Mario Simard

Mr. Speaker, it is rare for me to agree with my Conservative colleagues, but I do agree with them on one point. There is appalling ineffectiveness within the government. Allow me give an example. We have just come through an election campaign in Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, where it was made clear to the government that the funding, the liquidity support it wanted to provide to the forestry sector, is not working. The government was asked to lower the eligibility threshold from $2 million in annual revenue to $1 million. I have been checking for the past two weeks to see if anyone in Quebec has accessed this liquidity. No one has. This is appallingly ineffective. Meanwhile, the government is in the process of equipping itself with the tools to circumvent environmental laws. Ultimately, I have my doubts about both the Build Canada Homes strategy, as my colleague pointed out, and the strategy for providing access to liquidity for those in the forestry sector. No one is seeing any results yet. This is a terrible failure on the part of this government.

Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether my colleague read the bill carefully. I did. It gives the government the option of launching oil or gas infrastructure projects without completing environmental assessments first. Here is a very telling example. Back home, the GNL Québec project was turned down. Its proponents had said that they would respect the environmental assessments. However, when their proposal was flatly refused, they turned around and sued the government. I am loathe to think what would happen if an oil and gas project got off the ground, with infrastructure construction under way, only to find out that the project was a no-go and had to be shut down. That would lead to devastating lawsuits for the government. Is my colleague aware of that?

Mr. Speaker, the reality is not what my colleague claims. The only oil and gas infrastructure projects that have been carried out were only possible because the government agreed to invest public funds in them. Back home in Saguenay—Lac‑Saint‑Jean, as soon as developers started asking for public money for the liquefied natural gas project, the LNG project, the Government of Quebec lost interest. People know full well that over the long term, with the energy transition under way, these very expensive infrastructure projects are not profitable. That is the problem. We are going to end up in a scenario where environmental assessments have been scrapped and people can pretty much do whatever they want with infrastructure projects that are not profitable. Does my colleague agree?

Mr. Speaker, I find this debate rather fascinating. All day, my Conservative colleagues have been arguing that the government is not allowing oil and gas projects to move forward quickly enough. They can hardly say that it is a good idea to get rid of environmental assessments so that oil and gas projects can move forward. However, there is one thing that I hope we agree on, and I would like my colleague to give me a clear answer. On several occasions, the leader of the official opposition has said that big oil companies that let the public pay for their infrastructure are receiving corporate welfare. Does my colleague agree with us that it is unacceptable that public money is being used to pay for oil and gas infrastructure?

Mr. Speaker, I agree with my colleague entirely. While the intention may be commendable, the indicators suggest that the assistance may not reach the people who are struggling the most. As legislators, the last thing we want is to help greedy oil and gas companies make bigger profits. We definitely need a mechanism to ensure that the tax relief goes directly to the most vulnerable. I have a solution, and I wonder if my colleague would agree with me. Instead of sending oil and gas companies billions of dollars in tax credits and support, would it not be better to increase old age security for the most vulnerable, for seniors struggling to put food on the table with nothing but the GIS and OAS to rely on? That might be a better solution.

Mr. Speaker, I understand that there is a right time for implementing such a measure, but we also need indicators to prove that it will have the desired effect on the most vulnerable. That part is a bit more difficult. We are in favour of helping people who are struggling to afford housing, clothing and food in these difficult times. Gas is an essential consumer good. However, it is still important to make sure that this measure will not help the greedy oil and gas companies rack up even bigger profits. There is already a dedicated policy of giving those companies billions of dollars in support. I, for one, think that the government could make an effort to support seniors as well and increase old age security by ending its support for oil and gas companies. Perhaps my colleague is in favour of that.

Mr. Speaker, my colleague astutely pointed out that the measure we are discussing this evening is tied to the current situation. He also talked about the measures the government has put in place to help people cope with the cost of living, even though we do not agree on everything. However, there is one matter the Liberal government often overlooks, namely, the issue of seniors. Those who have suffered the most in the wake of the pandemic are seniors aged 65 to 74, who continue to suffer from inequity and whose purchasing power has never increased. Since my colleague started off by saying that the government should help people when they are going through tough times or facing difficult economic conditions, does he agree with me that increasing old age security for people aged 65 to 74 would be a good measure?

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has a bad habit of saying one thing and doing another. For example, in his campaign platform, the phrase “climate change” appeared 28 times, while the word “pipeline” did not appear even once, yet it is his pipeline that takes priority. Another example is that he said he would deal with the tariffs imposed by Donald Trump last July. In the meantime, he keeps making concessions to Donald Trump, who was still insisting as recently as yesterday that he wants nothing to do with free trade. Does the Prime Minister think he can keep saying one thing and doing another for much longer?

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Mirabel, the one they call “the MP with the golden voice”, just like little Joselito, and whom the people of Alto call “le député du petit train de l'amour”. It is a pleasure to speak today to express the Bloc Québécois's support for Bill C-26. The Bloc Québécois has often advocated for an unconditional transfer of $1.7 billion to the provinces and territories and that is what this bill provides. This money will go directly to the territories to address the major housing crisis we are currently facing, without going through any new structures. That is the best part, that this money is not going through new structures, action plans, or some sort of federal entity as we saw with Build Canada Homes. Not long ago, in fact, I rose to speak to Build Canada Homes. We quickly realized that although this initiative had its appeal, with $7.3 billion to invest, it was slowing down social housing construction. I gave the example, in my riding, of a group called Loge m'entraide, which received funds from the SHQ, or Société d'habitation du Québec, for a major project, and was waiting for an answer about the federal government's contribution through the affordable housing fund. As often happens with federal initiatives, CMHC's affordable housing fund was set aside with assurances that a new initiative was on the way. The new initiative never materialized and had to be picked up by Build Canada Homes, with the result that the Loge m'entraide project is now in limbo. However, that is not what we are seeing with Bill C-26. It provides a direct transfer to the provinces, as we have been calling for, rather than, as is often the case with the federal government, a proliferation of top-down structures and criteria imposed by Ottawa, without Ottawa necessarily being familiar with the specific challenges faced by the provinces and municipalities. We have said many times that the federal government should instead focus on straightforward, unconditional and predictable transfers to the provinces. That is what we are seeing with Bill C‑26, I might add. However, my job is certainly not to sing the government’s praises, so I would like to take this opportunity to address a glaring problem: federal interference in areas of provincial jurisdiction. Why can I do this in the context of Bill C-26? Because it is, in a way, the exception that proves the rule. There is something glaringly obvious when we look at this bill and past legislation in the context of Canadian federalism. I do not need to talk about predatory federalism, which we have often seen and involves an encroachment on areas of jurisdiction, but there is something glaringly obvious in the fact that the federal government has repeatedly acted in an unjust and unfair manner when transferring funds. This gives me an opportunity to once again address the most glaring injustice in the federation: the fiscal imbalance. We need to talk about this again because the reason the government can transfer $1.7 billion dollars at this point is that it has the fiscal capacity to do so. It has that fiscal capacity because of the fiscal imbalance. It has more revenue than expenses. What I mean by the fiscal imbalance is quite simple. Virtually all of the public services governments are required to provide are delivered by the provinces and Quebec, yet the federal government's tax base allows it to collect 60% of the total tax revenue. Essentially, the provinces and Quebec provide most of the services, such as education, health care and social programs, to name just a few, but the federal government's social mandate is typically limited to old age security benefits and family benefits. Note that employment insurance is not included because the employment insurance fund is not financed through taxation. It is funded by employers and workers. The federal government has no social mission and a lot of revenue. The provinces and Quebec have a lot of social missions, a lot of spending and little revenue. That is the fiscal imbalance at work. That is why, year in and year out, over the past 10 to 15 years, the government has had to focus on transfer programs to the provinces. These transfers were often accompanied by the federal government's involvement in areas of jurisdiction that it knew very little about, through strategies that were not always efficient. We have seen examples of that. Like me, we have experienced that. We could talk about the dental insurance program, which was a disaster. However, the worst disaster in the federation is the fiscal imbalance, which mainly affects health care. I want to emphasize that point because it seems to me that we have not talked about it in a while. If memory serves, 1969 is when the public health care system was put in place. For every dollar invested in health care, 50¢ came from the provinces and 50¢ came from the federal government. The Bloc Québécois has fought this battle. We have come back to this issue on numerous occasions over the past few years because barely 22% of today's funding for our health care systems comes from the federal government. When only 22% of funding comes from the federal government, this implies that the remainder is borne by the provinces. Health care is the Quebec government's most important responsibility and the largest budget item. Looking at the current projections, it quickly becomes clear that between 42% and 45% of the Quebec government's total budget is devoted to a single responsibility: health care. This means that there is just over 50% of the budget left to cover all the government's other responsibilities such as education, the fight against poverty, the needs of local authorities, infrastructure requirements or support for Quebeckers. The federal government sometimes implements industrial strategies to support businesses, but they are not always appropriate. Allow me to give a rather striking example. We are currently experiencing one of the worst slumps in Canada's economic history due to our relations with the United States. The two hardest hit sectors are Quebec's forestry industry and the aluminum sector. The situation in Quebec's forestry industry is the worst. With the combination of countervailing duties, anti-dumping duties and additional tariffs of 10%, 45% of these companies' profit margins are going right down the drain. They have no access to them given the tariff issue with the United States. The other major problem affects the aluminum industry, which is being hit with 50% tariffs. What was the federal government's strategic response? It said that we needed to export more energy. That is rather shocking. The strategic response of the level of government with the greatest fiscal capacity was not to look at which sectors were most affected. Instead, the government looked at what opportunities were available to it. The government had an opportunity to advance the energy sector, one of its primary missions. It therefore chose to support the oil and gas industry, even though that industry was not affected by the crisis. It is true. The oil and gas industry is the only one that has not been affected by the crisis. Here is what I find even more shocking. When we look at the ownership structure of the oil and gas industry, we see that most of the companies belong to Americans. The federal government has therefore decided to invest Quebeckers' money in strategies aimed at supporting the only sector of the economy that is harming Quebec. This is an example of one of the federal government's major investments. This is of direct concern to the member for Lac-Saint-Jean, since he arrived just as I was talking about that. The federal government is making this investment using its fiscal capacity, but it is hurting Quebec. We will therefore take the $1.7 billion, since it is being paid out unconditionally, but once again it strikes me as a counter-example that proves that we are in a predatory federalist system. I would love to hear the member for Winnipeg North contradict what I just said.

Mr. Speaker, that is a new one. I did not see that coming. Equalization payments must be calculated on a per capita basis, and there are more people in Quebec than in Manitoba. I would urge my colleague, the member for Winnipeg North, to take into account the fact that, every year, the Quebec government runs a trade deficit with the oil-producing provinces. Every year, the Quebec government probably sends far more money to Alberta than Albertans can send to Quebec. As for the major investments that were made—yes, it is not a surprise—if the government had not used $34 billion to buy a pipeline and instead made major investments in any other economy, we might be in a different situation today. We have paid for our energy infrastructure. It was Quebec, it was Hydro-Québec, that paid for its own energy infrastructure. It was not the entire federation. That is worse than equalization.

Mr. Speaker, the greatest benefit anyone can have in life is political autonomy. My neighbour is not the one who decides what I do with my earnings, how I use that money, how I will make it grow. I am the one who makes those decisions. As I said earlier, politically, we are subject to a level of government that makes decisions that are contrary to our best interest. The government's response to the tariff crisis is one example of that. The only sector with no tariffs is the energy sector. All of the government's strategies focus on the energy sector, and that is what Quebeckers' money is being used for. This proves that the only way to succeed is to have political autonomy, and the only way we can achieve that is through independence.

Mr. Speaker, it definitely is a trap. It is such a trap that it has even been documented. They call it “Dutch disease”. Quebec's manufacturing sector lost most of its jobs because the energy sector bumped up the value of the Canadian dollar. We are the ones who paid the price. I remember the former NDP leader speaking out against that. As soon as he came close to power, however, he chose to pander to the rest of Canada and pretend Dutch disease no longer existed.

Mr. Speaker, I want to commend my colleague from Berthier—Maskinongé on his speech. He talked about how big some ridings are. I know that he is known for being very good about travelling around to different parts of his riding. Everyone there knows him and loves him. He also talked about political financing. Would this bill not have been a good opportunity to review our political financing system, which is not particularly fair to people who want to participate constructively in the democratic debate? I would like him to elaborate on that.

Mr. Speaker, earlier, in his speech, my colleague referred to the size of certain ridings. When the electoral map is redrawn, there are two concepts. First, there is the concept of the quotient, which is the population base, and then there is the concept of community of interest. Unfortunately, the latter is rarely respected, much less used, when an electoral map is redrawn. As a result, communities that have no similar economic interests sometimes wind up lumped together. That is what happened in my riding. A rather major distinction is made in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean. Residents come from either Saguenay or Lac-Saint-Jean. Unfortunately, when the map was redrawn, they took small communities from Lac-Saint-Jean and lumped them in with Saguenay, causing an uproar. We will work hard to represent these people as they deserve, but I think it is important to support this idea of community of interest. Can my colleague elaborate on that?

Mr. Speaker, I would just like to say that I will be sharing my time with the ever-energetic member for South Shore—St. Margarets. I want to talk about a recurring pattern with this government, one that I have observed since the beginning of this Parliament. There are two crises that are affecting us. I will focus on two major crises, although there may be more. The first is the housing crisis, and the second is the tariff crisis. In a previous life, when I was studying philosophy, we were given a definition of “crisis” that was quite simple. It is when a body goes through a period that puts it on the brink of life or death. Responding to a crisis means ensuring the survival of a body. If nothing is done, then that body will die. That was a definition that I had in my philosophy courses. What does that imply? Why do I raise this? It is because during a crisis, what is needed is prompt action that produces results. The best example is perhaps a heart attack. If someone has a heart attack, they would not be satisfied with me telling them not to worry and to keep breathing because it will eventually pass. They would want prompt action. They would want medical care to stay alive. What I am seeing today from the government is precisely a lack of prompt action. Now we have Build Canada Homes, and I will give an example. Loge m'entraide, an organization in my riding that received funding from the Société d'habitation du Québec, or SHQ, to build social housing, was supposed to receive money from the affordable housing fund, or AHF, which was administered by CMHC. That was at the beginning, in 2024. This organization received its SHQ funding. CMHC officials said that if SHQ funding was secured, then AHF funding would be coming. Several months passed. The affordable housing fund disappeared. The government said that it would reach a new agreement with the provinces and that it would then follow up to see whether SHQ projects would qualify. Now, after 18 months, Loge m'entraide is still waiting for federal funding. The government scrapped the AHF, which was supposed to be refinanced by the government in the budget. However, what we learned from the budget is that there would be a new program instead. This new program was going to solve all the problems. This new program is called Build Canada Homes, but in the meantime, no social housing is being built in my riding because the federal government is unable to respond to the crisis. Another point that strikes me as essential is that, throughout the election campaign and even afterward, I heard the Prime Minister and the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources say that there is one sector that has been particularly affected by tariffs since 2017, and that is the forestry sector. We were already dealing with U.S. tariffs even before the tariff crisis. These two people told us that they knew that the lumber sector was particularly affected, but that they were going to resolve this issue through a major initiative. The Prime Minister said that during the election campaign. The Minister of Natural Resources repeated it ad nauseam. They said they were going to resolve it through a major initiative that would allow homes to be built using Canadian lumber. I am a guy who is all about co-operation. I thought to myself that we have been asking for this since I arrived here in 2019 and that this government may have understood that it had to support the forestry industry. However, where do we stand today? If I look at the Build Canada Homes bill, is there anything that clearly states that Canadian wood has to be used? I do not know whether anyone else has seen that, but I have not. Apart from the Liberal Party's lip service, there is absolutely nothing to suggest that construction will be done with wood. This brings us to another major crisis, the softwood lumber crisis, which mainly affects Quebec, but also Ontario to some extent as well as British Columbia. However, there is absolutely nothing in there to suggest that the federal government wants to prioritize wood as a material, apart from the statements that have been made. I say that because it is very important; I remember that in 2025, for the first time, a federal government said in response to the softwood lumber crisis that it would provide liquidity. In August 2025, the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources said that there would be a liquidity program for people in the forestry sector who are going through one of the worst crises they have ever experienced. Eight or nine months later, people in my riding have contacted me to express interest in accessing the Business Development Bank of Canada, or BDC, program, but it is still vague and the rules are so hard to understand that no one I know can access it. Eight or nine months on, we are in a crisis, as I said earlier. If a person has a heart attack, they want an immediate response. Eight or nine months later, absolutely nothing has been done to support the forestry sector. Then, the federal government announces that it is going to launch a broad strategy to use wood in building construction. How is it going to use wood in building construction when the majority of businesses, whether small sawmills or lumber producers, are shutting down? How can the same momentum be recreated when companies in the forestry sector are being left to die? We sat down and came up with proposals. We are in collaboration mode. It is true that we sometimes criticize the government's measures in the House. However, we gave the government a suggestion. The first thing that we did was to go and see people in the forestry sector to tell them that there will be business opportunities. The government wants to launch a major construction project, and so we asked business owners in the industry what they have to offer. These people told us that, before they can offer anything, they have to keep their companies afloat and get through the tariff crisis with the United States, and that the best way to do that would be for the government to cover some of the anti-dumping and countervailing duties at the end of each month. Today, more than $13 billion is being held captive, in trust, at the border by the Americans. That amount belongs to the forestry sector. If we could inject that $13 billion into this sector, everybody would be thrilled. However, this $13 billion is being held captive. People in the forestry sector are accommodating. They do not want to get that money back right away. They want to exhaust all available recourse with the international trade tribunals. In the meantime, they are asking the government to take care of 50% of these countervailing and anti-dumping duties and tariffs at the end of each month. A 10% tariff brings the total tariff amount to 45%. Furthermore, this is not a subsidy, because this problem will eventually be resolved. The forestry industry is asking the government to adopt this proposal so that it can keep its ecosystem alive. When construction starts up again, forestry companies will be there and they will not have all disappeared. The government rejected this proposal. The government was given another proposal to maintain the ecosystem and the value chain that allows us to use wood in construction. The proposal was for the government to provide the equivalent of a wage subsidy, which would be an easy thing for the government to do. The government also rejected this proposal. Last week, the government announced with great fanfare what the task force strategy entailed. It is very interesting. The government talked about $10 billion over 10 years. Will this amount actually be distributed? I do not know, but it was announced with great fanfare. Are there any conclusive solutions and results today that will allow the forestry sector to respond to what will be a vast construction site for the Build Canada Homes projects? There is absolutely nothing. In closing, Build Canada Homes is a great strategy but, at the end of the day, absolutely nothing is being done. This government likes to talk about what it wants to do but is very slow to take action. That is what is disappointing. I look forward to hearing my colleagues' questions on this matter. I also look forward to seeing their record so far.

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, I am in collaboration mode, but I am not seeing any results. I sometimes wonder about the government's interest in the forestry industry. What struck me the most about the “Canada Strong for All” fiscal update is that the words “forest” and “forestry” appear only nine times. However, a search for the words “oil” or “oil company” shows that they appear 130 times. “Canada for all” seems to be Canada focused on western Canada's energy sector. It is not Canada focused on the forestry sector. As we know, politics is a balance of power, and unfortunately, when it comes down to the forestry industry, right now our balance of power is non‑existent.

Mr. Speaker, our position is quite simple: We want more housing construction, and we want support for the forestry industry. Our criticisms concern the government's slow response. If it does not take immediate action to support forestry, this industry will lose its lifeblood. Small regions like mine, whether in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean, Abitibi or the north shore, are being hollowed out and will pay the price. The government is turning a deaf ear and is unwilling to listen to the industry's legitimate demands. It is still making announcements rather than responding to the crisis. We are still going to vote in favour of this initiative. If it comes to fruition and is good for everyone, then we will not vote against it. The goal is not to oppose for the sake of opposing. That is not what we do.

Mr. Speaker, that is an excellent question. The answer is quite simple: The federal government has never been willing to fight for softwood lumber. We are at the mercy of the Americans. Not only that, but we also have an economic sector that is currently unable to access federal assistance, because it is constantly being referred to Global Affairs Canada and told no. What the federal government has been doing for the past few years is unconscionable. It has allowed the situation to deteriorate, and now we are facing deeply troubling consolidations in the forestry sector.

Mr. Speaker, it seems like it is always the same old story. The federal government is proposing strategies, like the Build Canada Homes program. It is also proposing to retool the forestry sector, but that will not happen in six months. It will take 10 years to see results. The federal government is not agile enough to act in a timely manner. That is why, in my speech earlier, I gave the example of the affordable housing fund, which has gone from CMHC to Build Canada Homes, meaning that, today, projects that would have received this funding 10 or so months ago are now stuck waiting. That is the problem with these initiatives. Perhaps my colleague is seeing the same thing in her own riding.