Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, to the hon. member for emergency preparedness, we have to do far more. We know that, not only as the member for Kings—Hants says, the cell service is inadequate, cell service goes down even where we have it during climate emergencies. We lose power. We lose land lines. We need a national firefighting force, a national water bomber fleet and a permanent national task force for climate …
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, as is the usual practice, I would have assumed the right to have unanimous consent for non-contentious motions as the previous two times the Conservatives just blocked me from speaking in honour of Monique Bégin.
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, to the best of my information, it has not been passed to us to consider whether we are in favour or not. We would require—
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I did raise, with the minister, the same issue that my colleague has raised, which is the lack of services in pretrial detention. We should attend to that issue. I want to know if he has more clarity than I do on the position of the official opposition. I appreciate he is exhorting us not to be partisan, but I am frankly confused. I thought the hon. leader of the official opposition s…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I certainly wish to add my congratulations to the hon. member on his joining cabinet in his very critical position as Minister of Justice. I have also seen, as my colleague from Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke and others have said previously, nothing but really strong relationships and non-partisan and strong collaborative efforts from the member. I know that the public is very alarmed by peo…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I want to come back to something quite shocking the hon. member told the House. I know it is true because it happens on the B.C. coast too. We have a fleet separation in B.C. that is more extreme than what happens in Nova Scotia. The people who are fishing do not own their own business. They are essentially employees in a vast machine. In British Columbia, billionaire Jimmy Pattison…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I take it my hon. colleague from Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon is persuaded there is enough good in this bill in having a beneficial ownership registry that he will be voting for it. I ask him to comment on how he sees the use of this reducing money laundering, which has been a scandal, particularly in our home province.
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I am going to put the hon. parliamentary secretary out of any sense of suspense over how I will vote on this bill. I will probably vote for it. The reason I waffled was that I was so impressed the other day by the speech from the hon. member for Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, who took us through, as a collective, what it was like to be in committee and to have the evidence from Tran…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I wanted to point out to my friend from Coast of Bays—Central—Notre Dame that there are many things in the Standing Orders that are actually known as rules; they are not guidelines. In the old days, Speakers who found somebody heckling, or violating the Standing Orders in other ways, would throw them out of the chamber for six months or more. This is not censorship; this is called d…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I know this might more properly be a continuation of a point of order, but in response—
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I am much in sympathy with what I have heard from the Conservatives around Bill C-18 to the extent of whether it will solve the problem. I am not hearing us identify the problem of social media outlets like Google and Facebook and the others having eviscerated the news media in this country, not necessarily by putting their content up without paying for it but by actually getting ri…
Read full speech →Statements By Members
Mr. Speaker, as we approach the recess for the summer months, I usually look forward to a time of peace and reflection and to enjoying good weather, but this summer will be different. Due to the baked-in increase in temperatures resulting from our addiction to fossil fuels and our failure to act, we are going to have a rough summer. To all of my colleagues and everyone in their constituencies, I h…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I am very entertained by my hon. colleague's speech, but I was wondering when he might discuss Bill C-18.
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I want to provide an opportunity for my hon. colleague and neighbour from Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke to explain more fully what we are debating today and why we would be better served to debate other issues that we have to resolve in the few days that are left before, we hope, a parliamentary recess will occur, and not because we want to be on vacation but because we need to get some bil…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, I have to say I agree that this debate takes attention away. As my hon. friend from Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke just pointed out, we are debating a concurrence report with which we all agree. This means that we are not really debating the topic at all. We are not talking about victims' rights. The report focuses on specific recommendations, so the debate today, lest anyone be confused, …
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Madam Speaker, I certainly am as disturbed, I think, as anyone in this country about Paul Bernardo's being moved to a medium-security prison, but I do think the hon. parliamentary secretary raises a good point. I am sure the hon. member for Fundy Royal was not the architect of this strategy, but when we have repeated concurrence debates in this place, we certainly do lose time to debate legislatio…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I am very strongly in favour of Bill C-35, but I think we had better not ignore the concerns that we are “Not Done Yet”. That is the title of a report from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, co-authored by economist David Macdonald and Canada's leading champion for early childhood education Martha Friendly. We have child care deserts in this country. We have areas where ch…
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, it is hard to know what to say in the face of the list of what jobs are going to be created. Let me just perhaps talk about the people in British Columbia worried about jobs. The International Longshore and Warehouse Union says that this approval of Roberts Bank threatens jobs because the way the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority wants to operate it is automated. The union thinks it is …
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I am rising tonight in Adjournment Proceedings, at a later time than usual, with it being just about one o'clock in the morning, to follow up on a question I asked in question period on April 27. Just before Earth Day, the Government of Canada approved a massive nature-destroying project, a controversial one that has been fought by British Columbians since 2013 when it was first put f…
Read full speech →Private Members' Business
Mr. Speaker, I cannot imagine there will be a voice opposing the creation of this recognition of the significant contribution of Lebanese Canadians to the life of Canadians. I found it very touching that our hon. colleague was asked to send a video from Nova Scotia home to children in Lebanon. I think the more we improve our ties with that country and welcome the Lebanese diaspora to Canada, the b…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, there is another aspect that is really important. As I have been a climate activist since 1986, it bears mentioning that my biggest carbon footprint is getting to work. I do appreciate a chance not to have to fly. It definitely takes a toll. Jet lag definitely takes a toll and flying is physically exhausting, but I love being here. As far as I am concerned, I am on the freedom 85 plan…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, being able to pick up exactly at this moment with my hon. colleague from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, I do not disagree. I find the notion worrying that, virtually forever, we are going to have a blanket equivalency between participating virtually and participating in person. I do not take it as something that is an automatic modernization or an automatic improvement. Tonight, we …
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, does my hon. friend from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan see no context in which we need to continue to have the availability of hybrid rules? Even with a voting app, without the rules we adopted post-COVID, members of Parliament who were actually dying had to come in here. They had to be physically present at a stage in their private member's bill, and there was no way to do it remot…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I would love to have had a chance to amend the proposed Standing Orders with one change, and I would like the member's thoughts on it, although I do not think we would get a chance in this place unless the government makes the change. If we go with the proposed new Standing Order 15.1, the only condition for participating virtually is that the members participating remotely be in Cana…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I certainly appreciate what the member said about the disadvantages of not being able to meet in person, but I have been here long enough to have watched friends and colleagues, before the days when hybrid was allowed, drag themselves in here literally from their deathbeds to protect their work because there were no rules to allow virtual participation. In particular I remember the ho…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I want to follow up on the point made by the hon. member for Edmonton Strathcona. We should recognize that, when we talk about refugee protections in this place, we are normally talking about protecting people who need to come to Canada. There is an option in this legislation, which is good for humanitarian exceptions, if somebody is otherwise inadmissible but has a profound case fo…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise in this place to add the voice of the Green caucus in saying farewell to the hon. member for Durham, and he exemplifies the term an honourable member. There are a lot of my colleagues in this place. If I were asked when I first met, for example, the hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona, who just spoke, I cannot remember the first time we met. We have known each ot…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, the climate crisis demands of us action that is twofold, first, to end our addiction to fossil fuels so we could avoid the worst and, second, to prepare for what we can no longer avoid. We had an excellent non-partisan briefing from the Minister of Emergency Preparedness for all parties. Today, as I read that California's insurers are no longer prepared to insure for fires and floods,…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. Minister of Justice for tackling the issue of wrongful convictions at long last. The name David Milgaard is one of many. Donald Marshall is another. Unfortunately, systems of justice that put the innocent in jail, despite the moment when they are released and celebrated, and apologies are made, can never make things right again. I appreciate the focus on this.…
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Mr. Speaker, in voting for this bill, would the hon. member also put forward any ideas he has for what we should be doing to protect the lives of women and girls in Afghanistan?
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Mr. Speaker, I am torn about Bill C-41, only to the extent that I understand why some of my NDP colleagues will be voting against it. I will be voting for it. It is urgent that Canada provide the cover for massively needed humanitarian aid and assistance. This is an aspect of what the government claims is a feminist foreign policy. The government in Afghanistan has declared war on its women, and w…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, the member for Cariboo—Prince George and I are in quite strong agreement that we have infrastructure problems in transportation. Here is my view at this point, having been working on these issues, as my hon. colleague has, for quite a while. We created in the 1980s harbour authorities and airport authorities that are arm's length from government and completely unaccountable to anyone.…
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Mr. Speaker, to my dear friend from Cariboo—Prince George, I give my deep sympathies for the struggle he is going through tonight. He has had more than his fair share of health problems in the last year, and this does not seem fair. To his point about access to rail and the farmers who cannot get the railcars needed to ship grain to port, the question for me is this: How is this a problem of over-…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I want to drill down on something that is a widespread assumption without evidence, which is that the private sector is more efficient. I have been tracking what happened to my riding with the backup of freighters, as many as 27 at a time, all up the coast of Vancouver Island, all the way up to Ladysmith and Gabriola. It is very inefficient. Everyone loses. The grain shippers lose. Th…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to Bill C-33, even if it is only in a question for the hon. parliamentary secretary. I have been waiting for this bill to come up for debate. It is a key and critical piece of legislation for people in my community, as I mentioned when I was asking a question of the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay. We have an incredibly frustrating, dangerous, e…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague from Timmins—James Bay for making a number of excellent points about this legislation. From my point of view, coming from another part of the country, one important part of this legislation that needs clarification is what it needs in terms of protecting the Salish Sea from the use of our area as free parking for freighters that are backed up out of…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, we know what climate change looks like on land. We see it. Our forests are burning. We see storms, droughts and floods. We experience it as human beings. However, every single second of every single minute of every single hour of every single day, the energy equivalent to 10 Hiroshima-sized atomic bombs is absorbed by our oceans. Today is World Oceans Day, and it is worth pausing for …
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I thank my dear colleague from the Bloc Québécois and all members of the Bloc for raising this debate today. The federal government's answer is that it is already doing things to protect the climate, but obviously it has yet to reach any of its targets because it is still favourable to new products that come from fossil fuels. We have only to think of the Bay du Nord project, as wel…
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Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague and friend from Repentigny for her speech. She is an extraordinary activist. This is my first opportunity to speak this afternoon. I would like to thank the Bloc Québécois for raising this issue today. It is a good opportunity to have an important debate. I completely agree with the Bloc on this. The Green Party will obviously be voting in favour of the mot…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
With regard to the funds allocated for future Arctic offshore oil and gas development in budget 2023 and the 2016 moratorium on oil and gas activities in Canada’s Arctic waters: (a) what are the details of the proposed funding; and (b) are future Arctic offshore oil and gas developments and an end to the moratorium being considered?
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is right about one thing, which is that climate change is real, but the policies of the current government do not meet the requirements of the moment. We are in a climate emergency. Our eyes are burning in this place. The Ottawa parliamentary bubble has been pierced by the forest fires across this country, yet in this place the debates are inane. Please, will the Pr…
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Madam Speaker, this is a really worthwhile discussion the hon. parliamentary secretary and I are having. Here is the problem, for the answers the Prime Minister, or anybody standing up for the Liberal Party, gives, it is not good enough if we are going to put the planet at risk, continuing the trajectory we are on, which threatens the survival, and this is not hyperbole, of human civilization. We …
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Madam Speaker, as I rise this evening during the Adjournment Proceedings, most of what I want to say about the climate science is that we are running out of time and the hour is late. Both of those things are literally true, as I rise to speak after midnight. I am raising a question that I put to the Prime Minister on March 22 of this year in question period in response to the most recent and sobe…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, my hon. friend from Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon continues to amaze me given how much he is like a Green Party candidate, because it is in our platform that we need workplace child care for all the reasons the member just discussed, which I would love him to expand on. I think Bill C-35 is consistent with putting child care spaces where people can visit their kids throughout the da…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I do know what a dedicated father my hon. friend from Cowichan—Malahat—Langford is. How would he reflect on the availability of early learning and child care on Vancouver Island, particularly in the kinds of areas where we both work and live?
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, following up on that, it is true that at report stage the only amendments that can be brought forward, generally speaking, are deletions. However, certainly the official opposition had a choice of what part of the bill it might want to delete. Is there anything the member can add as to why the choice was made to delete the short title?
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I could not agree more with the member for Winnipeg Centre. I apologize to her for changing to a different topic. However, I think it is critical, and I thought I made it clear in my speech, that we support and respect the child care workers who deliver early learning and child care. Why do we pay CEOs and hockey players more than we pay people doing the most critical job in our soc…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, when I referred to partisan games, I was merely referring to the public statements that have been made by the leader of the official opposition on the intent to gum up this place with as many obstructive tactics as possible. If he did not intend for those comments to apply to this debate on Bill C-35, I apologize to the hon. member. I agree with her. There are many things, as I ment…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I wish I could believe that passing the bill means that a future government will not repeal it. I recall spring 2012 and an omnibus budget bill, Bill C-38, which repealed the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act, repealed the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy Act and gutted the Fisheries Act. There were 70 separate pieces of legislation destroyed in that. I will a…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, it is a great honour to speak in support of Bill C-35 at this time. I could not agree more with some of the members who spoke before me, such as the member for Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill and the Bloc Québécois member for Shefford, who gave a great speech. I always appreciate my colleagues' efforts. Despite the fact that it is late, I would like to give my opinion on this bill. …
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