Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that the member from the Green Party is opposed to the government's bill. We know that our faith-based communities are at the heart of what it means to be Canadian. In a lot of our small towns in particular, the faith-based groups and churches make sure that many events and community-led initiatives go ahead. They raise the funds, and they provide the volunteers and build…
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Mr. Speaker, yes, absolutely. Overwhelmingly, the people of Canada are opposed to what the government is trying to do with this. People recognize that it historically has been the case, and today it still continues to be the case, that churches provide a lot of the much-needed social assistance for people. Anything that the government is going to do to make life more difficult for those churches i…
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Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The member has been asking the same question over and over today. If he does not have anything new to add to the debate, maybe he should let somebody else take the floor, because nobody else seems to want to—
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Mr. Speaker, I appreciate any of the language that was added through the committee phase to try to make this terrible bill less bad. I am appreciative of that amendment. The problem still remains that we have a government that continues to attack faith-based communities. When we see legislation like this, as I alluded to in my speech, it gives social licence to thugs to target synagogues, churches…
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Mr. Speaker, we are here to debate some of the amendments to the bill. We are not debating the actual short title. I just want to get that clear. I have received many emails from my constituents, just like the member has, and every single email I have received has said to please vote against this terrible piece of legislation. They have made it abundantly clear that is what they want to do, and so…
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Mr. Speaker, the member talked in his speech about needing new laws and new rules. We have already had good questions from many of my colleagues, who have spoken about how representatives of the biggest police forces in this country have already said they do not need more laws and rules to have to try to enforce. What they need is that when somebody is to be prosecuted, charges would be pressed an…
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Mr. Speaker, it is a different point of order. The member opposite earlier today was calling a member on this side a grifter. He did not apologize for it. He was told he was not allowed to make those comments. He did not apologize for defaming a member in the House. He should not be allowed to stand up and ask another question until he apologizes for his disgraceful and disrespectful comments. I w…
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Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour and a privilege to rise on behalf of the great people of southwest and west central Saskatchewan. Before I begin though, I just want to give a quick shout-out to my daughter's U13 girls' hockey team. The Colts had a great series against the girls from the Big River First Nation Rangers. My daughter's team was victorious this time, two games to one. I want to com…
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Mr. Speaker, I want to ask my colleague another question. The largest public sector union, PSAC, has come out and said that it wants this bill not just amended but scrapped entirely. It does not support anything inside this bill. I am wondering if the member has met with PSAC and whether he is willing to take its concerns or if he would tell PSAC that it is wrong and that this bill needs to be pas…
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Mr. Speaker, the cost of groceries continues to rise quite rapidly. When we go to the grocery store, it is quite alarming how expensive just one bag of groceries is. Conservatives certainly support the concept of helping people be able to buy those groceries, but the bill would not actually lower the cost of groceries. The Liberals would be borrowing money to give to Canadians to help them buy gro…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has admitted that a country that cannot feed itself has few options. However, the Liberal government is closing seven agriculture research facilities. Their research and development has a 35:1 return on investment for taxpayers. It is also crucial for growing crops to feed Canada and the rest of the world, despite our harsh climate. With 2.2 million Canadians lining…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, Canada has the highest food price inflation in the G7. That is the Liberal record on full display for the whole world to see. Instead of fixing it, the Prime Minister raises taxes on fertilizer, manufacturing and transportation, all of which lead to higher food prices. Reversing Liberal policies that punish Canadian agriculture would be a good start, but we could also grow even more f…
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Madam Speaker, the government is looking for some quick, simple, easy wins. A sovereignty act is obviously just that. There are so many great parts to it that would remove the barriers that industry has been telling us about for over a decade. The member and I have been on the same committee together many times, and we have heard this over and over again. I am wondering if my colleague would like …
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Madam Speaker, my colleague's terrific speech highlighted that the urban-rural divide is one of the biggest issues that Canada faces and that one of the best ways to tackle that issue would be through our proposed sovereignty act because there is a lot of nation-building potential that exists within it. Could the member highlight a little of that?
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Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour to rise in the House to engage in debate and to ask some questions. We have seen over time that the issue of the border is a big one. I am wondering if the member has any thoughts as to when the government is going to start the process of getting the 1,000 CBSA guards it promised in the election.
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Mr. Speaker, my colleague and I were elected at the same time, and I know that in that time frame, we have both found that the government is really, really bad at legislation. It is even worse at managing the House calendar. I am just wondering if my colleague can elaborate a bit more on some of the amendments that the Conservatives put forward to strengthen the bill that the Liberals have no idea…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I request that the motion be carried on division. (Motion agreed to)
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, earlier in the chamber, we had a member accuse one of our members of misinformation. This is a continuing trend we are seeing from the Liberals. Conservatives bring facts to the debate. If the Liberals do not believe us, all they need to do is open a newspaper, read the news on their phone or watch TV, because that is how we get a lot of our facts and information, as well as from al…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I ask that it be carried on division. (Motion agreed to)
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour and privilege to rise on behalf of the great people of southwest and west central Saskatchewan. This weekend, we got to experience the first real blast of winter back home. It was down to the mid minus 20s. We had a bit of snow on the ground. I think we are fully into the grips of winter here now. To everybody who is out driving on the roads, or out working in t…
Read full speech →Private Members' Business
Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour to rise in the House of Commons to speak on behalf of the great people of southwest and west central Saskatchewan. I want to commend my colleague from Kamloops—Thompson—Nicola on this fantastic bill. It is our job as members of Parliament to take issues from our local communities and find ways to advocate for or work on them to make a better Canada. I firmly bel…
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Mr. Speaker, the member talked in her speech about how a family could save up to $840 with the Liberals' tax break, but at the end of the day, a couple with children making about $75,000 a year would realize only about $20 in savings with this tax cut. In fact, a single parent making $50,000 would realize only about $140 or $150 in savings with this tax cut. I am wondering how the Liberals can squ…
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Mr. Speaker, while there is little income tax relief in this bill, the cost of inflation and the cost of food continue to go up. I keep track of the price of butter, for example, and in just the last year, it has gone up $2 at my local grocery store. There was an article by Policy Options magazine, entitled “Ten million Canadians live in food-insecure households. The federal budget doesn’t help th…
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Mr. Speaker, I just want to pick up on a thread one of my colleagues was talking about earlier, with regard to Bill C-4 and the rebate on new housing. We know that most first-time homebuyers do not purchase newly built homes. There is a phrase, “starter home”, that usually means an older house, smaller in square footage but more cost-friendly to purchase. This is what first-time homebuyers are loo…
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Mr. Speaker, as I told the member, this bill has some Conservative values and Conservative principles in it. The Liberals are starting to run out of ideas. This is Bill C-4. It is only the fourth piece of legislation that this place has seen, and already, they are trying to plagiarize Conservative ideas and principles. Of course, we are all for tax breaks for Canadians. We would like to see the go…
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Mr. Speaker, I was reading in the Parliamentary Budget Officer's report about the tax break the Liberals are supposedly giving to people. For a couple with a child, if they are both in the first income tax bracket, it would amount to only about $20 a month in savings for that family. When I look at the cost of groceries, I see that the cost of butter alone is up two dollars. If people are using bu…
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Mr. Speaker, the member is right. The forestry sector is one of the breadwinners for Canada, or at least it has been historically. The government has completely abandoned and neglected it. I would have liked to see more measures to support economic growth, because that is what the forestry sector brings. Unfortunately, the member's riding has been decimated by bad Liberal policy, again ignoring ge…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, earlier this year, the Prime Minister left his position at Brookfield Asset Management as head of ESG and impact fund investing. He claims to have put all his assets in a blind trust and disclosed his investments to the Ethics Commissioner. With the conflict of interest screen in place, everyone is supposed to just trust the process, after the head of Canada's government left working …
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Mr. Speaker, that was a fantastic question. There are several things they could have taken out of the budget that would have helped the next generation. The industrial carbon tax is a huge one. It is largely a hidden tax. We cannot see it on line items, but it is baked into a lot of things. Any of the large emitters that have it include the steel producers. The Prime Minister, when he was running …
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Mr. Speaker, I want to get my friend and colleague's thoughts on an important sector we share in this country: agriculture. In the budget, the government is sending over $300 million to farmers in other parts of the world, yet our farmers are dealing with punishing tariffs here in Canada. Also, we have had many years of drought and of not being able to grow the crops the way we normally would like…
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Mr. Speaker, what I will say to the member opposite is that he was sort of getting on the right track because I think the point he was trying to make was that natural resource development is the jurisdiction of the province. It is not the federal government's jurisdiction to be in natural resource development. When I look at the Major Project Office, most of the projects it is developing are proje…
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Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour and a privilege to rise in the House of Commons and speak on behalf of the great people of southwest and west-central Saskatchewan. It was a nice weekend back home, but it looks as though, this week, winter is going to be settling in for the long haul. Unfortunately, there is some snow on the forecast, so I just want to wish everyone well back home as we get rea…
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Mr. Speaker, if we want to talk about ways that we can save money, for example, Conservatives proposed that we would cut funding to the CBC. That is a pretty simple and easy one there. There is the $742-million gun buyback program, which I mentioned already. The $10-a-day child care system is not working the way the Liberals said it would work. There have been day care closures. There have been al…
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Mr. Speaker, the member has talked a lot about climate change, its effects and the impact it has, but there are a couple of things that the budget does not talk about and does not deal with, and I was hoping the member would have addressed it in his speech. There have been 30 sawmill closures in the province of B.C. There have been multiple sawmill closures in Quebec. We have seen a decimation of …
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Mr. Speaker, the member opposite publicly supported defunding the police. I did not hear him say that.
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, before I begin, I would just like to put this on the public record: I want to wish my wife a happy anniversary. Last week, on November 10, we celebrated 18 years of being married. I thank her for putting up with me for 18 years and for being by my side throughout this political journey. It has been quite the ride.
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I thank the members across the way and my colleagues here as well; I appreciate that. I also just want to give a quick shout-out to the Saskatchewan Roughriders for winning the Grey Cup championship. Obviously, it is a long season with lots of games. It is a gruelling schedule, but they are the ones who came out on top through hard work and great teamwork, so I congratulate the Saskat…
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I saw the announcement on the funds that were being allocated. As the member will most likely know, AgriStability is actually a cost-shared program with the provincial governments. It is nice for the Liberals to say they have upped it from 80% to 90% and increased the threshold from $3 million to $6 million, but can the member confirm here today that the provincial governments are in …
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Mr. Speaker, I happened to notice that, throughout the member's speech, a lot of the things she was talking about fall within either provincial or municipal jurisdiction. It seems like a lot of what the federal government is trying to do with the budget circumvents the provinces or works above the municipalities, instead of working through the proper channels, the way the federation is supposed to…
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Madam Speaker, the member talked a bit about the mill closures that happened in her community. I have been a member of Parliament for six years now, and one of the more common headlines I have seen in the news is that mill closures are happening all across Canada. There has been no new softwood lumber deal with the United States for over 10 years. We hear a lot about housing in the House of Common…
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Mr. Speaker, we know the Prime Minister was quick to abandon one of the fiscal anchors he campaigned on. In the last Parliament, the member belonged to a government that said one of its fiscal anchors was that the deficit would never go over $42 billion, yet here he is, poised to vote in favour of a budget that is going to put Canada $78 billion in the hole this fiscal year. Will the finance minis…
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Madam Speaker, on a point of order, I believe the member insinuated in her question that the Conservative Party was lying to Canadians. We know that is not true, and it is unparliamentary to insinuate it.
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, I previously had the opportunity to question the minister on the performance of the CRA after the Auditor General had released a report on her findings on the performance standards at the CRA. I think it is important to start this off by reading a couple of fine points from her findings. She starts off with a line about how “The Taxpayer Bill of Rights states that callers have the rig…
Read full speech →Adjournment Proceedings
Mr. Speaker, if the target accuracy rate was 94%, the Auditor General would not have gone through the whole process of auditing the department. She has found the complete opposite when it comes to service standards. I find it a little rich for the government member to stand up and say there is a 94% success rate when that was clearly not the case. It would be nice if the member would get up to exp…
Read full speech →Statements by Members
Mr. Speaker, last night, I had the privilege of co-hosting the annual MS Canada reception. Some 90,000 Canadians struggle with multiple sclerosis. Thanks to medical innovation, they are increasingly able to live normal, fulfilling lives. They come from all backgrounds and professions, from hairdressers to researchers, teachers, Hill staffers and former MPs. Nearly three-quarters of them are women.…
Read full speech →Oral questions
Mr. Speaker, the minister is not even meeting with his counterparts on his trip, and he is proving to be as ineffective as his predecessor. Harvest on the Prairies is coming to an end, and Canadian farmers are still enduring tariffs imposed by China on canola and pulse products. Exports of these crops to China have halted. They need relief, but the government is slow to act. Ahead of a meeting wit…
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Mr. Speaker, it is always an honour and a privilege to rise on behalf of the great people of Swift Current—Grasslands—Kindersley. I want to take a few moments here as I begin my speech to say happy birthday to my daughter Kenzie. She turned 11 today. Happy birthday, sweetie. I love her very much. I am really proud of the great young girl she is growing up to be, and I look forward to seeing the gr…
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Mr. Speaker, the Auditor General report shows that the CRA had a huge increase in deflected calls, from one million to eight million in one year. People in the southwest wait hours, sometimes days, to reach a service agent, and then they have to deal with huge delays in resolving their file, even if the CRA made the mistake. The CRA fails to meet its own service standards after already lowering th…
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Mr. Speaker, I could not help but notice that, although we are debating the border bill today, the government already tabled a bill earlier in the current Parliament and has already had to basically withdraw it and present a new bill because it messed up the first one so badly. I know that my colleague is newer to Parliament. I wonder how he feels so far about his own government's messing up so ba…
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Mr. Speaker, there is an old proverb that says that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Canadian workers are getting sick and tired of the Prime Minister's good intentions. The best predictor of the future is the past, so let us take a look at the Prime Minister's record. His last act as the chair of Brookfield was to move the company headquarters out of Canada and into the United Stat…
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