Parliamentary Speeches

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the hon. member for Essex, who has been a breath of fresh air since he came to this House. He has done a great job. He represents the people of his riding. I have been to his riding and met first-hand all the wonderful people in that area. I want them to know they have a great member. I look forward to working with him for years to come. In Saskatchewan right now, it is spring seeding time. It is a tough time right now, because seeding is about three weeks later than it should be. People are stressed. They are burning the midnight oil, or burning the candle at both ends, one might say, to get the crop in because of the timely nature of the crops they are planting. I want to mention this in the little time I have. To farmer friends in my riding, across Saskatchewan and across Canada, slow down, take a breath, relax and be safe out there. To those who are working in agricultural districts or driving down those roads, remember that those farmers are working really hard and they are have time constraints. Give them space on the road. If people see a tractor coming down the road, they should slow down and let them go by. If they see a sprayer, slow down and let them go by. Let them do their business, because it is so crucial right now, in this next week or two, that they get the crop in as quickly as they can. Trust me when I say these are stressful conditions. Farmers are wet and they are frustrated. I have been there and done that. I have been up to my knees and up to my waist, and I know what it is like to pull a tractor out. I never got the tractor stuck. That was always my dad. I will say that, or at least that is what I will admit to. Talking about stress leads to what we are talking about today. Canadians are stressed. They are financially stressed. They are feeling the impact of costs going up. They are feeling the impact of their wages just not keeping up with what they have to pay per week or per month for the standard cost of living. We are not talking about surplus things or things that are just a benefit. I am talking about the day-to-day requirements to actually feed a family or put clothes on kids and get them off to school. Those are the types of costs that Canadians are struggling with. In a lot of cases, people are maxing out their credit cards. They are looking at ways to save money, but there is just nothing left to cut. That is where we, as a government, can play a role. That is one of the proposals we have made today. It is a simple solution that could immediately be implemented, and its impact could be felt immediately, without a huge bureaucracy being created and without a whole pile of spending on administrating and trying to create new programs. It is a very simple choice, which is to remove the fuel tax on diesel and gas. Instantaneously, that would provide relief at the pumps. It would not only provide relief for the family, but provide relief for the guys who are hauling the food to the warehouse or from the warehouse to the grocery store. It would provide a domino effect of relief through all sectors here in Canada that would make life just that much easier. Hopefully, those costs would trickle down to the consumer and make life just a little easier for that consumer, that Canadian citizen, to make ends meet. We proposed very simple measures. Get rid of the federal tax on gas and diesel, including the GST, and then permanently scrap the clean fuel standard. I am going to talk about the clean fuel standard right now. What is frustrating with this tax is that it is a tax. No matter how the Liberals want to bury it, it is a tax and it is a cost that will get through the supply chain to the end consumer. It always does. Those costs are always passed up the chain, and they will probably be passed up with a multiplier effect as margins are added to them all the way through. They end up in the consumer's back pocket, and those costs are hurting it. This tax also makes our manufacturers, suppliers and international traders uncompetitive in the global marketplace. What do I mean by that? The reality is that these are costs Canadian manufacturers and Canadian producers face, but their competitors around the world do not. These are costs that they have to embed into their pricing as they try to recover the costs and sell abroad that their competition does not have to. Automatically, they have one hand tied behind their back, yet we are telling them to diversify trade, take on new markets and find new ways of doing things. What do we do? We battle. We are basically putting more costs into the situation they are facing. It just does not make sense. We want to improve Canada's ability to market and sell around the world, which I agree with. I think those are good, honourable things to do. I have been pro-free trade all my life. Coming from the agriculture sector in Saskatchewan, we trade and we sell stuff around the world. We sell to clients in China, South America, North Africa and Europe. We are doing business around the world all the time. We are competing with Brazilians, Australians and Americans. We are competing with people around the world who do not have those restraints and those embedded costs. It actually makes it tougher for us to compete. However, we are very creative in Canada. Our farmers are the best in the world. They are quick adopters of new technology. They are very astute and they are competing. They can compete, even though they have had one hand tied behind their back so many times over the last few years. All we are saying is to take the hand from behind their backs and put them on a level playing field. That is what we are saying here by removing the clean fuel standard. It is not just farmers, but manufacturers and the whole Canadian economy that could find more relief and a greater ability to compete internationally by having this removed from their cost platform. I want to circle back to families and the stresses they are facing. I go to events. We held passport clinics in the riding a few weeks back, I sat down at the table and talked to people who were coming in to get passports for their kids. They may travel over the next five or six years. When I held these clinics over the last two or three years, people were talking about a trip they were going to take the next year or the year after. When I talk to them now, they say, “We want to get our passport because it is convenient and it is easy, and thanks for offering the service, but I do not know if we will ever use it because I just cannot afford to travel. I just cannot afford to take on any luxuries like travel, but I want to have my passport.” When we drive down and ask how they are doing, what is going on in their family and how their babies are, I hear a little softening in their tone and see them biting on their lip or a tear in their eye. They say, “It is tough. We had to make the choice this year between letting our kids play baseball or play golf. We had to make the choice this year of whether we are going to put our kids in swimming lessons. We looked at the cost and we just cannot afford it.” They want to make sure that their kids have all of the opportunities to play different sports and experience what they all grew up with, but they say, “I do not know if we can afford it. I do not know if we can do it.” I was talking to one guy. He said, “I have three jobs because I want my kids to play hockey. I want them to experience hockey, but that means I have three jobs.” His wife is also working in that family of four. Two parents are working just so their kids can play hockey. Something is wrong with this equation. Looking back, what has happened? What is wrong? It is 10 years of bad policy. It has been 10 years of ignoring what really needs to be done through policy to make sure that Canadians can thrive, grow, experience the benefits of being a Canadian citizen and have the “top of the world” lifestyle that we became accustomed to in the years before the last 10 years of the Liberal government. These are the things that people are looking at, and they are saying, “It never used to be this way. Why is it now?” Let us look at it. We drove away industry. We brought in policies that no other country in the world has. We have done it all under the guise of being for the environment. I think a lot of people would agree that it is important to take care of our environment, and I agree with that. Canadians would agree with that, but they did not need to be the Boy Scouts of it. They did not need to be the ones doing it all by themselves. Keep in mind that we produce 2% of global emissions, yet we thought we were taking on the world and we are trying to find a way to solve 100% of global emissions. We cannot do it by ourselves, but the government is asking our businesses and our families to pay for all of this with really no benefit at the end of the day to actually make a change in the environment. Going back to these families, they are struggling. They are looking for a way to make ends meet. They want to give their kids a good quality of life. They want to see some hope and a light at the end of the tunnel. They want to see that they are through this rough patch and this structural change that is going on in the U.S. and things like that, and that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. However, from the current government, there has been no policy, really, that has impacted people's day-to-day functions. The Liberals talk about different subsidy programs that they put in place, and they all sound good, but at the end of the day, they are not hitting the mark. They are not actually helping Canadian families. With respect to this policy and these changes, if we were to implement them tomorrow, the impact would be felt immediately. At least families would know right out to the end of the year that for the summer season and going into the fall, they would have some relief. They would know that as the economy picks up and as their job and everything else stabilize, they would be good. That is why this common-sense Conservative approach is something the Liberals should steal. They are good at stealing good Conservative policies. Why not steal this one? Canadians would benefit from it.

Mr. Speaker, I know the sincerity of the hon. member's heart. His approach to it is one way of approaching it. Is it the right way? Is it the most efficient way? That is where we would differ. The need is there. There is no question about it. However, I would like to make sure that families have good jobs, high-paying jobs, so they do not have to go to the federal government for a food program. I would like to make sure that they keep that money in their back pocket, so that they can spend it as they choose. That is the difference between the Conservative approach and the Liberal approach. Liberals would like to create a new bureaucracy, and they would like to dole out the money as they see fit. No, people should keep their money, so they can spend it as they see fit. They worked hard to earn it. While we understand that the issues are there, there are different ways of approaching it. Our way makes more sense. That is why we should do it the Conservative way.

Mr. Speaker, I understand where the member is coming from. Actually, it depends on the demographics. If someone is in rural Saskatchewan, they are not wealthy, by any means. They are a hard-working family with a middle-class income. Reducing fuel costs for them makes a difference. They do drive. If they are going for groceries, they are driving 50 kilometres one way. That is the reality in Saskatchewan. It may be different in Quebec. I do understand that maybe there are different requirements in Quebec, as there are for a lot of other things for which Quebec has different requirements than the rest of Canada. I acknowledge that. Here is something very simple for rural people in rural Canada that would benefit them immediately. It would. For somebody in downtown Toronto or downtown Montreal who takes the bus to work, maybe the benefit is not there. Maybe they need something different. If we could let people keep more of their money, or, in this situation, if we get rid of the clean fuel standard so that the cost of what they are buying is cheaper, then they will feel that benefit.

Mr. Speaker, I have worked with my colleague on the trade committee in the past, and I know she is someone who understands trade and how important it is for Canadian products to get to the world market. The concern I have in her speech is that she talked about the importance of trade, but she did not mention the fact that if we cannot get the product to market, how do we actually achieve those results? One of the problems we have in Canada is that our ports are ranked next to dead last and our rail system is unreliable. Our infrastructure is just not there. Where does the member see growth happening with this budget if it does not address the issues with our ports?

Mr. Speaker, today I want to recognize the communities across Saskatchewan and in my riding of Prince Albert that are facing serious flooding. This week, the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency reported that 34 communities are under local states of emergency, with 20 active flooding incidents. Families are dealing with flooded roads, damaged property and the uncertainty that comes with rapidly changing conditions. With significant road closures and communities under pressure, first responders, volunteers and neighbours are working around the clock to keep people safe, but they should not have to face this alone. I urge all levels of government to act without delay by working together to deliver emergency response, evacuation support and disaster assistance to those affected communities. To those back home, their bravery, strength and co-operation has helped save people's homes and properties. I thank all those who have stepped up to help their neighbours through these difficult times.

Mr. Speaker, on April 2, the United States announced substantial changes to how they will collect steel and aluminum tariffs. Now applied to the full value of products, this change will result in higher costs for Canadian manufacturers and reduce business activity across this country. Workers and businesses are looking for leadership, but instead they are getting silence. Was the Prime Minister aware of these changes? What is he doing to have these tariffs removed?

Mr. Speaker, Canadians are being left in the dark on the CUSMA review. We are forced to rely on media reports and the occasional committee appearance, hearing only vague talk of challenges faced. My constituents are calling me, concerned for their families and their businesses as a resolution to these disputes continues to grind on. In fact, many of us know more about the status of the U.S.-Mexico negotiations than those of our own country. When will the Prime Minister provide a clear update to this House on the deal that he promised to secure over a year ago?

Mr. Speaker, with record closures across the country, Canada's small businesses are sounding the alarm. High costs, red tape and never-ending uncertainty are discouraging the next generation of entrepreneurs. Do not take it from me. Brianna Solberg of the CFIB warns that “Canada’s economic foundation is crumbling.” After 10 years of bad Liberal policy, half of small business owners say they would not recommend starting a business. Why do the Liberals continue to make it harder and not easier for small businesses here in Canada?

Mr. Speaker, I really feel honoured to catch your eye. It is a privilege for me to be here on a Thursday afternoon and know that the Speaker has my back. I think everybody agrees that Bill C-13 should go through. It is common sense. It should be almost like a routine item. I am going to talk about some of the frustrations that we have with the U.K. wanting to join the TPP. I think it is good that it is joining the TPP. I look forward to it joining. I look forward to Costa Rica joining, hopefully, at the end of the month. I think whenever we can expand the TPP to include other countries, we make it a better multilateral agreement. It gives our Canadian manufacturers, producers, farmers and industries a chance to have access not only to another market but to other partners, to compete globally in a lower-tariff environment. Those are all good things. However, I am disappointed at this lost opportunity. As this agreement was being discussed, as we were talking about the fact that the U.K. wanted to join, we had the opportunity then and there to say that some things in our continuity agreement were not resolved, and they could have been resolved as the U.K. entered the TPP. We could have dealt with the additives in food products. We could have dealt with the carcass wash. We could have dealt with the pension issues. We could have said that these things were stumbling blocks that were really a barrier to the U.K. coming into this agreement and that we needed to come to some sort of agreement on all those issues, not only so the U.K. has fair access to Canada but also so we have fair access to the marketplace in the U.K. We could also have made the ethical argument about the U.K. treating its own civil servants with respect and dignity no matter where they live, especially if they decided to live here in Canada. I can understand why they would want to live here in Canada. I think we would all agree Canada is a wonderful country. Why would someone not want to live here? It is awesome. Unfortunately, that opportunity was lost and squandered. After 10 years of the Liberal government, there are so many examples of squandered and lost opportunities that have come back to roost at this point in time. Let us look at a current example. We have the world knocking on our door again looking for natural gas or oil and gas. We could have been developing our pipe and our oil and gas infrastructure, liquefied natural gas, over the last 10 years, and we could have built in and solved some of those problems globally. Now we are trying to do it. I guess it is better late than never, but if we would have done it then, just think of how much wealthier this country would be, how much more leverage this country would have globally and how much better everybody in the world would feel knowing they are getting an ethical supply of oil and gas. That is a lost opportunity that could have been done quite simply and quite effectively over the last 10 years. When we talk about things that are important to Canada, we have the Prime Minister right now going around the globe talking to different countries, and I actually think that is a good thing. I really do. After 10 years of Trudeau, there is a lot of rebuilding that has to happen. In fact, I can remember sitting in a coffee shop back in Prince Albert. A farmer sat down next to me and asked what we could do about Trudeau and if we could take his passport away or something. Every time that prime minister left the country, there was a disaster that followed, whether it was the India event or the open mic in the U.K. There is example after example of when the former prime minister went and burned goodwill, burned our image abroad and impacted our reputation negatively. Now we have the Prime Minister going around and trying to rebuild that reputation. I think it is good that he is doing that because it has to happen. With a Conservative government, that would have been the priority of our prime minister, Prime Minister Poilievre. In that scenario, he would have been able to—

Mr. Speaker, I thought I could sneak that in there. If there was a Conservative prime minister, I know he would be going around the world opening up those markets and rebuilding those relationships. That would be a top priority. In fact, we will see the Conservative leader go to the U.S. next week and do exactly that. He will talk about how Canada is such a great place to invest in and a great place to do business, and he is going to be very successful, just as he was last week in the U.K. and Germany. One thing he learned when he was in Germany, and here I am going to lead into the next part of my presentation, is the LNG aspect. When Germany came knocking on Canada's door, Trudeau said there was no market or economic potential for LNG going outside of Canada and into the rest of the world. Germany proved him 100% wrong. Look at what Germany did. In a matter of less than 60 days, it approved and permitted an LNG facility. In a matter of six months, it was operating. We should think about that, the urgency with which Germany could move and react to an ongoing crisis. The Prime Minister has been saying that we have a crisis in Canada and that we have to be bold and move forward. If that is the case, then why are we not doing the same thing? It is okay to go around the world, talk about rebuilding and sign MOUs on trade agreements that were developed by Ed Fast and Prime Minister Harper back in the 2008-15 era. It is nice to see the Prime Minister encouraging companies and people to take advantage of those 51 trade agreements, going out and trying to sell Canada again, but if people cannot get their goods to market, what good are they? Harper and Ed Fast understood that when we do a trade agreement, we also need to build the infrastructure to deliver the goods to market in a timely manner that is consistent with what the consumer and the supplier agreed upon and in a time frame that is bankable. We do not have that right now. In fact, if members talked to customers in Japan or other parts of Asia, they would say they love Canadian product. I will use the grain sector. They would say they love Canadian wheat but will never give us 100% of their business because they cannot rely on us to deliver it on time in a manner that is consistent and bankable. We have a reputation problem in our ports, in our rail system and in our infrastructure. It does not matter how many trade deals or MOUs we sign; if we cannot get the product to market in a bankable manner, they are useless. That is the scenario we face in Canada today. Three of our four top ports are in the bottom 15% of the globe. They are the worst in the world. Halifax, to its credit, is in the top 50. I will give Halifax credit. I toured Halifax in 2024. It has done a great job in expanding, utilizing and managing the port. However, in Prince Rupert, Vancouver and Montreal, there is a lot of work that needs to be done and a lot of infrastructure that needs to be put in place. When we talk to customers and ask what their biggest threat or concern is, let us say, in Vancouver, they say it is congestion. What is being invested today to help with congestion? What is being invested today in the Port of Vancouver to take the wait time of a vessel from 10 days down to two days? If we went to the port of Montreal or Prince Rupert, I think we would see the same issues. These ports need to become the best ports in the world. They need investment and to be able to deliver products when they say they are going to. We need to spend money there and understand that if we truly want to take advantage of all the goods that God has given us and export them around the world, we have to have the infrastructure to do that. We have not reinvested in our highways. Why do so many heavy semis going from east to west go into the U.S.? For example, a semi coming out of Quebec would go into the U.S. to come to Saskatchewan rather than using the Trans-Canada Highway. Why is that? Why do we rely on a pipeline, line 5, that goes to the U.S. to come back up to Sarnia to provide propane for Quebec and puts Sarnia and the industries relying on natural gas in jeopardy and held up by the U.S.? Where is that infrastructure investment? Where is that commitment to make us self-reliant? It has not showed up or been talked about. We need to make these ports the best in the world, we need to make our infrastructure some of the best in the world, and we need to look at our rail system and revamp our rail service. Our rail service is so bad in Canada, and it has been bad for years. When I was farming, our biggest complaint on the farm was the rail service and lack of it. We had CEOs who were more concerned about the shareholders than their customers, and those same CEOs are still more concerned about their shareholders than their customers. They know they are going to get the grain. They know they are going to get the lumber. They know they are going to get the oil. They know they are going to get it, so why do they care when? That is what has happened and it is why, when a customer in Japan is saying, “Listen guys, I love your wheat. I want more of it, but I cannot take more because I do not know when I am going to get it. You may give me a thousand tonnes one week and nothing for the next six weeks,” that has to do with our ports and rails. When are they going to fix those systems? When are they going to invest in that type of infrastructure? When are they going to make it so that when I have a container of manufactured goods, I know exactly where it is throughout the chain? We do not have those capacities here, and that was a big frustration in the port of Halifax. People really do not know what is coming into Halifax until it hits Halifax, and the reason they do not know is that the computer systems have not been invested in so that they have the ability to see what is coming in. When they get the paper manifest, that is when they find out what is in that container. Keep in mind that Halifax takes those containers and has a huge opportunity to take those big ships, unload those containers, put them onto smaller ships and go into New York, Boston and all those other harbours. Port of Halifax personnel have that potential if we give them the proper hardware and software to do that, and if the railways and the ports can talk to each other in a manner that is consistent. We do not have that in Canada. We need to put those types of systems in place. It can be done. Other countries in the world have done great jobs on their ports and the port systems in their infrastructure. We do not need to reinvent the wheel. I have never been one for reinventing the wheel unless there is something new that has not been invented before. There are companies and groups in the world, in Singapore for example, who run tremendous port facilities. Why do we not just go talk to them and ask them how we should do it in Vancouver? Why would we not take advantage of that knowledge and that wisdom and make sure that we have that here in Canada? We want to grow this economy and diversify trade, but if we do not spend the money on the infrastructure and on making sure that we can deliver the products, it does not matter. They can go around the world and sign all the trade agreements they want, but if they cannot get the goods to market, what good is it? The goods that we have in Canada are what the world wants. Think about it. Just in my province of Saskatchewan there are uranium, forestry products, grains and oilseeds, lentils and pulses, oil and gas, potash and fertilizer. That is just in Saskatchewan. Let us go down into Manitoba. Manitoba has grains and oilseeds and hydro. What does Alberta have? It has all sorts of things. We can go province by province and we have everything that the world wants. I am sure a lot of businessmen from Asia and around the world, when they come into Canada and they look at the maps, say, “Wow, this is awesome.” Then, they go in and they try to develop it and realize that it is 14 years for a mine, so they say, “Next.” Then they say, “Okay, I can get a mine, but I do not have a train or a truck or a road. Next.” That is what has been reoccurring over the last 10 years here in Canada. It is not that we do not have the resources. It is not that we do not have the educated workforce. It is not that we do not have the opportunity. We do not have the systems to allow people to say yes. We get in our way. That has been showing up over and over again, and we have left so much wealth on the table. That wealth could have been used for our hospitals, our pharmacare program and our dental care program. It would have been used to balance our budgets. That is how they get the money to provide the social programs that they want to deliver to Canadians. Norway is a perfect example of that. They have taken their sovereign wealth fund and used it to provide not only social services across Norway but wealth for the next generation and the generation after that. Norwegians know their kids and grandkids are going to be taken care of. We know our kids and grandkids here in Canada cannot buy a house and probably may never be able to buy a house unless something drastically changes. When we look at that and we see all these opportunities and all the potential and all the things that could be happening here in Canada, it makes us wonder why. What has gotten in the way? It was 10 years of Trudeau, for sure. It was 10 years of bad policy, at both the federal and provincial levels, a lack of infrastructure and infrastructure investment, and a lack of desire to actually allow it to happen. They have people who are basically the “no development” crowd, who say we should not develop anything but should just leave it all in the ground. I am sorry. In this day and age that does not work. That will not feed our kids. That does not provide the wealth that Canadians have come to expect. Let us go into some of the other aspects that are happening around the globe today. We are talking about the USMCA, or CUSMA, whatever we want to call it. It is a file that I know fairly intimately and that is very close to my heart. If we want leverage in that file, the best thing we can do is develop our country. The best thing we can do is control the things we can control. We do not know what the President of the U.S. is going to do, and he has every right to do whatever he wants to do. It is his country. The Americans will have those debates among themselves. Congress will decide how much leeway it will give the President when it comes to trade, trade issues and trade files. Again, that is out of our hands. We cannot control that. We can do our best to influence it. We can do our best to make sure the Americans understand the consequences of it. I was part of a team that did that in 2018. I still remember going there with Brian Masse from the NDP and Wayne Easter and Andrew Leslie from the Liberal Party and talking about the importance of trade and what it meant to them and their districts. I remember working very closely with the embassies down there, making sure we had the proper data and information so that when we sat down with a member, not only did they know when we left what the relationship was, but they knew how many jobs were created because of trade with Canada. They knew exactly how much economic activity was happening in their district because of Canada. They had a good sense and understanding of exactly what that agreement meant. We can do all that again. I know the embassy down in the U.S. has good people. It really does, and they are doing the best they can. However, the reality is that we are weak, and they know we are weak. The reality is that they know we do not have a lot of leverage, unless we start to develop the things we have. In fact, we used to use the leverage of critical minerals. We would say to the Americans, when we had disputes over the last four years, that we have critical minerals and that they did not want to piss us off because we have critical minerals. The first year, that worked. The second year, they said, okay, that it is good. They needed critical minerals and did not want to buy their critical minerals from China. The third year, they looked at us and said to prove to them we can get them out of the ground and that we can actually do something. This is the question I would have for the Prime Minister. It is to prove to Canadians that he is actually going to accomplish something. He has made some great speeches and people are raving about some of the speeches he has given around the world, which is fair enough. Words are good and important, but actions really show who someone is. I ask him show us the actions. He should show Canadians the actions he is going to take to position us properly, and not just for this negotiation because that is irrelevant as it is going to be what it is. It is what it is. Who is going to position Canada going into the future? Who has the vision of Canada to take advantage of the resources we are given, and to do it in a manner that we can all appreciate and respect and that is honourable? Canada has so much going for it. We have a good rule of law and a great global reputation. We have a great education system. There is no reason we cannot be the best, most popular superpower in the world when it comes to delivering, whether it is resources, finished goods or AI products. Name it and we can do it. I am going to end with a challenge. If the Liberal government really wants to do something, if it really wants to leave an impact that is going to help our kids, it must get serious about the infrastructure. If it is going to invest in things, it needs to get serious about those types of things and invest in those. If it is not going to get serious on that, if it is not going to get serious about improving our efficiency and our costs of production and getting those down, if it is not going to get serious about doing those types of things, then we are going to have another year until the next election, or whenever that may be, of lost opportunity. Do not let it be an 11-year lost opportunity. Make some changes. I implore the government to do that. If it will not, we will.

Mr. Speaker, if I remember that bill, it was an ominous bill that had all sorts of things in it, including that. When we put a piece of pie in with a bunch of garbage, it is still a bunch of garbage. We do not get the chance to separate the piece of pie. There are things the member said that I would agree with, vote for and say they are good investments in Canada. However, the way the Liberals went about doing it made it impossible to support. Yes, they had their political wedge, and I congratulate them on it, good job, but did they do Canada any favours? No, they did not.

Mr. Speaker, that is a great question. I am in favour of ISDR when it makes sense to have an investor-state dispute mechanism. When we looked at removing chapter 11, the history of it and the number of disputes, the amount paid out versus the amount of trade we actually did was very small. The percentage was so small it was unreal. When we looked at what was being paid out, the reality is that it was because of the nationalization of a pulp mill. If a pulp mill is nationalized by a provincial government, does one not think that company deserves some sort of settlement? Let me reverse it. If a Canadian company is investing in another country and all of a sudden that country changes its constitution, changes its laws and comes back saying it is nationalizing that facility and the company has no recourse, is that fair? That is the idea behind ISDR, investor-state dispute resolution. It can be a small or medium-sized enterprise that is engaged in that type of situation. It does not have to be a big corporation, which everybody from the left seems to want to say is what is going on. The left has raised more money on investor-state dispute resolution than what the actual facts show. There are times we need those types of agreements in our trade agreements in order to make sure the investments we do abroad are protected. That is why they are there.

Mr. Speaker, we need the Ring of Fire. The reality is that for the types of goods and products we are producing into the future, the elements sitting in the Ring of Fire have to come to market. Either we bring them to market or the Chinese are going to bring them to market. If we want economic independence and the ability to take care of ourselves and our allies, the Ring of Fire becomes very crucial to seeing that develop. I will compliment Premier Ford for moving forward with that road. I am very concerned that the federal government is dragging its heels. It needs to shape up, get out of the way and make sure things happen. I am sorry, but it should not take five years to approve a mine that has been talked about for the last 15 years.

Mr. Speaker, I applaud the Prime Minister if that is actually what he ends up doing at the end of the day, once he proves to me that he has shovels in the ground and is doing it. However, where have you been for the last 10 years? How did we get into such a bad deficit situation in the last 10 years? Where have you been? The same Liberal members are sitting over there with a different guy leading them. That is all it is. You are telling me one person can now make all this happen? Where have you been for the last 12 years? Churchill is a perfect example. Wab Kinew, and I give him credit, is promoting that. I think that is a great idea. I am standing behind it. It seems to me that makes a lot of sense for bringing grains out of western Canada into the European marketplace. I would think it is great for LNG, and maybe even oil and gas. Where have you been for the last 10 years when we were talking about the port of Churchill? SARM has been on it, and a lot of other groups have been talking about it. Where has the Liberal government been? It has been nowhere to be found.

Mr. Speaker, there is a lot in that question. The member talked about the Alto train and the $90 billion, which will probably be $150 billion and which will probably be $200 billion by the time it is actually built and completed, where the average ticket cost will probably be around $2,000 one way in a corridor that actually is already being served by bus, existing rail and airplane. If the government has that kind of money, just think what it could do for port infrastructure and highway infrastructure that could actually bring revenue and royalties back to our country and provide the social programs that we want to see going forward. It is not that we do not want to dream. Dreams are fine, but reality does have to set in once in a while, and practicality has to rule the day. The reality is we have more priorities that have to come first before we see something like the Alto rail.

Mr. Speaker, the member laid out an example that I am not familiar with. I do not know the details and cannot answer the question effectively. The member and I are going to dispute investor state dispute settlements, because she looks at it through a different window than I do. I look at it as the mechanism for making sure that things are done fairly, equally and properly, and that everybody is protected, no matter what happens.

Mr. Speaker, I know that my colleague is the shadow minister for transport. I am just kind of curious. If he had $90 billion sitting in his pocket, would he be putting it into high-speed rail, or would he be looking at places like the port of Vancouver? Would he be looking at things like a national highway that is actually twinned? Would he be looking at other things like that if he had that kind of money? If we had been through 10 years of really good economic conditions and Canada could be self-sufficient, we would be in a different boat, but we are not. We are a trading nation, so if my colleague had that kind of money, where would he place it?

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe for not letting the Prime Minister sacrifice canola and pulse producers. Saskatchewan farmers know that market access to China has been low on the list of priorities for the Liberals. Thankfully, the premier understands a simple truth. If we want to grow the Canadian economy, we must sell to the world. While the premier has done his part, the same cannot be said for the Liberal government. Trade deals are as strong as the logistic networks supporting them. Exporters continue to face congested ports, limited rail capacity and aging infrastructure. Years of underinvestment and regulatory delays have made Canada an unreliable supplier in the eyes of our trading partners. If the Prime Minister truly believes in expanding access to global markets, he must commit to serious, sustained modernization of our ports, rails and export infrastructure. Saskatchewan knows how to sell to the world. The government must now do its part to expand markets.

Madam Speaker, it is an honour to get up this morning to talk about this motion. I can get behind it because there are lots of common-sense things within the motion. Who would not want to “strengthen the accountability, effectiveness, and mutual benefits of Canada's international development assistance”? I think that is common sense. I think everybody would get behind that. We always want to do things better. We want to deliver programs more efficiently. If we can do that more effectively with more accountability in the process, then that is a good thing. I think that is proper. The motion states it would do this by “implementing new policies to ensure that Canadian international assistance programming integrates opportunities for reciprocal economic benefit, including through the participation of Canadian small and medium-sized enterprises, innovators, and workers”. Why would we not want to include our SMEs in this process? They have so much to offer. They have so much to contribute in foreign aid. Foreign aid does actually give us soft power. It creates a Canadian environment in different countries around the world, and that is a positive environment. Our businesses that export in these regions do it with integrity and honour. Why would we not include them in foreign aid? I think that is a good way for them to participate. If there is a little economic benefit for them, there is nothing wrong with that. I think that is a positive thing. The motion would do this by “establishing a dedicated Economic Partnerships Window to support projects that align poverty reduction abroad with economic security at home, and that utilize Canadian economic strengths such as clean energy, agriculture, digital technology, and education”. Again, these types of things make sense. We have lots of knowledge in all these areas. When I think of agriculture in my province of Saskatchewan, I think that part of our foreign aid could be teaching farmers around the world how to use things that conserve soil and conserve fertilizer. When I look at the province of Saskatchewan, the potash, I see that we have things that can help increase yields, allow people to be self-sufficient and provide food security. On digital technology and education, Canada is becoming a leader in that, and it will be a leader in that. Why would we not help other countries around the world in developing those types of technologies? Why would they not come to Canada? Canada is a great place for AI work. It is a great place to store data. A lot of people do not want to store their data in China or the U.S. Why not store it in Canada? There is a natural advantage. Of course, these storage facilities take a lot of power to cool. It just so happens, where I live in Saskatchewan, it is cold six months out of the year, so we do not need nearly as much power to cool that data and keep it in place. Again, that is a common-sense approach where Canada could really help people around the world. The motion would do this by “requiring the Minister of International Development to report to Parliament annually on the extent of Canadian participation in international assistance projects, the measurable benefits for partner countries, and the economic opportunities created for Canadians”. Again, that is part of the accountability. I do not want to see this become something where there is red tape, where it gets over-regulated and becomes a cumbersome process. To come back to a committee to show what was done this year, show the benchmarks for next year, give a five-year goal and show that the 10-year goal can be flexible and change would be very proper and proactive management of our foreign aid and how we distribute our foreign aid. Canada should have a common, consistent approach around the world. We need the commonality where we stand up for the values we strongly believe in and show those values around the world through foreign aid and through the way we conduct ourselves in the business community. I think that is something Canada could really do well in, and I think it would be appreciated by countries all over the world. The Canadian flag still means something. I wear it proudly whenever I go abroad, and people often tap me on the shoulder to ask where I am from in Canada, because a lot of people have friends and relatives who live here in Canada. There are things we have done right in the past, which has created a country that is respected around the world. If we do foreign aid properly, we can maintain that respect, be more efficient and more effective, build that soft power and have that influence to make the world a better place. This motion has some good ideas, and I can see the Conservative Party getting strongly behind it.

Madam Speaker, it is always great to rise in the House to talk about things that are important to Canadians. Of course a budget implementation act is something we would all like to think is very important to Canadians. This budget really is an omnibus bill full of hypocrisy. The member for Winnipeg North would probably agree with me when I talk about hypocrisy, because I can remember the days when he talked about omnibus bills and how bad, how horrible, they were, yet here he is today defending one. A classic example is what the bill is supposed to do for people in Saskatchewan. I think of the agriculture sector, which is important to me; there is nothing of substance in the bill to help canola farmers and to help fisheries workers, both of whom are facing tariffs out of China and need market relief and market help to gain market access into not only the Chinese market but also other markets around the world. There is nothing really set aside to assist these guys to work with them. There is nothing in the budget for the forestry sector, other than more debt and more loans. There is nothing there that would give people in the forestry sector a game plan to solve the problems they have with the U.S., to actually look at expanding their markets into other parts of the world and to look at using wood and wood products in different ways that would take them into the next generation and allow them to export throughout the world. What is there? There is a piece regarding the Canada Post Corporation. What that has to do with budget implementation, I am not sure, but it is there. There is a piece respecting Farm Credit Canada that is concerning. It is important to talk about Farm Credit Canada to make sure it is delivering things in the most effective and meaningful way. The minister would have a report, not this year or next year but in five years, when there is no longer a Liberal government, to report to the committee about Farm Credit and how it is operating and functioning. I remember the days when banks would not touch farming. I remember there was a reason Farm Credit Canada was an organization created to help farmers: There was a time and place where banks looked at farming as too much risk. FCC has been a great partner for the farming community right across Canada. Now, as I see the government wanting to pry into FCC, I am suspicious of what its motive is. If the Liberals want to do something proper with respect to FCC, they should not put it in a budget implementation act. They should run it through the agriculture committee, which should actually do a study on it and then come back to the House with its own set of motions, but no, the Liberals put it in the budget implementation act. Respecting the Special Economic Measures Act, it looks to me as if the finance department and Global Affairs cannot get along. Historically, under these measures, if it wanted to put a restriction on a financial institution, Global Affairs could do that. However, now it would not be able to. It would have more red tape, and Global Affairs officials would have to talk to finance officials before they could take action. Again, this just puts more red tape into things that need to be done faster and more efficiently. I also see things in the budget that the Liberals have stolen from the Conservative Party, and they are good things. The member for Winnipeg North cannot accuse me of saying nothing good. I see the First Nations Goods and Services Tax Act. The budget would empower First Nations to tax themselves, to consider a sales tax for themselves to raise revenues to fulfill their financial requirements to meet the needs of their people. This is a Conservative value. It is something that was in the Conservative platform and that the Liberal Party gladly stole, and it is something I could get behind, but it should be its own piece of legislation; it should not be part of the budget implementation act. It should be something that goes through the appropriate committees in the appropriate time frame to flesh out all the issues around it so it can be done properly. It deserves more than a two-minute reading in a committee, in with 600 pages of other items. It is a good policy, but it would not see the proper light of day and the proper scrutiny. Why would things concerning the Broadcasting Act, for example, be in a budget implementation act? Why would they not be their own act that would go through committees on its own? Why do they have to be part of the BIA? I see the Human Pathogens and Toxins Act. Members should think about that. It has nothing to do with finance. The Liberal government is exposing its hypocrisy, shoving things into one bill to avoid utilizing the House of Commons, Parliament and the committee structure to get a better bill, to get better oversight and to get a better piece of legislation that would benefit all Canadians. Did folks know that the Aeronautics Act is in the budget? Yes, it is, but no, we would not be funding a space program; we would just be changing some meanings of the act. We could not get canola in the budget. We could not get forestry workers in there. We could not get fishery workers in there. We could not get things in the budget that would actually reduce the cost to Canadians. We could not get things that would actually protect Canadians and their financial stability in the future, which is something the Liberal Party ran on. It talked about, in its campaign, how it was going to protect Canadians. It was going to make sure it got the best deal, elbows up, with Donald Trump, and all that. There is nothing in the budget that it talked about in its election campaign to protect Canadians, other than putting them at more risk with higher debt and higher interest payments that they, their grandkids and their great-grandkids are going to have to pay. That is what the government put on the Canadian population, yet it still found time to include all these things that really are not Canadian priorities but are priorities of the bureaucracy or are pet projects of the Liberal government. Coming from Saskatchewan, I believe it is important when a budget comes along that the needs of the people of Saskatchewan are at least talked about and represented. It is important that people across Canada feel that the budget is actually going to be something that will benefit them as they move forward, that will make life easier and more affordable. There is nothing in the budget implementation act or in the budget itself that really does that. The budget is really a shell game. It talks about things that either have already been approved and done or that are high and mighty and really would not accomplish anything. The budget implementation act is more about bureaucrats with pet projects, who are trying to manoeuvre and take advantage of a new government to get their own personal will done, not the will of Canadians. It is rather disappointing and disturbing to see in this type of bill. I come back to the omnibus style of the bill. The hypocrisy shown by the Liberal government is totally unbelievable, but I guess we should not be surprised; the Liberals have been full of hypocrisy over the last 10 years by creating a problem and then basically saying that they are the only ones who have a solution for it. The Liberals have created a problem in this country with bad policies over the last 10 years. The Liberals have made our country stagnant. They have created economic policies that have put our kids in a scenario where they will probably never be able to buy a house, instead of using the budget implementation act or the budget to put in proper policies that would make life more affordable for Canadians and to look at things that would help protect seniors in their retirement and things that would grow the economy. Policies have to be right, and the Liberals have not made the right policies. With anything they get wrong, what they do is throw more money at it, thinking it will go away. If one does not fix the problem, one does not get a proper solution. Money does not always fix the problem. I am going to leave it at that. I am letting the House know that the budget implementation act is a severe disappointment because it could have done so much. It had the opportunity, and it had the will of Canadians who wanted the government to do things for them that would succeed. The government let us down again. This is a horrible budget implementation act. It is an ominous bill. It should not see the light of day, and I absolutely will not vote for it.

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the member for Winnipeg North for hosting the Saskatchewan Roughriders and the Grey Cup. He did a great job, and we really appreciate that fact. I know he is a closet Roughriders fan. There is a big difference between the Liberal and Conservative approaches. The Liberals would rather take taxpayers' money and throw it at a problem instead of sitting back, analyzing the problem and fixing the policy that is creating it. If one fixes the policy, one creates the private investment that will see the economy grow. What do the Liberals do? They take the other way. If the Liberals have a problem, instead of fixing it, they just throw more money at it. They put a band-aid on it and say that it will be fine for now, because that will get them through to the next election. In the meantime, that compounds the problem. We have seen that compounding effect over the last 10 years, hitting our economy as we speak today. We cannot allow the Liberals to do that anymore.

Madam Speaker, I wish we had a surplus so we could spend money with that surplus, but reality is reality. The government has mismanaged the economy so badly over the last 10 years that we are in a deficit. The reality is that this world is not the place it was 15 or 20 years ago. Unfortunately, we will have to borrow money and we will have to spend it on defence. We will have to make sure our men and women in the military have the tools they need to protect our country. There is no way around that. I would love to see it happen under a different financial situation, no question about that, but we are not given that luxury because of bad management by the Liberal government.

Madam Speaker, during the 2008 crisis, the Harper government spent money on infrastructure. It was put into lift stations. It was put into things that were not considered sexy items. It was for things that Canadians needed in order to have a proper functioning economy. Yes, we need proper investments so we can actually feel and touch the assets that Canadians looked at. I want to remind members that during that time frame, it was not the government that picked the projects; it was the municipal governments and the provincial governments. Here, the federal government is dictating which projects get a green light and which do not. A committee was just set up for big beautiful projects. The Liberals should look at all 10 of them.

Mr. Speaker, division 2, the Canada Post Act; division 8, the Farm Credit Canada Act; division 18, the Special Economic Measures Act; and division 24, the Broadcasting Act, are examples of things included in the budget implementation act that have nothing to do with the budget. Does the member believe, understand or concur that the Liberals are actually shoving things in the budget with disrespect to Parliament, such as the First Nations Goods and Services Tax Act, that actually deserve their own piece of legislation and their own committee time so Parliament can actually put forward a proper bill about them, instead of the Liberals' shoving them in for a 30-second bite in the budget implementation act?

Mr. Speaker, it is great to be in the House this time of the year talking about harvest, food security, food safety and the cost of living. I come from Prince Albert. The riding of Prince Albert is an agriculture-producing region. It is a very viable part of the province of Saskatchewan, which produces a lot of the food we eat across Canada and around the world. What we are seeing happen right now in this economy and the bad policies of the government are really putting people in a bad situation. When we look at the cost of food right now, we are seeing food purchases and storage rising 3.5% year over year, versus 1.9% in the U.S. If we look at the costs in Canada, they are double the costs in the U.S. The prices have risen 48% faster in Canada. Food inflation has been 1.5%, which is double the 0.8% increase headlines in the CPI. Canadians are struggling. I do not want to give the impression that because food prices are going up, farmers are making a pile of money or getting a fat wallet out of this. Nothing is further from the truth. If we look at what was facing farmers when they were making decisions last spring, at that time they had a carbon tax, a cost other producers around the world did not have. Now that the carbon tax is gone, inflation has gone down substantially. It is not because of good policy from the government; it is the government taking the Conservatives' policy and applying it that brought inflation down. Let us, the Conservative party, accept a thank you and take a bow for that, because that is something we, for the last 10 years, have been saying would happen, but the Liberals did not listen until the voters decided they were going to turf them unless they listened. In Saskatchewan, we are a big canola-producing province. In fact, canola was developed in Saskatchewan, and it has grown in Alberta, Manitoba and parts of Ontario. Canola farmers are going through a really tough season this year. When we put tariffs on EVs roughly a year and a half ago, the 100% tariff, we and the canola and fisheries industries knew at that time that there were going to be consequences. The government did not prepare for those consequences. It had six months before the tariffs started to hit the canola and seafood industries to proactively develop a game plan for how to mitigate the damage, to go to China and say, “We are going to work something out for our canola and seafood industries.” The Liberals did nothing. They could have put together a mitigation plan with the canola producers, crush plants and facilities and say, “Here is a game plan to help adapt to the new environment we are possibly going to be faced with,” but there was nothing. What they did offer were more loans and debt, but those do not solve the problem. As producers look at a combine that is going up to $1.5 million and the machinery going over $1 million for an air drill, they are really starting to feel the pressures of the costs. When my dad first started farming, if he had a bad year, he could work in the winter time and catch up. Now, if these guys have a bad year, they are done. There is the amount of capital they have to put out in the spring and the lack of the ability to get that capital back in the fall if they have a bad crop, tariffs, bad market conditions or bad weather. There is so much going on that people who farm really have nerves of steel. There is no question about that. At least the Premier of Saskatchewan was willing to go to China and talk about canola, and I will give credit to the parliamentary secretary for going with him, but I will say that, when we had these problems under the Harper government, it was not even a day and a half before Minister Ritz would be on a plane and in China to sort out the problem. There would have been a proactive game plan put together, sitting with canola producers and growers and talking to different associates, to figure out how to mitigate this and move things forward, “Can we get more crush? Can we do more? Can we step up to the U.A.E. or Dubai? What are the options to make sure we do not feel the harm Chinese tariffs will place?” Nothing was done by the government. The cost to the Canadian economy is going to be substantial because of that, as will the hurt felt on the prairies and how that will domino back to Ontario and the rest of Canada. I was talking to some of the prairie machinery manufacturers, and they are looking at things very closely, too. Their sales are down substantially because their costs are up. The industrial carbon tax on steel, for example, is something they have to pay that their competitors around the world do not. When they export into Kazakhstan, China and around the world, they are already at a disadvantage because of the costs they bear here in Canada because of the bad policies of the Liberal government. That is the problem I see with the Liberal government. It brought in policies so quickly and blindly without listening to the industry, which has added costs to the system. It made the system so expensive that it has to subsidize people now just to stay alive. Members have been talking about the food program for schools. I think the aim is $4.50 a plate. Nobody wants a kid to go hungry. The science is there. If children have full stomachs, they will learn better and grow, but I will remind the members opposite that kids only go to school five days a week. They are also not at school on holidays and during the summer break. If their parents cannot afford food when the kids are at school, what are they supposed to do when they are not at school? Would it not be a better policy to look at things to bring costs down instead of bringing in a new program to help people out? Would that not be a better policy? Would it not be better to analyze what the real problems are and what is driving the cost of food up? The Conservatives put forward some solutions. Those are the things the government has to focus on, not looking at how to spend taxpayers' money to patch things up from A to B. I will use the example of the plastics program. When that was proposed, those in the industry very quickly asked if we understand the consequences of this. They explained very clearly that a lot of the fruits and vegetables that come in plastic are shipped from around the world in that type of material. They made it very clear that they are not going to change the packaging in which they ship food to Canada to accommodate Canadians without somebody paying the cost for something different. They also said that the amount of food waste will increase substantially because of rotting and not having the proper packaging material and that there are no alternatives at this point in time, but there is research going on for alternatives. What does the government want to do? It wants to barrel ahead with blinders on and bring in this kind of policy, a policy that is going to increase food waste, which increases cost. It is going to increase the cost of food because the packaging will have a higher cost. It is going to bring zero benefit to the environment. I understand that we want to take care of the oceans and all that. I am all for it. I think we should be doing everything we can to do those types of things when it makes sense and when we have the science, technology and materials to do it. In the meantime, we can do things to mitigate the problem. There is a gentleman in Prince Albert who does plastic recycling. He has a home for it all. He is looking for ways to recycle. I want to highlight for the Liberals that, when they bring in bad policy, there are costs. They say they are going to stick with the bad policy, but make it better by subsidizing, with a bit of a tax benefit, a food program, a dental program or something else. There was a time when Canadians did not need those types of programs. There was a time when I could go to the grocery store and fill up the cart, and it would only cost a hundred bucks. When I go to the grocery store now and put two items in the cart, it costs 250 bucks. It was 10 years ago that it was a hundred bucks. Today, it is substantially more. I was joking with a guy in the grocery store. We were waiting in line, and he said that we do not need these big carts anymore because he cannot afford to fill it. He is right. Bacon has gone from $17 to $23. I used to buy hot dogs for $12 and they are now pushing $18. It used to be $18 for a pound of coffee and it is $32 now. These are the result of bad policy. Farmers are not getting rich. This is not going into farmers' back pockets. If the farmers are not getting it, and I do not think the supply chain is getting it, who is getting it? It is the taxes being paid, directly and indirectly, to the federal government, which it is then paying back in some sort of subsidization program. It is absolutely stupid. When the Prime Minister was elected, he made all kinds of promises. I will remind members of his promises, the things he said during the campaign. These are not made up. Conservatives are repeating word for word what he told Canadians. All I want is for him to keep his word. The Prime Minister said he was going to reduce food costs, and he has not done that. He said he was going to make things better and be elbows up with the U.S. I am not sure if that was the right policy to begin with, to be honest, but he said it was the right policy and sold that to Canadians. Where is he today? He is scared to come into the House. We do not see him in question period or at any time during the day. The reality is that costs have gone up. Bad policies have made costs go up, and the government is so blind and so much like a cult on the environment and in so many other areas that it refuses to make decisions that would make things—

Mr. Speaker, first of all, the member did not hear me right. I did not say food; I said inflation in general. Second, when the government reduced the carbon tax, what was the price of fuel at the pump? It went from two dollars a litre down to I think $1.29 in Prince Albert. Where do members think inflationary pressures were relieved for Canadian consumers? It was from the savings they had on the price of gas so they were able to afford other things. That is what is showing up in your inflation numbers. Nothing else you have done has brought costs down. The reality is the reality. Go to the gas station and look at the price of fuel today compared to when you were in charge with your carbon tax.

Mr. Speaker, I will go back to what the member he is referring to said. We have to make changes when it makes sense. He used the example of tariffs on fertilizer. If we put a tariff on fertilizer and nobody else does, what impact does it have? If we put regulations in place that nobody else in the world is putting in place, all we have done is added costs to our consumers that nobody else is bearing. Let us look at that. The member is right. It is a complicated thing, but let us use common sense, which the member before him said, as we go through that process. Let us not disadvantage our farmers and manufacturers in the process just because we think we are right when nobody else is following that in this area.

Mr. Speaker, we have another person from Saskatchewan who is full of common sense. It is nice to see that show up here in the House. The member is absolutely right. We have to look at the things that underlie the increase in the cost of food. If it is increased taxes, increased indirect costs, or regulations coming into the sector that nobody else faces around the world and that are not providing food safety or food quality, those types of costs should not be borne by Canadian producers. Then they would not be passed on to the consumer. Let us use some common sense in this House, take a step back and keep in mind that people have to eat. They have to be able to afford groceries. That is the number one requirement. If the government keeps bringing in bad policies, as it has over the last 10 years, this is going to get worse.

Mr. Speaker, the riding of Prince Albert and the people of Saskatchewan have an esteemed agricultural history. Our farmers are proud exporters who help feed the world and improve food security for all. Unfortunately, punitive action taken by the Chinese Communist Party has unfairly targeted Canadian canola. In response to this unjust, unilateral behaviour, the Prime Minister sent a parliamentary secretary to Beijing. When the Conservative Party was in government, we sent the minister of agriculture because we recognized the importance of the canola industry to the Canadian economy. The Liberal government fails to properly understand the significant negative impacts this Chinese trade action would have on Saskatchewan, our farmers and the Canadian economy. It is about time that our Prime Minister recognizes the challenge at hand and shows Canada that our farmers and our jobs are worth fighting for. Will the Prime Minister show the resolve needed to defend our farmers and work to end the stalemate with Beijing, or will he just continue to roll over to China and sacrifice western Canadian farmers?

Mr. Speaker, at a time when Canada should be expanding energy production, the Liberals are using their anti-energy laws to stop pipeline construction. Companies that have wanted to build have not because of these laws. For 10 years now, the government has driven away investments and stranded our energy sector. It is time for anti-energy laws like Bill C-69, the shipping ban and the job-killing industrial carbon tax to go. If the Liberal government really wants to see energy projects built, will it finally do the right thing for Canadians and repeal its anti-energy laws?

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the presentation from the minister. I live in the riding of Prince Albert. We are receiving some 7,000 to 8,000 evacuees, and that could go up to 15,000 throughout the province of Saskatchewan. Lots of people are asking questions about how we are going to take care of these people and what types of resources are going to be available. The Province of Saskatchewan has mentioned that the Red Cross are going to be there, and it is going to provide them with $15 million in funding to support the evacuees. I have two questions. What would you recommend that the communities that are receiving evacuees do? Will the federal government consider something similar, as we used to do for disasters in other parts of the world, whereby if people donate to the Red Cross, it would match those donations?

Mr. Speaker, in the riding of Prince Albert, we have extended our hospitality to the member for Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River if he needs an office to work out of in Prince Albert as some of his constituents are moving south, so he has a place to work out of. I just want to make sure that the Government of Canada has people in place to help and receive these people as they go through issues of, maybe, unemployment insurance, social services and whatever other items that may come across, that they would normally get in their riding and are now going to receive in areas where they are displaced to. What have you put in place to actually accomplish that, and what other things do you think should be put in place at a local level to make sure these individuals are properly taken care of?

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank members for being here tonight for this important debate about the situation going on in Canada, in my riding and in the riding north of mine in Saskatchewan. I will be sharing my time with the member for Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman. I know he has some things to talk about with regard to the impact it is having on the people of Manitoba. When I landed in Saskatoon on Friday at the airport, it was like I landed in another world. One would swear one was in eastern Canada in a fog, but it was not fog; it was smoke. Those flying the airplane probably could not see across the runway. They were definitely on full instrumentation when they landed, no question about that. Getting off the plane as they opened the door, I could smell the smoke coming into the cabin of the plane. I have experienced forest fires in previous years, but this in the city of Saskatoon was something new, I think, to everybody there. I want to give members a sense of just how grave the situation is in Saskatchewan. Last week, I reached out to mayors and reeves to talk about what was happening in their communities. I want to talk a little about that today and give a situation update on Saskatchewan so the House is aware of what is going on there and some of the actions that are taking place. Then I want to highlight some of the amazing people who are working behind the scenes to help fight the fires and take care of evacuees as they are being displaced. They are trying to deal with their stressful situations as they are being moved because of the fires. Right now, the largest fire is just outside of Candle Lake. Candle Lake is a resort village with lots of people who live there year-round. It has a volunteer evacuation going on at this point in time. A 100-metre berm has been put in along the highway to give them a bigger area to stop the flames from coming toward the community. Basically, they are doing everything they can to protect the community from fires, and they have been getting lots of support from the provincial government and the SPSA. There are also extensive fires north and northeast of Prince Albert. Last night, we saw the evacuation of La Ronge. That was a scary event for a lot of people. They were basically told to pack up supplies for at least three days, if not more. They made the trek from La Ronge to Prince Albert, and then from Prince Albert, I understand, they are being displaced to different cities around Saskatchewan. Sucker River, Wadin Bay, English Bay and Nemeiben subdivisions were all issued evacuation orders on Monday. As of Tuesday, there are 20 active wildfires in the province, with seven considered contained. Air quality warnings are still in effect for much of the entire north. At least 20 communities have been evacuated so far in Saskatchewan and 8,000 people have been evacuated, with the premier saying today that he estimates it could be as high as 15,000 in the next three or four days. The shoe fire, currently the largest in the province, has prompted the closure of Highway 165 and evacuation alerts for several communities, including East Trout Lake, Whelan Bay, Narrow Hills and Little Bear Lake. This is a list of evacuation areas: Lower Fishing Lake, Piprell Lake, East Trout Lake, Little Bear Lake, Narrow Hills Provincial Park, Whiteswan, Whelan Bay, Brabant Lake, Hall Lake, Nemeiben Lake, Sucker Lake, Wadin Bay, English Bay, Foran Mine and McIlveena Bay, Jan Lake, Pelican Narrows, Creighton, Denare Beach, Weyakwin, the resort subdivision of Ramsey Bay, Sturgeon Landing, the northern hamlet of Timber Bay, Molanosa and the resort village of Candle Lake, which is a voluntary evacuation area. The map is of concern. These fires are in an area where there is just dry tinder. When I was home on the weekend, I was walking on my grass and it actually crunched under my feet because it is so dry. We have not had any rainfall pretty well all spring. As we look at what is coming up for the weather and the wind changes that have been happening, it just creates more concern. Really, we are in the hands of God in a lot of ways. We are praying for rain. One of the issues we need to deal with, of course, is air quality. For seniors, young people, young women, pregnant women, people who work outdoors, people involved in strenuous activities and people with chronic health conditions such as cancer, diabetes, lung and heart conditions, including asthma, and mental illness, air quality is important. Of course, the smoke is creating a scenario where people cannot go outside because the air quality is so bad. Air quality warnings have gone out right across the north, and as I said, the smoke has gone as far as Saskatoon and Regina. We hear stories of it going into northern states and other parts of Canada. If there is a good story about this, it is people coming together. I have to say that I am so proud of the constituents I have and am lucky to represent. Whether it is putting together a group of people to make sandwiches for the volunteer firefighters, RM of Buckland's firefighting crew lending their water truck to SPSA or TacoTime in Prince Albert making tacos for firefighters and evacuees, there are so many examples of people coming together to help each other out. Actually, in some ways, it is truly community building, similar to what we used to see in the early 1900s when the province was being settled. People are working hand in hand together in saving their communities and protecting each other's farms. Along the Torch River, there is an area that is really dry, and there are lots of houses along the northern fringe. People are working together to protect those houses and farms, something that has been ongoing for the last week, week and a half. They are working late into the night and starting early in the morning, and nobody is grumbling or complaining. They are doing what they have to do to save each other's houses and their homes. That is the good part. Now, with this, there are always some bad parts too, like the fact that the fires happened. It sounds like a good portion of them were man-made. Today, an individual was arrested who was actually lighting fires along one of the highways. Who could be so stupid? That is the type of thing that is really frustrating, because there are so many people negatively impacted by fires, and then there is somebody doing something as stupid as that. This has had a major impact on communities. Even in the north, as we look forward, we have lost telephone lines and power grids. The highways are closed. These things are not built or rebuilt overnight, so it is going to require a lot of work in this region to get it back to normal once the fires are put out and people return home. One thing Premier Moe has talked about, and I will talk about quickly, is the need for surge capacity and a federal water bomber fleet. There needs to be something in place so that when we have fires throughout Canada, we have the ability to react quickly and move resources where they are required. That is something the federal government should talk with the provinces about: Is this something we should be imagining in light of what has happened over the last few years? Whether it is in British Columbia, as it was last year; Quebec, where it could be next year; or Saskatchewan and Manitoba, as it is this year, it seems like there is a need for surge capacity to take the expertise and move it to the fire location to deal with the fires. We cannot just take somebody off the street and say, “Go fight forest fires.” The fire we have in Saskatchewan is so violent, for lack of a better word, that we cannot take somebody who does not know what they are doing and put them in the bush to fight that fire. We need trained professionals. A lot of those trained professionals, such as first nations people, have been doing it year after year, so we have to rely on them. We cannot just take somebody and say, “Hey, go fight fires tomorrow.” That does not work. We have to rely on the people who know the territory, how to properly fight fires and how to evacuate when they need to evacuate or retreat when they need to retreat. We have that expertise in Saskatchewan; we just do not have enough of it. Of course, we have to keep in mind too that when running water bombers and helicopters, pilots time out. Even though the hardware is sitting at an airport, the fire could still be going on but we do not have the people and personnel to operate that hardware in a 24-hour-a-day cycle. It is the same with CATs and things like them. I know that in our communities, a lot of farmers have that type of capacity and are using it. They are doing berms and firebreaks. They are being proactive, trying to make sure they are protecting each other. It is really a sad event that has happened. As I said, in some ways it has brought people together, but in other ways, the power of Mother Nature is really sobering. When I talked to the mayor of Prince Albert, one of the things we discussed was, as we receive evacuees and understand the stresses they are facing, what we can do to help. How can we help the kids who are not going to school? Can we do some sports events? The city is talking about opening up its leisure centre and maybe the Prince Albert Raiders will do ball hockey. We are looking at different ideas to keep people active and busy, and we are open to other ideas. If other communities have done things in the past that have been effective at helping evacuees deal with the stress of not being at home, we look forward to having that information and any of those ideas so that we can take care of these people as they go through this stress. I am proud of the people in my riding of Prince Albert. I am proud of what they are doing and how they are stepping up. I am proud to represent them, and I want to thank them for putting me here. It is an honour to represent them. I just wish my first speech in the House had been about something different, rather than talking about forest fires, but that is what we have here today.

Mr. Speaker, I made the same mistake twice tonight, and I have been here for 17 years. I apologize. It is going to happen, as you said. The member raised some really good points that tend to happen. We take care of individuals when they are away from home, making sure we do everything we can to make their life as comfortable as possible, but then they go home. In the situation in Saskatchewan, they could be going home to somewhere with no power and no telephone because those systems have been wiped out by the fire. We do not know what the highways are going to look like once the fires have gone through the highway system. In a lot of the places, the communities people are going back to have one way in and out, which is basically the highway, so there are a lot of things on the logistical side that need to be dealt with for sure. When we talk about mental health and items like that, some of the first nations in the northern part of the province have some really good individuals working in mental health. We just have to make sure we empower them so they are there to take care of individuals and help them progress through this tragedy.

Mr. Speaker, that is a great question. What is the role of the military when it comes to forest fires and emergencies? Our military is spread very thin, and if it is required to go somewhere else in the world and we still have this scenario going on in Canada, heaven forbid, I wonder if it can handle all that at the same time. The member also makes a good point about the ability of Canadian industry to build water bombers. We have all that technology in Canada. We just have to commit to it and say that it is something we make a priority. The government over the last few years has watched Canada burn. It has done nothing proactive to create a scenario where there are resources put in place to be there for Canadians. I would encourage the government to change that view, have a fleet in place, sit down and talk to the premiers about how this fleet will operate and be funded, and make sure Canadians are taken care of, because it is our communities and future at stake.

Mr. Speaker, it is an interesting question. I was just talking to a lady on Facebook who said it has the ability to bring these organizations together so we can go on Facebook and find them. There are solutions out there. It is about putting our heads together and finding a mechanism so they are all in one place to activate them. The member brings up a good idea, and I think it is something we should consider and pursue. Maybe it is something a committee could study to see what it looks like.

Mr. Speaker, before I begin, I would like to thank the residents of the riding of Prince Albert for re-electing me as their member of Parliament. As members of the House are aware, my home province of Saskatchewan is experiencing one of the worst starts to the wildfire season on record. More than half a million hectares have been burned, and as of Sunday afternoon, 20 communities remained under evacuation orders. Fifteen active wildfires are forcing residents from communities such as Timber Bay, Hall Lake and Pelican Narrows to flee their homes. Premier Scott Moe recently spoke about the value of developing a national investment strategy, one where critical resources, such as air tankers, can be owned by the country and shared across jurisdictions to meet the surge capacity when and where needed. It is about protecting our communities, our forests and our future. I thank the firefighters and emergency personnel, who are putting themselves at great risk to protect our communities. Please, let us all pray for rain.

Mr. Speaker, I really appreciated the member's comments and suggestions on the throne speech and working together. I have a very simple question. A lot of people in Canada are trying to figure out who this Liberal Party is. With this throne speech, it really is confusing, because there are things that were talked about during the campaign that are so different from what was talked about in the previous Liberal government. Of course, a lot things that were talked about in the campaign were actually things that we brought forward, so the question I have for the member is this: Which Conservative policy does she think is the best policy the Liberals took away from the Conservative Party?

Madam Speaker, I can see that you are upset today, and I do not blame you; Canadians are upset with this debate we are having today. The fact that we are having this debate has Canadians upset because they thought this was being taken care of. They thought this issue was being addressed by legislation. Canadians would not believe what is going on and what has been going on at our borders and how the current government has broken our border system and broken our systems altogether. I rise today to speak to this very important issue regarding forced and child labour in the supply chains and why the government must do more to rid the country of this problem. Before I begin, I will give a bit of history. On January 1, the Fighting Against Forced Labour and Child Labour in Supply Chains Act, known as the supply chains act, came into effect. It was not a great bill, but at least it was something. I was happy to see this private member's bill pass, as I voted for it along with nearly everyone in this House. That bill was the first step in Canada's long road to ridding our supply chains of forced labour and child labour. By asking the government departments and private businesses if their supply chains carry a risk of forced or child labour, we can begin to properly measure the size of the problem and take steps toward a solution. In this scenario, we are just talking about finding a benchmark. We are just trying to see how big the problem possibly could be. I will compare it to what my friend from Dufferin—Caledon, the shadow minister for labour, talked about in regard to what has been going on in the U.S. The Americans are not just identifying; they are actually taking action. We are at least identifying the issue. In the case of the supply chains act, identifying a risk of forced labour means that the government department or business determines there is some possibility that forced or child labour might have been used. However, what was learned by implementing the supply chains act is that Canada was late to the table. Numerous other jurisdictions have already implemented forced labour laws. This list includes the United Kingdom Modern Slavery Act, the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act and the Australian Modern Slavery Act. Many of our closest allies and trading partners drew the world's attention to the problem of modern slavery in supply chains and passed meaningful legislation to work toward a solution, but the current government took nearly six years to finally pass legislation and still fails to meaningfully enact it. The Canada supply chains act took numerous years to become law. It was first proposed in 2021 and only received royal assent on January 1, 2024. The government was well aware of its pending implementation. In fact, many Liberals voted for this bill, including the Prime Minister himself. With near-unanimous consent by members of the government, supported by His Majesty's loyal opposition, and three committee hearings at the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, the government members cannot plead ignorant to the issue of forced labour in supply chains. That then leads me to the matter we are debating here today: the government's failure to propose meaningful legislation that rids the supply chains of forced labour once and for all. Today's motion, that the 21st report of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade presented on Wednesday, October 30 be concurred in, is an embarrassment for the current Liberal government. What we are debating here today is for the government to acknowledge that it has been dragging its heels with respect to implementing meaningful legislation that would combat forced labour. Unfortunately, Bill S-211, while a positive step forward, is a limited step forward. It was limited in its mandate and, through the reports submitted by the Department of Public Safety, we have learned the Government of Canada and private businesses have a glaring problem. It was not as if the government was not aware of this, though. In the Liberals' budget presented in March 2023, the Liberal government indicated its intention to introduce anti-forced labour legislation by the end of 2024. The Liberals then followed up this spring with a statement and repeated themselves in the latest budget presentation in March, again indicating they wish to present anti-forced labour legislation by the end of 2024. It is now November 19 and there is no legislation in sight. This is a grave dereliction of duty as it is the government's legislation that is required to fix this problem. Ignorance of the problem here is no excuse; it is simply laziness and incompetence. The Liberal government has been aware of the problem for years. Its own ministers voted on the topic in two budgets in 2023 and 2024. It was indicated that it was a priority for the government and yet, nothing has happened. In the meantime, we have received government reports from the Department of Public Safety demonstrating the scale of the issue and the number of government departments that have identified a risk of forced or child labour in their supply chains. This is unacceptable. I would like to make clear just how significant the problem of forced labour is in our Canadian supply chains and to do this, it is important to look at the statistics on the matter. Before I jump into those, I would ask my colleagues in the House to remember what we are really discussing here today. Modern slavery is not a singular problem. These are individuals and, in many cases, children who are victims of an abusive system. The supply chains act, Bill S-211, mandates the Government of Canada to prepare an annual report highlighting the prevalence of forced and child labour in the supply chain. With responses by government departments, agencies and private businesses, the Minister of Public Safety is responsible for tabling an annual report to Parliament. This past September 30, we received the government's inaugural report, and it was not positive. In the report entitled “2024 Annual Report to Parliament on the Fighting Against Forced Labour and Child Labour in Supply Chains Act”, the Minister of Public Safety outlined the degree to which the government sourced supplies that carry the risk of forced labour. This is the report, a very damning report, excuse use my language, to the government, as the statistics will tell us. In 2024, 17.2%, of government institutions had identified that parts of their activities and supply chains had a risk of forced labour or child labour being used. Almost 20% of the government's own departments identified the possibility of child labour or slavery being used in their supply chains, the people they buy from. Some 37.9% of government institutions started the process of identifying the risks, but highlighted that there were still gaps in the assessment. That tells us that a good chunk of departments still have not even done a full assessment at this point in time, yet almost 20% of those supply chains are at risk of using forced or child labour. Some 44.8% had not started the process of identifying risks at all. That means 44% of government departments have not even gone through the process that they are mandated to do. We are getting stats of 17.2% of the supply chains for government without 44% of them even reporting. What is the actual number? It is disgusting and declaringly horrible, yet the government has done nothing to fix it. To remedy the glaring issue that 17.2% of government departments that identified risk of forced labour in their supply chains, only two government institutions indicated they had implemented actions to prevent forced or child labour and associated harms from reoccurring. In all the government departments, only two are doing something, meaning there are numerous government institutions that are aware they have forced or child labour problems and have not done anything. However, what I find even more concerning is that while responding to the questions was mandatory, again 44.8% of government institutions did not even start the process of identifying risks in their supply chain. Ignorance of the law excuses no one. “The head of every government institution must, on or before May 31 of each year, report to the Minister on the steps the government institution has taken during its previous financial year to prevent and reduce the risk that forced labour or child labour is used at any step of the production of goods produced, purchased or distributed by the government institution.” This is a direct quote from Bill S-211. That is what the Minister of Public Safety himself voted for. Why has he not enforced the laws he is mandated to enforce? To conclude, it is beyond unacceptable that the Liberal government is not giving the attention that is required to remove forced labour from our supply chains. It is beyond unacceptable that the government continues to drag its heels on meaningful legislation that would rid our supply chains of forced labour. It is beyond unacceptable that 17% of government institutions had identified parts of their activities and supply chains that carry a risk of forced labour or child labour being used. It is beyond unacceptable that only two government institutions are trying to do something about it. The fact that 44% of government institutions could just opt out of reporting is also horrible, and it is ridiculous that the minister failed to do his job. In fact, it is quite telling how little the government cares about removing forced and child labour that its own ministers and departments missed mandatory deadlines and failed to report information they are required to report. Forced and child labour in our supply chains has been identified as a leading issue by our allies. It is time we take it seriously. The impact this has on those who are exploited is unimaginable. Vulnerable people and children are victims of the government's inattentiveness and claiming that it did not know is inexcusable and, frankly, untrue. It is time the government take the issue of forced labour and child labour seriously, and remove it from the government procurement process and our store shelves. We can see there are lots of things to talk about regarding this issue and there is not enough time. I have not even talked about the implications on trade and what it means to our allies when we are laggards. The government is going around the world preaching to everybody about something while doing nothing about it here at home. This is another example of the government saying that they are going to do something but never actually accomplishing anything.

Madam Speaker, it is not just about passing legislation. It is about having the ability to enact the legislation. We have a piece of legislation that has already passed, and they are not even acting on it. It is sitting there. That is one thing that is different between Conservatives and Liberals. Liberals talk. They will talk and talk. We take action. When we say we are going to do something, we are going to do it. We stand behind our words. When it comes to forced labour, yes, we would see legislation brought in on forced labour. Not only that, we would see action to get it out of our supply chains.

Madam Speaker, those are two great questions. I will start off with the first one on Bill S-211. It is not a great piece of legislation. We agree with them on that. The reality is that it is a piece of legislation that gives us some benchmarks and some reporting tools to get a sense of how bad the problem is here in Canada. What we have seen is in the government's own departments, and 17.2% of them have child or forced labour as part of their supply chains. We would not have known that without Bill S-211. They would not have reported it or have been forced to report it. While not perfect, the legislation at least gives us some data we can move forward with and puts more accountability on the minister to see results. In regard to the temporary foreign workers program, I have many examples of businesses that are using the program that are models. It has worked for both the employees and the employer, and it has been good for everybody involved. There are always some bad actors. There are always some bad examples, and we have to put in place the appropriate rules to get rid of those bad apples so it does not happen again.

Madam Speaker, the reality is that the Liberals knew it was a problem a long time ago. They did not need Bill S-211 to bring in legislation that would have done something to reduce the problem of forced labour. They could have taken action similar to what the U.S., Australia and the U.K. have done, but they chose not to. When they brought in Bill S-211 and they started looking at the benchmarks, 44% of the government departments did not even report. Can the member tell me why that is? That is not acceptable. It is in the legislation that they have to report, yet they have not. Out of the 56% that did report, we know that 17.2% of their supply chains have forced labour in them. The Liberals know they have a problem. They have had a problem within their own government institutions and their own procurement process, and they have done nothing to fix it. Only two departments have actually taken actions to try to curb this. The rest have put their heads in the sand, and the ministers have done nothing. In reality, they have done nothing to fix this problem. They have the data in front of them. They have had it for years. Where is the legislation? It is November. I still do not see it.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a question on respect for the House and what is involved in respect for the House. The Liberal government has shown zero respect to the House. It has shown zero regard to the rules of Parliament. I would ask the member if he would maybe talk a little bit about what his constituents have been telling him in regards to the Liberal government and its lack of respect for parliamentary procedure, lack of respect for their tax dollars and lack of respect for respecting the will of Parliament in this situation. How do they want to see this solved?

Mr. Speaker, after nine years, the NDP-Liberals are not worth the cost. Just weeks after the U.S. hit Canada with a 14.5% tariff on softwood lumber, the Prime Minister dismissed his failures and their impacts on Canadian workers and our forestry sector as “small issues”. Since the PM's comments in New York City, two sawmills in B.C. have closed, putting over 500 workers out of work. Canadian producers have paid $9 billion in tariffs to the U.S. From softwood lumber to buy America, why has the Prime Minister repeatedly backed down to the U.S.?

Mr. Speaker, last night, there was a general election in my home province of Saskatchewan, and I would like to congratulate the Saskatchewan Party, led by Premier Scott Moe, on its victory. To all those who knocked on doors, volunteered to run as candidates and went to the polls and voted, their participation in our democracy is what it means to be a proud Saskatchewanian. Elections do not run themselves and democracies cannot happen without the people. I would like to congratulate Alana Ross, Eric Schmalz, Darlene Rowden, Todd Goudy, Terri Bromm and Kevin Kasun on their recent election victories. I would also like to thank Fred Bradshaw, Joe Hargrave, Nadine Wilson and Delbert Kirsch for their many years of service. I look forward to working with each and every one of my provincial counterparts, both new and old faces, to continue to serve the people of Saskatchewan.

Mr. Speaker, again, this is another example of disrespect for the Speaker. The member knows the rules. He probably has more speeches in the House than any member in Canadian history. The fact that he just did what he did shows us the contempt he has for the Speaker and Parliament. It is embarrassing. He says we are misleading people. He has been misleading people since 2015, and it shows. People are tired of it, and they are going to vote him out. They are going to have an honourable prime minister, and we are going to be happy on that day.

Mr. Speaker, after nine years of NDP-Liberals, taxes are up, costs are up, crime is up and time is up. The Speaker ruled that the NDP-Liberals violated a House order to turn over evidence to the police for a criminal investigation on their latest $400 million scandal. The NDP-Liberals' refusal to respect the ruling has paralyzed Parliament and pushed aside our work to address doubling of housing costs, food inflation and crime and chaos. The Auditor General's investigation found that the Liberals' appointees to SDTC gave nearly $400 million to their own companies, with over 186 conflicts of interest, at a time when Canadians cannot afford to eat, heat their home and house themselves. Responsible government is accountable to the people of Canada; we work for the people of Canada. This is a fundamental pillar of our parliamentary system. When will the NDP-Liberals end the cover-up and turn over the documents to the police so Parliament can get back to working for Canadians?