Parliamentary Speeches

Mr. Speaker, on the evening of August 7, when the Bald Range wildfire ignited and spread with frightening speed, brave firefighters and first responders put their lives on the line to keep us safe and to protect our lives, our homes and our communities. Within hours, the entire community of Summerland was evacuated. Thousands of evacuees poured into Penticton, many with little more than the shirts on their backs. Citizens opened up their homes, served meals and handed out water. Comfort centres opened for families who had lost everything, but in that darkness, we saw courage and compassion. we thank the firefighters, first responders, volunteers and every neighbour who stepped forward for showing us, in the face of disaster, how much we all mean to each other.

Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour to rise in the House to represent the great residents of Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay. Their words and their feedback will always guide me in this chamber, as they do in this debate on Bill C-38. For rural and remote communities like the one I represent, driving is a fact of life. It is not a choice. When I checked GasBuddy before coming to the House today, I found that regular gas was priced as high as $2.09 per litre and diesel was $2.95 a litre. Whether someone lives in Tulameen, Princeton, Keremeos, Cawston, Osoyoos, Rock Creek, Midway, Greenwood, Grand Forks, Christina Lake or Castlegar, a basic fact of life is that they drive, which means that almost everyone is paying high prices at the pump. The journey I just described across my riding is 360 kilometres. Unlike the urban regions of the country that many Liberal colleagues across from me represent, there is no SkyTrain. There is no subway, no LimeBike and no e-scooter that my constituents can turn to and travel across our riding in. Transportation costs are also affected by high gas prices. These costs then transfer to nearly every item on store shelves. Keeping prices down at the pump, as we have been speaking about for the past year, means keeping prices down on essential items at Walmart, Canadian Tire and Safeway. This is true not just for my constituents, but for anyone across the country who lives in a remote or rural region, from island communities to our Arctic territories. This is why, since the spring, my colleagues and I on this side of the House have been arguing that at a time of higher gas prices, the result of both conflict abroad and policy decisions at home, it was of the utmost importance for all members of Parliament to act to reduce the price of gas where we can do so. No one is pretending it can or should magically fall to zero, but providing tax relief at the pump is the least we can do when so many Canadians are in need. It is no coincidence that the lack of an affordable life is the number one thing I heard from my constituents this summer. I am guessing everyone else heard the same thing while they were in their ridings this summer. Of course, there were other issues, including health care, tariffs and wildfires. In my region, as many know, wildfires hit Summerland and the Penticton area tremendously. This was obviously what people talked about, but gas prices were very important because they have skyrocketed 25.7%, while overall energy costs have surged 16%. This pushed transportation costs up 7% while grocery prices rose 3%. A recent poll found that 63% of Canadians oppose the Liberals bringing back the fuel excise tax, including 43% who strongly oppose it. This includes 72% of seniors, 68% of women and 61% of those aged 35 to 54. Opposition crosses every region of the country: 71% in Manitoba and Saskatchewan; 64% in British Columbia, Alberta and Atlantic Canada; 62% in Ontario; and 60% in Quebec. Everyone is opposed to this tax, in other words. There is no reason the House cannot deliver for them. When the Liberals offered what they called summer gas tax relief, it was clear that what they were offering was not only insufficient, but very confusing. When I asked government members about this policy, they made no commitment to it beyond the summer, and the member for Delta also made it sound like the policy was meant to help people explore our home province and go camping. While I did have the opportunity to see much of my beautiful province this summer, it was not cheap to do so. In fact, I know several British Columbians who cancelled road trips and hunting expeditions this summer because the cost was too much and the price of gas was too high. Those costs will only rise as the snow starts to fall. That is why my colleagues and I were clear on the need for an extension to the gas tax relief so it could go further and for longer than just the summer until Labour Day. The bill before us today is because of those efforts, stopping what would have been a punishing tax hike at the pumps just this month. The Liberals' rosy rhetoric has not matched what Canadians are seeing in their wallets or on their bank statements. They cannot afford higher taxes. Thanks to Conservatives keeping up the fight for affordability, Canadians will keep more money in their pockets when they are filling up at the gas station this month, but we can go further. We can improve the bill before us. Bill C-38, as it is currently written, would suspend the fuel tax until January 31, 2027. Half the tax would return on February 1 and the full tax on April 1. Is the Liberal government predicting that Canadians will not be challenged by the costs at the grocery store, by their heating bills or by the price of the pump by April 1? Is everything going to change by then? I do not believe the Liberals have invented that kind of crystal ball, so why time-limit the relief people need? Why reimpose taxes they are currently recognizing as unnecessary? The Liberals have filled their treasury with unnecessary taxes and fees from Canadians' pockets. They have wasted far more tax dollars than we need in order to fund health care, road repairs or national defence properly. Canadians should not have to pay more for Liberal waste. The Minister of Finance himself said that truckers, farmers, home builders and delivery drivers benefit from fuel tax relief. Would they not benefit more if the government extended this relief to Canada next year, as we are calling for? Would they not benefit by permanently eliminating some of the government's gas taxes at the pump, as Conservatives are calling for? Of course, the only reason to allow gas taxes to go higher is that the government would choose to prioritize raising taxes instead of providing limited relief. Removing all federal taxes on gas and diesel, including the fuel excise tax, is what we are calling for. Eliminating costly fuel taxes like the fuel standard tax permanently would help keep prices lower. The Liberal government does not need more of Canadians' gas tax dollars for wasteful boutique projects like Alto rail, which will cost Canadians $60 billion to $90 billion in its life cycle. Instead of forcing families of four in my community to spend between $8,000 and $9,000 on eastern Canadian priorities, they want to see their gas tax dollars spent on efficient local infrastructure, like a secondary route for the South Okanagan to Kelowna, which we have been calling for for years. Conservatives support the Liberals' half measures like those in Bill C-38 if it means Canadians can get some savings, but we will be pushing for more. The legislation has the potential to provide more relief for longer, but only if we amend it. I hope all colleagues in the House can work together to do just that.

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives have been pushing to make life more affordable. When we have packages of bills that come at us or policies that come at us that do not make sense, of course we are not going to accept every one. We need Canadians' lives to be more affordable. We have been pushing for lower taxes on gasoline everywhere, but in a riding like mine, where it is a seven- to eight-hour drive from end to end, one can understand why Canadians or why the people in my riding need to have gas prices go down. That is what we have been pushing for since last year.

Mr. Speaker, obviously this is a temporary fix. I do not think there is anyone in the House or anyone in Canada right now who thinks that life is going to be a lot more affordable by April, when this tax relief is due to end in the bill. We need to look at the long run here. This is going to be a tough winter. This is going to be very difficult in my riding. In particular, as many members know, many people in my riding have suffered through the recent wildfire disasters. Our tourism has hit, unfortunately, rock bottom right now, because of the fires during our big tourist season. It is not just in my riding. Throughout Canada, we are going through a very difficult time, and we are going to need relief far beyond this April.

Mr. Speaker, today I am presenting an e-petition with over 800 signatures on a very serious subject, which is cases involving high-risk federal offenders convicted of intimate partner violence. The petitioners ask that they would have to wear an active GPS electronic monitoring system, including either geofencing or exclusion zone enforcement where appropriate, which would provide a more effective means of supervising compliance with release conditions and enhancing victim safety. I have heard about this over and over again from my constituents, and I know everyone sitting here today also has. I hope this will bring notice to the fact that people need to feel safe. They should not have to sign a petition like this, but it is extremely necessary, and I am proud to present this today.

Mr. Speaker, we need to hear from the chair of the health committee as to why he cancelled tomorrow's meeting. Hundreds of millions of health care dollars remain unaccounted for in the $300‑million PrescribeIT scandal. Why? It is because Liberal MPs keep turning off the cameras at the health committee. They turned off the cameras again yesterday. Canadians will not know what was said there for 30 years. Will the chair of the health committee tell Canadians today why he cancelled tomorrow's meeting, blocking Parliament from investigating PrescribeIT?

Mr. Speaker, I rise to table a petition brought forward by a passionate group of residents in my community who remain deeply concerned that our laws continue to fail to safeguard the victims of intimate partner violence. Most situations of intimate partner violence begin with patterns of behaviour that involve severe mental, emotional and psychological abuse, yet our justice system and our police system too often fail to recognize this abuse and to intervene before the violence begins. The petitioners are asking us to look at legislation criminalizing this behaviour in the U.K., Ireland and Australia. They would like the Government of Canada to amend the Criminal Code to criminalize targeted mental and emotional abuse. They are also asking for changes to be reflected in our bail and judicial system, as well as in law enforcement training, so we can recognize and investigate this abuse.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to the motion as it relates to the Liberal government's spring economic statement. It may be the spring season that prompted the Liberals to use this update to paint a rosy picture of our economy, but the reality on the ground is that the real and non-partisan numbers show a stark picture for residents in my community, especially among working families and struggling seniors. The economic statement shows spending continuing to rise rapidly and no binding fiscal anchors. The growing deficit will only worsen as the Liberal government borrows more against the national debt. Debt service costs are rising rapidly, eating up more of each tax dollar than total spending on health care or defence. The fact is, Canada's economy has entered a recession. That is not a political talking point but an agreed economic viewpoint for decades. Any period in which our economy sees two consecutive quarters of declining GDP is widely called a recession. This has been a mantra of economic statistics for decades. If others want to fight over the difference between a recession and a technical recession, the fact remains that there is nothing technical about a weak economy, as the Governor of the Bank of Canada described it just last week. A weak economy is what we see in 2026, when 112,000 more Canadians are out of work in just the first four months of this year and where, by per-person GDP, Canadians still have a lower standard of living than they did in 2022. Worsening signs like this for Canadian household finances are, sadly, not hard to come by. Household savings fell to the lowest level in two years, with Canada having the highest household debt in the G7 by far. Statistics Canada found that Canadian household debt has outstripped income for six consecutive quarters. Equifax reported that insolvency volumes increased to levels not seen since 2009, up nearly 19% year over year. There are 1.5 million Canadians who have missed a debt payment in the first three months of this year alone, with mortgage delinquency rates climbing 32% year over year. The Prime Minister promised us he would build the fastest-growing economy in the G7, yet we are alone among the G7 in having our economy shrink in three of the last four quarters. Promises to build quickly and build big to fortify the Canadian economy, through measures like the major projects act, a bill that I voted for, have not come to pass. Canada has neither designated nor started a single major economic project to fast-track a year after we passed that legislation. Instead, years of Liberal laws creating burdensome regulations, high taxes and persistent large-budget deficits have all made it increasingly expensive for businesses to invest in Canada. I understand that many want to hold on to the belief that the rosy picture the Prime Minister paints of the country is accurate, but looking at his peers outside politics, we see the real story. The Prime Minister's own choice for the non-partisan Parliamentary Budget Officer said that the Liberals' deficits are billions higher than they claim. She showed that promises to reduce government spending are not reflected in rising personal costs, which will also increase by billions of dollars over the next several years. She showed that the government's revenue forecasts will fall short because of expected weaker wages and slower salary growth in a worsening economy. Lastly, she said the government's fiscal plan has a 1% chance of meeting its fiscal anchor to reduce the deficit-to-GDP ratio each year. As someone who knows balance sheets in both the private and public sectors, I can say that if a fiscal plan showed only a 1% chance of succeeding, any small business or local government would be revising the plan. Instead, the Liberal government moves forward with more spending and more debt, which will only result in more taxes and more inflation. These are the national figures, but I would like to take a moment to focus on how these national trends are causing real tension in communities like mine in Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay. A real and growing consequence of higher-than-average unemployment, sluggish wages and food inflation is that more people are turning to local food banks. No one should ever be ashamed of turning to food banks, but government should be ashamed of the worsening affordability crisis pushing more workers, more seniors and groups that have historically not availed themselves of food banks to use their services for the very first time in their lives. The government's allocated funding for food banks is insufficient. It will not curb the worsening affordability curve. We have seen that it is pushing these groups toward food bank services. The Liberal government has overseen the worst rise in food bank use in a generation, surpassing levels during the 2008 financial crisis and the height of COVID-19, and rural Canada is really suffering. The amazing volunteers I recently met with at the Boundary Community Food Bank told me that they have seen a 73% increase in demand for their services since 2020, with 25% of their regular clients having only applied within the last year and 20% of their clients working full- or part-time. They told me that they now see over 100 seniors from within this little community needing their services each month, and this is just in the Boundary. It does not cover the Kootenays, the Similkameen, the South Okanagan or Penticton. Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay has one of the oldest demographics in Canada. Seniors used to be the demographic most likely to donate to food banks. They were more likely to fill out a volunteer form than to apply for a food hamper. That is now changing rapidly. This increased turn for our seniors is leaving them financially vulnerable and less able to participate in their own communities as much as they once did. This is a huge loss. Volunteers at community events have traditionally been older, partially because they had a little more in their bank accounts to fill an extra tank of gas for volunteer driving, for buying extra hamburgers or hot dogs, or for giving a little more of their day. After speaking with people in my region, and after speaking with colleagues from across the country, I feel that seniors are increasingly unable to volunteer because of the cost of living. Over the last few years in my region, we have seen the loss of community events, such as those in the community of Penticton. In the last few years, we have lost Ironman, the Pentastic Jazz Fest, Ribfest and Okanagan Granfondo. Service clubs, which in the past were made up of seniors volunteering, are dwindling. It is impacting the entire community as a whole, and many seniors who are facing a financial crunch are considering even more dire options than simply not volunteering. My office has heard from too many seniors who have exhausted their benefits and drained their savings and are inquiring into the terms of an application for MAID. It is a horrifying thought that, in Canada, the financial burden being carried by seniors should have them think that the best option is to end their life early, not on medical grounds but because of a harshly rising cost of living. This symbolizes an unaffordable Canada none of us should accept. Unfortunately, the spring economic update shows us little change in course to restore an affordable Canada for workers, families and seniors. I move, seconded by the member for Oshawa: That the amendment be amended, in paragraph (b), by replacing the words “paragraphs (b) to (f)” with the words “paragraphs (b) and (d) to (f)”.

Mr. Speaker, as my colleague may know, health spending is extremely important to me. I sit on the Standing Committee on Health right now. I agree that there are certain places where we need an increase in health spending, but we have to make sure that it is spent properly. We cannot spend any more on infrastructure or buildings for which we need to hire more and more bureaucracy. We need to spend it on boots on the ground. We need more doctors. We need more nurses. We need more MRI machines. We need things that would help people actually have a doctor. Thousands of people in my riding alone do not have a doctor.

Mr. Speaker, that is an excellent question. It is obvious. Anyone who runs a business knows that, if something costs more, they are going to have to charge more. It is not even advanced economics. People all over who have small businesses know that it is common sense. Yes, we need to take away the red tape. We need to lower taxes. We need to take away taxes such as the industrial carbon tax. Especially in my riding, which is extremely rural, any time it costs more to transport goods to a grocery store, the owner of that store is going to have to charge more for that product.

Mr. Speaker, 300 million tax dollars were wasted on PrescribeIT. Liberal members of the health committee have refused every request to answer why or how. The Minister of Health and the CEO must testify. Canadians want to know how their tax dollars were wasted on this boondoggle. Will the Liberal minister agree it is time to stop the secrets, keep the cameras on and investigate PrescribeIT in public?

Mr. Speaker, I would take that member more seriously if she did not keep turning the cameras off and voting to seal committee records for 30 years when we call for an audit. Conservatives have been clear that we will work through the summer to get a full accounting on $300 million wasted on PrescribeIT, but they must leave the cameras on. Canadians want to know: Will they hear about PrescribeIT on Tuesday or will the Liberal parliamentary secretary turn the cameras off again?

Mr. Speaker, I am tabling a couple of petitions from Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, which I am honoured to represent. The first petition has to do with rural transit, which is vital in our communities. The petitioners are concerned that the Government of Canada's rural transit solutions fund has invested in bus transit feasibility studies in rural Ontario and Alberta, but Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay has been poorly served by the loss of Greyhound buses in 2018, and there is no transit service available for residents that they can rely on. Transport Canada is owner and operator of the Penticton Airport. Many times, airports are being utilized across the country as hubs for bus services, so the petitioners are asking that we establish in their communities a rural transit options service for residents and communities in Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay and to declare that Penticton Airport be available for private busing operators who wish to utilize it as a passenger hub.

Mr. Speaker, the second petition relates to the Government of Canada's gun buyback plan. The Liberals call it a gun buyback plan, but it is obviously not working. It should be focused on gun violence and illegal guns being smuggled, from the United States in particular. We have six border crossings in our riding, so one can imagine that residents are very concerned about smuggled guns, as everyone member of the House is. Instead, right now, the plan places new burdens on law-abiding firearms owners, who already follow some of the strictest rules in the world for owning firearms. The program is expected to cost more than $700 million. Therefore, the petitioners are asking that the Government of Canada scrap what it calls the gun buyback program, and focus on border security, stopping illegal gun smuggling and going after real criminals, rather than targeting responsible gun owners in Canada.

Mr. Speaker, before I begin, I want to give a quick shout-out and congratulations to the kids at Penticton Secondary School, who recently raised, if members can believe it, $80,000 for the Canadian Cancer Society's Relay for Life with the help of Princess Margaret Secondary, Summerland Secondary and many other local organizations, businesses and community members. I congratulate these great kids, and the best news is that people can still donate, at cancer.ca. I want to start with a simple question. Why does a physician in this country have to fill out the same paperwork for the same drug, for the same condition, over and over again, while their patients wait? That is the problem the bill is trying to solve, and it is a real problem. According to Health Canada's own records, obtained through Order Paper Question No. 1104, the special access program has received over 148,000 requests since 2015. Last year alone, nearly 12,000 requests came through. Many of these are repeat applications for drugs that Canadian clinicians have been successfully requesting for years. These are therapies that are well established and approved by regulators, with real-world track records behind them, yet the system treats every single one as if it is the first time anyone has ever asked. A physician who has prescribed the same therapy for the same rare condition 10 times must submit a fresh application for patient number 11. They fill out the forms, they wait, they answer Health Canada's follow-up questions, and they wait some more. According to the government's own written response to questions tabled in this House, the average processing time for a special access program request is 4.65 days. That might not sound like that much, but the longest processing time on record was 1,641 days. For patients with serious and emergency needs, even a few days of unnecessary delay can mean permanent, irreversible harm. The Canadian Organization for Rare Disorders has put numbers to what this costs. Only 60% of rare disease treatments reach Canada at all. Most arrive up to six years after patients in the United States and Europe have access to them. This is the broken system that Bill C-265 is trying to address. The bill would direct the Minister of Health to establish a standing pre-approved list of non-marketed therapeutic products for serious or life-threatening conditions. Physicians could prescribe directly from that list without starting from scratch every time. Products would be eligible based on prior special access program authorization, a clean safety record or current approval by a recognized foreign regulator. An expert advisory committee would be consulted on the list. However, who those experts would be is not defined. I want to acknowledge the member for Thunder Bay—Rainy River for his work on this. He has approached it collaboratively and with genuine intent. His background as a physician gives him first-hand understanding of just how much time Canadian doctors waste on repetitive administrative processes. Conservatives will support sending this bill to committee, where we will work to address our concerns. My colleague from Riding Mountain raised these concerns before, but I will raise them again. Our first concern is the presumption of approval when two specialist clinicians submit a joint treatment plan. The problem is that the bill places no requirements on these two clinicians to be independent of each other or independent of the treating practitioner. There is nothing in the legislation to prevent the second opinion from coming from a colleague in the same clinic, a supervisor, a business partner or even a family member. A second opinion is only meaningful if it is genuinely independent. Our second concern is the absence of any exclusion of controlled substances from the pre-approved list. In 2013, Conservative health minister Rona Ambrose took special action to restrict the special access program after it was used to approve access to pharmaceutical heroin for patients with chronic addiction. Those restrictions were deliberate and warranted. The Trudeau government later dismantled them. As currently drafted, Bill C-265 would give the Minister of Health the authority to place substances like dangerous hard drugs directly onto a pre-approved list, from which any qualifying practitioner could order them without individual case-by-case review. We have watched the government use every lever available to it to normalize and expand access to hard drugs under the banner of harm reduction. Conservatives are not going to support legislation that would create another pathway for that agenda. The bill's own sponsor has said that diversion of these substances must be prevented. We take him at his word, and we will hold him to it at committee with an explicit amendment to exclude hard drugs from the scope of the pre-approved list. Our third concern involves who gets to nominate products for the pre-approved list. As written, the bill would allow not just licensed practitioners but also pharmacists, hospitals and medical non-profit organizations to submit products for inclusion. The term “medical non-profit organization” is nowhere defined in the legislation. When my colleague from Riding Mountain asked the government in an Order Paper question to tell us how many special access program requests were made, broken down by requester category, whether practitioners, pharmacists, hospitals or non-profit organizations, Health Canada told us that this information is not centrally tracked. That is not good. The government cannot even tell the House who is submitting these applications, and now we are being asked to expand the nomination criteria to include an undefined class of organizations with no meaningful guardrails. That appears like an open door that can be abused. Conservatives will propose amendments to restrict nomination rights to licensed practitioners who use the special access program in their day-to-day clinical work. There is a broader point worth making also. The health minister has had every opportunity to reform how this program operates currently and has not done so. Bill C-265 would offer some relief but would not fix the underlying problem. What it would do, if strengthened at committee, is reduce the repetitive administrative burden on physicians, provide a clear and faster pathway to proven therapies for patients who have no other options and do so without opening new doors to hard drugs or creating a regulatory bypass for pharmaceutical manufacturers. If amendments are accepted, the legislation would make a meaningful difference for Canadians who are waiting for treatments that already exist and are already proven. They have waited long enough.

Mr. Speaker, housing is so important right now in Canada. We cannot waste the moment by building more bureaucracy, more talking and not doing. For example, Build Canada Homes is another bureaucracy. In Penticton, housing is getting so expensive. In Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, multiple communities in my huge riding have applied for the housing accelerator fund in the last few years. Not one of them has gotten it. Why would we build another bureaucracy when that is not working?

Mr. Speaker, despite handing 300 million tax dollars over to Canada Health Infoway for the government's failed PrescribeIT project, we can see that the Liberals have no interest in finding out why or how this money was wasted. The Liberals have voted down every attempt to get the answers. The Conservatives have been clear. We will work through the summer to get to the bottom of this. Canadians want to hear the minister and the former CEO provide testimony. Will the minister tell her Liberal colleagues to end their obstruction and get to the bottom of this scandal?

Mr. Speaker, I always learn so much whenever my colleague stands in the House. I am hearing constantly from the people in my riding that they are struggling with basic needs, like putting food on the table. I know I am not the only one. I am sure every MP in this room right now, every MP who was elected in the last year, feels the same thing. We know from the data that there is a recession. We know there are issues in Canada, but the Liberals keep denying that anything is wrong. What does my colleague think is the danger of denying issues like this when they are so blatant? I know the Liberals are hearing the same things we are hearing. What is the danger of denial?

Mr. Speaker, my colleague's speech really hit home for me, coming from rural B.C. Not many people would call Kelowna rural, but it is just north of me, and it has the highest unemployment rate now in the country, at over 9%. Then that filters down to all the areas around it, including my riding. I am hearing from constituents constantly about exactly what the member talked about. They are having trouble putting food on the table, and it is a real thing. We are not stirring the pot; it is actually a real thing. I am hearing about it in my office constantly. I am seeing it at the food banks. What is the danger of denying that there is a problem in our country? What is the danger of the Liberals continuing to deny this?

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals are denying Canadians transparency on the $300 million that was wasted on PrescribeIT. At the health committee, they turned off the cameras, shut down meetings and blocked the minister from testifying. Conservatives are prepared to work through the summer to get to the bottom of this scandal. Why are the Liberals blocking the health committee from investigating this $300-million PrescribeIT failure?

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the ability to speak today on Bill C-240. This touches my heart, because I would imagine that for all MPs sitting in this room, no matter where they are sitting today, their lives have changed and their communities have changed. I know all Canadian cities have changed, including all communities in the Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay riding. I want to speak a bit about the city I live in. Penticton is a beautiful city. It is a place where people have always wanted to come to vacation, and possibly even retire, if they reach that point in their lives and have saved up enough money, because, of course, our housing is expensive, like it is in many communities. Unfortunately, our city, like so many, is filled with chaos right now. I hope everyone here knows they can go and enjoy the city and enjoy the area, but there is chaos because crime rates are skyrocketing. In fact, it was announced last week by our first responders that overdose rates in Penticton increased by nearly 500% in the first quarter of 2026 compared to the first quarter of 2025. This was reported by our fire department. Imagine what being a first responder in Penticton is like right now, when all they are doing is constantly going out to calls and trying to bring people back to life. Imagine how difficult it would be for them psychologically to not fight fires, like they were trained to. We do not have a lot of fires anymore, except for quite a few that are caused by people who are homeless and on the streets. Instead, our first responders are constantly going out and injecting people with some type of drug to try to bring them back to life. Sometimes they are successful and sometimes they are not. It has ruined our community and our most vulnerable people, who are those are on drugs and living on our streets. It has also ruined our community for many vulnerable people, as we have a very large senior community. Going back to Bill C-240, the bill aims to amend the Criminal Code to empower judges to prescribe structured rehabilitation programs for individuals whose offences stem from circumstances that can be addressed through skills development, education and recovery as part of a holistic healing process. It is important to know that in Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay, which is a very big riding in the B.C. interior, there is not one detox bed available. In fact, as a city councillor, a couple of years ago, I was given a presentation by leaders in the community who were addressing this issue. I asked them a question. If someone were to come into our city council meeting right then and say, “I am a drug addict. I want help. I want to go back to my family”, how long would it take for that person to get into a detox bed or a rehab bed? By the way, this was in public. Members can look this up from the City of Penticton's council meeting two years ago. They told the city council that it would take two years for that person to be given any type of detox bed or any type of rehabilitation. They also said it would not be in our huge riding. They would have to leave the community in two years and go to another community to get help. We all know what would happen in those two years. I am sure I will get letters saying, “No, it's not two years.” Maybe it has gotten better, and hopefully it has, but it would still be at least half that time. We need to give people the ability to go back to their families, and we also need to keep people behind bars who are not safe for our communities. Some of the residents I represent are afraid of even going to the grocery store anymore to shop because there are erratic people walking down the aisles. There has been a huge issue, obviously, since the pilot project to decriminalize drugs in B.C. That was a great experiment put together by the Liberal government and the NDP provincial government. I would like to ask everyone in this great room today, would they like to try that decriminalization project? Let us just see what might happen. British Columbia has the most deaths from fentanyl in the world now. The genie is out of the bottle now. Sure, the decriminalization project has been declared over, but we have not found out the complete chaos that was caused by it; the numbers are not out yet. That will happen, and we will bring them, hopefully, before the Standing Committee on Health, which I sit on, and get the complete numbers, but do we really need them? We all know that thousands and thousands of people have died in British Columbia from that project. I do not see anyone representing any other province wanting to come forward and try it for their communities. I want to thank MP DeRidder, who—

Excuse me, Mr. Speaker. I thank the MP for bringing forward this bill, and I want to quote her. She said Bill C-240 “would empower courts to prescribe structured rehabilitation measures, including education, skills training and treatment programs, to be undertaken during custody. These are not soft-on-crime measures. They are smart-on-recovery interventions.” We have to give people the opportunity to go back to their families. I was given a tour, as a city councillor a couple of years ago, of the penitentiary in my riding, the Okanagan Correctional Centre. At that time, the warden told us city councillors that it was 25% full. We have one of the highest crime rates, in Penticton and area, in all of B.C., per capita, and our correctional centre is only 25% full. The leaders in the community, the mayors of all the cities in the valley, have sent a letter to the province asking to use that correctional centre for exactly what the MP for Kitchener Centre is asking for: to provide rehabilitation measures, education, skills training and treatment, to give these people a chance to go back out in the world and back to their families, if they are able. If they cannot, if they are dangerous people, as we know there are, then they should not be released as they have been. This bill would also allow court-ordered rehabilitation measures for offenders. I believe everyone in this great hall knows that people get to a point in their drug use where there is no going back. I want to thank, again, the MP for bringing this forward, and I hope everyone here votes to support it.

Mr. Speaker, my colleague mentioned that he is knocking on doors and that his constituents are talking about lower grocery costs, making our streets safer, lower taxes and more affordable housing. I am hearing that at the doors also. I am sure all of us are hearing some of the same things, at least. Why does the member think the Liberals would create this bill that is basically ignoring what Canadians are really asking for?

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to an issue of great concern to every British Columbian, which is the impact of the B.C. Supreme Court decision in Cowichan Tribes v. Canada and its effect on private property rights across British Columbia. It is the first time in Canada's history that a court has declared aboriginal title over non-Crown lands, privately owned lands. There are 150 private landowners, farmers, homeowners and business owners in Richmond who discovered that their titles were now in conflict with aboriginal title designation. This is not a matter of reconciliation. It is a matter of confusion. It creates tension. It does not create a path forward. The Business Council of British Columbia conducted a survey of its members on the current uncertainty regarding B.C. property rights and found that 98% of respondents are very concerned. They are not a little concerned, but very concerned. We have already seen financing for job-created projects, including those for indigenous communities, pull back. Reconciliation remains the goal of every British Columbian I speak with, whether they have called their province home for a few years or for a few millennia. Let us not forget that our indigenous peoples own a huge swath of private property in British Columbia. They too are left in confusion by Cowichan. Our province wants to prove that the stewardship of British Columbia's many indigenous communities, both on their lands and in many projects of prosperity they are engaged in, can be a model for the nation. What we are not calling for today is for the government to appeal this decision, as it has already, and rightly, said it will do so. What we are asking for is that the federal government engage with British Columbians straightforwardly throughout what will likely be a long judicial process. We ask it to engage with British Columbians who are confused as to whether their private property is still theirs in full and whether their property rights, long an ancient feature of our legal traditions stretching back centuries, are still theirs. We ask it to decry those who use an error of the court to spread hate, and we seek to understand those who do not know if the home, business or property in their name will remain theirs. The decisions of the courts will not be swift. Uncertainty will persist so long as Ottawa remains in court and Victoria remains deadlocked. A very real and local example of this uncertainty is occurring in my riding in the community of Okanagan Falls.

Mr. Speaker, gas prices across Canada remain higher than they need to be, not just because of the war in Iran but because of unnecessary federal taxes. The last time a barrel of oil cost $100 was in 2014 under a Conservative government, and gas prices never reached their current levels. In Penticton and Oliver, gas prices are now two dollars a litre, with communities like Castlegar, Grand Forks, Osoyoos and Princeton over $1.90 a litre. We need to offer real relief for longer. Our Conservative plan would scrap all federal gas taxes, the excise tax, GST and the fuel standard tax, for the rest of 2026. We would pay for this by ending Liberal waste, like their gun-grab program. Uncertainty abroad does not mean Canada cannot be affordable and strong at home.

Mr. Speaker, a very real and local example of this growing uncertainty is occurring in my riding in the community of Okanagan Falls, whose narrow vote last year to incorporate as a municipality is now being re-evaluated as a whole community. From the decision-making powers of the town council to the municipality's actual name, uncertainty persists because of the title changes brought about by the B.C. government, which now risk serious consequences across the nation. When people of the community of Okanagan Falls, which is 100 years old, no longer know and are waiting to be told what the name of their community they voted to incorporate will be, that is a sign of poor consultation brought on by an error-ridden provincial government. While our motion today is focused on the federal government, I join with my local and provincial representatives in encouraging Victoria to engage fully with every resident and neighbour in the beautiful community of Okanagan Falls with respect to the future of the community. As for the government across from me, Conservatives are calling for a common-sense approach that keeps the federal government involved with British Columbians throughout the entire legal process. We are calling on the government to put private property first in the Cowichan case at the Department of Justice. Statements by Liberal MPs in the House are not the same as the direction they have provided to their public lawyers, who argued and lost in the Cowichan decision because of that. Litigation guideline number 14 from “Attorney General of Canada's Directive on Civil Litigation Involving Indigenous Peoples” prevented the federal government from defending property rights in the Cowichan case, as many Canadian lawyers have pointed out. This is what the Cowichan decision itself said at paragraph 2096: “Canada initially pled extinguishment but abandoned its reliance on this defence in its amended response to civil claim filed November 22, 2018.” What is called the “principle of extinguishment”, that the Crown's creation of fee simple title supersedes historical indigenous title, was the legal argument on which Canadian governments rested their defence of private property historically, under both Liberal and Conservative attorneys general. It does not cancel any existing treaties. It simply upholds the property rights created through Canadian history, particularly in the last century of property division in British Columbia. It was our best line of defence for property rights, but the Attorney General's guidelines limited its use. The federal government itself has also created confusion on the intersection of title claims with its own Musqueam Rights Recognition Agreement, which fails to say anything definitive about fee simple property rights, a dangerous precedent going into its appeal. Until the Cowichan case is resolved, it is clear that the federal government should be negotiating the defence of private property rights into its agreements with our first nations. It is not that first nations are trying to take private property. They are not. It is that legal agreements create precedents that could cause greater problems in the decades ahead. This creation of legal grey areas is how we got to the Cowichan decision. It should not be continued in agreements like the Musqueam agreement. Legal matters are never simply aspirational. They are law. That is why we on this side of the House are also calling for the Liberal government to publish a plan within 30 days to protect property rights for Canadians affected by the Cowichan decision and the Musqueam agreement, and appoint a special committee with the mandate to study all legal, constitutional and political steps that can be taken to protect property rights in Canada. This should be a multi-party committee that would hold multiple meetings over the next several weeks to hear from legal experts and to develop advice to be published in an interim report by the summer, with a full report to follow later. Both sides of the House feature people of great legal talent, many of whom are indigenous and many more who are familiar with indigenous law. There is no reason they cannot provide the government with clear advice before we rise for the summer. Canada is not required in international law to pursue reconciliation. We have our own law, and our own lawmakers in the House who wish to find common ground, equal rights and shared prosperity. Section 35 of our Constitution already recognizes and affirms existing aboriginal and treaty rights of the aboriginal people of Canada. No one pretends this framework is perfect, but it is our framework, built and improved by all Canadians. Few nations around the world maintain this kind of legal framework with indigenous peoples. It is a process of ever-greater improvement, but to maintain it we need all parties, such as the Crown, first nation leaders and everyday Canadians, who are extremely worried right now, to sit in a common understanding of how we will proceed and how we will recognize the rights of land, property and consultation. Let us maintain it as legislators of Canadian law. Setting aspirational goals aligned with UN resolutions in our laws does not serve anyone. Real Canadian law and real Canadian reconciliation can serve everyone fairly.

Mr. Speaker, as I said, first nation leaders, the Crown and everyday Canadians all need to sit at a table in order to proceed. What I do not understand is how the member can say there is not a problem. I know that I am getting calls and emails, and I am getting people knocking on our door wondering if they are still going to own their property in the next little while. I know that the member who just spoke is not from British Columbia, but this is a Canadian issue that needs to be addressed immediately.

Mr. Speaker, that is a really good question. Liberals have shut down all communication. Everything we have tried to bring forward to committee has been shut down. I know it is not a good idea to keep pretending the issue is minor, or that somehow Conservatives are stirring the pot and making people scared. Again, how is it that the government does not realize people are scared about the future of their property rights? They are scared to develop. They are scared to invest in Canada right now.

Mr. Speaker, it is exactly what my colleague said. The government members are burying their head in the sand, pretending this is not something that could grow into something we will not be able to address farther down the road. We need to get together, as I mentioned in my speech. There are a lot of people on all sides of the House who have great experience, legal experience and indigenous experience. We have lawyers on both sides who can look at this and make sure. We need to be leaders. We need to show people they do not need to be frightened, because we are going to do something about this.

Mr. Speaker, Canadians need answers on how the Liberals burned $300 million on their failed PrescribeIT program, money that could have been spent on other health care needs. Just last week, the Liberals moved to shut off the cameras at the health committee, sealing the records of that meeting for 30 years. Yesterday, the Liberals shut down the health committee to prevent the minister from testifying. Why is the Liberals' $300‑million PrescribeIT failure being hidden from Canadians?

Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to speak about a scandal that is only growing in size, complexity and cost to taxpayers. The Liberals' PrescribeIT was launched in 2016, promising to put every prescription in Canada into a digital system, allowing our pharmacies to move off their reliance on fax machines. At least $300 million in taxpayer dollars was spent in the following decade in pursuit of this goal. The result was complete failure. This taxpayer-funded boondoggle failed to fill even 5% of all prescriptions and cannot be shown to have replaced a single fax machine. It is now being shut down entirely, with the few partners who used it now likely to have to find someone who can reinstall a fax machine in 2026. Canada did not invent e-prescription services. Health care systems and private firms around the world have upgraded their prescription systems from fax machines to serve doctors, pharmacists and patients better. We did not have to reinvent the wheel. Only in Canada and only under the Liberal government could yet another government-funded IT project create absolutely nothing of benefit to Canadians. It is another ArriveCAN, except with an even higher price tag for taxpayers. In the time that I have spent in the House and on the health committee, it has become apparent to me how much better $300 million could have been spent on our health care system. It could have gone toward health transfers to British Columbia, to hire dozens more doctors, nurses and specialists, especially for rural regions like mine that suffer constant closures of many of our emergency rooms for lack of staff. It could have gone toward treatment beds, to give people with addiction in my province a path to recovery. Instead, it was hundreds of millions handed off to a quasi-governmental agency, Canada Health Infoway, in partnership with Telus, with nothing to show for it and the vast majority of the IP created left in private hands rather than the public interest. This disastrous waste of taxpayer money on the Liberals' $300-million PrescribeIT deserves a full investigation but Conservative attempts to do so have been stonewalled every step of the way. When I questioned Michael Green, the CEO in charge of the agency that oversaw PrescribeIT, Canada Health Infoway, about what went wrong, he could not provide a straight answer despite having worked on the failed Liberal program for 10 years. When I asked how much he was paid, he refused to answer, saying that it was in the public record, but, as his own board chair later admitted, that was a lie. Mr. Green's compensation was not public at that time. There is a reason he wanted it that way. He was paid almost $900,000 when we include the hundreds of thousands of dollars in bonuses and a taxpayer-funded car. Between our first and last meetings on this topic, the board of Canada Health Infoway fired Mr. Green to prevent him from returning to answer questions. Was the $300 million spent on PrescribeIT a good use of taxpayer dollars, considering that it did not permanently eliminate a single fax machine?

Mr. Speaker, what Canadians deserve is transparency. Conservatives want to get to the bottom of how $300 million of taxpayer money was wasted on this project, PrescribeIT. When Conservatives demanded that Mr. Green return to the committee to account for the millions of tax dollars that he had been paid for no results, the Liberals voted us down. When the Bloc moved to have the Liberal health minister appear within the next month to testify to her role in this scandal, Liberals ended our meeting entirely. When Conservatives moved to call on the Auditor General of Canada, a non-partisan official, to investigate, the Liberals moved to turn off the camera and seal the records of that committee for the next 30 years. My question is simple: Why did the Liberals turn off the camera and seal the records of that meeting for the next 30 years?

Mr. Speaker, I am going to focus a bit here on the forestry industry, which is not talked about a lot. Obviously, we have lost thousands of jobs in that sector. The government talked about expanding opportunities in trade as something we definitely need to do. The Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay riding that I represent has six border crossings we depend on and have used historically for trade with the United States. With respect to the industries that are dependent on that cross-border trade, like the forest industry, what does the member think about the very little time spent in negotiations for this sector?

Mr. Speaker, the Cowichan decision has left many residents across our communities concerned about their private property rights. The Liberals are now talking about how they will defend property rights in court, but they never made this argument in Cowichan before. Appeals are not do overs. They cannot raise new arguments they never argued before. How will government lawyers argue what Liberals MPs are arguing here when they did not do so at trial?

Madam Speaker, at a recent health committee, Conservatives moved a motion calling for a full investigation into the Liberals' wasteful, $300-million PrescribeIT boondoggle. The Liberals immediately responded by moving that meeting behind closed doors. As a result, under House rules, I am forbidden from telling Canadians what happened in that meeting for the next 30 years. Does silencing MPs on committee work for 30 years show transparency from this majority Liberal government?

Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to address the taxes that residents in my community pay every single day, specifically gas taxes. I have requested this opportunity to speak in light of the Minister of Veteran Affairs' recent response to my question on April 14. Her response to my question on these gas taxes was as follows: British Columbians are happy to hear that...we are making a reduction in fuel costs from now until Labour Day. British Columbians are going to use that to go and enjoy our country as they can this summer. Maybe they will also combine that with the Canada Strong pass as they go and explore this wonderful country. The Liberal minister seems to be suggesting that the purpose of gas tax relief is to encourage more people to take a vacation or to go camping. As fellow British Columbians, she and I agree that our beautiful province certainly is a place families should explore, but it is not the main reason residents in my communities fill up their cars, trucks, vans or SUVs. A family in Hedley does it to get to the grocery store or a hockey practice. A senior in Rock Creek fills up to attend medical appointments or check in with friends. A forestry worker in Christina Lake needs fuel to get to work and then to get home safely. Driving is a fact of life for tens of thousands of residents in my community. That is not to mention the hauling, the transporting or the towing that empties our tanks even faster. Subways, electric buses and public bicycles, which I often hear Liberals talk about, are not available in the communities I serve. A job in the forestry, mining or agriculture sector does not just happen right down the street. It takes a lot of gas to get rural school buses going or to get essentials to rural supermarkets, not just in the spring or summer, but in the autumn and winter. That is why it is now costing a lot more. Higher gas prices truly punish rural communities. That is why Conservatives are offering a full-year gas tax relief plan with zero federal tax on gas and diesel for the rest of 2026, paid for by ending Liberal spending on the gun buyback program, consulting fees and wasteful foreign aid. Our plan would eliminate the fuel excise tax, 10¢ a litre; the clean fuel standard, seven cents; and GST, eight cents, to save every driver 25¢ a litre. This would not just be savings at the gas station as people would also save when they buy an item that has to be shipped to our shelves, where higher transport costs mean bigger receipts. The Liberal plan offers no excise tax on gas until Labour Day. Presumably, that is when Canadians will stop camping. Even now, with the Liberal plan in effect, Castanet reports that “prices at the pumps soared to their highest levels in years” today in the Okanagan, rising roughly 30¢ a litre from just the night earlier. In my home community of Penticton, every gas station today has it above $1.90 a litre. My question to the government is as follows: Given these sudden and shocking increases and the instability in the Middle East, why does the member think Canadians will not need gas tax relief past Labour Day?

Mr. Speaker, we agree that recent gas price hikes were helped by the war in Iran, but will that be over by Labour Day, as the Liberals' policy suggests? Even if the U.S. and Iran ended the war tomorrow, the Pentagon has said it would take up to six months to fully clear sea mines from the Strait of Hormuz to restore shipping. That is not to mention the damage to oil and gas infrastructure hammered by missile attacks. Conservatives believe it is more prudent to provide Canadians with higher, longer-lasting relief at the pump, given the uncertainty abroad. Nations like Australia, Spain and Ireland all cut their taxes more than Canada has in response. On average, Americans currently pay less at the pump. Will the government take note of our Conservative plan and other plans abroad and cut the tax on gas for longer than just the summer?

Mr. Speaker, Canadians deserve accountability, as $300 million was spent on PrescribeIT to replace pharmacy fax machines, with nothing to show for it. Liberal obstruction at committee has prevented Canadians from finding out where the money went. That is enough. We need a full investigation. Will the Minister of Health agree to our call for the non-partisan Auditor General of Canada to investigate this $300-million boondoggle?

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-25, an act to amend the Canada Elections Act. Our Elections Act is among the most important laws we have as a nation, as it sets out the rules and procedures for our democracy to function. All members of the House believe in democracy, of course. It is how we all ended up here. However, any time measures are brought forward that would change our laws, this could change how we vote and whom we can vote for, and the proposed measures must be considered with a microscope. Any proposed changes to how an election would operate must be considered with strict consideration to make sure the rules of the games would not be stacked in the favour of the party in power. We only need to look around the globe to see nations where democratic decline has started because free and fair elections have been watered down by legislative majorities. Canada and many of our allies have avoided this, but the decline of democracy can come swiftly. What once started in a forum in ancient Greece largely disappeared for more than a millennium. Democracy is not a natural occurrence. It must always be reasserted, and changes made to it must be agreed to among the largest possible number of parties and citizens. Given that the House now has a Liberal majority government constructed behind closed doors instead of at the ballot box, extra consideration is needed. The proposed changes that are before us could now be passed by one party alone, changing how our elections would be conducted. I know that the minister said in a minority government that he wanted to have consensus support for legislation amending the Canada Elections Act, and he expressed an openness to entertaining supporting other parties' amendments. I hope he keeps his word on this and trusts that members on this side of the House are working in good faith to possibly make further changes. For the most part, I think the bill contains many welcome proposed changes, though many are long overdue. Other areas will require careful study by my colleagues in committee. For the people watching at home, I will explain that the legislation would make the following changes. First, the bill contains measures to counter foreign interference in our elections, as well as in nomination and leadership contests. Foreign entities would be banned from contributing to third parties at all. Foreign funding would be barred from leadership contests. Also closed would be contributions made anonymously, and funding channels such as money orders or cryptocurrency would be traced. After years of delays by the Liberal government, I am pleased that this would finally be addressed. Additionally, the bill would create several new offences and extend existing offences under the act to leadership and nomination contests. The bill would give significant new powers to the commissioner of Canada elections to undertake investigations and to enforce the act, among other measures. Last, the bill includes welcome measures to counter the disruptive and anti-democratic activities of the so-called longest ballot committee. Under the act as it stands, a candidate must obtain 100 signatures from electors in a riding in order to get their name on the ballot. The longest ballot committee, however, identified that the same pool of 100 voters could sign the nomination forms of hundreds of protest candidates who were seeking to get their name on the ballot, even if few or any of them were from the riding. This is clearly an abuse of the Canada Elections Act, insofar as the purpose of that section is to require that a candidate have the support of at least 100 electors, not that the same 100 voters can flood the ballot with an endless list of candidates. It is a low threshold but a threshold nonetheless. This point is of great importance because it does touch upon the issue of protests. Protests are in the blood of any democratic system. No country can call itself free if it does not allow for protests. I appreciate that the members of the longest ballot committee wish to make their case for changes to our election system. Canada has a long legal tradition that does not prescribe how these protests should be done. What one person may think is serious, another may feel is frivolous. The law does not discriminate, however. Protest candidates also have a long tradition in Canada and other democracies. British Columbians still remember the Marijuana Party of Canada. Others will remember the Rhinoceros Party of Canada, which campaigned on jokes. John Turmel is probably the most famous candidate, having run in 112 elections between 1979 and 2024, never once elected and yet never forgotten. In some ways, his persistence is a symbol of our democracy itself. However, it is not a universal right to subject other Canadians to protests. We are allowed a million ways, for example, to protest at an airport. We are even allowed to run for election to protest an airport. What we are not allowed to do is to stand on the runway and block the plane. The longest ballot committee chose to exploit a loophole in the Elections Act to fill ballots with hundreds of candidates, none of whom had any connection to the riding where an election was being held. This strikes against the principle of local representation. As a result of its actions, the metre-long ballots that were printed for voters were enormously burdensome. Other ridings chose to make ballots write-in only, which limited voters' ability to consider their candidate in the voting booth. If the longest ballot committee wishes to protest our voting system, that is fine. It is not fine to disrupt the ballots for citizens in ridings across the country with long lists of people who do not live there and do not intend to represent them. It also strikes against some of this country's strongest democracy supporters, such as the volunteers who take time every election to assist in the election process with Elections Canada. Forcing them to count enormously long ballots deep into the night is wrong. They give their time freely, with no reward, to ensure our elections are conducted fairly. They are heroes of democracy whom I know every MP in the House respects enormously. We literally cannot have elections without them. The changes that would be made here to limit the longest ballot committee are simple and fair and will leave a wide amount of space for protest candidates to continue. The amendments brought forward would require that electors sign only one candidate nomination form, as well as that an official agent act for only one candidate per riding. This is good for candidates, voters, election volunteers and even protesters. As I said previously, I look forward to seeing the bill go forward to committee for further study and possible amendments from all parties. I ask that my Liberal colleagues do not look to pass this legislation unilaterally and operate with an open mind to good ideas. Lastly, given this is on the subject of elections, it has been almost a year since I was elected myself as the member of Parliament for Similkameen—South Okanagan—West Kootenay. On this one-year anniversary, I would like to thank all the residents, whether they voted for me or for others, for granting me the honour of my life, to serve them in our nation's Parliament. Over the past year, I have come to know the distinct character of this vast region, from the vineyards and beaches of the Okanagan to the mountains and valleys of the Similkameen, the forests and rivers of Boundary Country and the alpine landscapes of West Kootenay. Each community is unique, with its own needs and challenges, and I will work hard to ensure those voices are heard here in Ottawa.

Mr. Speaker, I am so glad that my colleague and the rest of the cohort here are going to be working on this collaboratively. It is very important. Canadians are watching right now. On virtual voting, we would need to make sure that it is fail-safe and that Canadians feel it could not be tampered with. Are we at that point, where they would feel secure with virtual voting? I do not think we are at that point, but I am sure someday soon we will be.

Mr. Speaker, I think there are a lot of issues we need to talk about in committee concerning elections and making sure they are safe, and donations. There are ridings like mine that are massive. I am given a certain amount to service my communities and the residents, and also for the election, and in donations, but I will say that smaller ridings have it a lot easier. We have to remember that there are many ridings in Canada where the amount we are allowed to spend is pretty difficult when we look at how big some of them are. I think we should discuss this at committee.

Mr. Speaker, I think quite a bit needs to be discussed at the committee level, and I look forward to our party collaborating with all parties on this. I think there should be a discussion, and not everyone agrees with me on this, of course, on whether someone needs to be a citizen to vote in the nomination process. I think it is a really interesting and important issue that should be discussed, and voted on also, because obviously, it does affect elections.

Mr. Speaker, this is a really important subject. One thing the member touched on, and I just wanted to ask his opinion on this further, is that we are considering changes so that during an election a financial agent could only work for one party at a time. I want to know what he thought about that. It is getting tougher to find financial agents because of the red tape and the complications. It is a really big job to volunteer for. Does the member agree that during an election a financial agent should only work for one party?