Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, in 2015, the Prime Minister promised not to buy F-35s, even though he knew that Canada's defence industry had already invested hundreds of millions of dollars and had to meet its obligations to Lockheed Martin. Even with this week's announcement, the Prime Minister is still keeping Canada's defence industry in limbo. He did not commit to buy F-35s. He agreed to talk about it. When wil…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, the F-35 file clearly shows that the Prime Minister is not serious about Canada's defence and our commitments abroad. In 2015, when he promised not to buy F-35s, he was putting his political ambitions and those of the Liberal Party ahead of the aspirations of the Canadian Armed Forces. When he wasted $360 million on Australia's old, rusted-out F-18s, it was to buy time. Even the exper…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, Canada has been part of the F-35 development and procurement program with 10 other countries for more than 14 years. We have lost seven years because the Prime Minister made an election promise not to purchase this jet. After losing so many years for purely political reasons, we now want a real answer. Will the F-35 be Canada's final choice or will the government drag this announcemen…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, I come from the Quebec City area, the most beautiful tourist city in North America. The city has suffered enormously over the past two years, economically speaking. Everyone is talking about our businesses, restaurants and hotels. How can the Minister of Health, who is the member for Quebec, justify to the hotels, restaurants and tourism industry in his riding that he is maintaining h…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, exactly two years ago, I was the first MP to ask the government to close the border. It was taking too long. It took too long. People in Quebec died because it took too long. Now the situation has changed, and it is taking too long to reopen the border and lift the senseless restrictions. If tourists want to visit Quebec City to, say, go to the summer festival in the minister's riding…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, yesterday I asked the Minister of Foreign Affairs a question, but the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence was the one who answered by reading something that had nothing to do with my question. I will therefore ask the question again today because it is a very important one. The Liberals finally recognized the importance of sending lethal weapons to Ukraine, and…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, I thank the minister. We now see that her answer to Mario Dumont yesterday was wrong, because she did not clearly answer the question: Our weapons have not reached Ukraine. It is like last week, when the Prime Minister travelled to Europe with his ministers. They went all over the place, but we do not know why, if not for pointless photo ops. Tonight, the Prime Minister is heading off…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, after several requests, the Liberals have finally agreed to send lethal weapons to Ukraine. Canada has sent 4,500 M72 rocket launchers, 7,500 grenades, 100 Carl Gustav M2 anti-tank weapons, and 2,000 rounds of 84-millimetre ammunition. This morning, the Minister of Foreign Affairs confirmed that all the weapons had reached Ukraine. My question is simple: Have all the Canadian weapons …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, that is not an answer. We want to know if the weapons we sent have reached the battlefield. Are Ukrainian soldiers using our Carl Gustavs, our M72s and our grenades, as the Minister of Foreign Affairs told Mario Dumont this morning on LCN? It is a simple question: Are the weapons on the battlefield at this time, yes or no?
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, the former president of the United States and the Prime Minister issued a joint statement in February 2017, in which the Prime Minister committed to modernizing our NORAD equipment. Five years later, nothing has been done. The Prime Minister has to realize that Vladimir Putin is a danger to Canada and that our country does not currently have the capacity to defend the Far North. Will …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, that is funny, because according to an April 2019 report from the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, the committee was surprised to learn that Russia's military had significantly increased its air and naval capacities in the Arctic. The members of the committee said that the North Warning System was approaching the end of its life expectancy and that …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, when Russia attacked Ukraine in 2014, Stephen Harper indicated that Canada should be prepared to respond to potential Russian incursions into our territory. Yesterday, the Defence Minister said she would work with U.S. partners to ensure that NORAD gets modernized. In other words, the Liberals have done nothing since 2015. This morning, there are reports in the media that Russia is am…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, Vladimir Putin just put Russia's nuclear forces on alert. He is a dangerous man, and we must not forget that Russia is our neighbour to the north west. As the crow flies, Russia is not far from Canada. The Prime Minister has been caught off guard because he neglected to modernize the north warning system and is still refusing to buy F-35s. Canada's sovereignty in the north is in jeopa…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, that $250 million will be used to pay an Inuit company to maintain the system, but the system is obsolete. It is finished. It is urgent that it be replaced. The government has known this for a long time. We have another problem. Aluminerie Alouette in Sept-Îles was the victim of a cyber-attack. Cybersecurity experts believe that it was a Russian attack and that cyber-attacks will defi…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Chair, I rise in the House this evening to add my voice to those of millions around the world who now see just how dangerous Vladimir Putin is. I spent years in the Canadian Forces learning the structure of the Warsaw pact by heart, studying and memorizing Soviet tactics, learning to recognize vehicles, such as T-80s, BRDM-1s and BMPs, and various types of aircraft. I can say for sure that one…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Chair, I see where my colleague is going. I think we need to open our eyes to what is going on in Europe and Russia. The Russian threat was there before, but people were reluctant to really acknowledge it. We see it now. Canada has natural resources. Yes, we must combat climate change, but in the coming years, we will still need natural gas, a resource that happens to be much cleaner than coal…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Chair, I do know a little about this because I have operated various anti-tank weapons, among others. I would like to remind my colleague that the Conservative Party has been asking for several months that Canada provide weapons to Ukraine. Before the invasion, people were too scared to say the words “lethal weapon”. However, now that Ukraine is under direct attack by Russia, no one is afraid …
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Chair, that is actually a major and recurring problem at the Department of Citizenship and Immigration. The government wanted to bring 40,000 Afghan refugees to Canada, but it barely managed to bring 5,000 to 6,000. We have just learned that the Taliban has decided that no one else will be leaving Afghanistan. It is impossible. It will now take resources and, above all, a sense of urgency. Eve…
Read full speech →Statements By Members
Mr. Speaker, in any situation where police intervention is required, whether it is to maintain or restore public order, our peace officers must demonstrate a strong sense of individual and collective responsibility. They must maintain their composure in the face of insults being hurled at them, and still demonstrate empathy. Cohesiveness is the key to success, and I want to congratulate the police…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, Canadians are not easily fooled, and even the Prime Minister's caucus is growing increasingly nervous about his reckless governance. The Prime Minister claims he has no other choice but to invoke emergency measures. Today, he is turning this into a confidence issue for his own caucus. The emergency measures constitute a precedent that must not be taken lightly. What is more, the Prime…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, I rise in the House today as a matter of principle and with pride in my past. I began my career as a soldier in the Canadian Armed Forces. All I wanted throughout my military career was to defend my country and its values. I can still say today that I am and will always be that soldier, the one who decided that law and order should be a priority for our country, for the safety of Ca…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, I am only talking out of one side of my mouth. When a province asks the federal government for help, as was the case at the Summit of the Americas in 2001, where the RCMP was deployed in large numbers in Quebec City to support the Quebec City police and the Sûreté du Québec, was the Emergencies Act invoked? No, it was not. It is possible for a province to ask the federal government …
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, from the very first day, what was the truckers' intent? It was to protest against a rule change brought in on January 15 that prevented unvaccinated truckers from travelling between the United States and Canada, even though this had been allowed for two years. Quebec has 9,000 unvaccinated nurses working in the health system. Yes, the Conservative Party did believe that it was a lau…
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Madam Speaker, yes, I did tweet that on February 4. I fully acknowledge that I tweeted that, and I still very much believe in what I said. After six days of the occupation in Ottawa, I decided that enough was enough, for me and for the people of Ottawa. My colleagues then also started saying that enough was enough, that they had gotten the message and that the protesters needed to leave. My party …
Read full speech →Orders of the Day
Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the leader of the Bloc Québécois what he thinks about the differences between what the act allows and the capacity and resources on the ground. We can see that the major problem in Ottawa right now is the ability to remove tractor trailers from the streets. Is my colleague aware that section 129 of the Criminal Code compels transportation companies to provide resou…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, that does not explain why in December 2020, 23 Liberal members begged the Prime Minister to take action to save Afghan nationals who had helped Canadians during the conflict in Afghanistan. It took eight months, and after that, the embassy closed its doors, everyone left and nothing happened. Today, they are throwing a number at us: 40,000 Afghans are coming here. However, they have n…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, in 2015, the Prime Minister promised to help veterans. In 2018, he gave the impression that he would do something by hiring hundreds of contract workers to tackle the backlog of thousands of disability claims. These are the claims of the men and women who risked their lives while fighting for our country. Today, the contracts have expired and he is refusing to commit to renewing the c…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, in November, the Prime Minister said that the top priority was keeping Canadians safe and following the science. Today, we know that his decisions were not based on science. Not one, but two of his MPs have stated that the Prime Minister's response to the pandemic was politicized and divisive. Over a dozen developed countries have already begun to lift public health restrictions, but …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, what is clear, what we found out yesterday, is that, under the guise of fighting the pandemic, the Prime Minister voluntarily played with Canadians' mental health. He manipulated people to get votes in the last election. He kept parliamentary activities to a minimum to prevent us from scrutinizing his cabinet's decisions. He stigmatized all Canadians whose opinions differed from his. …
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, this morning, the chair of the Quebec Liberal caucus proved us right. For months now, we have been asking for greater clarity, for science-based decisions and, most of all, for a unifying rather than a divisive approach. Unfortunately, the Prime Minister has been doing the opposite for the past two years by demonizing everyone who disagrees with him. Will he finally admit that he is p…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, this morning, the member for Louis-Hébert and chair of the Quebec Liberal caucus made himself very clear. He asked his government to provide a roadmap, a game plan for where we are going with all this. That is what we have been asking of the Prime Minister for the past two years, but there has been no response from him. The Prime Minister chose to politicize the pandemic that is divid…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, the Fraser Institute has revealed where 35 developed countries rank on its Misery Index. Thanks to its high rates of inflation and unemployment, Canada is ranked the sixth most miserable country. That does not come from me, it is what the report says. This ranking does not even include January's data, which confirms that 200,000 jobs were lost. Jason Clements, the institute's executiv…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, I thank the minister for her comments, but I invite the Prime Minister to leave his house and find a solution to the problem. In January, Canada lost 200,000 jobs and the unemployment rate reached 6.5%. In December, it was 5.9%. The Liberal government has no plan for creating jobs and no plan to reduce inflation, which means that Canadians, again, Canadians, are having a hard time pay…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
With regard to government litigation related to non-compliance of contractual obligations, which has been commenced or has been ongoing since January 1, 2020, related to contracts signed by the government: (a) how many contracts are the subject of litigation; and (b) what are the details of each contract involved in the litigation, including the (i) date, (ii) description of the goods or services,…
Read full speech →Routine Proceedings
With regard to all contracts signed by the government where advance payments were made since February 1, 2020, broken down by department, agency, or other government entity: (a) how many such contracts were awarded; (b) what is the total value of those contracts; and (c) what are the details of each contract with advance payment, including the (i) date, (ii) description of the goods or services, i…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, how much more evidence does the Prime Minister need to ban Huawei? This week we learned from the Washington Post that Huawei was promoting its products to governments saying that they could use voice recognition on citizens and even surveil politicians of interest. The Prime Minister knows that under the Chinese Communist regime, businesses are required to provide information to the r…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, I do indeed know a thing or two about security, and we know that four of the countries in the Five Eyes alliance, which Canada is a part of, have decided to ban Huawei because it poses a threat to their national security. Why is Canada incapable of understanding that Huawei must be banned from 5G development for national security reasons? Yet more evidence came to light this week in t…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his question. Obviously, I do not have the information with me. However, one thing is certain: Law and order follow a certain basic logic in our society. Do we want a society where people know that, if they commit a crime, there are practically no consequences, or do we want a society that makes sure that people who decided to commit a crime…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague. I actually did mention in my speech that I was not talking about drug users. Drug use is a problem that needs to be managed. In this case, we are talking about criminals like drug dealers and drug traffickers. That is where we think we need to continue to focus and step up our efforts, not the opposite.
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, every week, we hear from Canadians who do not understand why a certain judgment was handed down, why a person who committed a crime received a short sentence or a third of a sentence. We often hear questions about judgments. The most important part of our job is creating laws. The administration of justice is the purview of judges. Of course, we need to provide the justice system an…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question. Based on what I hear from my colleagues, rural areas in Alberta and Saskatchewan are experiencing serious problems with people breaking into isolated homes while the owners are present. These people show up drunk, high and armed. These offences happen often and are a huge problem. This type of breaking and entering in rural areas is a problem t…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for her question. That is part of the ideological debate, the position we should take on matters of public safety. As I mentioned, being indigenous, Black, white or other is irrelevant. We are all human beings with two hands. When we decide to commit a crime with a gun, for example, we have to pay the price. I know that the notion of indigenous group or race was…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague and I congratulate him on his election. We did not win his riding. I do believe in the concept of occasional criminals and career criminals. There is nothing to be done for some criminals, while others simply have bad luck. However, lighter sentences will work in favour of new criminals, youth, who will say to themselves that if they commit an offence, they will…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, that is precisely what I was saying at the beginning of my speech when I quoted my colleague from St. Albert—Edmonton. When we talk about opioids, we are talking about fentanyl. Let us not forget that there are criminal networks of dealers importing and selling these substances. Traffickers mix opioids, cocaine and other drugs, and the concentration becomes too high, which is why ev…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Madam Speaker, it brings me no great joy to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C‑5. The first thing I want to point out is that this bill is an exact copy of Bill C‑22, which was introduced and debated in the previous Parliament. Then there was an election, so now we have to start over. On second thought, maybe starting over is not such a bad thing, because if Bill C‑22 had been adopted in i…
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, when the Prime Minister says he does not think about public finances, we know he is telling the truth. He just renewed a five-year contract with a Liberal friend to lease land near Roxham Road without a call for tenders. Will the Prime Minister show some transparency and tell us how much taxpayers will have to pay for that five-year contract?
Read full speech →Oral Questions
Mr. Speaker, I was expecting that answer from the minister. I would respond that since 2015, he has been donating to the Liberal Party. What we are seeing right now is that the contract, the kickback, is very high. We would like to know why we are maintaining a five-year contract for the land on Roxham Road. Does the government intend to let the Roxham Road problem go on indefinitely?
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question. It is good to see him in the House, so I thank him for being here. The fact is that all the committees are already overloaded because they have to conduct their own studies on specific subjects or bills. For example, the Special Committee on Canada-China Relations had to be established because there were so many subjects that needed to be studied…
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I think it is important I begin by providing some background so that people can understand why we are debating a motion today about what happened in Afghanistan. Let us remember that exactly 20 years ago, Canada was part of an international military coalition seeking to combat terrorism in Afghanistan. At the time, in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Canada decided to join …
Read full speech →Government Orders
Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question. He is a great soldier who served missions in Afghanistan and Iraq. When he was elected for his first term in office, he was just getting back from Iraq. I thank him for his military service. We know the Taliban are capable of the worst cruelty imaginable. They are lawless people who will do whatever they want to a five-year-old child because that…
Read full speech →