Parliamentary Speeches
473 speeches by Christine Normandin — Page 7 of 10
Private Members' Business
Madam Speaker, since these are the last speeches before we go spend a week in our ridings and many members have already left the House to go be with their families and constituents, I would like to commend all those stalwart members who are sticking it out to the end. There are not very many of us, judging by the number of empty spaces there were in the parking lot this morning and by how easily I…
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Madam Speaker, immigration is a blessing. However, based on the new thresholds they announced, the Liberals are completely out of touch with Quebec's situation. It seems they have forgotten that Quebeckers must provide all the services newcomers may expect such as housing, health, education and, above all, francization. In short, everything that helps people integrate. Why are the Liberals so inte…
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Madam Speaker, the problem is that the federal government is not listening to what Quebec wants. It throws out a number, 500,000 immigrants, and thinks it has done its job. Immigration is not just a number. It is also about meeting people's needs. The federal government is incapable of providing its fair share of funding for housing and health. It is incapable of processing applications for perman…
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Mr. Speaker, René Lévesque left us 35 years ago. Quebec owes René Lévesque and the Parti Québécois so much, including the nationalization of electricity, the Charter of the French Language, agricultural zoning, automobile insurance, the immigration agreement, the environment department and so much more. More than any of these achievements, his main contribution, his greatest contribution, was that…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Timmins—James Bay for his speech. I would like to hear what he has to say about the fact that, in the bill before us, the voices of victims are not really heard when the review panel decides to dismiss a complaint. The review panel may propose actions, such as therapy or an apology letter, and can impose certain sanctions on the judge. However, we never hea…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. I am not sure if he is looking for his headset, but I know that he speaks excellent French. He spoke about section 102 and what the review panel can do if it dismisses a complaint against a judge. The panel can take several actions, which include ordering the judge to attend counselling or to apologize publicly. To come back to the member's prove…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. Aside from the very specific subject matter of Bill C-9, he talked about a few things that can sometimes contribute to a loss of public trust in our institutions, particularly legal and judicial institutions. Given that Bill C-9 deals with what happens further downstream, that is, after judges are appointed, I wonder if my colleague could comment…
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Madam Speaker, Radio-Canada is reporting that the federal government is hunting down journalistic sources in order to punish a whistle-blower. It wants to know who disclosed that the federal government was appointing a unilingual English speaker as CEO of the Canadian Museum of History. What the government should have done was take a hard look in the mirror and ask why it continues to make uniling…
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Madam Speaker, the Fédération professionnelle des journalistes du Québec spoke out against the government's source hunting. It fears that Ottawa is discouraging whistle-blowers when it should in fact be protecting them. It is concerned, and rightly so, because Canada has the weakest whistle-blower legislation in the world. According to the International Bar Association, Canada ranks 50th out of 50…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Northumberland—Peterborough South for his speech and for his bill. I wonder if he could comment on the issue of cluster munitions. We know that the United States is not a signatory to the Dublin convention and that it manufactures this type of weapon. Bill C‑281 seeks to expand the list of people who would be targeted by the Canadian restrictions. I wonder …
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Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands for her speech. She said that, even though the dental insurance program is not perfect, it is better to send money to people than not send it at all. With all due respect, I disagree. For example, under this program, families that have insurance cannot collect the benefit even if their insurance does not cover everything, whereas families th…
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Madam Speaker, the Liberals say that they know what they are doing, but yesterday we read stories in Le Journal de Montréal about businesses that have been waiting for their foreign workers for a year. That is a year of lost contracts for the businesses, a year of lost income for the workers and a year of lost growth for our economy. Everyone loses while this government fails to realize that the i…
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Madam Speaker, every time we ask government members about problems with the temporary foreign worker program, they subject us to sermons about the importance of immigration. Obviously immigration is important. That is why we need to deal with it. It is important for companies that lose contracts because they cannot get enough workers, but it is just as important—perhaps more so—for the foreign wor…
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak today to Bill C‑281 introduced by the member for Northumberland—Peterborough South. This bill has a relatively long, but rather clear title and, as the member mentioned, it is a good exercise in diction. It is the act to amend the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Act, the Justice for Victims of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act, also known as th…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, Andrée Ferretti, a staunch separatist from start to finish, passed away on Thursday. On behalf of the Bloc Québécois, I want to offer my condolences to her children Lucia and Vincent, and her immediate family and friends. Born Andrée Bertrand in a working-class neighbourhood in Montreal, Andrée Ferretti discovered very early a common thread that she would follow her entire life: freed…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. We do not always agree with the Conservatives on certain topics, like inflation, for example. We do not agree that the government is entirely responsible for inflation. There is the global situation, but there is also a labour shortage that is contributing to lower demand and higher prices. One of the Bloc Québécois's proposed solutions to the labo…
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Mr. Speaker, Quebeckers are worried about the future. Hundreds of thousands of people across Quebec are marching on the streets to remind the government about the principles of the former minister of the environment and climate change, who at the time wanted to divest from fossil fuels. This government continues to support the oil industry, however. Over the past year, it approved the new Bay du N…
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Mr. Speaker, Quebec is taking action against climate change: 145,000 people voted in favour of striking all across Quebec to put an end to fossil fuels. Thousands of people are expected in front of Parliament this afternoon. It is the best place to protest because the federal government is the chief culprit when it comes to climate inaction. Not only is this government refusing to stop consuming f…
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Red Deer—Lacombe for his speech. He and the speaker before him talked about the importance of cutting spending to fight inflation. If we want to cut spending, then I would suggest that we cut the subsidies being given to oil companies that are making record profits in the current crisis. The Conservatives would never dream of cutting oil subsidies, but they d…
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague. I have not been a member of the House for very long, but I am sure that if I had been, I would have been happy to have the member around for a long time with me. I have a question about the timing of the introduction of Bill C-30. It is a relatively simple bill that is quite easy to implement. We already knew when the budget was tabled in the spring that inflatio…
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Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois agrees to apply the results of the previous vote and will be voting in favour.
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois agrees to apply the results of the previous vote and will be voting against.
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Madam Speaker, I am not the justice critic, so, unfortunately, I cannot say that I have had the privilege of meeting with women's groups, among others, that might have had a thing or two to say. I opted to focus more on the practical legislative aspect of the issue with my colleagues, some of whom are more knowledgeable about criminal law. They said there may or may not be some room for improvemen…
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Madam Speaker, in a way, I am reassured that it has already been announced that there will be an ex post facto review of the measure. I would hope that legal professionals will be invited. My criminal law colleagues for both the Crown and the defence would certainly have some interesting things to say. I imagine it will be most interesting to analyze the section as applied. I will say it again. Th…
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to Bill C‑28 this evening, in part because it got me to look over my old class notes. I am trained as a lawyer, but I certainly do not claim to be a criminal lawyer. As a result, while reading the Brown decision, I had to go back and review some of the concepts to refresh my memory. Tonight's debate is taking place in the knowledge that, in any case, th…
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Madam Speaker, I think that in some ways, it is even more important to tackle this problem than it is to address Bill C‑28. It is important to remember that the bill deals with extremely rare cases. Extreme intoxication to the point of automatism is not a common occurrence. We have seen it only a few times over a period of 30 years, while sexual assault offences are sadly far more common. With tha…
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Madam Speaker, there is the whole issue of how to deal with different types of sexual assault. My colleague mentioned a few. I would say that this is a different issue. We cannot see the bill as being part of a continuum because we are responding to a Supreme Court of Canada decision, and we could not anticipate exactly when it would be handed down. It is rather unfortunate that the ruling was han…
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Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Lethbridge for her speech, although it was a bit much for my ears at times. I want to go back to one of the complaints that the Conservatives made in committee. They complained that there was not enough time to hear from a number of witnesses. One of those witnesses was Scott Benzie from Digital First Canada, an organization that has no members but …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Madam Speaker, Quebec's minister of the French language, Simon Jolin‑Barrette, has been invited to address the Académie française. He will head to Paris to explain to “the immortals”, who have been defending the French language for 400 years, how Quebec plans to protect its national language. The Minister of Official Languages has also introduced a bill that is supposed to protect the future of Fr…
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Madam Speaker, I will take that as a no. It is probably because Bill C‑13 does not really protect French in Quebec. It protects institutional bilingualism, which results in the anglicization of workplaces and reduces the perception of the importance of being fluent in French in Quebec. Bill C‑13 does not recognize that French is the only official language that requires protection in light of the p…
Read full speech →Private Members' Business
Madam Speaker, it is the last Friday of this session in the House. If I may, I would like to take a moment to acknowledge everyone who has supported our work throughout this past parliamentary session. This includes the interpreters, the pages, the Sergeant-at-Arms and his team, maintenance staff, cafeteria employees, IT support staff, law clerks, analysts, and so on. Not only do these people help…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Fundy Royal for his speech. My question also addresses victims, because he talked a lot about victims in his speech. I want to talk about the new provisions that allow the review panel to impose certain sanctions for less serious offences—continuing education and therapy, for example—which is an improvement over the previous bill. However, there is no oppor…
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Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Rivière-du-Nord for his speech. I would like to comment on the second part of his speech on the appointment process. As we discuss Bill C-9 today, what our colleagues have often pointed out is both the importance of maintaining the separation between the judiciary, the executive and the legislative powers and the importance of having a system …
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to stand this morning to discuss Bill C-9. While I was reading the bill, I had a bit of déjà vu. I remember driving on the 417 in the spring while listening to the speeches in the House on Bill S-5, which was sponsored by Senator Dalphond, for whom I have tremendous respect. I still call him “Your Honour”. I know that Bill S‑5 died on the Order Paper because of the elec…
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Madam Speaker, as the previous speaker did, I too want to thank my colleague for his question, which he asked in French. We really do appreciate it and see it as a sign of respect. We know that it is not always easy. I have already mentioned one possible way to impose sanctions for offences that do not necessarily call for the judge to be removed from office. I talked about including victims more …
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Madam Speaker, whether the role of an ombudsman is to protect victims or offenders, there is always a certain obligation to appoint someone quickly. When a position remains vacant for a long time, there will be a backlog of cases. Unfortunately, that has become this government's specialty. I am thinking in particular about the immigration file, which I carried for two years. I also think there sho…
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Madam Speaker, I will not miss any opportunity to say that Quebec is forward-thinking and is doing great things that we should emulate more often. We need to have a much more transparent, non-partisan and depoliticized process. I will say it again, because this is key to having confidence in the justice system: The legislative, the executive, and the judicial branches must be kept separate, which …
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, first of all, I am going to share my time with one of my Bloc Québécois colleagues. It is a pleasure to speak to Government Business No. 16, which is for Bill C‑11. Unfortunately, it is not exactly a great pleasure because it feels like Groundhog Day. We went through essentially the same thing with Bill C‑10, which was introduced in the previous Parliament and was kind of hit or mis…
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Longueuil—Saint-Hubert reminded us that there was a time allocation motion on the former Bill C‑10. We supported that motion insofar as it was a bit more “step by step”. We were trying to break the impasse at committee to be able to continue deliberating, including in the House or on other aspects of the bill. However, the motion before us today deadlocks the entire …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, the Ukrainians fleeing the war heard the government tell them they would be welcomed with open arms. Some 127,000 of them applied for emergency travel. What has the Government of Canada done for these people, 107 days into the war? It chartered three flights, offered 500 plane tickets and says it is happy with that. They cannot be serious. Will the government arrange a real airlift, o…
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Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois was skeptical when the government announced that it would offer Aeroplan points to help people displaced by the war in Ukraine come to Canada. We now know we had good reason to be skeptical, and that is really frustrating. The government promised to help 10,000 people with this ridiculous idea at least two months ago. Two long months later, all the government has to…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, congratulations on what I believe is your first ruling in the House. There has been a lot of emphasis on the fact that under the super-closure motion, there is not enough time to hear witnesses in committee. I would be curious to know how much time my colleague thinks is enough. We know that many TikTokers and YouTubers have come to testify, some even twice. How much would be enough i…
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Madam Speaker, it has been three years since the government promised to include Chantier Davie in the shipbuilding contracts, but nothing has been done. Davie has been getting crumbs, while Irving, in Halifax, is drowning in contracts. Yesterday we got the proof that this is a political decision. This winter, the Minister of Public Services and Procurement blamed the delays on Chantier Davie, clai…
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Madam Speaker, I would need a good 10 minutes to answer that question, but I will give it a shot. The situation with Turkey is unique. It is wavering for reasons that are understandable, in a way. Turkey may have lost some trust in its NATO allies. The United States, for example, used Kurdish soldiers in their war in Syria, which was an affront to Turkey. Since Turkey purchased weapons from Russia…
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Madam Speaker, in his speech, my colleague talked about supplying weapons. We know that these days weapons are more and more technologically complex and people need training to use them properly. I would like to comment on the need to provide as much predictability as possible when we send weapons, so that we can also link that to training for the people who will use them. Can my colleague provide…
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Madam Speaker, my colleague is always so fascinating to listen to. While we were in Lithuania, I heard something that has stuck with me. Lithuania's parliament building, the Seimas, is not particularly attractive. Some Lithuanians even called it ugly. However, they are particularly proud of it for what it represents, since people have put their lives, hearts and souls into that building. Indeed, a…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from North Island—Powell River. I also travelled with her to Lithuania. A few of us here this evening travelled there. We are probably all still feeling a bit jet-lagged. What I realized on the trip is that, as parliamentarians, we try to share our information with our foreign counterparts, but we are mostly looking for information. We then act as spokespeople, …
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her excellent speech. I want to correct the record. I think I said that Ukraine had a $35‑billion deficit, but what I should have said was that 35% of the country's economy is shut down, resulting in $5 billion in losses every month. My colleague spoke about sanctions. Many people are calling for the money that was seized from oligarchs to be used to help Uk…
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Madam Speaker, I think that the debate we are having this evening is in some small way part of the solution. We have a consensus on the membership of Finland and Sweden. Given that Finland and Sweden meet NATO's admission criteria, I believe that we are sending Turkey the message that it will be accountable for its actions if it votes “no”. There is no reason to do so other than purely personal re…
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Madam Speaker, unfortunately, I get the impression that there is absolutely nothing we can do to guard against a Russian invasion. These invasions are often irrational and are becoming increasingly illogical. Apparently some close to President Putin are starting to very much question the strategy. In a context where prevention is not possible, we must nevertheless be prepared for attacks, hence my…
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