured this out.” Is this what we can expect under Bill C-11: big government telling us what news is fact and what is misinformation when it does …

Oral Questions

Mr. Speaker, despite all that, the horrors of the out-of-service Service Canada office in Saskatoon continue. Margaret is 86 years old and the nicest lady you can find. She was struggling to get through on the phone, so she went to the Saskatoon office in person. The staff refused to meet with her for not having booked an online appointment. Our seniors, and indeed all Canadians, deserve better th…